LINK BETWEEN DOMESTIC R&D AND INFLOW OF FDI: A GAME-THEORETIC ANALYSIS

Abstract.  The empirical literature has generated mixed correlations between research and development (R&D) undertaken by domestic firms and the inflow of foreign direct investment (FDI) by their multinational rivals. Further, the existing theoretical explanations of such empirical results appear to be inadequate. This study presents an alternative game-theoretic explanation for the observed correlations. The results show that the seemingly contradictory observed mixed correlations can be explained in an encompassing model in terms of the multinationals' competitive and interactive assessment of the efficiency and expenditure consequences that domestic R&D could generate for the undertaking domestic competitors.     

Aid-for-trade facilitation

‘Aid for Trade’ is an ongoing and high-profile discussion associated with the Doha negotiations of the World Trade Organization. It also relates to questions of how best to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Questions remain, however, about whether foreign aid spent on trade facilitation increases trade flows of developing countries. Does it work differently from aid in general? Using detailed data on aid flows from the OECD, the analysis here estimates the relationship between specific types of aid and trade flows, both globally and of the aid recipients. The findings indicate that aid spent on promoting trade is positively associated with global trade. For most types of such aid-for-trade facilitation, it is relatively more strongly associated with recipient exports than their imports. In contrast ‘other’ types of aid are more strongly associated with recipient imports. Based on elasticities estimated over 16 years of trade and aid data for 40 donor countries and about 170 country trading pairs, our results suggest that a 1% increase in aid-for-trade facilitation (of about US220 million in 2008) correlates to about US 220 million in 2008) correlates to about US 290 million of additional exports from the aid receiving countries.     

INNOVATION AND COMPETITION IN GENERATION AND RETAIL POWER MARKETS

There has been considerable merger activity in EU energy markets in recent years. It could be argued that competition authorities should be required to take into account potential innovation effects of mergers. In the UK, regulators are now trying to achieve multiple objectives within the current framework. There is a danger that if markets are expected to deliver mutually incompatible objectives they will be unable to achieve any of them.     

Insights from images posted on social media: Examining the motivations of volunteer tourists

Extensive research has been conducted on the motivations of volunteer tourists; however, the scope has not included how motivation is expressed through the posting of images on social media. This study examines the relationship between volunteer tourists’ motivations and social media use through the identification of picture publishing behavior based on motivations. An online survey yielding 260 complete responses is used and statistical tests investigate the relationship between demographic factors, motivations and social sharing of photos. The results show that demographics have little impact; however, there is a relationship between motivation and photo sharing and between motivation and volume of photos.     

Mathematical College Majors and the Gender Gap in Wages

College graduates with mathematical college majors earn more than other college graduates. Women are less likely than men to pursue mathematical college majors. This does not, however, explain the entire gender wage differential. In a representative cross section of recent college graduates, women earn 9 percent less than men with equally mathematical college majors. The gender wage disadvantage faced by women with technical college majors is no larger than that faced by women with nontechnical college majors.     

The wandering weekday effect in major stock markets

This paper reports a wandering weekday effect: the pattern of day seasonality in stock market returns is not fixed, as assumed in the Monday or weekend effects, but changes over time. Analysing daily closing prices in eleven major stock markets during 1993–2007, our results show that the wandering weekday is not conditional on average returns in the previous week (the “twist” in the Monday effect). Nor does it diminish through the period of analysis. The results have important implications for market efficiency, and help to reconcile mixed findings in previous studies, including the reported disappearance of the weekday effect in recent years.     

Positioning codes of ethics on international corporations' websites: A six-year longitudinal study

This research examines the level of international website disclosures of corporate codes of ethics during the period of July 2002 and July 2003, which surrounds the enactment of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOX) in United States. We also gathered similar data from these corporations' websites in April of 2006 through April of 2008 (i.e., three through five years after the effective date of SOX). In April of 2006 (2007 and 2008), 30 (34 and 36) of the 43 corporations listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) had readily available codes. While not required to have their codes on their corporate websites, 14 (18 and 23) of the 49 corporations that were not listed on the NYSE also had readily available codes. Our research also indicates that corporations headquartered in Europe were more likely to have readily available codes of ethics than corporations headquartered in the Pacific region in 2006 and 2007 but not in 2008.     

Adoption and Diffusion of Natural-Resource-Conserving Agricultural Technology

A national sample of U.S. farms is used to estimate the long-term trends in adoption and diffusion of conservation tillage, IPM, and soil fertilizer testing, technologies designed to reduce environmental externalities from agriculture. Results from a duration model show that diffusion of these technologies has been relatively slow, with long lags in adoption due to differences in land quality, farm size, farmer education, and regional factors.     

A general model of customer-class pricing

A theory of utility customer-class pricing is developed, and a firm's pricing incentives under various objectives are derived. Rate of return regulation is shown to motivate non-optimal prices in an output counterpart to the Averch-Johnson effect.     

夏威夷农产品礼物篮的消费者偏好分析——对于广州购买者的问卷研究

文章使用广州的调研数据,采用联合分析方法研究了消费者对于高价值、夏威夷生产的食品礼物篮的偏好.我们计算了相对重要性指标衡量消费者对礼物篮属性的评价.研究得到了三点结论:(1)食品和容器应为"夏威夷制造",从而使得消费者愿意支付高的价格;(2)企业消费者一般不愿意为礼物篮支付高的价格;(3)个人消费者愿意支付高价格的奎阿相思木礼物篮.这说明一个新兴的高消费阶层在中国出现.