Orientation to sustainability and strategic positioning of destinations: an analysis of international tourism websites

The communication that Destination Management Organizations (DMOs) address to destination stakeholders plays a central role in attracting attention and resources for sustainable destination development and disclosing the efforts made to be a sustainable territory. There has been extensive analysis on the role of official tourism websites that addresses both DMO's internal and external stakeholders. However, less exploration is available on the relationship between the contents disclosed through tourism websites and the strategic positioning of the destination. This study empirically examines that link with a focus on ‘green/sustainable/responsible' travel. Results show a positive association between the orientation to sustainability in online communication and both sustainable regulation of the tourism sector and tourism development. In contrast, there is no significant association with destination size, tourism maturity and pricing policies.     

The political economy of pricing and capacity decisions for congestible local public goods in a federal state

This paper studies the political economy of pricing and investment for excludable and congestible public goods in a federal state. Although the model applies to many local congestible public facilities (such as libraries, museums and public swimming facilities), our main motivation is the problem of providing and pricing road infrastructure in federal states. The two-region model we develop allows for spill-overs between regions, it takes into account congestion, and it captures demand heterogeneity both between and within regions. Regional decisions are taken by majority voting; federal decisions are taken by a minimum winning coalition in a legislature of regionally elected representatives. We have the following results. First, when users form the majority in at least one region, decentralized decision making performs certainly better than centralized decision making if spill-overs are not too large. Centralized decisions may yield higher welfare than decentralization only if users have a large majority and the infrastructure in a given region is intensively used by both local and outside users. Second, if non-users form a majority in both regions, centralized decision making and decentralized decision making yield the same socially undesirable outcome, with prices that are much too high. Third, the performance of decentralized supply is strongly enhanced by local self-financing rules; this prevents potential exploitation of users within regions.     

The geography of giving: The effect of corporate headquarters on local charities

Does the presence of corporate headquarters in a city affect the incomes of local charities? To address this question we combine data on the head office locations of publicly traded U.S. firms with information on the receipts of local charitable organizations. Cities like Houston, San Jose, and San Francisco gained significant numbers of corporate headquarters over the past two decades, while cities like Chicago and Los Angeles lost. Our analysis suggests that attracting or retaining the headquarters of a publicly traded firm yields approximately $3–10 million per year in contributions to local non-profits. Likewise, each $1000 increase in the market value of the firms headquartered in a city yields $0.60–1.60 to local non-profits. Most of the increase in charitable contributions is attributable to an effect on the number of highly-compensated individuals in a city, rather than through direct donations by the corporations themselves. The increased private sector donations from the presence of corporate headquarters do not seem to crowd out government grants to local charities.     

Limits to creative destruction and technologies in practice: the case of ham radio

Drawing on the structurationist notion of ‘technologies-in-practice’, this article analyses the different types of technological actions that users perform, after technological change, in order to keep a declining technology alive over time. The research question of the article is: How do technologies-in-practice based on the application of new technology hamper the creative destruction of old technology? The case study of ham radio technology and amateur radio operators is explored. The results of the investigation support the development of a technology-in-practice ‘experimentation’ and four inductive research propositions.     

Do technology externalities justify restrictions on emission permit trading?

International emission trading is an important flexibility mechanism, but its use has been often restricted on the ground that access to international carbon credits can undermine the domestic abatement effort reducing the incentive to innovate and, eventually, lowering the pace of climate policy-induced technological change. This paper examines the economics that is behind these concerns by studying how a cap to the trade of carbon offsets influences innovation, technological change, and welfare. By using a standard game of abatement and R&D, we investigate the main mechanisms that shape these relationships. We also use a numerical integrated assessment model that features environmental and technology externalities to quantify how limits to the volume, the timing, and the regional allocation of carbon offsets affect climate policy costs and the incentive to invest in innovation and low-carbon technologies.Results indicate that, for moderate caps on the amount tradable emissions permits and sufficiently high technology spillovers, global innovation and technical change would increase and that this additional innovative effort could lead to economic efficiency gains. The numerical analysis confirms that when constraints are close to 15% of domestic abatement, efficiency losses are small because they are partly compensated by more technological spillovers and lower energy prices. Under a broad range of parameters, restrictions are costly for the constrained countries, but always beneficial for unconstrained ones.     

基于MATLAB的基金最优投资计划

根据组合投资中"存款期长者优先"的投资准则。应用线性代数的知识建立了基金投资的最优化模型,给出了求解此类问题的MATLAB通用程序,利用该程序可以准确快捷地制订出基金存取计划。     

洗钱罪刑事立法之完善——以《联合国反腐败公约》为视角

《联合国反腐败公约》对洗钱犯罪作了规定,我国现行《刑法》对洗钱罪的规定与《公约》存在较大差异,从而使我国对洗钱罪及其上游犯罪的预防和打击的效果受到影响。我们有必要根据《公约》的规定完善我国关于洗钱犯罪的立法。     

第三方仓储物流企业盈利模式探讨

文中主要论述了第三方仓储物流企业三大类共四种不同类型的盈利模式,包括空间仓储服务模式、增值服务模式和基于供需管理平台的服务模式,其中基于供需管理平台的服务模式可分为作为初级阶段管理增值模式和高级阶段的供需网控模式。文中最后还提出了模式转换的建议措施。认为,前两种模式是过去和当前第三方仓储物流企业的主要盈利模式,后两种模式则代表着企业未来的发展方向。     

France in the global economy: a structural approximate dynamic factor model analysis

This study identifies the main shocks that cause fluctuations in French output and their channels of transmission. It uses a large-dimensional structural approximate dynamic factor model. There are three main findings. First, common shocks, especially demand shocks, which seem to originate from the U.S., play an important role in explaining French economic activity. While international trade, relative prices, and foreign direct investment (FDI) flows are the main channels of transmission, the stock market, consumer confidence, and interest rates also matter. Second, France’s integration with the rest of the world has increased over time. Third, there is some tentative evidence of regional components in explaining French output fluctuations; country-specific components also contribute. The predominance of exogenous factors affecting French output, the asymmetry in the transmission of shocks, and France’s participation in a currency area argue for making French goods, services, and labor markets as flexible as possible.