Jungle studies: the state of anthropology

The anthropological project, tired and exhausted after years searching for ‘methodological absolution’, remains mired in a spiral of self-doubt and self-indulgent ‘crisis’. Anthropological teaching continues the very complicities that a self-critical reflexivity professed to avoid. Co-option and incorporation, even at the best of times. This essay asks just what would break the cycle of ‘suicidal rejoicing’ for an ‘end of anthropology’ that never comes, that continues to be taught anew, over and over? Nietzsche once suggested that what is falling down should be pushed. A reconfigured anthropology would be a different discipline, perhaps reinvesting the tasks of knowledge production with a purpose that was not wholly slave to the same interests of power. There is much to be cleared away.     

Overzicht van buitenlandse tijdschriften

Jaartal en blz. achter de namen der tijdschriften hebben betrekking op de plaats, waar deze laatstelijk in De Economist werden behandeld.     

PHYSICIANS' COST SHIFTING BEHAVIOR: MEDICAID VERSUS OTHER PATIENTS

Much of the debate about rising health care costs in the United States centers on the notion of "cost shifting." Cost shifting is loosely defined as charging one set of patients a higher price to offset losses on another set of patients. One aspect of the cost shifting debate that the empirical work has ignored is whether or not doctors—as opposed to hospitals—practice cost shifting. The analysis here investigates this question using the Physicians' Practice Costs and Income Survey, 1983–1985 (PPCIS, expanded version)
Using variation across states in Medicaid reimbursements, the analysis finds that lower Medicaid reimbursements tend to lower the fees physicians charge, contradicting the standard cost shifting story. Evidence also suggests that lower Medicaid reimbursements tend to cause physicians to treat fewer Medicaid patients. These results are consistent with profit maximizing behavior for physicians and also with the hypothesis that physicians exert some monopoly power.     

Testing for a Structural Change in U.S. Wage Determination

Previous tests for structural changes (slope changes) and shifts (intercept changes) in the Phillips curve and union wage determination specify the date of structural change a priori. This article tests for structural changes and shifts without specifying the change point ex ante . The results support the belief that structural changes occurred in the early 1980s. Contrary to some previous research, however, the results do not support a structural shift in the Phillips curve.     

GOLF TOURNAMENTS AND CEO PAY—UNRAVELING THE MYSTERIES OF EXECUTIVE COMPENSATION

Leading financial economists and activist institutional investors have long argued that the proper alignment of manager and shareholder interests requires the use of performance based compensation. Partly in response to these pressures, and in combination with a change in the tax code that encourages performance-based pay, corporate boards have dramatically increased their use of stock grants and executive stock options. Combine this development with the longest bull market in U.S. financial history, and the result is unprecedented levels of CEO pay at the close of the 20th century. This review of executive compensation reveals that the economic theory of tournaments may provide a rationale for the pattern, if not the level, of executive pay. Specifically it finds that the total compensation of the five highestpaid executives in a cross-section of new and old-economy firms is very similar to the pattern of payouts to players in a golf tournament. The author also reports that recent studies show a significant increase in the pay-for-performance correlation throughout the 1990s. But whether that correlation is as high as it should be, and whether current levels of CEO pay are socially "optimal," are questions that remain unanswered.     

Allocations and Common Costs in Long-Run Investing and Pricing Decisions: An Historical Analysis

The extent to which allocated common costs should influence business decisions remains controversial in management accounting. In the finance and investment literature this issue is generally ignored or dismissed by appeals to the'incremental' principle. This article presents an historical analysis of allocations in long-run investing and pricing decisions. It is demonstrated that seminal figures in the development of both investment and price theory were conscious of the need for firms to cover common costs and generally favoured some form of allocation. The anti-allocationist position is shown to be of relatively recent origin and to have caused an inconsistency in the management accounting literature in the treatment of common costs. European costing theory is shown to have been consistently allocationist. Evidence of a return in the recent U.S. literature to the older Anglo-American, and continuing European, allocations tradition is presented.     

Extensification of agriculture and deforestation: empirical evidence from Sudan

Extensification of agriculture is one of the major factors contributing to the destruction of forests in Africa. In Sudan, such horizontal expansion comes at the expense of land devoted to trees and other vegetation, thereby inducing conditions that are inimical to sustainable agricultural production. Different factors have contributed to extensification. Although high economic returns from crop (mainly sorghum) production was an important factor encouraging extensification of rainfed mechanized farming, other factors outside agriculture have also contributed to that expansion. This paper uses data from eastern Sudan and an acreage response model, to identify the most important factors influencing acreage expansion. Different measures and forms of risk were used in the acreage response model. The paper shows how policies in the energy sector can indirectly influence acreage expansion in the agricultural sector.