Economic design of one-sided screening procedures based on a correlated variable with all parameters unknown

Summary Economic design of one-sided screening procedures for improving outgoing product quality based on a screening variable is considered for the case with all parameters unknown. It is assumed that the performance and screening variables are jointly normally distributed and that costs are incurred by screening inspection, acceptance of an imperfect item, and disposition of a rejected one. A method for finding optimal cutoff value based on the predictive distribution is presented.     

Henry George and His Philosophy: He Sought Equality of Opportunity to Use the Earth's Resources as Well as the End of Land Monopoly

Abstract . The George scholars today appear to be interesting the academic community in re-evaluating Henry George and his ideas. George, the 19th century American economist and social philosopher, dedicated himself to ending poverty by giving everyone equal access to the earth and its resources. He believed that land monopoly could be ended by taking the economic rent of all land and natural resources to meet the costs of government in lieu of taxes on labor and capital. George's writings revived interest in the ethos of the early settlers a time when sight was being lost of Pioneer America's contribution to the world's march toward freedom.     

Theϕ-divergence statistic in bivariate multinomial populations including stratification

ϕ-divergence statistics quantify the divergence between a joint probability measure and the product of its marginal probabilities on the basis of contingency tables. Asymptotic properties of these statistics are investigated either considering random sampling or stratified random sampling with proportional allocation and independence among strata. To finish same tests of hypotheses of independence are presented. The research in this paper was supported in part by DGICYT Grants No. PS91-0387 and No. PB91-0155. Their financial support is gratefully acknowledged.     

A sequential selectivity model of the decisions of arbitrators

The study investigates arbitrator gender and grievant gender effects on the decisions of 146 arbitrators rendered on a hypothetical drug-testing case. The effects are estimated using a sequential selectivity model. This approach takes into account the sequential and conditional nature of arbitrators' decisions. The results indicate that arbitrators are more likely to overturn terminations when the grievant is female, and that female arbitrators are less likely to fully reinstate grievants when the termination is overturned. Other results include the finding that older arbitrators treated grievants more harshly by more often awarding only partial reinstatements. When suspensions are given, however, we find that older arbitrators award shorter suspensions than do younger arbitrators. It is also found that more experienced arbitrators awarded longer suspensions than less experienced arbitrators.     

Design considerations for neyman-pearson and wald hypothesis testing

Summary The Neyman-Pearson Lemma describes a test for two simple hypotheses that, for a given sample size, is most powerful for its level. It is usually implemented by choosing the smallest sample size that achieves a prespecified power for a fixed level. The Lemma does not describe how to select either the level or the power of the test. In the usual Wald decision-theoretic structure there exists a sampling cost function, an initial prior over the hypothesis space and various payoffs to right/wrong hypothesis selections. The optimal Wald test is a Bayes decision rule that maximizes the expected payoff net of sampling costs. This paper shows that the Wald-optimal test and the Neyman-Pearson test can be the same and how the Neyman-Pearson test, with fixed level and power, can be viewed as a Wald test subject to restrictions on the payoff vector, cost function and prior distribution.     

Russian Nanotechnology Market: High-Technology Industry or Statistical Phenomenon

This article presents a medium-term forecast of the development of the Russian nanoindustry, taking into account the assumed transition of the industry from the formation stage to the investment growth stage. Problems associated with the estimated output volumes of products in the Russian nanoindustry are considered, since the trends recorded in the primary statistical data are very far from reflecting the real situation due to the imperfection of the system of statistics of nano-containing products, as well as a reduction of state funding and a decline in the intensity of research in the industry. It is concluded that a full-fledged industry has not been yet completely formed in Russia and it actually exists only as a statistical phenomenon; in addition, the project really set different objectives from the declared creation of a breakthrough high-technology branch.