Male–female wage discrimination in Chinese industryInvestigation using firm‐level data1

We use firm‐level data to analyze male–female wage discrimination in China's industry. We find that there is a significant negative association between wages and the share of female workers in a firm's labour force. However, we also find that the marginal productivity of female workers is significantly lower than that of male workers. Comparing wage gaps and productivity gaps between men and women, we notice an intriguing contrast between state‐owned enterprises (SOEs) and private firms. The wage gap is smaller than the productivity gap in SOEs, while the converse is true for private firms. These results suggest that women in the state sector receive wage premiums, whereas women in the private sector face wage discrimination.     

INTERCONNECTION AGREEMENT BETWEEN INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDERS AND THE OPTIMAL POLICY INTERVENTION: THE CASE OF COURNOT‐TYPE COMPETITION UNDER NETWORK EXTERNALITIES*

We derive the optimal subsidy policy for an interconnection agreement between two symmetric Internet service providers (ISPs) competing á la Cournot in a network service market. The interconnection quality agreed upon is lower than the socially optimal level, as suggested by Crémer et al. (2000 ). In the basic model where both ISPs compete in the domestic market, the optimal investment subsidy rate depends positively on the strength of network externalities. In the extended model where home and foreign ISPs compete in the home market, the optimal subsidy rate for the home government is higher than in the basic model.     

Demand under product differentiation: an empirical analysis of the US wine market*

Oversupply has led to a number of perplexities for the Australian wine industry in recent times. When disaggregated from the industry level, however, the problem can be better described as a range of attribute‐specific disequilibria. To date, the solutions to this problem have predominantly revolved around supply‐side policies of reducing output through crop thinning or vine pulling. By contrast, this paper focuses on the demand side and argues that the disequilibria may be reduced by gaining a better understanding of the demand for Australian wine. A discrete choice model of product differentiation is used to estimate the demand for wine in Australia's second largest export market, the United States. Implications of the analysis are explored.     

THE REVENUE‐SHARING RULE FOR INTERCONNECTION CHARGES*

In this paper we explore the economic principle behind the revenue‐sharing rule for interconnection charges. Our main finding is that symmetric firms can collude by splitting the revenues equally. We further characterize the optimal revenue‐sharing ratio and discuss the relationship between optimal ratio and the optimal access price. We also show that the revenue‐sharing rule can have the perverse effect of inducing a firm to raise its own costs in order to gain a higher share of revenues.     

Building consumer–brand relationship: A cross‐cultural experiential view

This research aims to develop a framework of consumer–brand relationship by taking an experiential view. In this article, the authors report a cross‐cultural comparative study that was conducted on a sample of real consumers at coffee chain stores in Shanghai, China, and Taipei, Taiwan. The findings reveal that individual as well as shared experiences work through brand association, brand personality, brand attitude, and brand image to shape a consumer–brand relationship. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

双重委托代理理论与股权集中型公司治理最优化研究综述

基于双重委托代理理论模型构建的股权集中型公司治理最优化研究,试图基于双重委托代理理论模型的构建而确立一种股权集中型公司治理问题的一般分析框架,希冀解析基于一定公司治理环境及其变迁的公司治理最优化特别是股权集中型公司治理最优化这一问题的理论涵义与实践要旨,其对于丰富公司治理理论与促进公司治理实践的重要意义不言而喻.本文由此出发,对既有相关研究进行了述评,并有基于此,就基于双重委托代理理论模型构建的股权集中型公司治理最优化研究的主要内容与关键问题进行了阐述.     

Changing investment styles: style creep and style gaming in the hedge fund industry

Notwithstanding their common features, hedge funds remain an extremely diverse asset class. Information on fund styles is important for numerous purposes, such as portfolio construction, performance attribution and risk management. With fund self‐declaration being prone to (strategic) misclassification, return‐based taxonomies grouping funds along similarities in realized returns provide a useful alternative. We provide a consistent classification system of homogeneous groups of hedge funds based on self‐organizing maps. Whereas some fund categories such as managed futures are largely consistent in their self‐declared strategies, others, especially so‐called ‘equity hedge’ funds, display no or very limited return similarities. Furthermore, we also find evidence of fund managers performing undisclosed changes of their trading style over time. Those funds that misclassified themselves once are particularly likely to change their trading style again. Although style self‐declaration can, therefore, be quite misleading, our results indicate that hedge funds do not misdeclare their style strategically to improve their relative performance. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Competition and Concentration in the New European Banking Landscape

This paper measures the degree of concentration and competition in the enlarged European Union (EU) banking environment over the period 1998–2002. In the empirical part we opt for a methodology as proposed by Panzar and Rosse based on a non‐structural estimation of market competition. Our results suggest that European banks were operating under conditions of monopolistic competition and that bank interest revenues in the 10 new EU member states was earned under conditions of higher competition than those that existed in the old EU banking countries. The opposite result was observed for total operating revenues. Smaller banks earn interest income in a less competitive environment than larger banks, while the opposite is observed for total revenues.