Bayesian estimation and prediction based on Rayleigh sample quantiles

Ordered data arise naturally in many fields of statistical practice. Often some sample values are unknown or disregarded due to various reasons. On the basis of some sample quantiles from the Rayleigh distribution, the problems of estimating the Rayleigh parameter, hazard rate and reliability function, and predicting future observations are addressed using a Bayesian perspective. The construction of β-content and β-expectation Bayes tolerance limits is also tackled. Under squared-error loss, Bayes estimators and predictors are deduced analytically. Exact tolerance limits are derived by solving simple nonlinear equations. Highest posterior density estimators and credibility intervals, as well as Bayes estimators and predictors under linear loss, can easily be computed iteratively.     

The KwaZulu-Natal Income Dynamics Study (KIDS) third wave: methods,first findings and an agenda for future research

The panel study known as the KwaZulu-Natal Income Dynamics Study (KIDS) has been extended by a new wave of data collection conducted in 2004. This third wave of the study interviewed 865 households containing core adult members from 760 of the households contacted in 1993. It also conducted interviews in next-generation households that have split off from the parental households and in the current households of children who have been fostered out. The study finds that the proportion of people aged 20–44 dying between the second and third waves was nearly three times the proportion dying between the first two waves. The pattern of income distribution is one of increasing poverty and inequality since 1993, although the partial reversal of these trends in the post-1998 period is hopeful, as are signs of relative prosperity among those who established independent next-generation households. In addition, access to services has improved.     

Regulatory issues in regional satellite communications: Towards a USA - Mexico bilateral agreement

This article examines the issues raised by the drawing up of a bilateral agreement for satellite communications between the USA and Mexico. Mexico has been mainly leasing capacity from INTELSAT and is developing its own Morelos satellite system. Both the USA and Mexico are keen to develop transborder satellite telecommunications services, but before coming to an agreement both parties must arrive at a clear definition of the main concepts that will constitute the agreement. Key concepts being analysed are: services classification, the reciprocity principle, economic harm to INTELSAT, and technical harm to INTELSAT.     

更美好的合作

尽管山水相隔、文化相异，但墨西哥与中国保持着异常良好的政治关系，而且，两国在经贸领域也是重要的合作伙伴.     

The Informational Role of Product Trade‐Ins for Pricing Durable Goods

This research theorizes that sellers of durable goods can utilize inferences about the buyer's willingness to pay based not only on her decision to trade in the old good but also on its characteristics. We find empirical support for this theory using transaction data for new car purchases. The results support the notion that dealers infer a higher willingness to pay and charge higher prices to consumers who trade in a used vehicle than to those who do not. We also find that dealers charge even higher prices to those consumers who trade in used cars that are similar to the new one.     

Technology roadmapping (TRM) and strategic alignment for an applied research centre: a case study with methodological contributions

Technology roadmapping provides a strategic tool to help companies develop an outside‐in view and challenge their current competitive perspectives. In this paper, the authors describe the roadmapping process, which is aligned, with the research and development (R&D) strategy of an applied research centre. This process is based in an adapted combination of state‐of‐the‐art methodologies, and as a result, the case study shows interesting findings in terms of R&D strategy, technology strategy and roadmapping processes and methodology.     

Exploring The Gender Effect On Europeans’ Retirement Savings

This paper investigates whether European women have the same probability of saving for retirement as European men and if driving factors for this saving behavior differ by gender. The evidence is based on a sample of 6,036 individuals from eight European countries (France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom). The results show that European women are less likely to save for retirement than men, although the determinants of this decision are similar for both genders. Moreover, the results suggest that country-level institutional factors play a more important role on the individual's retirement attitudes than gender differences.     

Analysis of Social Performance in the Spanish Financial Industry Through Public Data. A Proposal

Banking firms are becoming increasingly aware that their clients’ management of environmental and social risks may in term threaten their own business as lenders and investors. In addition, stakeholders are requiring banks to improve their social performance. As a result, some banks are developing corporate social responsibility (CSR) policies and management systems to reduce potential risks and improve their performance. In the Spanish financial system, half of the banking firms are savings banks, most of which have always used some Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) criteria in their management. Private Banks have only recently started to integrate social aspects in their performance. However, no formal analysis has been carried out on the impact of CSR strategies. Various initiatives have been launched nationally and internationally to include the social dimension in management systems. The purpose of this research is to analyse the social performance of the main Spanish financial companies through public data such as social or sustainability reports and media sources. In order to do this, we need to determine which CSR criteria most greatly affect banking firms and to choose the most accurate quantitative and qualitative indicators to measure social performance.     

Impression Management Tactics and Performance Ratings: A Moderated-Mediation Framework

Purpose: The objective of this study is to contribute to the sales management literature by analyzing whether self-monitoring dimensions (the ability to adjust the presentation of one’s self and the sensitivity to the expressive behaviors of others) play a moderating role in the use of impression management—supervisor liking—performance rating nomological network.

Methodology/approach: Empirical analysis is based on dyadic data from 122 industrial salespeople and their sales managers in 9 different industries. Structural equation modelling was used to analyze the psychometric proprieties of the measurement scales, and conditional process analysis was used to test the proposed hypotheses.

Research implications: The results obtained indicate that the use of supervisor-focused impression management tactics is an indirect antecedent of a salesperson’s performance rating through sales manager liking, but not the self-focused tactics. Results also show that a self-monitoring dimension i.e., the ability to adjust the presentation of one’s self, moderates the “impression management—supervisor liking—performance rating” chain. These results provide an increased understanding of the processes involved in sales managers—salespeople’s interactions.

Practical implications: The main implication for salespeople is that the use of impression management tactics to influence performance ratings only is effective when they use supervisor-focused tactics because attempts to influence via self-focused tactics will not have any effect. The most important implication for sales managers’ is that not all impression management tactics are successfully executed and that the identification of combinations of impression management tactics and the levels of salespeople’s self-monitoring can positively influence performance appraisals by generating evaluative biases. Given that evaluative biases can produce inequitable behaviors by sales managers in the task assignments and support provided to the salespeople, it is important that sales managers are aware of when they can occur (i.e., when salespeople with a moderate ability to adjust their self-presentation use supervisor-focused tactics).

Originality/value/contribution of the article: This article contributes to the existing knowledge by two important means. First, this study proposes a model and presents an empirical test of constructs that mediate (i.e., supervisor liking) and moderate (i.e., self-monitoring dimensions) the “use of impression management tactics—sales manager liking—performance appraisal” relation. This model responds to calls for studies that analyze how impression management tactics are related to performance appraisal and when the relation between the use of these tactics and performance rating occurs. Two, this study uses data from both salespeople and their sales managers, which minimizes any risk of common method variance bias.     

Preferential Rules of Origin and the Multilateral Trading System: Pro-Development Policy Options

With the proliferation of regional trade agreements since the late 1980s and early 1990s, preferential rules of origin have also proliferated. The discussion on these rules has gradually shifted from a purely technical discussion (“how to establish the origin of goods not wholly obtained in one country”, and hence, “how to apply trade preferences in these cases”) to a wider discussion also touching upon the transaction costs caused by having a “spaghetti bowl” of rules, and the actual or presumed neo-protectionist use that is being made of them. In the context of the discussion on possible policy options for developing countries simultaneously involved in (or negotiating) regional and multilateral trade agreements, this article will first give a brief overview of the findings of the recent empirical literature. Some indications are then presented as to what such policy options could look like. This paper was first presented at the Ad-hoc Expert Group Meeting on The Development Interface between the Multilateral Trading System and Regional Trade Agreements, Session III Regulatory Provisions in RTAs, Palais des Nations, Geneva, 15-16 March 2007. It is partly based on P. De Lombaerde, L. J. Garay : Preferential Rules of Origin: EU and NAFTA Regulatory Models and the WTO, in: The Journal of World Investment & Trade, Vol. 6, No. 6, 2005, pp. 953-994; and L. J. Garay, P. De Lombaerde: Preferential Rules of Origin: Models and Levels of Rulemaking, in: S. Woolcock (ed.): Trade and Investment Rulemaking: The Role of Regional and Bilateral Agreements, Tokyo 2006, UNU Press, pp. 78-106.