Explaining Firm Emergence: Specialization,Transaction Costs,and the Integration Process

This article explains firm emergence and the role of firms in the market structure using the productive power of specialization. Based on productivity efficiencies through technological specialization, a model for firm emergence is drafted alongside Coasean transaction cost theory. I find that transaction costs cannot explain firm emergence, but the entrepreneurial specialization perspective here adopted provides a promising approach to understanding the firm's function to the entrepreneur and its internal organization and capabilities. It suggests a foundational framework for studying the creation of capabilities and the interplay between markets, firms, and entrepreneurs. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Sex and environmental policy in the U.S. House of Representatives

Using LCV score data, we find that female legislators favor stricter environmental policies than do their male counterparts. Moreover, gender-corrected estimates suggest that voters do not push environmental policy towards the middle, but rather select the ideologically closest candidate.     

Technology in the rear-view mirror: how to better incorporate the history of technology into technology education

The history of technology can play an important role in illuminating the fundamentals of technological change, but it is important that technology teachers, teacher educators, curriculum developers and researchers can be provided with good analytical tools for this purpose. In this article, we propose a model of techno-historical interplay, as a help in deciding what historical artefacts and systems should be included in technology curricula and teaching as well as in analyzing and conveying to students the fundamental issues of technological change. We want to emphasize particularly three points of importance in employing the model as a tool of analysis. First of all, it is crucial to decide what one wants the technologically literate student to know about technology and technological change. This should include an awareness of the historical and geographical contingency of any technology. Second, on the basis of this decision one should adapt the model as a tool for selecting relevant technologies. Third, the model should be applied as an instrument of analysis of the history of the selected technological artefacts or systems as well as theories of technological development.     

Can sickness absence be affected by information meetings? Evidence from a social experiment

During the last decade several empirical studies have stressed the importance of norms and social interactions for explaining sickness-absence behavior. In this context, public discussions about the intentions of the insurance, and of the rights and duties of the receivers, may be important for reducing the sickness absence. In this article, we study whether information meetings about the Swedish sickness insurance affect the length of sickness-absence spells. The study is based on experimental data on individuals with weak labor market attachments. The displacement of when the call to the meeting was sent out was randomized. Comparing the survival functions of those called immediately with those whose calls were delayed (by about 30 days) makes it possible to study whether the length of sickness absence is affected by receiving the call earlier. The result suggests that the length is reduced by, on average, 20%. In the long term (12 months later), there is no effect of the information meeting. This suggests that attendance to the information meeting does not change individuals’ long-term behavior.     

The evolution of service innovation research: a critical review and synthesis

The number of service innovation articles has increased dramatically in the past 25 years. By reviewing 128 articles published between 1986 and 2010, primarily in leading marketing and innovation journals, this study analyzes the progression of service innovation research according to topicality and perspective. The authors summarize prior research by clustering it into three evolutional phases and drawing parallels with the evolution of the wider services marketing field. Overall, the view of service innovation has evolved, from a complement of traditional product innovation to a multidimensional, all-encompassing notion that entails several functions, both within and outside the firm.     

The relationship between domestic and outward foreign direct investment: The role of industry-specific effects

Previous research has been inconclusive as regards the effect of outward foreign direct investment (FDI) on domestic investments. In this article, we show that this inconclusiveness can be explained at a disaggregated level as a function of the way industries are organized. Based on a simple theoretical framework including monitoring and trade costs, we argue that a complementary relationship can be expected to prevail in vertically integrated industries, whereas a substitutionary relationship can be expected in horizontally organized production. The empirical analysis confirms a significant difference between the two categories of industry as regards the impact of outward FDI on domestic investment. The results may thus have profound policy implications. JEL no. F12, F21, F23, G34.     

Internet service provision and content services: paid peering and competition between internet providers

We consider the relationship of Internet service providers (ISP) and content service providers (CP) in the Internet ecosystem. Currently, the position of ISPs is challenged by the emergence of powerful content service providers, especially with the spreading of bandwidth-demanding video services. The further investment in the network capacity may be hindered by prevailing business models that largely exclude the ISPs from sharing in the major cash flows resulting from content provision. We develop modeling tools for evaluation of business models of ISPs and present results of an analysis of two models with the potential for the generation of additional cash flows for ISP: paid content peering and service differentiation. Firstly, we show that under certain conditions on the cost structure and the level of demand elasticity and uncertainty, it can be profitable for a powerful content provider to resort to paid content peering, thus transferring to the ISP a part of his content provision revenue. The resulting business model may provide substantial benefits to all major participants in this ecosystem: network providers, content and service providers and end users. After this we consider competition in the Internet provision sector and show that - also in this case - the paid content peering can help ISPs to expand the network capacity and at the same time increase profits of content providers. The end users benefit from the lower prices for content services. Finally, we consider the situation when an ISP differentiates the service offer by engaging in content provision, thus entering in direct competition with content providers.     

Using local injury surveillance for community-based injury prevention: an analysis of scandinavian WHO safe community and canadian safe community foundation programmes

Injury surveillance is widely recognized as a critical prerequisite for effective injury prevention, yet few studies have investigated its use by community-based injury prevention programmes. This study examined the extent to which local injury data were collected, documented, analysed, linked to injury prevention action and used for evaluation among WHO Safe Communities in Scandinavia (25 programmes) and the Canadian Safe Community Foundation (SCF) network (16 programmes). For each programme, a key informant with relevant local knowledge was selected to respond to an emailed questionnaire. The study demonstrates that community-based injury prevention programmes experience difficulties accessing and effectively utilizing local injury surveillance data. The findings suggest that the responding SCF programmes approach injury prevention more scientifically than the Scandinavian WHO-designated Safe Community programmes, by making greater use of injury surveillance for assessment, integration into prevention strategies and measures, and evaluation. Despite study limitations, such as the low response rate among Canadian programmes and a large number of non-responses to two questions, the results highlight the importance of, and need for, greater use of local injury surveillance.     

Formulae of recurrence for the semiinvariants at a class of frequency functions of more variables

Abstract

In a paper in this journal¹ Mr. Paul Qvale has proved following theorem: