De Viti de Marco,historian of economic analysis*

After briefly reconstructing the debate in Italy during the period of the marginalist revolution on the correct methodology for the history of economic thought, the article examines De Viti de Marco's position. A historical essay of his (De Viti ) on Antonio Serra (), becomes the first object of our critical enquiry. As with other studies of De Viti de Marco, from it emerges the adoption of an analytical and retrospective approach. Through comparison with the essays of the other historians of economic thought of his age, the originality of the method applied by De Viti de Marco in his historical contribution can be seen.     

生态移民:一个复杂的故事——读谢元媛《生态移民政策与地方政府实践》

本文是对《生态移民政策与地方政府实践》一书的评论,以及由此引发的一些思考。文章对这项研究将生态移民放在一个复杂的背景中进行分析给予了高度的评价,并指出,现在面对的移民不同于传统的移民,首先是国家高强度的介入移民,移民不再是一个自然的过程,而是国家规划的结果;其次,国家推动的移民不再是对自然的一个适应过程,而是一个人为的发展过程。在移民的背后所充斥的是有关发展和现代化的单向度价值判断。     

Backwater Economics: A Life Story

Abstract:

Economics is sometimes portrayed as a contest between saltwater and freshwater, between the coastal pseudo-Keynesians and the Great Lakes neo-Walrasians, between the flaws-and-friction model-builders and the free-market hard-liners. As evolutionists know, both habitats are fairly sterile. Evolution occurs in the backwaters, in the mudflats, bogs, lagoons, cypress swamps, and wetlands, in the shadows of perpetually endangered habitat. This essay sketches a personal journey through the backwaters. Intellectually they are my home, as they have been for every other recipient of the Veblen-Commons prize, with just one exception …     

Gender Pay Equity and Comparable Worth in Australia: A Reassessment

The Australian labour market is characterised by a persistent earnings differential between men and women. This article examines the contribution made by gender-based occupational segmentation to that gap using data from the 1993 Survey of Training and Education. It is estimated that occupational segmentation is responsible for between 3.9 and 4.9 percentage points of the earnings differential when measured across all employees. The comparable range after excluding managerial employees, however, is only 2.1 to 3.6 percentage points. Finally, the importance of segmentation for the gender earnings gap is found to be directly correlated with age, suggesting the intriguing possibility that the occupation-based inequity in pay will work itself out over time. That said, other explanations for this age effect also exist.     

Analyzing Gas and Electric Convergence Mergers: A Supply Curve is Worth a Thousand Words

The recent trend toward convergence mergers between gas and electric utilities raises questions regarding merger analysis. Standard concentration measures do not capture adequately the ability of the merged firm to raise rivals' costs or impede their access to natural gas supplies. Estimating electricity supply curves for various time periods gives analysts an additional tool for predicting future market outcomes.     

资源基础转变与科技代工企业升级——以台湾宏达电子为例

在短短5年间,台湾宏达电子由默默无闻的PDA代工企业成功升级为顶尖品牌智能手机制造商.宏达电子的案例为动态能力应用过程,特别是组织资源基础转变过程提供了丰富的实证经验.基于动态能力范式,采用案例研究的方法,分析了台湾宏达电子通过组织资源基础的4种转变方式:资源杠杆利用、全新资源创造、外部资源获取与原有资源释放,最终实现了由ODM向OBM的升级.     

Political economy of virtue: civil economy,happiness and public trust in the thought of Antonio Genovesi

Abstract

Amid the growing literature in English on the work of the Neapolitan political economist Antonio Genovesi (1713–1769), this paper focuses on his conception of civil economy (economia civile) as a theory of government. By contrast with existing interpretations, the argument is that for Genovesi virtue is a significant ordering device of the polity: virtue mediates between passions and reason, and the human capacity for virtue helps individuals better to realise their different talents. This, in turn, means that virtue is central to the division of labour and the right proportions between different activities, including the balance between consumption and trade.     

A Tale of Two Indices: The Story of the NASDAQ and the SENSEX

Using the daily data on SENSEX and NASDAQ from January to October of 2000, the paper attempts to find out to what extent the “news” on NASDAQ helps price formation at the beginning and at the end of a trading day at the Indian bourses. The possible impact of NASDAQ on SENSEX is analyzed through OLS equations under cointegration and error correction framework. The results indicate that the “news” on NASDAQ plays an important role in price formation at the beginning of a trading day at the Indian bourses. However, as the impact of NASDAQ fades a lot during the trading hours when the Indian market remains open and the US market remains closed, the closing figures at SENSEX could not be predicted well with this information.

     

"二奶"阿珍:一个在虚拟世界中建构主体的故事

"二奶"在当代中国社会已被认为是常见现象.然而,由于这一女性群体身份的"特殊性",在公共场所谈论"二奶"几乎成为一种禁忌,而她们作为社会主体也鲜现于公共视野.2006年底,一篇题为<我在深圳当二奶>的帖子出现在某论坛上,由此引发了关于"二奶"的网络大讨论,作者阿珍也一夜成为网络明星.本文通过观察阿珍在虚拟世界里主体构建的过程,讨论中国两性关系所面临的现实.     

Medical Expenditures and Health Status in Australia: A Story of Increasing or Decreasing Returns?

We use a three‐equation model to estimate a health production function for Australia using population data for 1996. Working at the level of the Statistical Local Area (n= 1335) we match (i) data on private practice medical services (derived from the Medicare scheme), (ii) mortality data derived from the de‐identified unit records produced by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), and (Hi) social and economic data from the Australian Census of Population and Housing (ABS 1997). We detect strong and statistically significant positive marginal effects of medical expenditure on health status as well as increasing returns. These findings are remarkably different from those of US health production studies, which have tended to lend support to the hypothesis of ‘flat‐of‐the‐curve (that is, zero marginal product) medicine’. Moreover, our conclusions are in stark contrast to those produced by Richardson and Peacock (2003, p. 6), who have argued that their econometric work indicates that ‘an increase in the [Australian] doctor supply is associated with increasing mortality’.     

An Apartment Story: To Introduce the Study of Spot,Forward, and Futures Markets,the Term Structure,and Arbitrage

An imagined apartment condominium complex is used as a device to teach how real markets work.     

The Increase in College Premium and the Decline in Low‐Skill Wages: A Signaling Story

The increase in the college premium over the last 30 years in the United States is to a large extent driven by a reduction in noncollege wages. We show that the signaling effects triggered by an improvement in the incentives to attend higher education can explain this fact, as well as the increase in the number of college graduates. Under imperfect credit markets and wealth heterogeneity, higher education is not only a signal of ability but also of individuals' (parents') wealth. General conditions on the distribution of wealth guarantee that after an increase in incentives to attend higher education, the absence of a college degree becomes a more evident signal of low ability. This results in a reduction in low‐skill wages but not necessarily in increased high skill wages. The increased incentives to enroll in college can either arise from a skill‐biased technology change or an improvement in access to higher education. An important difference is that while skill‐biased technology change always results in an increase in the college premium, that is not necessarily the case when the increased incentives to enroll arise from improved access to higher education.