Monopoly pricing in the binary herding model

How should a monopolist price when selling to buyers who learn from each other’s decisions? Focusing on the case in which the common value of the good is binary and each buyer receives a binary private signal about that value, we completely answer this question for all values of the production cost, the precision of the buyers’ signals, and the seller’s discount factor. Unexpectedly, we find that there is a region of parameters for which learning stops at intermediate and at extreme beliefs, but not at beliefs that lie between those intermediate and extreme beliefs.     

Optimal payment schemes for physicians

Increasingly, physicians payment schemes are being reformed to enhance performance and to ensure an optimal allocation of scarce medical resources. The empirical evidence points towards the use of mixed payment schemes that appear better at achieving efficiency than either lump sum payments (such as capitation) or piece rates (fee for service). Yet, this alleged superiority remains to be established from a theoretical standpoint. The Principal-Agent model developed in this paper offers a contribution in this line, with a primary care physician as agent and a public regulator as principal. Alternative specifications of the principals objective function are considered in the model (efficiency versus fairness). Uncertainty is introduced by two random variables that represent the probability for an individual of being ill and his productivity parameter which determines the amount of resources (the physicians effort in particular) necessary to restore health. The relationship is characterised by information asymmetry since the physician is assumed to observe both variables after the contract has been signed, but before choosing his effort level. Both selection and moral hazard issues are addressed in the model and the results show that, under GP risk neutrality, mixed payment schemes fully correct for both types of information asymmetry.Received: June 2002, Accepted: May 2003, JEL Classification: I18, I11, D82Rosella Levaggi: Correspondence toThe authors would like to thank participants to the LEA Barcelona Workshop, November 2001, to the Second Health Economics Workshop, Lisbon, February 2002 and two anonymous referees for their helpful comments. The usual disclaimer applies.     

Factors affecting women's participation in forestry in Turkey

This study analyses women's participation in forestry. The study was carried out with 270 women in the Bartın province, located in the West Black Sea Region of Turkey. By employing a Principal Component Analysis it was found that the most important factors affecting women's participation are women's perception related to (1) forest dependence, (2) quality of cooperatives, (3) quality of Forest Organisation, and (4) forest quality. These four factors explained 58% of women's participation. These factors need to be taken into consideration to enhance women's participation in forestry and to achieve sustainable forestry in Turkey.Regression analyses indicate that age, marital status, the rate of population increase and wealth are important variables for explaining variation in levels of participation. The estimated game theoretic model on women's participation indicates that the sharing of forest benefits among women in Turkey is considerably harmonious, while there is scope for improving the Forest Organisation, namely by stimulating participation towards a more effective management of the Turkish forests.     

Estimating the impact on efficiency of the adoption of a voluntary environmental standard: an empirical study of the global copper mining industry

This paper uses data on the world’s copper mining industry to measure the impact on efficiency of the adoption of the ISO 14001 environmental standard. Anecdotal and case study literature suggests that firms are motivated to adopt this standard so as to achieve greater efficiency through changes in operating procedures and processes. Using plant level panel data from 1992 to 2007 on most of the world’s industrial copper mines, the study uses stochastic frontier methods to investigate the effects of ISO adoption. The variety of models used in this study find that adoption either tends to improve efficiency or has no impact on efficiency, but no evidence is found that ISO adoption decreases efficiency.     

Associations among Park Use,Age, Social Participation,and Neighborhood Age Composition in Montreal

Parks provide benefits for the physical, psychological, and social well-being of residents in neighborhood environments. Multilevel logistic regression was used to examine associations between neighborhood- and individual-level characteristics and the lack of park use in Montreal. Data on park use were collected from 787 adults residing in 299 different neighborhoods. Results found that older adults who lived in areas with a younger age composition were more likely not to use their nearby parks as compared to older adults living in areas with an older age composition. Forms of social participation were also important for the park use of older adults. Public policies should consider targeting aspects of the social environment to improve neighborhood park use.     

The search for legitimacy and organizational change: The agency of subordinated actors

This article investigates the organizational changes triggered by the implementation of certified management systems (CMS) in Denmark and explores how institutionalized organizational practices change over time. The study shows that improvements in performance were not significant in the implementation of CMS, though in most cases its adoption implied organizational changes. The study also shows that the search for external legitimacy was appropriated by various internal organizational actors, other than management. When internal actors share the institutionalized beliefs and norms of the wider society, they implicitly strive to reduce decoupling. We argue that understanding the social dynamics of legitimacy in organisations requires paying attention to the agency of superordinated as well as subordinate actors.     

Measuring differential forest outcomes: A tale of two countries

This paper empirically analyzes the growth/deforestation trajectories of El Salvador and Puerto Rico, two Latin American tropical developing countries which have witnessed widely different economic and forest scenarios since the early 1960s. Although both countries began the period with relatively abundant forest resources and similar levels of development, only Puerto Rico witnessed an increase in forest cover during this period. After briefly discussing each country's respective socioeconomic and land use changes, the paper empirically measures possible factors mediating these different deforestation outcomes. Empirical results presented here suggest that Puerto Rico's forest success has depended significantly on its rapid economic growth and development, in particular, its high levels of industrialization, social welfare provision, and domestic investment. Having successfully avoided the scarcity-induced forms of forest exploitation that have destroyed El Salvador's forests, Puerto Rico must now devote the considerable resources generated by this growth to protecting its forest cover from the negative effects of unrestricted urban and industrial development.