Forecasting Housing Approvals in Australia: Do Forecasters Herd?

Price trends in housing markets may reflect herding of market participants. A natural question is whether such herding, to the extent that it occurred, reflects herding in forecasts of professional forecasters. Using more than 6,000 forecasts of housing approvals for Australia, we did not find evidence of forecaster herding. On the contrary, forecasters anti‐herd and, thereby, tend to intentionally scatter their forecasts around the consensus forecast. The extent of anti‐herding seems to vary over time. We also found that more pronounced anti‐herding leads to less accurate forecasts.     

The role of leadership in salespeople’s price negotiation behavior

Salespeople assume a key role in defending firms’ price levels in price negotiations with customers. The degree to which salespeople defend prices should critically depend upon their leaders’ influence. However, the influence of leadership on salespeople’s price defense behavior is barely understood, conceptually or empirically. Therefore, building on social learning theory, the authors propose that salespeople might adopt their leaders’ price defense behavior given a transformational leadership style. Furthermore, drawing on the contingency leadership perspective, the authors argue that this adoption fundamentally depends on three variables deduced from the motivation–ability–opportunity (MAO) framework, that is, salespeople’s learning motivation, negotiation efficacy, and perceived customer lenience. Results of a multi-level model using data from 92 salespeople and 264 salesperson–customer interactions confirm these predictions. The first to explore contingencies of salespeople’s adoption of their transformational leaders’ price negotiation behaviors, this study extends marketing theory and provides actionable guidance to practitioners.     

Understanding the adoption of new brands through salespeople: a multilevel framework

So far there has been scant empirical attention paid to the role of the sales force in the adoption of new brands in the early implementation stages. We test a framework of internal (sales manager and salespeople) brand adoption using an empirical multilevel study. Our findings suggest that the construct of expected customer demand (ECD) plays an important role in sales force brand adoption. First, ECD directly influences salespeople’s and sales managers’ brand adoption. Second, ECD serves as a cross-level moderator of new brand adoption transmission. We find the influence of sales managers’ brand adoption on salespeople’s brand adoption to be stronger when salespeople’s ECD is lower.     

Schumpeter and the revival of evolutionary economics: an appraisal of the literature

During the last two decades we have seen a revival of interest in the works of Joseph Schumpeter and “evolutionary” ideas in economics more generally. A professional society honouring Schumpeter's name has been founded, and linked to it we have had for more than fifteen years now a professional journal devoted to this stream of thought. However, it has been argued that, despite these developments, the link between Schumpeter's own work and the more recent contributions to evolutionary economics is in fact rather weak. This paper considers this claim. Based on an analysis of Schumpeter's contribution to economics the paper presents an overview and assessment of the more recent literature in this area. It is argued that although there are important differences between Schumpeter's work and some of the more recent contributions, there nevertheless remains a strong common core that clearly distinguishes the evolutionary stream from other approaches (such as, for instance, so-called “new growth theory”). RID="*" ID="*" Many people have contributed to this paper in various ways. Jon Hekland at the Norwegian Research Council started it all by asking me to make an overview of the contribution from “evolutionary economics” to our understanding of contemporary economies. Several people helped me on the way by supplying written material, comments and suggestions, and I am indebted to all of them. Brian Arthur, Stan Metcalfe, Keith Pavitt, Erik Reinert, Paolo Saviotti and Bart Verspagen may be particularly mentioned. A preliminary version was presented at the conference “Industrial R&D and Innovation Policy Learning – Evolutionary Perspectives and New Methods for Impact Assessment” organised by the Norwegian Research Council (“SAKI”) at Leangkollen, Asker, April 18–19.2002. I wish to thank the discussant, Tor Jakob Klette, and the participants at the conference for useful feedback. Moreover I have benefited from comments and suggestions from the editors and referees of this journal. The final responsibility is mine, however. Economic support from the Norwegian Research Council (“SAKI”) is gratefully acknowledged.     

Estimating healthcare resource use associated with the treatment of metastatic melanoma in eight countries

Objectives Studies reporting healthcare resourse use (HRU) for melanoma, one of the most costly cancers to treat, are limited. Using consistent, robust methodology, this study estimated HRU associated with the treatment of metastatic melanoma in eight countries.

Methods Using published literature and clinician input, treatment phases were identified: active systemic treatment (pre-progression); disease progression; best supportive care (BSC)/palliative care; and terminal care. HRU elements were identified for each phase and estimates of the magnitude and frequency of use in clinical practice were obtained through country-specific Delphi panels, comprising healthcare professionals with experience in oncology (n?=?8).

Results Medical oncologists are the key care providers for patients with metastatic melanoma, although in Germany dermato-oncologists also lead care. During the active systemic treatment phase, each patient was estimated to require 0.83–2 consultations with a medical oncologist/month across countries; the median number of such assessments in 3 months was highest in Canada (range?=?3.5–5) and lowest in France, the Netherlands and Spain (1). Resource use during the disease progression phase was intensive and similar across countries: all patients were estimated to consult with medical oncologists and 10–40% with a radiation oncologist; up to 40% were estimated to require a brain MRI scan. During the BSC/palliative care phase, all patients were estimated to consult with medical oncologists, and most to consult with a primary care physician (40–100%).

Limitations Panelists were from centers of excellence, thus results may not reflect care within smaller hospitals; data obtained from experts may be less variable than data from broader clinical practice. Treatments for metastatic melanoma are continually emerging, thus some elements of our work could be superseded.

Conclusions HRU estimates were substantial and varied across countries for some resources. These data could be used with country-specific costs to elucidate costs for the management of metastatic melanoma.     

Multidimensionales Verfahren zur Bestimmung des Regelleistungsbedarfes unter Berücksichtigung von Unsicherheiten

One of the most crucial constraints in operation of electrical power supply systems is the permanent balance between generation and load. Reserve power is held ready to be able to keep this balance also in case of the occurrence of unpredictable events like power plant outages or inevitable deviations of power injections from their predicted values. At this, the allocation of operating reserves is in the field of conflict between level of reliability and cost effectiveness. The amount of reserve generation capacity required in a control area heavily depends on prediction quality which constitutes the need for high quality predictions. This article is about the influence of prediction quality on the amount of reserve generation capacity required in a control area. The algorithms for the assessment of required reserve generation capacity known from literature use the variation calculus technique to account for the aforementioned unpredictable events and prediction errors. In this article, an extension to a convolution-based method is presented in which the uncertainties of the predictions are expressed using intervals. Each parameter is represented by an independent dimension, assuming statistical independence among them. This allows the distinct analysis of each parameter’s influence on the amount of required reserve generation capacity. In addition, two methods for the visualization of the multi-dimensional results are presented, allowing a comprehensive analysis of the parameters’ influences. Standard distribution functions are used to represent the parameters for the simulation and the results are shown as probability density functions of possible imbalances. Based on forecasts of the development of conventional power plants and regenerative generation in the years 2020, 2030 and 2040, the required control power of the future German transmission system is calculated. Influences and dependencies are identified with the extended convolution-based method.     

Global dynamics,capabilities and the crisis

The financial crisis started in 2007–8, initially in the US, but its consequences have been felt throughout the global economy. However, its effects were far from uniform. While parts of Asia and Africa continued to grow fast, Europe experienced a large set back. This paper emphasizes three important factors: differences across countries in technological development; differences in capacities to exploit the opportunities offered by technology; and differences in the ability to compete in international market. A formal model, based on this approach, is developed and applied to data for 100 countries in the period 1997–2012. Empirical indicators reflecting the various factors are developed, a dataset constructed and econometric estimates of the model performed. The results are used to explore the factors behind the slowdown in economic growth, with a particular emphasis on the continuing stagnation in Europe. A major factor turns out to be the increased financialization of the economy. The negative effect of the growth of finance prior to the crisis is especially pronounced for the countries that suffered most during the crisis.     

R-estimation of the parameters of a multiple regression model with measurement errors

We consider the theory of R-estimation of the regression parameters of a multiple regression models with measurement errors. Using the standard linear rank statistics, R-estimators are defined and their asymptotic properties are studied as robust alternatives to the least squares estimator. This paper fills the gap of the rank theory for the estimation of regression parameters with measurement error models. Some simulation results are presented to show the effectiveness of the R-estimators.