Cost Accounting and Performance Measurement in a Just-in-Time Production Environment

There are normative statements in the literature, backed up by case observations and anecdotal evidence, which indicate that manufacturing companies operating just-in-time (JIT) production management systems should also change their cost accounting systems and place greater reliance on non-financial performance indicators. This study provides empirical evidence suggesting that JIT manufacturing companies which have made some degree of modification to their costing system demonstrate higher performance than JIT companies which have not made changes. The results also suggest that greater use of non-financial performance indicators is associated with higher performance irrespective of the production management system adopted.     

Estimation of commodity-by-commodity input–output matrices

In this paper we derive a method for the estimation of symmetric input–output tables (SIOTs), which makes it possible to use the commodity technology assumption even when use- and make tables are rectangular. The method also solves the problem of negative coefficients. In the empirical part we derive annual SIOTs in order to evaluate the differences between SIOTs calculated with different methods and the change in technical coefficients over time. Our results, based on data for Sweden, show that the impact of using different technology assumptions is rather large. However, in a factor content of trade application the impact of different technology assumptions does not seem to be very important. Also the size of the changes in the technical coefficients over time is found to be quite large, indicating the importance of calculating SIOTs annually.     

Match Point Management — Gleichzeitig Kosten- und Marktperformance verbessern

Der Matchpoint entscheidet über Sieg oder Niederlage. Match Point Management zeigt, wie man Krisen meistert, indem man gleichzeitig Gewinn und Kosten verbessert — ohne in die Falle eines zyklischen Auf und Ab zu tappen.     

Should countries block foreign takeovers of R&D champions and promote greenfield entry?

Abstract In R&D intensive industries, governments promote greenfield foreign investments, while being sceptical towards foreign acquisitions of domestic high‐quality firms. We develop a theoretical model that shows that foreign acquisitions are conducive to high‐quality targets because of strategic effects on the sales price. However, foreign firms ‘cherry pick’ high‐quality targets to expand R&D rather than to downsize. Otherwise, rivals expand R&D, making the acquisition unprofitable. Thus, our model predicts that acquired affiliates invest more in R&D than greenfield affiliates. Using affiliate data, we find evidence that acquired affiliates have a higher level of sequential R&D intensity than greenfield affiliates.     

Candidate stability and nonbinary social choice

Summary. The requirement that a voting procedure be immune to the strategic withdrawal of a candidate for election can be formalized in different ways. Dutta, Jackson, and Le Breton (Econometrica, 2001) have recently shown that two formalizations of this candidate stability property are incompatible with some other desirable properties of voting procedures. This article shows that Grether and Plott's nonbinary generalization of Arrow's Theorem can be used to provide simple proofs of two of their impossibility theorems. Received: August 15, 2001; revised version: March 11, 2002 RID="*" ID="*" Parts of this article were previously circulated in somewhat different form in a working paper with the same title by the second author. We are grateful to Michel Le Breton and an anonymous referee for their comments. Correspondence to:J.A. Weymark