Prostate cancer: a review of common underwriting problems, Part 1

Part 1 of a two-part discussion of Prostate Cancer from an underwriting perspective, covers the epidemiology and screening for prostate cancer. Included is a "Primer on Screening Tests" that discusses problems with digital rectal exam (DRE) and prostate specific antigen (PSA) as screening tests. Approaches to enhancing the use of PSA for screening including age and race specific ranging, PSA density, PSA velocity, free PSA, and complexed PSA are discussed. Arguments for and against the use of PSA for prostate cancer are presented. The widespread use of PSA testing in the insurance setting is contrasted with cautious statements concerning general use of PSA in the clinical preventive care setting. In a future issue, Part 2 will cover staging and follow-up of treated prostate cancer.     

People's Advertising in China: A Longitudinal Content Analysis of the People's Daily Since 1949

The number of advertisements in the People's Daily newspaper has increased, as has the proportion of advertisements whose objective is to introduce new Chinese industrial products targeted towards corporate audiences. Also consistent with modernization and marketization efforts, there are more foreign advertisers and a wider variety of written and visual execution styles.     

Retail change: effects on employees' job demands and home life

Causes and effects of occupational stress have received research attention for several decades, with increasing focus during the 1990s as organizations and individual workers attempt to adapt to economic change. Stress arising from either the work or home domain can have a variety of outcomes in the workplace, and similarly can impact in many ways on relationships and activities at home. This paper reports the first phase of a research study to identify the impact on work and home life of changes in retailing, a sector of the economy which has experienced significant change over the past few years. A qualitative methodology was adopted, using group discussions to allow staff to identify the specific changes in retailing most important for themselves, and then to explore how these changes related to satisfactions and dissatisfactions at work, and their impact on general aspects of home life. The results suggest that the 'spillover' relationship between work and home stress seems to be the most useful in describing the impact of change. This suggests that additional role demands at work brought about by change have an impact on relationships and social life outside work. However, some individuals described instances of 'compensation' between work and home, and independence between the two domains. This suggests that the issue of stress in the home/work interface is complex, and that the demands in each domain may be positively or negatively related depending on characteristics of the demands themselves, or may vary according to individual characteristics of the people in the study.     

The Incremental Predictive Information Associated with Using Theoretical New Keynesian DSGE Models vs. Simple Linear Econometric Models*

In this paper we construct output gap and inflation predictions using a variety of dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) sticky price models. Predictive density accuracy tests related to the test discussed in Corradi and Swanson [Journal of Econometrics (2005a), forthcoming] as well as predictive accuracy tests due to Diebold and Mariano [Journal of Business and Economic Statistics (1995) , Vol. 13, pp. 253–263]; and West [Econometrica (1996) , Vol. 64, pp. 1067–1084] are used to compare the alternative models. A number of simple time‐series prediction models (such as autoregressive and vector autoregressive (VAR) models) are additionally used as strawman models. Given that DSGE model restrictions are routinely nested within VAR models, the addition of our strawman models allows us to indirectly assess the usefulness of imposing theoretical restrictions implied by DSGE models on unrestricted econometric models. With respect to predictive density evaluation, our results suggest that the standard sticky price model discussed in Calvo [Journal of Monetary Economics (1983), Vol. XII, pp. 383–398] is not outperformed by the same model augmented either with information or indexation, when used to predict the output gap. On the other hand, there are clear gains to using the more recent models when predicting inflation. Results based on mean square forecast error analysis are less clear‐cut, although the standard sticky price model fares best at our longest forecast horizon of 3 years, it performs relatively poorly at shorter horizons. When the strawman time‐series models are added to the picture, we find that the DSGE models still fare very well, often outperforming our forecast competitions, suggesting that theoretical macroeconomic restrictions yield useful additional information for forming macroeconomic forecasts.     

Monetary Policy Rules with Model and Data Uncertainty

In this paper we examine the prevalence of data, specification, and parameter uncertainty in the formation of simple rules that mimic monetary policymaking decisions. Our approach is to build real-time data sets and simulate a real-time policy-setting environment in which we assume that policy is captured by movements in the actual federal funds rate, and then to assess what sorts of policy rule models and what sorts of data best explain what the Federal Reserve actually did. This approach allows us not only to track the performance of alternative rules over time (hence facilitating a type of model selection among competing rules), but also to more generally assess the importance of the data revision process in the formation of macroeconomic time series models. From the perspective of real-time data, our results suggest that the use of data that are erroneous, in the sense that they were not available at the time decisions could have been made based on forecasts from the rules, can lead to the selection of quantitatively different models. From the perspective of finding a rule that best approximates what the Federal Reserve Board (Fed) has actually done (and hence from the perspective of finding a rule that best approximates what the Fed will do in the future), we find that (i) our version of “calibration” is better than naïve estimation, although both are dominated by an approach to rule formation based on the use of adaptive least-squares learning; (ii) rules based on data that are not seasonally adjusted are more reliable than those based on seasonally adjusted data; and (iii) rules based solely on preliminary data do not minimize mean square forecast error risk. In particular, early releases of data can be noisy, and for this reason it is useful to also use data that have been revised when making decisions using policy rules.     

Trade, investment and growth: nexus, analysis and prognosis

Patterns of causation between income, export, import and investment growth for 39 developing countries are examined using model selection techniques which are based on ex ante predictive ability criteria to identify the best predictive model for each country. In particular, we look at the incidence of causation and reverse causation between various economic variables which are commonly believed to lead economic growth and find that there is less reverse causation from income to these variables than previously thought. We also construct an index of global business cycle conditions and find that models of countries with high trade exposure, growth rates and investment rates tend to gain in predictive ability from the addition of this variable.     

MEASURING EFFECTS ON STOCK RETURNS OF SENTIMENT INDEXES CREATED FROM STOCK MESSAGE BOARDS

Various techniques and sources of information exist to aid investors in predicting future stock returns. However, no effective proxy for retail investors, such as stock message board users, has been established. This study provides guidelines for creating an effective proxy. The heart of such proxies is sentiment indexes, and in the past the indexes have had low predictive power. Introducing four methodological improvements for applying text classifiers and two probability measurements, we contrast eight widely applied text classifiers to stock message board data. Based on the classifier results and incorporating our new methods, the new sentiment index proves to be a significant “same‐day positive but next‐day negative” directional indicator.     

The value of reputation on eBay: A controlled experiment

We conducted the first randomized controlled field experiment of an Internet reputation mechanism. A high-reputation, established eBay dealer sold matched pairs of lots—batches of vintage postcards—under his regular identity and under new seller identities (also operated by him). As predicted, the established identity fared better. The difference in buyers’ willingness-to-pay was 8.1% of the selling price. A subsidiary experiment followed the same format, but compared sales by relatively new sellers with and without negative feedback. Surprisingly, one or two negative feedbacks for our new sellers did not affect buyers’ willingness-to-pay. JEL Classification D82 · L14 · Z13     

INTERRELATIONSHIPS AMONG DOMESTIC AND EUROCURRENCY DEPOSIT YIELDS: A FOCUS ON THE U.S. DOLLAR

The effectiveness of monetary and fiscal policy actions is partially dependent upon the degree of isolationism of the U.S. money markets. This paper extends the study of capital market integration by investigating the relationships between yields on various currency denominated deposits. The only identified impact of changes in U.S. dollar yields, at home or abroad, on other currency returns is through contemporaneous determination; no direct causality from U.S. to foreign yields is indicated. Several significant reverse causality relationships, however, are evident.     

The two faces of organizational information

Organizational information, i.e. “facts” given and taken, and inferences drawn and established by participants within an organizational situation, may be examined in terms of its import to the relationship between an organization and its environment. A “locus” for organizational information is established in which information is classified as: (a) either inner- or other-directed: (b) either internally- or externally-based; and (c) either self- or other-referencing. Examples of organizational information in each of the eight possible categories are readily identified. Much, if not most, organizational information is probably best regarded as “two-faced”, i.e. as the product of inner- and other-directed needs taken together. For this reason, the basis, or justification of any item of organizational information is often obscure. This is seen to have consequences for organizational self-learning and self-delusion, and for the maintenance of organizational credibility and organizational secrets.