Congestion games with load-dependent failures: Identical resources

We define a new class of games, congestion games with load-dependent failures (CGLFs). In a CGLF each player can choose a subset of a set of available resources in order to try and perform his task. We assume that the resources are identical but that players' benefits from successful completion of their tasks may differ. Each resource is associated with a cost of use and a failure probability which are load-dependent. Although CGLFs in general do not have a pure strategy Nash equilibrium, we prove the existence of a pure strategy Nash equilibrium in every CGLF with nondecreasing cost functions. Moreover, we present a polynomial time algorithm for computing such an equilibrium.     

Digitalization of SMEs

International Advances in Economic Research -     

Women,Children and Patience: Experimental Evidence from Indian Villages

Researchers have observed that women in developing countries often make more development friendly choices than men. We implemented experimental tasks among a large and diverse sample of married individuals in rural India and found women to make on average more patient and more risk‐averse choices than men. We find important heterogeneity in gender differences in patience: there is no difference for spouses with no children but patience levels diverge if there are small children in a family. The findings imply that conflicting spousal preferences are most likely in poor families with children.     

G2P – Governmental e-Solutions for the Public: Citizen vs Corporation Aspects

International Advances in Economic Research -     

Web-based CSR communication in post-communist countries

In this survey, we investigate the level of web-based CSR communication in selected post-communist countries. Our objective was to identify, analyse and evaluate the scope of web-based CSR communication and the structure of CSR activities communicated by the TOP 100 companies based in the Czech Republic and Ukraine. On the basis of content analysis of the websites of the 100 most important companies (according to the level of revenue) based in each of these countries, we can state that the level of their web-based CSR communication is comparable. It does, however, correspond to the generally low level of CSR communication in post-communist countries. Apart from corporate websites, another popular channel of communication is social networks, in particular, Facebook. As far as the scope of CSR activities communicated is concerned, companies based in the Czech Republic communicate an average of 19 and companies based in Ukraine communicate an average of 18 of the 39 monitored activities. TOP 100 companies operating in these countries communicate economic and environmental responsibility activities in the greatest scope and on the contrary, ethical responsibility activities the least.     

Combinatorial agency

We study a combinatorial variant of the classical principal-agent model. In our setting a principal wishes to incentivize a team of strategic agents to exert costly effort on his behalf. Agents? actions are hidden and the principal observes only the outcome of the team, which depends stochastically on the complex combinations of the efforts by the agents. The principal seeks the mechanism that maximizes the principal?s net revenue given an equilibrium behavior of the agents. We investigate the structure of the optimal mechanism for various production technologies as the principal?s value from the project varies. In doing so we quantify the gap between the first-best and second-best solutions. Our results highlight the qualitative and quantitative differences between production technologies that exhibit complementarities and substitutabilities between the agents? actions. In comparing the first best with the second best we highlight the role of effort monitoring by the principal. As we shall see, the benefit from monitoring crucially depends on the underlying technology, with the two polar cases being perfect substitution and perfect complementarity.     

The effects of monetary policy in the Czech Republic: an empirical study

In this paper, we examine the effects of Czech monetary policy on the economy within the vector auto regression (VAR), structural VAR, Bayesian VAR with sign restrictions, and factor-augmented VAR, frameworks. We document a well-functioning transmission mechanism similar to the euro area countries, especially in terms of persistence of monetary policy shocks. Subject to various sensitivity tests, we find that a contractionary monetary policy shock has a negative effect on the degree of economic activity and the price level, both with a peak response after one year or so. Regarding prices at the sectoral level, tradables adjust faster than non-tradables, which is in line with microeconomic evidence on price stickiness. There is no price puzzle, as our data come from a single monetary policy regime. There is a rationale in using the real-time output gap instead of current GDP growth, as using the former results in much more precise estimates. The results indicate a rather persistent appreciation of the domestic currency after a monetary tightening, with a gradual depreciation afterwards.     

Contrasting Models of the Effect of Inflation on Growth

Abstract.  The paper formulates a nesting model for studying the theoretical literature on inflation and endogenous growth. It analyses different classes of endogenous growth models, with different usage of physical and human capital, with different exchange technologies. First, the paper shows that a broad array of models can all generate significant negative effects of inflation on growth. Second, it shows that these models can be differentiated primarily by the fact whether there is a Tobin-type effect of inflation and also whether the inflation–growth effect becomes weaker as the inflation rate rises, a non-linearity, or stays essentially constant over the range of inflation rates. The paper compares these features of the models to empirical evidence as a way to summarize the efficacy of the models.