Homotheticity and Non-Radial Changes

Färe and Mitchell(1992) have shown that cost functions for a multi-output firmobey a particular output-scaling law if and only if the underlyingproduction technology is ray-homothetic. Multi-output firms,however, frequently change their output mix in addition to theirscale. Therefore, it is important to identify technologies thatpossess relatively tractable analytical characteristics whensubjected to non-radial changes in the output vector. This paperconsiders additive and other, more general, changes in the outputvector. One result shows that the cost function obeys an ``output-translationlaw' if and only if the input correspondence is input homothetic,thus suggesting that ``input homotheticity' is more than justan ``input-scaling' property.     

Utility representation theorems for Debreu separable preorders

We prove the existence of arbitrary (resp., semicontinuous, continuous) utility representations for arbitrary (resp., semicontinuous, continuous) preorders satisfying some weakened Debreu order separability conditions. In this way we widely generalize a classical result for total preorders that essentially is due to Debreu.     

会计稳健性根源探析

利益相关者之间的信息不对称是会计稳健性产生的根本原因。损失函数的不对称包括契约性的和非契约性的。遭受损失的契约方会向管理当局和非契约方寻求帮助以降低其损失,准则制定机构和法律制定机构会分别制定更加稳健的会计准则以及执行严格的法律法规,从而保证处于信息劣势方不发生损失或者降低损失程度。准则以及各项法律法规在一定程度上形成了外部公司治理机制,从而产生了会计稳健性。     

Productive efficiency of French grain producers: A latent variable model

In this article we propose to implement a covariance structure analysis to deal with the estimation of a stochastic frontier production function on panel data and the measurement of a time-varying technical efficiency. First, this method solves the potential problem of correlations between input quantities and individual effects. Second, individual effects and efficiency measures can be recovered as a byproduct of the analysis through the so-called factor scores. We implement this approach by fitting to a balanced panel of French grain producers, a parsimonious version of the Cornwell, Schmidt, and Sickles [1990]'s model where technical efficiencies are individual-specific linear functions of time. A specification search shows that this model is preferred to the traditional production function. Results shed light on the temporal pattern of efficiency in the French grain production sector.The authors thank Jacques Mairesse, Quang Vuong, two referees, the editor, and session participants at the Econometric Society European Meeting, Cambridge, September 1991, at the Second European Workshop on Efficiency and Productivity Analysis, Louvain-la-Neuve, October 1991, at the Conference on Current Issues in Productivity, Newark, December 1991, and at the ENSAE-EHESS seminar, Paris, March 1992, for helpful comments and suggestions.     

An Updated Literature Review of Distance Correlation and Its Applications to Time Series

The concept of distance covariance/correlation was introduced recently to characterise dependence among vectors of random variables. We review some statistical aspects of distance covariance/correlation function, and we demonstrate its applicability to time series analysis. We will see that the auto‐distance covariance/correlation function is able to identify non‐linear relationships and can be employed for testing the i.i.d. hypothesis. Comparisons with other measures of dependence are included.