Comparable Axiomatizations of Two Allocation Rules for Cooperative Games with Transferable Utility and Their Subclass of Data Games

The axiom of balanced collective contributions is introduced as a collective variant of the axiom of balanced contributions proposed by Myerson. It requires the identical average impact of the withdrawal of any agent from a game on the remaining population. It turns out that the axiom of balanced collective contributions and the classical axiom of efficiency characterize the equal allocation of nonseparable costs, an allocation rule that is extensively used in cost allocation problems and in accounting. In particular, the equal allocation of nonseparable costs coincides with the nucleolus on the class of data games within the European REACH legislation. While our result does not hold on data games, extra axioms enable provision of comparable characterizations of the equal allocation of nonseparable costs and the Shapley value on this class of games.     

Inter‐industry Wage Differences and Individual Heterogeneity*

Two well‐established findings are apparent in the analyses of individual wage determination: cross‐section wage equations can account for less than half of the variance in earnings and there are large and persistent inter‐industry wage differentials. We explore these two empirical regularities using longitudinal data from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS). We show that around 90% of the variation in earnings can be explained by observed and unobserved individual characteristics. However, small – but statistically significant – industry wage premia do remain, and there is also a role for a rich set of job and workplace controls.     

飞思卡尔论坛美国再次亮剑

与五月底首度移师上海的“FTF论坛”(飞思卡尔技术论坛)有所不同,在自家门口搭架子、摆擂台,其底气难免要更为雄壮一些,Freescale从心态上也着实放松了不少。7月24日,本刊记者专程赶赴美国佛罗里达州奥兰多,并在其FTF上认真地走过了一圈,得到的最直观感受是:场面更大、人数更多、国际化程度更强、新产品更为丰富。     

Takeover Risk and Dividend Strategy: A Study of UK Firms

We investigate the relationship between a company’s dividend strategy and its risk of takeover. Our results from a large panel of UK quoted companies suggest that higher dividend payments are associated with a significantly lower conditional probability (hazard) of takeover. Moreover, firms which wish to avoid takeover would be better to distribute the marginal £1 of earnings in dividends rather than investing it in the company. We consider two explanations for these findings. We suggest that the presence of an active market for corporate control could encourage firms to raise dividends to maintain shareholder loyalty.     

Nursing case management: affecting quality and cost

North Mississippi Health Services' nursing case management program has been deemed a success by all parties involved, especially the patients. High-risk patients with specific chronic health problems receive an enhanced level of care and experience significant reductions in cost, length of stay, and repeat hospitalizations. Quality of life for many of these patients is also improved. These outcomes are made possible by assigning a registered nurse to case manage or coordinate care for these patients.     

Do quits cause under-training?

A recent finding in the training literature is that there willbe under-investment in skills if there is a positive quit rate,training is at least partially transferable, and there is imperfectcompetition in the labour market. We explore the conditionsunder which this under-investment result might be reversed.In economies characterised by uncertainty about future productivity,we show that a higher quit rate may increase the number of workerstrained, by making firms wait less for information about futureproductivity before training new workers. At low quit rates,this offsets all of the under-investment effect.     

Ethical Problems, Conflicts and Beliefs of Small Business Professionals

This paper presents the results of a national study of the beliefs and perceptions of small business professionals concerning ethics within their company and business in general. The study examined their views on the relationship between success and ethical conduct as well as the extent and nature of ethical conflicts experienced by the respondents. Some comparisons are made with similar studies that have been conducted in the past. Respondents have the most ethical conflicts with customers and employees, and with regard to honesty in contracts/agreements. Most also believe that ethical standards are lower than they were 10 and 20 years ago, primarily because society's moral standards are lower. Additionally, they believe that the behavior of top management has the most influence on decisions in ethical situations. Finally, consistent with prior studies, they believe that they have the most responsibility to customers, ahead of employees and stockholders.     

What do We Know About Investment Under Uncertainty?

Recent theoretical developments relating to investment under uncertainty have highlighted the importance of irreversibility for the timing of investment expenditures and their expected returns. This has subsequently stimulated a growing empirical literature which examines uncertainty and threshold effects on investment behaviour. This paper presents a review of this literature. A variety of methods have been used to investigate the empirical implication of irreversibility in investment, the majority focusing on the relationship between investment flows and proxy measures of uncertainty. A general conclusion is that increased uncertainty, at both aggregate and disaggregate levels, leads to lower investment rates. This suggests that there is an irreversibility effect, under which greater uncertainty raises the value of the 'call option' to delay a commitment to investment. This effect appears to dominate any positive impact on investment arising from the fact that greater uncertainty, under certain circumstances, increases the marginal profitability of capital. The methods used raise a number of issues which call into question the reliability of the findings, and these are addressed in the paper. However, if such irreversibility effects are present, then their omission from traditional investment models casts doubt on the efficacy of such specifications. JEL Classification: D81, D92, E22     

The growth and valuation of computing and other generic skills

This paper describes a method for measuring job skills usingsurvey data on detailed work activities, and using these measuresexamines whether the utilisation of skills is growing, and howthey are valued in the labour market. We show that between 1997and 2001 there was a growth in Britain in the utilisation ofcomputing skills, literacy, numeracy, technical know-how, high-levelcommunication skills, planning skills, client communicationskills, horizontal communication skills, problem-solving, andchecking skills. Computer skills utilisation was growing thefastest, and the use of computers was becoming more sophisticated.We re-evaluate the issue of whether computers have affectedwages, taking into account existing critiques in the literature.We find that both computer skills and high-level communicationskills carry positive wage premia, as shown both in cross-sectionhedonic wage equations that control for many detailed activities,and through a within-cohorts change analysis.