Screening when some agents are nonstrategic: does a monopoly need to exclude?

We characterize the optimal screening mechanism for a monopolist facing consumers with privately known demands, some of whom have limited abilities to misrepresent their preferences. We show that consumers with better abilities to misrepresent information benefit from the presence of consumers who lack such abilities. Whenever the fraction of the latter group is positive, there is no exclusion: the firm supplies a positive quantity of the good to all consumers whose valuations exceed marginal cost of production. Our analysis is motivated by the evidence indicating that some individuals have limited ability to misrepresent themselves and imitate others.     

Contextual Factors Affecting Quality of Work Life and Career Attitudes of Gay Men

With the current political environment (such as new legislation recognising gay and lesbian couples) and societal changes (such as increasing disclosure of sexual identity in the workplace) in countries such as the USA and Australia, organizations are increasingly recognising the existence of their gay and lesbian employees. This paper reports on an on-line survey of 581 working gay men, examining their quality of work life and career attitudes. The findings of the research provide a strong indication that contextual factors affect the quality of work life and work attitudes of gay men.     

Are corporates' target leverage ratios time-dependent?

This paper extends the stationary-leverage-ratio model to incorporate a time-dependent target leverage ratio. The theoretical hypothesis of the existence of a time-dependent target leverage ratio reflects the movement of a firm's initial target ratio toward a long-term target ratio over time. Using some simple scenarios about the time-dependence of the target leverage ratio, the numerical results show that the incorporation of the hypothesis into the stationary-leverage-ratio model is capable of producing term structures of probabilities of default that are consistent with some empirical findings. The results provide some evidences to support the hypothesis.     

International spillover effects of consumption taxation

This paper investigates the international spillover effects of a revenue-neutral increase in consumption taxes coupled with a reduction in wage taxes in a two-country open economy. Many economists feel that the consumption tax would be an improvement over the income tax. This paper provides counterexamples to the conventional wisdom. We show that conversion to a consumption tax may reduce capital accumulation and may transmit a negative externality to the rest of the countries in the world economy under certain conditions: endogenous labor supply and bequests.     

The perceived legitimacy of managerial influence: A twenty-five year comparison

The study examines perceptions of managers, nonmanagerial employees, students, and union officers regarding the legitimacy of managerial influence over various subordinate behaviors and beliefs. The results indicate that: (1) perceived legitimacy has decreased since a comparable study by Schein and Ott in 1962, (2) perceived legitimacy is generally related to proximity to the managerial role, (3) there is a high degree of consensus on the relative legitimacy of influencing various behaviors and beliefs, and (4) only issues of direct relevance to work and task performance are currently perceived as legitimate areas for managerial influence. Theoretical, research, and managerial implications are discussed. Blake Ashforth is Assistant Professor of Management at Concordia University in Montreal. His research interests include the adjustment of newcomers to work, organizational socialization, and the dysfunctions of organizational structures and processes. His work has appeared in the Academy of Management Review, Human Relations, and Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes.Raymond Lee is a doctoral candidate in Industrial/Organizational Psychology at Wayne State University in Detroit. His research interests include occupational stress and adjustment, work climate, and organizational socialization. His dissertation examines the antecedents and consequences of job burnout among supervisors in a large public welfare agency.The authors are indebted to Gary Johns and Ed Schein for their helpful comments on an earlier draft, and to Barrie Gibbs, Ed Schein, Hal Stack, and Susan Taylor for very kindly assisting in the collection of data at their respective campuses. The data were collected while the first author was at Wayne State University, Detroit. An earlier version of the paper was presented at the 1988 meeting of the Council on Employee Responsibilities and Rights in Virginia Beach, VA.     

Spatial dimensions of precision agriculture: a spatial econometric analysis of millet yield on Sahelian coversands

The identification of local soil variability caused by within‐field differences of macronutrients and ecological features is of paramount importance for the effectiveness of precision agriculture. We present several spatial statistical and econometric techniques to capture local differences in soil variation, ecological characteristics, and yield more effectively than the analytical techniques traditionally used in agronomy. The application of these techniques is illustrated in a case study dealing with precision agriculture in the West African Sahel. The production of millet on acid sandy soils constitutes a typical example of low soil fertility areas exhibiting small absolute but large relative differences in crop production conditions over short distances.