Recreation Demand and Residential Location

We use the properties of competitive location equilibrium to study the demand for recreation and the choice of primary residence location. Location-specific recreation and employment lead to pooling equilibria in which consumers reside according to their preference for recreation. In general, the stronger the taste for recreation, the greater the attraction of living close to the recreation site and the lower the demand for other goods, including housing. We explore the effects of trip frequency, trip length, and recreation cost on the spatial distribution of consumers. We also consider the effect of the wage rate on recreation and location demands.     

FOCUS: Ethical Business: Thinking Thoughts and Facilitating Processes

Doing business ethics and conducting ethical business has to be much more than conducting a rational enquiry. Much also depends on the motivation of individuals and how a positive moral vision of business can unite intellectual and affective approaches to the conduct of business. The author is a lecturer in Philosophy at Warwick University, Coventry CV4 7AL, and a Research Associate at the Local Government Centre at Warwick Business School. He is also an independent organisation development consultant specialising in helping organisations develop their learning processes and value-based forms of leadership.     

Valuing Food Store Access: Policy Implications for the Food Stamp Program

Food stamp recipients may lack access to larger stores, reducing the availability of nutritious food. Reliance on smaller stores may have undesirable impacts. Policy alternatives include limiting food stamp redemption to larger stores and subsidizing store development. I estimate that limiting redemption to supermarkets and grocery stores, or supermarkets alone, results in losses ranging from $499.2 million to $1.05 billion, or $1.17 billion to $2.44 billion (respectively) annual loss in food stamp recipient welfare nationwide. The impact of improving access is also significant, ranging from $333.6 million to $931.2 million.     

Application of replacement theory in dairy cows and its use in disease treatment

A model to simulate the costs and returns of an individual dairy cow over 14 years under various assumptions of genetic potential, health status and management was developed especially to evaluate the effects of diseases that reduce production and reproduction efficiency and to evaluate alternative management interventions. Data were collected from the Food Animal Health Resource Management System (FAHRMX), Today's Electronic Planning (TELPLAN), Today's Electric Farm Accounting (TELFARM) databases and secondary sources at Michigan State University. A case study of cystic ovaries was analysed using the model. The results showed that it is more economical to treat cystic ovaries than not to treat, and treatment with Gonadotropin Releasing Hormone (GNRH) was superior to Human Chrionic Gonadotropin (HCG). Four to five lactations were the optimum for keeping a dairy cow to replacement and it was estimated that there is a loss of US$0.45 per day of extended calving interval (days open beyond the optimal 70 days).     

Applying continuous improvement to teaching in another culture

As international business programs proliferate, the mixing of many cultures in the classroom creates new teaching challenges. This paper reports on how an American accounting professor coped with cultural differences at INSEAD in France. Student evaluations for the first course taught at INSEAD revealed a variety of problems that the professor tried to resolve by applying the principles of continuous improvement in the next course he taught. Confronting the students directly with the problem, enlisting their aid in improving the course, and eliciting specific feedback all combined to substantially raise the level of student satisfaction. The principles applied in this intervention are broadly applicable to college professors, not only those working with “international” students.     

Changing Risk Premia: Evidence from a Small Open Economy

Little is known about the differences in the relation between risk and return in large economies such as the U.S. compared with smaller, less studied, markets. In this paper, Sweden serves as a representative for small open economies. The price of risk on the Swedish stock market is estimated using a conditional asset pricing model that allows for time variation in the risk. Four different GARCH-M models are used in the econometric specification. The estimates of the price of risk are invariably positive and significant, and we conclude that there exists a time-varying risk premium in the Swedish stock market. Our results show that there are small differences in the preferences towards risk of representative investors in small and large economies.