Generation Z Perceptions of a Positive Workplace Environment

Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal - The most recent generation to enter the workplace, generation Z, has been stereotyped as being less engaged in the workplace, despite being highly...     

New Evidence on Home Prices from Freddie Mac Repeat Sales

The weighted repeat sales price index methodology recently reported in Case and Shiller [5] [6] is applied to a dataset of over eight million loans bought by the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation over the last twenty years. Regional price indices are reported and compared to indices from other sources. Statistical issues in the creation of the index, both technical and due to sample selectivity of the Freddie Mac dataset, are extensively discussed. It is found that the new index grows at a rate similar to other indices up until 1985, after which time it grows at a significantly higher rate.     

The Impacts of an Antitrust Investigation: A Case Study in Agriculture

We analyze the impacts of an antitrust investigation on the purchasing practices of a buying collaboration and its common bidding agent. Using a repeated cross section of prices across procurement auctions that were and were not subjected to the investigation, we find that auction prices in the targeted auctions: (i) significantly increased as soon as the targets were made aware they were under investigation; (ii) remained higher as long as the investigation was open; and (iii) systematically declined to the same low pre-knowledge state after the closure of the investigation without prosecution. Finally, the counterfactual impact on auction prices by the removal of the common bidding agent and the demise of the buying collaboration at a later date was on par with the impacts of the investigation.     

DRAMs as model organisms for study of technological evolution

The short, well-documented market life of generations of dynamic random access memory (DRAM) computer chips makes them an excellent “model organism,” like the fruit fly, for study of evolution, in this case technological. Using classic models of logistic growth, substitution, and learning, we examine the global dynamics of eight generations of DRAMs and forecast the market characteristics of the next DRAM generations.     

Real-world cost of treatment for multiple sclerosis patients initiating and receiving infused disease-modifying therapies per recommended label in the United States

Abstract

Aims: The study evaluated the real-world cost of treatment in multiple sclerosis (MS) patients initiating infused disease-modifying-therapies (DMT) in the United States.

Materials and Methods: This retrospective cohort study using administrative claims data included adult patients with MS initiating index infusion DMT (ocrelizumab (OCR), natalizumab (NTZ) or alemtuzumab (ATZ)) from April 2017–September 2018 with 6-months pre/12-months post-index continuous enrollment. The primary cohort included patients who had prescribed annual dosing visits indicated by the approved product label (PL): 3 OCR, 5 ATZ, and 12–13 NTZ infusion visits within the first year of initiation. Annual treatment cost was the sum of all costs on index DMT infusion visit dates. Costs were summarized for a primary and secondary cohort of patients receiving additional doses than prescribed in PL (>3 OCR, >5 ATZ, and >13 NTZ infusion visits); and an overall cohort of patients who met minimum required annual dose (≥3 OCR, ≥5 ATZ, and ≥12 NTZ), further stratified by insurance type.

Results: For patients in the primary cohort (123 OCR, 18 ATZ, and 48 NTZ), mean (standard-deviation) annual cost of treatment with OCR, ATZ, and NTZ cohorts was $72,066 ($34,480), $121,053 ($51,097) and $93,777 ($38,815), respectively. Among patients initiating OCR and NTZ, 15 and 6% respectively, had additional infusion visits leading to greater costs. Mean annual costs of index infusion DMT treatment in the overall cohort (162 patients treated with OCR, 18 with ATZ, 56 with NTZ) were $80,582, $121,053, and $93,807, respectively. The mean costs for commercial enrollees were higher than those for MAPD enrollees.

Limitations: Small sample size, limited population generalizability, and cost-reduction for ATZ beyond the second year need to be accounted for.

Conclusions: Real-world infusion DMT treatment costs for commercially insured patients were higher than perceived expenditures based on wholesale acquisition cost and administration costs via a physician-fee schedule. Consideration of real-world costs in cost-effectiveness and treatment/coverage decisions is needed.     

When young soldiers drink: The impact of legal access to alcohol among U.S. Army soldiers

We study the impacts of legal access to alcohol on young U.S. Army soldiers. Regression discontinuity estimates reveal that soldiers report a large and significant increase in alcohol consumption after their 21st birthday; however, we precisely estimate that there are no meaningful impacts of legal access on any of the short-term outcomes we observe, including suicidal tendencies, depression, tobacco use, physical fitness, psychological health, fitness for combat deployment, and job-related infractions. Novel data on soldier's cognitive ability, psychological health, and family history allow us to explore whether the impacts of legal access vary by risk factors for alcohol abuse. While the increases in alcohol consumption were largest among those who had a family history of mental health problems, had better coping ability, and had higher cognitive ability, these subgroups did not uniformly experience adverse behavioral and physical outcomes upon gaining legal access to alcohol.     

Critical dialogics,agonistic pluralism,and accounting information systems

We propose heteroglossic accounting as a context wherein accounting information systems may be conceptualized so as to provide a more complete and complex basis for including competing, and possibility incompatible, information needs associated with interested and diverse constituencies. Given that information needs to vary based on such dimensions as geography, values, views, and vision, one representation is unlikely to be adequate. Incorporating pluralistic perspectives facilitates more relevant comparisons required to derived criteria of judging among the viable alternatives, especially in cases where no one perspective can be shown to be inclusive. Agonistic pluralism employed in developing alternative accounting information systems provides insights into the underlying ideologies, assumptions, values, worldviews, and power relationships that inform alternative positions, indicating those being privileged. Accounting information systems conceptualization, development, and implementation based on the principles of critical dialogics recognizes the countervailing forces operating both pulling the dialog and debate toward hegemonic consensus as well as pushing it toward antagonistic separation.