MAINTAINING MARKET POSITION: TEAM PERFORMANCE,REVENUE AND WAGE EXPENDITURE IN THE ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE

This paper investigates the relationship between playing success and commercial success in team sports. Utilizing a data set relating to the English Premier League that combines both financial measures and indicators of playing skills and performances, our empirical analysis is based on three behavioural equations. Our analysis indicates that on‐field success can be directly related to players’ skills and abilities and that revenue is positively related to on‐field success. Wage expenditure is also shown to systematically reflect player skills and performances. One interpretation of this evidence is that investment in players’ skills and ability buys on‐field success, with richer teams becoming ever richer and able to maintain or even build upon success by spending more on players than less successful clubs. To the extent that richer clubs are successful in their objective there is a causal link between revenue earned and competitive imbalance via investments in players. The implications of this tendency within a league are discussed in our conclusion, which also considers the potentially wider implications of our study as they relate to the evolution of firm size and issues of market share.     

Agriculture and aggregate productivity: A quantitative cross-country analysis

A decomposition of aggregate labor productivity based on internationally comparable data reveals that a high share of employment and low labor productivity in agriculture are mainly responsible for low aggregate productivity in poor countries. Using a two-sector general-equilibrium model, we show that differences in economy-wide productivity, barriers to modern intermediate inputs in agriculture, and barriers in the labor market generate large cross-country differences in the share of employment and labor productivity in agriculture. The model implies a factor difference of 10.8 in aggregate labor productivity between the richest and the poorest 5% of the countries in the world, leaving the unexplained factor at 3.2. Overall, this two-sector framework performs much better than a single-sector growth model in explaining observed differences in international productivity.     

时艰更看领导力（上）

金融危机席卷而来。2009年,麦肯锡咨询公司特别采访了多家大公司的14名领导人,请他们反思自己觉得从危机中学到了什么。当然,这次访谈也不想把他们的评论仅仅局限于当前的衰退,还请他们思考了在以前扭亏为盈的转型或危机期间曾经面临的挑战。     

美国推进会计准则国际趋同的最新动向及思考

目前世界主要经济体几乎均已采用国际财务报告准则或发布了趋同路线图.我国已草拟了我国企业会计准则(CAS)与国际财务报告准则(IFKS)全面趋同的路线图,将"实质性趋同"推进到"全面趋同".然而,国际趋同是一个艰难的、互动的过程,我国现阶段国际趋同的成效只能说是刚刚迈出了第一步,随着国际会计准则理事会(IASB)应对金融危机重大项目的完成.我国会计准则可能再次与国际准则产生众多差异.作为积极推动会计准则国际趋同的重要力量,美国积极推行国际趋同所经历的战略转变以及所采取的措施,对我国会计准则国际趋同及其未来发展将具有重要的影响作用.本文拟通过追踪美国采用IFRS的进展和动态情况,阐述美国各界人士对采用IFRS的不同观点,旨在对我国会计准则国际趋同的未来提供借鉴.     

Does a factor Phillips curve help? An evaluation of the predictive power for U.S. inflation

This article evaluates various models’ predictive power for U.S. inflation rate using a simulated out-of-sample forecasting framework. The starting point is the traditional unemployment Phillips curve. We show that a factor Phillips curve model is superior to the traditional Phillips curve, and its performance is comparable to other factor models. We find that a factor AR model is superior to the factor Phillips curve model, and is the best bivariate or factor model at longer horizons. Finally, we investigate a New Keynesian Phillips curve model, and find that its forecasting performance dominates all other models at the longer horizons.     

Arbitrator Decision-Making in the Transfer Market: an Empirical Analysis

This paper analyses data generated by the annual round of arbitrated settlements of disputed transfer fees for end-of-contract players in the English Football League. Using information on final-offers of the disputant clubs and data on a variety of player and club characteristics we analyse arbitrated fees and final-offers, and the relative importance of final-offers and case facts in fashioning outcomes. Our analysis suggests that a large proportion of the variation in settlements can be accounted for by certain case facts rather than a mechanical compromise of final-offers, with the latter receiving a relatively low weight. In general, our findings are consistent with the view that conventional arbitration systems generate little useful information in terms of final-offers from the disputant parties.     

AGAINST LEVIATHAN: A REVIEW OF CLASSICAL LIBERALISM IN THE 21ST CENTURY: ESSAYS IN HONOUR OF NORMAN P. BARRY1

Classical Liberalism in the 21st Century is a collection of essays from colleagues and friends of the late Norman Barry, Professor of Social and Political Theory at the University of Buckingham. Most share Barry's Hayekian perspective. The essays cover themes such as: international competition in trade and between jurisdictions; the corporate social responsibility fad; secular economic errors; policies relating to alleged global warming; the state's impotence at removing externalities; the moral functions of competition; and, above all, Barry's rigour and eloquence in the economic and political case for freedom.