Re-thinking the future of work: Beyond binary hierarchies

How will work be organised in the future? This paper reveals that although there are multiple stories about the future of work, a similar storyline is adopted across many of the competing visions. Most visions firstly squeeze all forms of work into one side or the other or some dichotomy and then proceed to temporally and/or normatively sequence the two sides of the dualism and finally label the resultant one-dimensional and linear trajectory as some -ism, -ation or post-something-or-other. This paper evaluates critically such hierarchical binary narratives (e.g., the shift from informal to formal work, non-commodified to commodified work, localisation to globalisation, Fordism to post-Fordism, bureaucracy to post-bureaucracy) and displays how these dominant narratives, as well as the counter narratives that simply invert the temporal and/or hierarchical sequencing of these dichotomies, over-simplify lived practice. The paper concludes by offering a way forward that transcends these one-dimensional linear tales and recognises the heterogeneous and multiple directions of work in order to provide a more kaleidoscope-like understanding of the direction of work and open up the future of work to new possibilities.     

Wealth inequality and efficiency in the Commons, part II: the regulated case

Does more inequality lead to more efficiency in the managementof common property resources? To answer this question, an attemptis made to develop relevant theoretical models and to articulatethem with empirical evidence drawn mainly from social sciencestudies. The paper is divided into two parts. In this, the secondpart, it is shown that inequality tends to amplify the distributiveeffects of regulation when the latter is carried out throughthe use of second best instruments. As a resuh efficiency gainsfrom regulation must decrease as inequality increases, for allusers to gain from such regulation.     

中英高等教育之间的联结

高等教育往往是不同国家之间联系、发展的出发点,学校与学生之间长久关系的全球性联结的重要性已被世界各大院校所认知。 我所就职的大学──诺丁汉大学,很早就认识到中国的重要性,并且,多年来一直致力于与中国、澳大利亚、北美及欧洲的一流大学进行交流与合作,并且组建了 Ｕｎｉｖｅｒｓｉｔａｓ ２１──一个具有世界一流研究技术水平的资深大学所组成的国际性网络组织。 组建Ｕｎｉｖｅｒｓｉｔａｓ ２１的目的在于加强各大学之间的联系,鼓励我们的员工相互合作,学生相互交换,我们彼此间学到很多,通过大学之间的合作与共同努力…     

Do High Oil Prices Matter? Evidence on the Mobility Behavior of German Households

Focusing on travel survey data from Germany, this paper investigates the determinants of automobile travel, with the specific aim of quantifying the effects of fuel prices and fuel economy. The analysis is predicated on the notion that car mileage is a two-stage decision process, comprising the discrete choice of whether to own a car and the continuous choice of distance traveled. To capture this process, we employ censored regression models consisting of Probit and OLS estimators, which allows us to gauge the extent to which sample selectivity may bias the results. Our elasticity estimates indicate a significant positive association between increased fuel economy and increased driving, and a significantly negative fuel-price elasticity, which ranges between − 35% and − 41%. Taken together, these results suggest that fuel taxes are likely to be a more effective policy measure in reducing emissions than fuel-efficiency standards.      

Models of mortality rates – analysing the residuals

The area of mortality modelling has received significant attention over the last 25 years owing to the need to quantify and forecast improving mortality rates. This need is driven primarily by the concern of governments, insurance and actuarial professionals and individuals to be able to fund their old age. In particular, to quantify the costs of increasing longevity we need suitable model of mortality rates that capture the dynamics of the data and forecast them with sufficient accuracy to make them useful. In this article, we test several of the leading time series models by considering the fitting quality and in particular, testing the residuals of those models for normality properties. In a wide ranging study considering 30 countries we find that almost exclusively the residuals do not demonstrate normality. Further, in Hurst tests of the residuals we find evidence that structure remains that is not captured by the models.