External information sources of product enthusiasts: Differences between variety seekers,variety neutrals,and variety avoiders

The external information sources of enthusiasts are examined. Enthusiasts who frequently switch their purchases of wine from different regions are compared with those who switch their purchases less frequently. Findings indicate that variety-seeking enthusiasts use a significantly larger number of information sources than variety neutrals, and variety neutrals use a significantly larger number of sources than variety avoiders. Differences concerning wine consumption, the use of print media, interpersonal sources, and trial information sources are also noted. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

The effect of ceded reinsurance on solvency of primary insurers

Primary insurance companies diversify their underwriting risk and thus improve their financial stability through buying reinsurance contracts. However, excessive use of reinsurance by an insurance company may signal the presence of financial difficulties. In fact, as research shows, a less solvent insurer tends to use more reinsurance because of its inability to raise needed capital in the financial market. Thus, regulators need to pay extra attention to insurers that overly use reinsurance since such behavior could signal an insurer's disproportionately high risk and its eventual probability of insolvency.     

Performance of Dairy Plants in the Cooperative and Private Sectors in India

During the 1990s the cooperative dairy processing sector in India was exposed to greater competition from private sector plants. In this paper we measure cost efficiency (decomposed into technical and allocative efficiency) at the dairy plant level in the cooperative and private sectors in India. Two efficiency measurement methods are used: stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) and data envelopment analysis (DEA). The study utilizes an (incomplete) panel data sample of 23 plants, comprising 13 cooperative plants and 10 private plants, observed between 1992/93 and 1996/97. Our results indicate that cooperative plants are more cost efficient than private plants, although this difference is insignificant at the 5 per cent level. Furthermore, we observe that the cost efficiency of cooperative plants has not improved since market liberalization in 1991. These results suggest that the liberalization policy has not yet realized its expected benefits, and also cause us to question the general expectation that private operators will have efficiency advantages relative to cooperatives.     

Gender,productivity, and the nature of work and pay: evidence from the late nineteenth‐century tobacco industry

Women have typically been paid less than men throughout history. We investigate earnings in Swedish cigar making around 1900. Strength was unimportant, yet the gender wage gap was large. Differences in characteristics, such as age and experience, and different jobs within firms, account for two‐thirds of the gap overall, and the entire gap for piece‐rate workers. Firms were as willing to employ women as men in the better‐paying piece‐rate section, and women were willing to take those jobs. In contrast, discrimination was extensive in the time‐rate section. Men in this section benefited from greater outside opportunities and customary wages elsewhere. Theory holds that labour market discrimination will reduce profitability, and make firm survival harder, a proposition that has never been tested historically. We find that cigar firms that feminized their workforces most extensively were most likely to survive. Product market competition prevented firms employing (overpaid) men to any great extent. We argue that economic historians must interpret industry‐specific gender wage differentials in the context of workers' outside opportunities, and in the context of product markets, which can—and in this case did—limit firms' room for manoeuvre.     

Capital formation in transport infrastructure in New Zealand to 1950

Series of disaggregated capital formation in the New Zealand public sector prior to 1950 remain scarce despite thirty years having passed since the series for the period 1871–1900 were compiled by J.A. Dowie. Even within his series there can be problems utilizing the estimates because of the aggregated nature of some outlay categories. The capital stock series are more deficient, reflecting methodological problems with the preparation of such series from capital formation data. Using the Dowie series as a point of reference this article focusses on one important area of public capital stock, transport infrastructure. The resulting estimates allow some exploration of public policies in respect of the provision of transport infrastructure.     

Do Firms Use Derivatives to Reduce their Dependence on External Capital Markets?

This study investigates if the use of derivatives by corporations is likelyto affect their financing strategies. I find a strong positive relationbetween the minimum revenue guaranteed by hedging and investmentexpenditures. This result implies that hedging increases the likelihood thatinvestments can be financed internally. I also find that firms tend tofinance their investment expenditures externally rather than internally. Ifexternal capital is more costly than internal capital it would clearly be ina firm's interest to reduce its dependence on external capital. Consistentwith this result, I find that the median firm that does not hedge finances100% of its investment expenditures externally, while the median firm thathedges finances only 86% of investments externally.     

Termination of the WGTA: An Examination of Factor Market Distortions, Input Subsidies anc Compensation

Input subsidies are common in North American agriculture and create production and trade distortions. As the theoretical discussion in this paper shows, the Crow transportation subsidy was no exception. The Crow benefit was eliminated in 1996 with the elimination of the Western Grain Transportation Act. Under the "pay the producer" approach, farmers in western Canada were compensated for the removal of the Crow subsidy, but the compensation was nowhere near that required to make grain and oilseed producers in western Canada at least as well off as before the Crow subsidy was removed. This policy change satisfied the compensation principle but not the Pareto principle. Reasons are given why this was the case, including very divergent views from various farm groups such as the National Farmers Union, the Alberta Cattle Commission, and the Alberta Barley Growers Association.
Les intrants du secteur agricole sont souvent subventionnés en Amérique du Nord, ce qui fausse la production et les échanges. Comme l'illustre la discussion dans cet article, il en a été ainsi pour le tarif du Pas-du-Nid-du-Corbeau, dans les transports. Cette subvention a été abolie en 1996 avec l'abrogation de Loi sur le transport du grain de l'Ouest. Les producteurs de céréales et d'oléagineux de l'Ouest canadien ont été indemnisés, mais la somme qui leur a été versée était largement insuffisante pour qu'ils restent aussi bien lotis qu'avant l'abolition de la subvention. La nouvelle politique a satisfait le principe de la compensation, mais pas celui de Pareto. On explique le pourquoi de cette situation, l'une des raisons étant les points de vue tràs divergents de diverses associations agricoles.