Let's Get Messi? Top‐Scorer Productivity in the European Champions League

Getting a player like Lionel Messi in the squad would seem like a dream come true for a professional football manager, but is it always best to have top‐quality players? We study the determinants of top goal‐scorers’ productivity in the UEFA Champions League. We find evidence of a concave relationship between age and productivity and uncover an inverted‐U relationship between performance and minutes played. Finally, we find a positive effect on height, being left footed and being a striker on the probability of scoring a goal. The results have important implications for managers both in looking to sign on new players and to maximise their potential during a competitive match.     

Hochwasservorsorge zwischen Staatshilfen und privater Versicherung

The recent flood events in Germany have demonstrated that the nation’s current system of private flood insurance is suboptimal. The article provides novel nationwide survey data on stated flood insurance penetration (suggesting that many households overestimate their own insurance coverage), damage compensation expectations (a significant share of the population expects governmental relief payments), and on the dissemination of private flood mitigation measures. Taking into account fundamental economic considerations and the empirical insights, the authors propose a limited compulsory insurance, covering only the most basic risks and leaving incentives for further private insurance and precaution.     

Returns to alliance portfolio diversity: The relative effects of partner diversity on firm's innovative performance and productivity

This study considers the impact of diversification in types of technological alliances, resulting in alliance portfolio diversity, on various dimensions of a firm's performance, as they relate to exploration and exploitation. Using a large panel of innovative firms in the Netherlands, this study shows that partner type diversity in a firm's alliance portfolio has an inverted U-shaped relationship with productivity and radical innovative performance and a positive relationship with incremental innovative performance. Moreover, the results suggest that a lower level of diversity is needed to achieve an optimal level of productivity compared to radical innovative performance, whereas for incremental innovative performance a higher level of portfolio diversity appears to give the best performance.     

Rising Wage Inequality, Returns to Education and Labour Market Institutions: Evidence from Ireland

Institutional factors and increased supply of skilled labour have been advanced in an effort to explain why some countries have experienced smaller increases in earnings dispersion and in returns to education than the USA and the UK. Ireland has had a highly centralized wage bargaining structure and the supply of skilled labour has increased sharply in recent years; hence, relatively little change in earnings dispersion might be expected. We compare the distribution of earnings in Ireland in 1987 and 1994 and find a surprisingly large growth in earnings dispersion. In addition, using a decomposition technique, we find that much of this is accounted for by increasing returns to measured.     

Border effects for domestic and international Canadian passenger air travel

An augmented gravity model of passenger air travel between five Canadian airports and destinations within and without of Canada reveals a substantial border effect. After controlling for GDP, populations and distance, the number of seats offered on domestic routes is about six times the number on international flights. This result is consistent with the border effects found in studies of international merchandise trade.     

Critical Realism as a Basis for Economic Methodology: A critique

This paper considers the claim that critical realism provides a convincing critique of mainstream economics and offers a sound methodological basis for an alternative approach. It argues that critical realism presents a tendentious definition of positivism and a characterisation of mainstream economics that is misleading, and that it misrepresents the nature and purpose of the work of Hume and modern Humean philosophers. It also argues that critical realism's bold ontological claims lack epistemological support. The paper concludes that critical realism does not provide a compelling basis for economic methodology.     

别说了,把话筒交给消费者吧——成功的用户自创内容（user-generated-content）活动

大家最近有去唱过卡拉OK吗？其实从唱K中获得的欢乐与用户自创内容活动颇有相似之处。在卡拉OK娱乐场所,流行歌曲和伴奏音乐固然是至关重要的。没有它们,就没办法唱歌!     

Virtual Reality and Innovation Potential

This article examines how companies can harness virtual reality (VR) technology to help make themselves more innovative. VR has some unique characteristics which, taken together, can help companies to develop three features common to many innovative organisations: a capacity to experiment in depth; involvement of all in the innovation process; and an ability to capture ideas generated in the innovation process. However, some obstacles need to be overcome before VR fulfils this potential.