Renaissance attachment to things: material culture in last wills and testaments1

Over the past decade ‘material culture’ has become a sub‐discipline of Italian Renaissance studies. This literature, however, has focused on the rich and their objects preserved in museums or reflected in paintings. In addition, the period 1300 to 1600 has been treated without attention to changes in the relationship between people and possessions. The article turns to last wills and testaments, which survive in great numbers and sink deep roots through late medieval and Renaissance cities and their hinterlands. They reveal aspirations and anxieties about things from post‐mortem repairs to farm houses to pillows of monk's wool. These aspirations changed fundamentally after the Black Death. Earlier, during the ‘commercial revolution’, ordinary merchants, artisans, and peasants on their deathbeds practised what the mendicants preached: stripping themselves of their possessions, they converted their estates to coin to be scattered among pious and non‐pious beneficiaries. After the Black Death, testators began to reverse tack, devising ever more complex legal strategies to govern the future flow of their goods. This work of the dead had larger economic consequences. By encouraging the liquidation of estates, the earlier mendicant ideology quickened the velocity of exchange, while the early Renaissance attachment to things did the opposite.     

Using Market Structure to Regulate a Vertically Integrated Monopolist

A natural monopolist whose cost is private information produces a good which is combined with another good that can be produced by the monopolist or by other firms. The agency that regulates the monopolist can impose any of several different market structures in the industry: integrated monopoly, vertical separation with free entry downstream, or liberalization downstream (both integrated and independent production). When several firms produce downstream, a Cournot quantity-setting game with free entry determines the market price. We derive the optimal contracts to offer the monopolist under all three market structures and examine the influence of downstream cost differences on access prices.We then study the optimal regulatory policy where the regulator can condition the downstream market structure on the monopolist's cost report to the regulator. The optimal regulatory policy awards a monopoly to a low-cost upstream firm, but requires free entry downstream if the monopolist reports high upstream costs. Thus, the choice of market structure is an additional tool to limit rent extraction by the monopolist. Simulation analysis reveals the possibility of significant welfare gains from this additional regulatory tool.     

The upgrading effect of voluntary export restraints

Summary Given that a volume-defined VER is introduced on two differently priced varieties of a good,(i) the transfer of the VER-rent to the exporting country will cause imports of both varieties to fall,(ii) the relative price change in favour of the high cost variety counteracts this import fall and could in fact outweigh it,(iii) an ad valorem tariff restoring the original relative price of the two varieties would increase welfare and that welfare increase could in fact outweigh the welfare loss due to the VER-transfer to the exporting country.     

In Search of the Fourth Way: A Commentary on the Books by Fred Argy and Mark Latham

This paper is a critique of the new books by Mark Latham and Fred Argy, the first of which in particular is said to herald the 'Third Way' in Australian politics. It considers the implications for new policies of economic power and the redefinition of economic welfare, and concludes that if this is the Third Way then we are in need of a Fourth Way.     

Challenges to employment at will: A survey of the natural gas transmission industry

The natural gas transmission industry, once paternalistic towards its employees, is feeling the effects of challenges to the doctrine of employment at will, and is responding with policies that will increase managerial prerogatives. This article approaches the issue from the points of view both of law and of economics, and includes a survey of pipeline managers who must develop viable work rules in an environment of increasing expectations of employee rights and tightening market competition.     

Border tax adjustments and U.S. trade

This paper reports welfare and terms of trade effects from border adjustments in the indirect taxes used by major U.S. trading partners using a numerical general equilibrium model of world trade and production due to Whalley (1985). Where the United States is a net importer of manufactures (as with Japan and the EEC) the United States gains by having these countries administer taxes on a destination rather than an origin basis. This is because the taxes involved typically have higher rates on manufactured products, and a discriminatory origin basis tax with higher rates on exportables operates akin to an export tax.     

Developing a Leadership-Rich Culture: The Missing Link to Creating a Market-Focused Organization

Much has been written about the need for organizations to be more market-focused. Authors have addressed a myriad of constructs which promote the realization of the marketing concept. This article examines leadership and its development in the context of creating a market-focused organization. It links the areas of leadership development, leadership skills, and internal customer culture to the strategy development process. The emphasis in a leadership-rich culture is on the relationships between leaders, followers, and customers. This idea parallels existing thought in the relationship marketing literature touting the benefits of relationships in buyer-seller partnerships and network structures. In addition, this article offers a leadership deployment process to create a market-focused organization from top to bottom.     

Faith,hope and love: doing family through consuming pilgrimage

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to explore the consumption of Lourdes, a Catholic pilgrimage site in France. Based on a three-year ethnography, our findings focus on respondents’ ‘Lourdes stories’. Discussing themes of faith, hope and love, we illustrate the importance of the family in consuming Lourdes. Family members act as influencing agents in the initial and sometimes continuous consumption of Lourdes. Our findings differ from consumer research to date in that rather than furthering discussion of family structure or furthering discussion on family identity we suggest a new focus is the actual building of intimate family bonds and relationships – the ‘doing’ of family or ‘familying’ – with the context of the Lourdes pilgrimage offering consumers a unique setting comprising faith, fun and family.