Do currency boards increase the credibility of exchange-rate pegs?

After massive attacks against the peso in January 2002 the Argentine government abandoned its currency board arrangement. The collapse of the Argentine exchange-rate system initiated a new discussion about the pros and cons of currency boards. Why did the Argentine currency board fail? What does its collapse reveal about the conditions that have to be fulfilled for a currency board to function smoothly? What consequences can be drawn from the Argentine case with regard to the currency boards of countries in central and eastern Europe?     

Learning from past experience: Footnotes on mindfulness and habitual entrepreneurship

Although scholars have long recognized that failure is endemic to entrepreneurial activity, they have implicitly argued that prior entrepreneurial experience positively affects opportunity discovery and opportunity exploitation. In contrast, I argue that the degree of mindfulness with which entrepreneurs use prior experience can both help and harm their ability to discover and exploit opportunities. I draw on several literatures, including studies of habitual entrepreneurship, behavioral learning theory, and theories of mindfulness, to develop a framework that yields insights about how, when and why habitual entrepreneurs’ use of past experience might improve the performance of their new ventures.     

预拌自密实混凝土应用性能的控制

自密实混凝土(SVB)特点主要体现在其新拌混凝土的特别的性能。然而自密实混凝土这些特性是通过质量稳定的最优化的原材料以及制造过程达到的。在实际应用时,作为预拌自密实混凝土浇筑时,其必须显示出所需要的新拌混凝土特性。在混合物混合结束与浇筑开始之间的间隔时间总计可能超过90min,在这较长时间间隔情况下,与在预制工厂应用相比,要求考虑时间和温度对自密实混凝土(SVB)的实用特性变化的影响。掌握粉体材料应用、含水量和增塑剂作用原理以及其相互影响方面的足够的知识是必要的。混凝土原材料和混凝土构成对混凝土流变性能、混凝土硬化性能和施工性能的影响由试验室试验确定。在对预拌混凝土相同原材料和相同配合比的监督检查应根据在结合实际情况下进行,混凝土的可否运送由试验室的结果确定。所有被监督检查的混凝土应符合客户订货确定的硬化混凝土性能要求。     

Spartengewerkschaften auch in Wettbewerbsbereichen unterbinden

Craft unions are trade unions which represent a specific professional branch of the workforce. The German Constitutional Court is currently examining a new law which would more or less stop their activities. This paper argues in favour of such restriction, not only in protected sectors with price regulation, public bail outs, etc. (as a previous paper did), but also in competitive sectors of the economy like airlines. The reason is that craft unions abuse monopolistic bottlenecks to siphon off economic rents at the cost of their colleagues, which simultaneously hurts efficiency and equity. Moreover, there is no indication that these adverse incentives diminish over time.     

Random walks with drifts: Nonsense regression and spurious fixed-effect estimation

The paper analyses the regression of two independent random walks with drifts. Applying the nonsense regression results to panel data, it is shown that the convergence to pseudo true values also applies to the estimation of (spurious) fixed-effects models. Simulated evidence reveals potential interpretation problems in finite samples.     

Acknowledgement to referees

Dear colleagues: At the end of another successful year the Editors of the Journal of Evolutionary Economics would like to thank you for your cooperation as a referee and for supporting our work by contributing valuable suggestions and comments. We are ambitious to maintain the achieved quality standard and hope to count on your expertise in the future.Wishing you a happy Christmas and all the best for 2004.Yours sincerely,Ritu AgarwalJasmina ArifovicEric J. BartelsmannSiegfried BerninghausGiulio BottazziSamuel BowlesThomas BrennerStefano BreschiLucas BretschgerEva BuchingerGuido BünstorfMartin A. CarreeMark CassonCharles M.A. ClarkJuan CordobaGiacomo Corneo Jean-Michel DalleHerbert DawidElias DinopoulosEngelbert Josef DocknerKurt DopferGiovanni DosiKristina DresslerCharles EdquistMassimo EgidiGunnar K. EliassonMathias ErleiMalte FaberJan FagerbergGiorgio FagioloJean FanGustav FeichtingerNicolas FloresJim L. FordJohn FosterRobert H. FrankChristopher FreemanDaniel FriedmanMichael FritschAngelo FusariSimon GächterSanjeev GoyalOve GranstrandHolger GrafThomas GrebelHariolf GruppWerner GüthJohn C. HaltiwangerGerhardt HanappiMichael HannanGeoff HarcourtMaik HeinemannErnst HelmstädterWerner HildenbrandGeoffrey HodgsonCharles HoltCars HommesSteffen HuckPeter N. IrelandNicolas JonardReinoud JoostenChristos KalantaridisYuri KaniovskiCatherine KavanaghHartmut KliemtThorbjørn KnudsenJens KrügerThomas KuhnWitold KwasnickiNathalie LazaricMarco Lehmann-WaffenschmidtWolfgang LeiningerFrank LevySusan J. LinzBrian Loasby Hans-Walter LorenzFrancesca LottiSusanna LundströmBengt-Åke LundvallThomas LuxBoris MaciejovskyGary MageeVolker MahnkeJacques MairesseLuigi MarengoSilvia MassiniMarianna MazzucatoJ.S. MetcalfeHassan MolanaRichard R. NelsonJoelle NoaillyAxel OckenfelsPavel PelikanMark PerlmanCharles R. PlottRichard A. PosnerJason PottsWilliam V. RappAl RothWilhelm RuprechtPier Paolo SaviottiHansjörg SiegenthalerGerald Silverberg Claes-Henric SivenAndrew SpicerManfred StadlerEd SteinmuellerJohn SuttonPeter SwannRichard SwedbergGabriel SzulanskiErol TaymazMorris TeubalPeter ThompsonMarco ValenteJeroen C.J.M. van den BergJohn Van ReenenFernando Vega-RedondoBart VerspagenGeorg von KroghGeorg von WangenheimRainer VosskampNicolaas J. VriendJack VromenWilliam W. WadmanRolf WalterFrank WesterhoffUlrich WittMichael WohlgemuthEdward J. ZajacMaurizio Zollo     

Limits to global sourcing?: Strategic consequences of dependency on international suppliers: Cluster theory,resource-based view and case studies

This paper argues for the inclusion of an analysis of industry clusters when making decisions about global or local sourcing. Suppliers are viewed as valuable resources that can contribute to a firm's competitive advantage. Two contrasting case studies illustrate that, contrary to common expectations, a high global sourcing quota does not necessarily improve a firm's competitiveness. Rather, there may be limits to global sourcing, if a firm is unable to become a preferred customer of its strategic suppliers. Achieving preferred customer status is easier for firms located in the same regional or national cluster than it is for foreign firms attempting to access a remote supplier. This paper contributes a new and more differentiated approach to global sourcing decisions by integrating the cluster concept. Furthermore, our findings enrich the discourse of strategic management by supporting the view that resources which enable a firm to achieve sustainable competitive advantages can be located beyond its legal boundaries.     

Optimal Provision of Public Goods: A Synthesis*

The standard approach to the optimal provision of public goods highlights the importance of distortionary taxation and distributional concerns. A new approach neutralizes distributional concerns by adjusting the income tax schedule. We demonstrate that both approaches are derived from the same basic formula. We also take the new approach further by deriving an intuitive formula for the optimal level of public goods, without imposing strong assumptions on preferences. This formula shows that distortionary taxation has a role to play, as in the standard approach. However, the main determinants of optimal provision are different, and the modified Samuelson rule is likely to lead to underprovision.