Interest rate interactions in the classical gold standard, 1880-1914: was there any monetary independence?

This paper examines an hypothesis of Svensson (1994) (Journal of Monetary Economics 33, 157-199) that a credible target zone can confer on a country a degree of independence in the operation of its monetary policy, even when exchange rates are fixed. We test this hypothesis for the Classical gold standard using a newly created monthly data base for the period 1880-1913. Building on the recently noted finding that the Classical gold standard represented a credible, well-behaved, target zone system we propose a number of ways of testing the Svensson’ model. Our main finding is that the Classical gold standard did indeed confer some independence in the operation of monetary policy for participating countries. This would seem to have an important bearing on the kind of institutional framework required for a modern day target zone to function effectively and, in particular, to weather speculative attacks.     

Electoral and Partisan Cycles in Fiscal Policy: An Examination of Canadian Provinces

This paper examines the fiscal policy choices of Canadian provincial governments in the context of partisan and opportunistic cycles. We identify an electoral cycle in which the predilection of provincial governments of all political stripes to increase taxes is temporarily halted in election years. Opportunistic responses in spending are also present. Spending in highly visible areas (schools, roads and hockey rinks) tends to increase in election years. Partisan responses are largely absent from revenues but appear more frequently in program spending choices. Thus, Canadian political parties tend to favour differentiating amongst themselves via their spending, as opposed to their revenue, choices.     

A Comparison of Federal Government Office Rents with Market Rents

This study examines Federal Government office leases using data from Texas and Oklahoma during the 1981–1991 time period. The lease indifference model presented here indicates that landlords may be willing to accept lower rents from government tenants due to reduced tenant risk, but that such discounts may be offset by other premiums implicit in the lease contract. The data collected for this study reveal that rents paid by the government are significantly higher than average market rents during this time period. A time-series, cross-sectional regression analysis of the spread between market rents and office rents to government tenants in nine metropolitan markets suggests that the difference is affected in part by expense pass-throughs, lease period, amount of space leased, and local market conditions.     

Investor Sophistication and Voluntary Disclosures

This paper studies voluntary disclosures in a model in which investors probabilistically become informed about whether a firm has received information. The firm's value is established via a first price, sealed bid, common value auction. The paper demonstrates that the threshold level determining whether the firm withholds or discloses information uniformly declines in the probability investors are informed. The paper also shows that, notwithstanding the risk-neutrality of investors, the expected selling price of the firm strictly decreases (increases) in the probability individual investors are informed when that probability is small (large). These results follow from winner's curse effects.     

An analysis of “exactly distributed” test statistics for multivariate event tests

In this paper we derive a rule that identifies when exact tests may be used in the context of the multivariate regression model. Our derivation extends distribution theory reported in Rao (1973) and leads to the specification of exact tests for several event study hypothesis forms of interest to accounting and finance researchers. For tests where the event parameter is constrained to be equal across firms, we show that an infinite set of exact tests is available, of which the well known portfoliot-test is a special case. We conduct simulations using data from the CRSP Daily Returns file, and find that several test statistics, including exactly distributed statistics derived using the multivariate regression model, significantly over-reject the hypotheses examined.     

Brain wave analysis. An electroencephalographic technique used for evaluating the communications-effect of advertising

The results from the authors's applied research studies of communications-effect and electroencephalographic (EEG) recording, which took place over the last ten years, employing thousands of respondents, are integrated in this paper. Application of EEG methodology to ad research, rather than theory, is stressed. Brain Wave Analysis

1 Brain Wave Analysis is a service mark of NeuroCommunication Research Laboratories, Inc., for its brand of EEG service.

, an EEG technique, is described. A positive relationship determined between Brain Wave Analysis and sales is discussed, as well as various applications such as “brain typing” the target market. The application of Brain Wave Analysis in determining effective advertising frequency is discussed as it relates to Krugman's three exposure theory. The continuing development of EEG analysis is briefly discussed.