Modern Technology in Provincial Offices: Some Empirical Evidence

Data from some 300 business service offices in eight British provincial cities is used to show that the adoption of information processing and telecommunications (IPT) equipment has been selective in relation to the status, function and location of establishments. Possession of certain kinds of IPT equipment increases the likelihood of other items being present. There is an inverse relationship between size of urban area and attitudes towards office technology and its adoption. Offices can be classified into a minority of positive adopters; a much larger group of conservative adopters; and a residual group of traditionalists, resolutely refusing to adapt their working practices.     

An empirical assessment of the preconditions of Japanese manufacturing foreign direct investment in the United States

An Empirical Assessment of the Preconditions of Japanese Manufacturing Foreign Direct Investment in the United States. — This study undertook a multivariate regression analysis of Japanese foreign direct investment in the US (FDIUS), based on firm- and industry-specific data. Firm size was a positive and significant explanatory variable of firms’ completed transactions as well as their additions to investment value. Firms’ overall profit was a positive and significant indicator of firms’ addition to investment value, but not their completed transactions. Firms’ return on assets was generally a positive, albeit insignificant indicator of FDIUS. Three industry-specific variables (prior exports to the US, industry concentration, and technological intensity) were examined and all were positive but insignificant indicators of FDIUS.     

The determinants of immigration-policy preferences in advanced economies: A cross-country study

This paper employs survey data to examine the determinants of immigration-policy preferences among ten advanced economies. Ordered probit specifications suggest that skill level is a robust determinant of immigration-policy preferences and that less-skilled workers are more likely to express a preference for policies that restrict immigration. The results also suggest that older individuals, members of trade unions, and those who classify their political ideology as conservative are more likely to favor limiting immigration while non-citizens are less likely to favor such policies. Individual country-level regression results vary, in particular with regard to the influence of trade union member-ship, which is a robust determinant of immigration-policy preferences for both measures of skill in only a subset of nations.     

Legislation and the American Dialysis Industry:

A bstract Monopoly power in the dialysis industry in the United States is linked to Public Lau'92-603 (section 2991) of the Social Security Amendments of 1972 under which 90 percent of all patients with end-stage renal disease became eligible for Medicare coverage In effect, Congress spawned a new government enterprise by removing the constraining factor of price to the consumer and legalizing government-subsidized monopoltes in renal care which were empowered with the right to supply renal care services within designated areas without competition Those who suffer from renal insufficiency encounter monopoly on the supply side of the product (dialysis units) market, and the labor market (kidney specialists) since outside nephrologists are not permitted to treat patients'assigned' to "closed staff" units     

Transportation Costs and US Manufacturing FDI

In empirical models of foreign direct investment (FDI), distance is most often used to proxy for transportation costs and other pure‐trade costs. Given that distance is time invariant but transportation costs are not, this approach is less than satisfactory when actual transportation costs rise and fall over time.The contribution of this work is to explicitly control for transportation costs and thereby better understand their impact on FDI. We explore the impact of shipping costs on total US FDI stocks abroad, manufacturing stocks and service stocks using measures of sea‐shipping and air‐shipping costs in a Hausman–Taylor model that controls for endogeneity and allows for time‐invariant variables such as distance. We find that transportation costs have a positive and statistically significant relationship with US total and manufacturing FDI, suggesting a substitute relationship between FDI and trade flows consistent with horizontal MNE activity. As one would expect, these costs are insignificant for service stocks.     

Shorter reviews

Crush, Jonathan and James Wilmot (eds.) Crossing boundaries: mine migrancy in a democratic South Africa Smith, Michael Peter (ed.) Marginal spaces: comparative urban and community research, volume 5 Harrington, J.W. and B. Wharf Industrial location: principles, practice and policy King, Desmond Separate and unequal. Black Americans and the US Federal government     

A comparative assessment of the productivity of Australia's public rail systems 1971/72–1991/92

There is a growing interest in the establishment of suitable measures of the overall performance of government business enterprises, particularly railways, which are a major recipient of government subsidy. They must improve their performance and become more cost efficient. Any policy designed to reduce costs must consider the implications of resultant actions on the overall productivity of a business. We propose the use of the total factor productivity index as an appropriate reference benchmark, to enable each railway to evaluate the productivity implications of any change to the operating and managerial environment. Using the Institute of Transport Studies' rail database, total factor productivity indices are derived annually from 1971/72 to 1991/92 for the 5 major public rail systems in Australia and sources of variation are identified.The paper recognizes the need to identify sources of variation in productivity which translate into operational guidelines for management in assisting them to improve performance over time. A contribution is the recognition of the importance of including both demand side (final output) and supply, side measures of output (intermediate output). Final output may be more important for monitoring the performance of an enterprise from a cost-effectiveness perspective, but a supply side measure is often more useful to operators because it is the dimension of output over which they have more control.The research reported in this paper was partially funded by an Australian Research Council grant (No. A78930595).