Electoral Balancing in Federal and Sub-national Elections: The Case of Canada

The major premise of this study is that in federal countries voters can balance and moderate national policy by dividing electoral support between different parties in federal and sub-national elections. We compare the non-concurrent federal and provincial elections in Canada to assess the balancing properties of sub-national elections. The balancing hypothesis implies that the federal incumbent party may suffer additional electoral losses in provincial elections. We use several statistical tests - ordinary OLS, fixed effect and unbalanced random effect cross-section time series - to analyze Canadian electoral data for the period of 1949-1997. All tests sustain that the incumbent party at the federal level loses votes in provincial elections.     

OPTIMAL CONTROL OF EXTERNALITIES IN THE PRESENCE OF INCOME TAXATION*

A substantial literature examines how the Pigouvian directive that marginal taxes should equal marginal external harms needs to be modified in light of the preexisting distortion due to labor income taxation. Additional literature considers distributive concerns. It is demonstrated, however, that simple first‐best rules—unmodified for labor supply distortion or distribution—are correct in the model examined. Specifically, setting all commodity taxes equal to marginal harms (and subsidies equal to marginal benefits) can generate a Pareto improvement, as can a marginal reform toward the first‐best. Qualifications and explanations for differences from previous work are also presented.     

2007年东盟国家经济预测

2007年东盟经济增长率将有可能逊于2006年。由于欧美地区经济增速预计放缓，东盟国家对这些地区的出口会因此下降。不过，中国和印度的经济增长及亚洲多个国家国内经济需求和基础设施发展等，将抵消欧美经济放缓对东盟经济所带来的部分；中击，东盟经济仍将保持持续增长。     

Do strained bilateral relations affect tourists’ desire to visit a country that is a target of animosity?

ABSTRACT

This study examines the attractiveness of destination tourism offerings when the destination country and the source market country are engaged in ongoing political and economic conflict. The study is set in the Russia–United States (US) context, where Russia is the tourism-generating region and the US are the vacation destination. Specifically, the study investigates how the desire of Russian tourists to vacation in the US is affected by perceptions of the US as a country and as a vacation destination, animosity toward the US, and Russian tourists? level of national attachment and ethnocentric tendencies. The study found that country image, destination image, and general animosity have a direct effect on intention to visit. The effects of consumer ethnocentrism and national situational animosity on intention to visit are mediated by destination image and country image respectively.     

与时俱进 艰苦奋斗 实现学校(院)的可持续发展

2002年,中共上海市财贸党校、上海商业职业技术学院实现了超常规、跨越式的发展。2003年,该校(院)将继续以发展作为第一要务,大力推进学校(院)朝集约化内涵式方向发展;以创建示范性高职院校为目标,切实提高教学质量,努力形成高职特色;按照“以人为本”的原则,推进体制创新,积极稳妥地实施人事用工分配制度和教学管理体制改革,以改革促进发展,以改革加强和规范管理,将贯彻“十六大”精神落到实处。     

Timing under individual evolutionary learning in a continuous double auction

The moment of order submission plays an important role for the trading outcome in a Continuous Double Auction; submitting an offer at the beginning of the trading period may yield a lower profit, as the trade is likely to be settled at the own offered price, whereas late offers result in a lower probability of trading. This timing problem makes the order submission strategy more difficult. We extend the behavioral model of Individual Evolutionary Learning to incorporate the timing problem and study the limiting distribution of submission moments and the resulting offer function that maps submission moments to offers. We find that traders submit different offers at different submission moments the distribution of which uni-modal with a peak moving from late to early as the market size increases. This behavior exacerbates efficiency loss from learning. If traders evaluate profitability of their strategies over longer history, orders are submitted later with the same effect of market size.     

Risky IPTV Investment

IPTV （Internet Protocol television） is a frequently mentioned word recently, since Shanda changes its main business to IPTV, which isrecognized as a new technology and at- tractive business in the future. Shanda is the most active Chinese online game pioneer, it has produced one trail box, which will be used as the host while traditional TV station as terminal of the IPTV. Shanda hopes that the box＇s development and the family entertainment service operation will boost its revenue and help to recover the investors＇ confidence. It is estimated that Shanda has spend about $450 millions on IPTV in the last year, including production research and sales channel establishment. However, it is reported that the box is of poor quality. Even the internal trial members complained about the box＇s unsatisfactory performance. In addition, the price of the box is about 6,000 RMB each （equivalent US $ 800）, it is too expen-sive to most Chinese consumers.