Does International Harmonization of Environmental Policy Instruments Make Economic Sense?

Harmonization of the instruments used in environmental policy has beenconsidered necessary to guarantee fair competition in internationalmarkets. We examine the economic costs of harmonizing paper recyclingstandards in countries where the urgency of the waste disposal problemsdiffer. Using data of seven European countries we estimate thetechnologically feasible input combinations of pulp and waste paper forpaper production. Short-term effects of two environmental policy measures,minimum content requirement and utilization rate target, are analyzed. Bytranslating the two administrative instruments into taxes and subsidies, weshow that the shadow costs of the harmonization vary considerably betweencountries. The difference in the domestic availability of waste may explainthe variation, and a modification of the policy measures to incorporate thisaspect is suggested.     

Using managers' expectations for ex-ante policy evaluation: Evidence from the COVID-19 crisis

Evaluation of the impacts of government policies during an economic crisis is often delayed until the outcomes are realized. Policies can be better guided if they can be evaluated amid a crisis, before the realization of outcomes. This study examines whether survey data on the expectations of small business managers can help evaluate two high-stake subsidies for firms amid the COVID-19 crisis in Japan, namely, Subsidy Program for Sustaining Businesses (SPSB) and Employment Adjustment Subsidy (EAS). We evaluate the accuracy of managers' expectations, estimate the impact of subsidies on the expected firm survival, and compare it with the estimated impact on realized survival. We find that the managers' expectations on their future sales, survival rate, and the possibility of receiving these subsidies predict the realized outcomes, although they were highly pessimistic about their survival rates. We find that the estimated impacts of the SPSB on the expected survival rates have the same sign as the estimated impact on the realized survival rates, but the size is more than twice because of the pessimism on survival. The estimated impacts of the EAS are both insignificant. Therefore, although its impact may be overestimated, managers' expectations are useful for selecting an effective policy.     

A model for R&D performance measurement

R&D activities are increasingly costly and risky and, as a consequence, measuring their performance and contribution to value becomes critical. This paper illustrates a formal model for measuring R&D performance, based upon a balanced and synthetic evaluation of quantitative indicators from five different perspectives of performance: financial, customer, innovation and learning, internal business, alliances, and networks. The model is built in coherence with the suggestions coming from the theory of measurement in soft systems, which gives relevant guidelines for ensuring validity, objectivity and inter-subjectivity of the model. Then, an application in a real R&D setting is described, which helps to understand the model and to enlighten its main advantages and limits.     

Single factor models with Markovian spot interest rate: an analytical treatment

In the spirit of the Heath–Jarrow–Morton methodology, we provide an analytical characterization of bond prices within the context of single factor term structure models in which the spot rate follows a Markov process and the volatility structure of zero coupon bond returns is stochastic. Also, a perturbative analysis of the extended Cox–Ingersoll–Ross model is proposed. Received: 7 February 2001 / Accepted: 8 June 2002     

Gaussian clustering and jump-diffusion models of electricity prices: a deep learning analysis

Decisions in Economics and Finance - We propose a deep learning-based methodology to investigate the complex dynamics of electricity prices observed in power markets. The aims are: (a) to process...     

Conflict as a Tool for Measuring Ethics at Workplace

The article concentrates on problems, which emerge in the ongoing process of transforming a socialistic society to a western welfare society. This process does not only include economic aspects, as it might seem from several articles and books written about the subject. Often these societies, having established a stable financial and legal systems face much harder problems related to the prevailing values. They are not struggling anymore because of bad loans or lack of investment but because of outdated values and inability to adapt themselves to a changing world. To understand these difficulties better, 2000 conflicts, occurred during last four years in local companies, have been investigated.Conflict as the research tool has been chosen because it is a very informative phenomenon for revealing an organisation's general status. It sheds light on different aspects of problems, which occur during rapid development. We could name several conflict reasons but generally all of them stem from three sources:(1)Popularity of the early-capitalistic values(2)Inability to organise information according to needs(3)Outdated valuesThe article gives an overview about the reasons of conflicts in Estonian companies and ethical problems, which occur when managers start to solve these conflicts with power.     

Employees' choices in learning how to use information and communication technology systems at work: strategies and approaches

The purpose of this paper is to promote the understanding of how employees learn to use information and communication technology (ICT) systems at work. The elements of a learning activity in the context of ICT use are identified from the literature. In particular, approaches to learning, learning strategies and problem‐solving strategies are reviewed. The empirical part of the study examines how employees choose to start learning how to use ICT systems, and how they choose to learn while solving problems related to system use. The data were collected using qualitative semi‐structured interviews with 39 employees in three organizations. The interviewees usually preferred to learn how to use ICT quickly and without investing too much effort. The interviewees preferred informal learning and problem‐solving strategies. The most commonly used strategies were to try things out alone or together with peers, or to ask for help from peers. The main conclusions of the study are that the users' learning intentions affect the kind of learning support they need and that ICT learning is best approached as a learning activity strongly rooted in collaboration and the social context.     

International Enterprises and Trade Unions

A “shipping war” has broken out between two friendly neighbouring countries: Estonia (a rather poor land; liberated of Soviet occupation in 1991), and Finland (a wealthy one; independent since 1918). Led by their trade union the Finnish dockers boycott Estonian ships demanding for Estonian sailors the salary in the same range as that is in wealthy West-European countries. Estonian Sailors' Union finds that such a war is not for their better work-conditions but against their working possibilities: the cheap labour force is the only possibility for a poor country to entice foreign investments in it. No matter how the “shipping war” will be solved – the problem will remain. This is the problem of two opposites – cheap labour force of poor countries and expensive one of wealthy countries –, and international enterprises standing between them. Could such an enterprise survive without using the cheap labour force? And if it could, how could the poor countries survive then? Could there be found a clear unambiguous ethical solution? What ought to be the role of trade unions in such international business conflicts?     

Outsourcing and Offshoring: Implications for Productivity of Business Services

This paper reviews the implications of outsourcing and offshoringfor the productivity of business services in the UK. Officialstatistics indicate that business-service productivity has grownby over 20 per cent in the last 7 years at the same time asemployment grew by 20 per cent. The paper considers possiblefactors that account for the simultaneous growth of employmentand productivity. First, we discuss outsourcing and offshoring,and their role in enhancing productivity through greater specialization,standardization, and consolidation of business processes, anda shift to higher value-added services. Outsourcing of businessservices is interpreted as part of corporate restructuring,namely as the unbundling of corporate functions as well as verticaldisintegration. Second, as some services become more like products,both low-skilled and high-skilled jobs are subjected to productivitygrowth through standardization and digitization. It is argued,however, that the future of business-service productivity ison a knife-edge, depending on the mix of two sources of productivityenhancement—namely greater standardization and capturingvalue from customized solutions. Footnotes ¹ E-mail addresses: mari.sako{at}sbs.ox.ac.uk