Evolution of Smartn Players

To model the evolution of strategic intelligence, player types are drawn from a hierarchy of "smartness" analogous to the levels of iterated rationalizability. Nonrationalizable strategies die out, but when higher levels of smartness incur maintenance costs, being right is always as good as being smart. Moreover, if a manifest way to play emerges, then dumb players never die out, while smarter players with positive maintenance costs vanish. These results call to question the standard game-theoretic assumption of super-intelligent players. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: B40, C70, C72, C73.     

Divorce and female labor force participation: Evidence from times-series data and cointegration

The divorce rate in the United States has increased over the last 40 years. This increase was accompanied both by growing female labor force participation and rising female income. These changes were accompanied by a significant reduction in the birth rate for married women. This article uses time-series data and cointegration techniques to determine the direction of causality between these variables. Analysis of the impulse functions show that the divorce rate will increase if either female labor force participation or income increases. Positive innovations to the divorce rate increase the labor force participation rate of married women. Rising levels of income lead to greater female participation in the labor market.     

Information technology and the Japanese economy

In this paper we compare sources of economic growth in Japan and the United States from 1975 through 2003, focusing on the role of information technology (IT). We have adjusted Japanese data to conform to US definitions in order to provide a rigorous comparison between the two economies. The adjusted data show that the share of the Japanese gross domestic product devoted to investment in computers, telecommunications equipment, and software rose sharply after 1995. The contribution of total factor productivity growth from the IT sector in Japan also increased, while the contributions of labor input and productivity growth from the non-IT sector lagged far behind the United States. Our projection of potential economic growth in Japan from for the next decade is substantially below that in the United States, mainly due to slower growth of labor input. Our projections of labor productivity growth in the two economies are much more similar. J. Japanese Int. Economies 19 (4) (2005) 460–481.     

A short-run Johansen industry model for common-pool resources: planning a fishery's industrial capacity to curb overfishing

Current methods for assessing capacity and its utilisation infisheries operate at the firm-level, but neglect industry capacity.Here, we introduce the Johansen-Färe measure of plant capacityof the firm into a multi-output, frontier-based version of theshort-run Johansen industry model. The model determines firmcapacity utilisation such that current industry outputs aremaintained, while minimising the use of fixed inputs at industrylevel and assuming abundant variable inputs. Policy extensionsrelevant to combating overfishing include tightening quotas,seasonal closures, linking economic and plant capacity, decommissioningschemes and area closures, implementation issues and equityconsiderations. The application to the Danish fisheries revealssubstantial overcapacity in the Danish fleet.     

East Meets West: A Cross-Cultural Comparison of Charismatic Leadership Among Canadian and Iranian Executives

ABSTRACT This study first develops an empirically based Western charismatic leadership profile. Using confirmatory factor analysis, the profile is compared with a profile of Iranian managers. The results demonstrate that despite major cultural differences in the two countries, there are core similarities in the profiles across the two cultures. The Canadian charismatic profile of vision, tenacity, intellectual challenge, self-sacrifice, and eloquence is substantially confirmed within the Iranian sample. But we also show that Iranian managers' ratings are significantly lower than those of the Canadian managers, indicating potentially different behavioural manifestations. The paper speculates that while the differences are probably due to cultural differences, the similarities may be due to universal intrinsic human desire for morality, autonomy, and achievement.     

International Portfolio Diversification and the Magnitude of the Market Timer's Penalty

Market timers without timing skill suffer a penalty relative to buy-and-hold investors in the form of higher portfolio risk. With transactions costs, timers suffer lower expected returns as well. We derive the magnitude of this penalty for a timer randomly switching funds between two or more risky assets. Assuming costless trades, a U.S.-based timer randomly switching between U.S. and Japanese national stock funds can expect to face a 26.2% higher standard deviation than a comparable buy-and-hold investor at the same level of expected return. A timer randomly switching between a globally diversified equity portfolio and U.S. T-bills faces a 50.3% higher standard deviation of return than a comparable buy-and-hold investor.