金融消费者保护(AEA2011年会哈佛论文,上)

近期的金融危机使得很多人开始质疑企业在提供服务方面的表现,而对于消费者金融市场中存在的问题,监管机构的处理能力也同样受到质疑.本文论述了消费者金融监管问题,重点对市场失灵的监管、金融决策中有限消费理性的监管进行全方位深入地探讨.本文引用了三个案例:按揭市场、发薪日贷款以及退休消费融资,通过案例分析来说明监管的必要性及有限性.我们认为,只有当监管是针对具体问题所设定,并以监管干预的有效性评估研究为辅助,那么此项监管才会是有益的.     

金融消费者保护(AEA2011年会哈佛论文,下)

近期的金融危机使得很多人开始质疑企业在提供服务方面的表现,而对于消费者金融市场中存在的问题,监管机构的处理能力也同样受到质疑.本文论述了消费者金融监管问题,重点对市场失灵的监管、金融决策中有限消费理性的监管进行全方位深入地探讨.本文引用了三个案例:按揭市场、发薪日贷款以及退休消费融资,通过案例分析来说明监管的必要性及有限性.我们认为,只有当监管是针对具体问题所设定,并以监管干预的有效性评估研究为辅助,那么此项监管才会是有益的.     

An Improved Reverse Auction for Addressing Water Quality in Agricultural Watersheds Using Coupled Simulation-Optimization Models

As nutrients and sediment in agricultural watersheds continue to degrade water quality, attention is increasingly given to reverse auctions to cost-effectively address these pollutants. Typically, reverse auctions include a selection process which depends on both the monetary bid and a ranking of the environmental benefit, where the latter is often approximated using simple models, such as the Universal Soil Loss Equation （USLE）. When the environmental objective is to improve water quality, the cost-effectiveness of such ranking methods cannot always be assured since simple models may poorly approximate the effects on downstream water quality. In this paper, we introduce an alternative reverse auction approach that takes advantage of richer watershed process models and optimization tools that are now much more commonly available. This ＂improved＂ reverse auction allows decision-makers to better consider the cost-effective assignment of conservation practices and to address water quality or other environmental objectives. In a spatially detailed simulation, we demonstrate how this approach can improve the design of a reverse auction for the Raccoon River Watershed in Iowa, and estimate the potential gains from using the simulation-optimization approach relative to simpler ranking methods for selecting bids. We also point out that simple bid ranking schemes may not yield sufficient nutrient reductions to achieve water quality goals but bids areeasily selected to achieve any feasible water quality improvement in the ＂improved＂ auction process.     

‘Joined-Up’ Policy-Making: Group Decision and Negotiation Practice

Creating public value is problematic in a world of austerity. Joint private and public, and public-public, projects are now an established way of creating public value. Establishing joint goals within a context of different ‘own goals’ is important and difficult. A particular issue facing many organisations in seeking to negotiate joint goals in a collaborative project is that of getting all the key managers from both organisations together over enough of a sequence of meetings for agreements to be meaningful and owned by those who will deliver the project. The development of such goals can be significantly enhanced by (1) using a Group Decision Support System (GDSS) and (2) using a powerful conceptualisation of a goals framework comprising: a goals system; ‘core goals’; ‘meta-goals’; ‘negative’ goals; and ‘above and beyond’ goals. In the case of negotiating joint goals the use of a GDSS has increased productivity to such an extent that powerful negotiated agreements can be achieved with all key managers in the room in as little as one meeting. The combination of high productivity, anonymity, and the structuring of the data has also facilitated the uncovering of ‘negative goals’, and the development of ‘meta-goals’ and ‘above and beyond’ goals. This paper uses three real cases to illustrate the significance of a Group Support System’s contribution and to illustrate the different types of goals. In doing so the paper suggests that facilitating such outcomes requires a carefully designed strategic conversation necessarily supported by a GDSS to enable group decision and negotiation in practice. Two of the cases are from public-public collaboration in the health field, and the other from a private-public setting.     

Responding to a Monetary Superpower: Investigating the Behavioral Spillovers of U.S. Monetary Policy

Between 2002 and 2006, the Federal Reserve set interest rates significantly below the rates suggested by well-known monetary policy rules. There is a growing body of research suggesting that this helped fuel an excess of liquidity in the U.S. that contributed to the 2008 worldwide financial crash. It is less well known that a number of other central banks also lowered interest rates during this period. An important question, then, is what role the Federal Reserve played in influencing other central banks to alter their own monetary policies, which could have magnified the Fed’s actions in creating global liquidity. This paper addresses the issue by showing how spillovers in central bank behavior occur in theoretical rational expectations models. It then establishes empirically how U.S. monetary policy actions affect the actions of other major central banks, particularly in terms of interest rates and currency interventions. The models and data suggest that the U.S. lowering its policy rate, either in general or in reference to a monetary policy rule, influences other central banks to lower their own policy rates and intervene in currency markets, even when controlling for worldwide macroeconomic trends. It thus appears that U.S. actions were a factor in the worldwide lowering of interest rates and the increase in currency reserves in the early 2000s that may have contributed to the subsequent global liquidity boom.     

On the Weighted Average Cost of Capital with Personal Taxes

This paper considers the impact of personal taxation on the Miles and Ezzell (1980) result that the weighted average cost of capital is the appropriate rate for discounting after corporation tax cash flows in an MM (Modigliani and Miller, 1958, 1963) perfect capital market with corporation tax. An analogous result, incorporating a capital gains tax adjustment, is derived for the personal tax case, and its application to the UK tax system is considered.     

Explaining participation in the self-service economy

To explain participation in the self-service economy, competing theorisations have variously depicted participants as rational economic actors, dupes, seekers of self-identity, or simply doing so out of economic necessity or choice. To evaluate motives for self-servicing in the home improvement and maintenance sector, a survey of 120 households in an English locality is reported. This will reveal that all theorisations are valid to differing degrees, and through a process of induction, will offer a typology that combines the existing theorisations by differentiating between ‘willing’ (rational economic actors, choice, identity seeking) and ‘reluctant’ (economic and market necessity, dupes) participants in self-servicing. The outcome is a call to evaluate the broader applicability of this typology when explaining the wider self-service economy.     

Determining overall risk

The risk journal literature lacks a clear and simple account of the conceptual issues involved in determining the overall risk of an action, and in explaining how risk is additive. This article attempts to bring a measure of clarity to these issues in as basic and non‐technical a way as possible. First of all, the view that risk is ‘expected harm’ is explained. The view that risk is a quantitative concept is then defended. The distinction between the risk run by doing action A in respect of possible outcome x, and the overall risk run by doing action A in general is explained, as is the position that the overall risk of A is determined by summing the risks of each possible harm that A could give rise to. The article then explains how risks can be summed over time, as long as the probabilities involved are determined according to probability theory. Finally, the article explains that in a doing a risk‐benefit analysis of A, positive aspects of a possible outcome x, where x is harmful on balance, must be incorporated into x's level of harm rather than incorporated into the benefit side of the risk‐benefit analysis of A.     

The Annuity Puzzle and an Outline of Its Solution

In his seminal 1965 paper, Yaari showed that, assuming actuarially fair annuity prices, uncertain lifetimes, and no bequest motives, utility-maximizing retirees should annuitize all of their wealth on retirement. Nevertheless, the markets for individual immediate life annuities in the United States, the United Kingdom, and several other developed countries have been small relative to other financial investment outlets competing for retirement savings. Researchers have found this situation puzzling, hence the so-called “annuity puzzle.” There are many possible explanations for the annuity puzzle, including “rational” explanations such as adverse selection, bequest motives, and incomplete markets; and “behaviorial” explanations, such as mental accounting, cumulative prospect theory, and mortality salience. We review the literature on the various plausible explanations given for the existence of the annuity puzzle, suggest ways of stimulating the demand for annuities, and suggest a few of the ingredients needed for further development of hybrid annuity products that may provide a solution to the puzzle.     

Information dynamics, dividend displacement, conservatism, and earnings measurement: a development of the Ohlson (1995) valuation framework

This paper extends the Ohlson (Contemp Account Res 11, 661–687, 1995) equity valuation framework by demonstrating that dividend displacement continues to hold when dividends have a positive forecast coefficient in the linear abnormal earnings dynamic. The analysis demonstrates that such a predictive role for dividends implies a positive association between cum div book value of equity and the present value of expected abnormal earnings, consistent with both dividend displacement and accounting conservatism. While a signaling role for dividends is ruled out, a link between dividends, expected performance, and equity value is, however, demonstrated. The paper also considers a linear information model where an undefined variable replaces realized abnormal comprehensive earnings as an indicator of future performance. The role of this variable as a predictor of future abnormal comprehensive earnings is highlighted and the special case where it corresponds to recurring abnormal earnings is considered. This latter case provides useful implications for implementation of asset revaluations.