"装门面"不一定是坏事

仔细观察身边的列车站台、公共汽车站,你会发现很多人尽管已经失业,还装出一副去上班的模样:西装革履的华尔街精英们,拎着塞满各种文件的公文包;戴着珍珠首饰的女白领,摆弄着黑莓手机;还有穿着工地靴、腰别工具袋的建筑工人……     

The effectiveness of contractual and trust‐based governance in strategic alliances under behavioral and environmental uncertainty

Research summary: We examine the interplay of behavioral and environmental uncertainty in shaping the effectiveness of two key governance mechanisms used by strategic alliances: contractual and trust‐based governance. We develop and test hypotheses, using a meta‐analytic dataset encompassing over 15,000 strategic alliances across 82 independent samples. We find that contractual governance works best under low to moderate levels of behavioral uncertainty and moderate to high levels of environmental uncertainty, while it is detrimental to alliance performance when both types of uncertainty are low or high. Trust‐based governance is most effective at high levels of behavioral uncertainty and low levels of environmental uncertainty. It suffers a large loss of usefulness at high behavioral uncertainty as environmental uncertainty increases. Managerial summary: Strategic alliances allow firms to gain greater efficiency and create value. Yet, many such alliances fail because they are not able to deal with the twin challenges posed by behavioral and environmental uncertainty. Findings from our meta‐analysis imply that under conditions of high behavioral uncertainty and low‐to‐moderate levels of environmental uncertainty, the use of trust‐based governance alongside contractual governance might enhance the latter's effectiveness. The combined effectiveness of contractual and trust‐based governance under high levels of both behavioral and environmental uncertainty is not obvious. When both behavioral and environmental uncertainty are high, contractual governance hurts alliance performance while trust‐based governance does not function at its best either. Under these conditions, it might be better for firms to turn to hierarchy or vertical integration. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Family Members' Projections of Each Other's Preference and Influence: A Two-Stage Conjoint Approach

Two important sources of error that may limit the accuracy of individual family members' projections of joint family preferences are: (i) misperceptions of other members' preferences, and (ii) misperceptions of other members' influence in joint family evaluations. We propose a two-stage conjoint approach to study these potential errors. Stage one compares family members' projections of each other's preferences to members' self-reported preferences. Stage two compares family members' projections of each other's influence to observed influence in joint family preferences. An empirical illustration shows that family members are relatively poor predictors of preference, but fairly accurate predictors of influence, in the area of family holiday preferences.     

What happens to social spending in IMF-supported programmes?

This article finds that education and health spending has risen during International Monetary Fund (IMF)-supported programmes at a faster pace than in developing countries as a whole. The analysis is based on the most comprehensive dataset assembled thus far for this purpose, with data covering 1985 to 2009 for 140 countries. Controlling for other determinants of education and health spending, including macroeconomic conditions, the results confirm that IMF-supported programmes have a positive and significant effect on social spending in low-income countries. Over a 5-year period with IMF-supported programmes, spending for education increases by about ¾ percentage point of Gross Domestic Product (GDP); and for health, by about 1 percentage point of GDP. IMF-supported programmes are also associated with increases in the share of government spending allocated to education and health.     

Cost-effectiveness of adding carfilzomib to lenalidomide and dexamethasone in relapsed multiple myeloma from a US perspective

Objective: To assess the economic value of carfilzomib (Kyprolis), this study developed the Kyprolis Global Economic Model (K-GEM), which examined from a United States (US) payer perspective the cost-effectiveness of carfilzomib-lenalidomide-dexamethasone (KRd) versus lenalidomide-dexamethasone (Rd) in relapsed multiple myeloma (RMM; 1–3 prior therapies) based on results from the phase III ASPIRE trial that directly compared these regimens.

Methods: A partitioned survival model that included three health states of progression-free (on or off treatment), post-progression, and death was developed. Using ASPIRE data, the effect of treatment regimens as administered in the trial was assessed for progression-free survival and overall survival (OS). Treatment effects were estimated with parametric regression models adjusting for baseline patient characteristics and applied over a lifetime horizon. US Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (1984–2014) registry data were matched to ASPIRE patients to extrapolate OS beyond the trial. Estimated survival was adjusted to account for utilities across health states. The K-GEM considered the total direct costs (pharmacy/medical) of care for patients treated with KRd and Rd.

Results: KRd was estimated to be more effective compared to Rd, providing 1.99 life year and 1.67 quality-adjusted life year (QALY) gains over the modeled horizon. KRd-treated patients incurred $179,393 in total additional costs. The incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) was $107,520 per QALY.

Limitations: Extrapolated survival functions present the greatest uncertainty in the modeled results. Utilities were derived from a combination of sources and assumed to reflect how US patients value their health state.

Conclusions: The K-GEM showed KRd is cost-effective, with an ICER of $107,520 per QALY gained against Rd for the treatment of patients with RMM (1–3 prior therapies) at a willingness-to-pay threshold of $150,000. Reimbursement of KRd for patients with RMM may represent an efficient allocation of the healthcare budget.     

Choice in Interactive Environments

In the early 21st century, firms are thinking seriously and practically about an interactive marketing paradigm—one that integrates mass scale with individual responsiveness. The focus of this paper is on how this interactive environment is changing the customer decision-making process. With the increased amount of information available, the existence of sophisticated decision aids such as intelligent agents, and more latitude in how to interact beyond the basic desktop and laptop computers (e.g., personal digital assistants, cellular phones, tablet computers), customers have more choices than ever about how, when, and how much to interact with companies and each other. In this paper, we attempt to cover a few of the major areas of research on how customers make decisions in these environments.     

Agricultural research and extension services in China

China's agricultural extension service has been merged with the research system to assure that research focuses on practical problems and that extension programmes are informed by scientific research. A complex network of research and experimentation stations has been established, with sophisticated research centres at the national and provincial level, coordination at commune and county level, and research groups at team and brigade level. This research and extension system has developed distinctive techniques for improving productivity, including fast-maturing grains suitable for multiple-cropping systems, advanced methods of tissue culture, and methods of utilizing biological processes for plant protection.     

Government Subsidies

This paper addresses the problems of defining and measuring government subsidies, examines why and how government subsidies are used as a fiscal policy tool, discusses their general economic effects in terms of real welfare costs and distributional implications, appraises international empirical evidence on government subsidies, and offers options for their reform. Recent international trends in government subsidy expenditure are analyzed for the 16‐year period from 1975 to 1990, using general government subsidy data for 60 countries from the United Nations' System of National Accounts (SNA). The paper reviews major policy options for subsidy reform, focusing on ways to improve the cost‐effectiveness of subsidy programs.     

Cost-effectiveness of TYRX absorbable antibacterial envelope for prevention of cardiovascular implantable electronic device infection

Aims: Infection is a major complication of cardiovascular implantable electronic device (CIED) therapy that usually requires device extraction and is associated with increased morbidity and mortality. The TYRX Antibacterial Envelope is a polypropylene mesh that stabilizes the CIED and elutes minocycline and rifampin to reduce the risk of post-operative infection.

Methods: A decision tree was developed to assess the cost-effectiveness of TYRX vs standard of care (SOC) following implantation of four CIED device types. The model was parameterized for a UK National Health Service perspective. Probabilities were derived from the literature. Resource use included drug acquisition and administration, hospitalization, adverse events, device extraction, and replacement. Incremental cost-effectiveness ratios (ICERs) were calculated from costs and quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs).

Results: Over a 12-month time horizon, TYRX was less costly and more effective than SOC when utilized in patients with an ICD or CRT-D. TYRX was associated with ICERs of £46,548 and £21,768 per QALY gained in patients with an IPG or CRT-P, respectively. TYRX was cost-effective at a £30,000 threshold at baseline probabilities of infection exceeding 1.65% (CRT-D), 1.95% (CRT-P), 1.87% (IPG), and 1.38% (ICD).

Limitations and conclusions: Device-specific infection rates for high-risk patients were not available in the literature and not used in this analysis, potentially under-estimating the impact of TYRX in certain devices. Nevertheless, TYRX is associated with a reduction in post-operative infection risk relative to SOC, resulting in reduced healthcare resource utilization at an initial cost. The ICERs are below the accepted willingness-to-pay thresholds used by UK decision-makers. TYRX, therefore, represents a cost-effective prevention option for CIED patients at high-risk of post-operative infection.