Learning to Live with Loans? International Policy Transfer and the Funding of Higher Education

Over the last decade or so a number of OECD economies have migrated from providing higher education free at the point of consumption to levying user charges. However, rather than charges for tuition being paid up‐front, contributions have taken the form of income‐contingent loans. Graduates therefore contribute to the costs of their education, after they have graduated and when they are earning. The earliest example of this instrument was in Australia, with the introduction of the Higher Education Contributions Scheme (HECS). This paper argues that following their successful introduction in Australia, income‐contingent loans offer a good example of successful international policy transfer, with elements of that scheme being adopted and modified for use in New Zealand, South Africa and the United Kingdom. The paper reviews the conditions for successful policy transfer and discusses the reasons why the arrangements have not proliferated in non‐OECD countries.     

Wealth effects of time variation in investor risk preferences

We investigate the source of risk premiums: individual risk preferences. By examining the wealth characteristics of agents of different risk preferences, we study the financial incentive of investors to demonstrate different risk preferences. To accomplish this, we model the stock market utilizing artificial adaptive agents. If investors have incentive to vary their risk preferences, or if investors of a constant risk preference vary the way they participate in the market under different market conditions, this could lead to time variation in market risk premiums. We find that agents have significant incentive to demonstrate different risk preferences under different market conditions.(JEl G12)     

Institutional Portfolios: Diversification through Farmland Investment

This article demonstrates that farmland can enhance the overall performance of institutional portfolios which are currently dominated by stocks, bonds, and business real estate. Unlike previous articles on farmland returns, this article addresses the issue of "smoothing bias" associated with appraisal-based farmland returns. Improved measures of income returns to farmland are also used in developing the estimates of optimal portfolios. Parametric testing revealed that farmland continues to enter the optimal portfolios even for large increases in the variance or for large reductions in the annual returns to farmland.     

Concentration-price relations in regional fed cattle markets

Since 1977, the U.S. beef packing industry has been restructured at a pace unprecedented in large American industries. By 1987, four packers slaughtered over two-thirds of all steers and heifers. In the thirteen regional feedlot-packer markets studied here, the four leading packers slaughtered 85 percent of fed cattle, on average. The impact of packer concentration on fed cattle prices during 1971–86 was examined using several econometric models. The results generally support the hypothesis that packer concentration was negatively related to live cattle prices. Cattle prices were estimated to be about 3 percent less in the most concentrated region compared to the least concentrated region. There was evidence of a critical concentration of CR₄=60 in regional livestock markets.     

Empathy and the salesperson: A multidimensional perspective

Prior studies of empathy have yielded conflicting findings regarding the effectiveness of empathy in improving salesperson performance. This article integrates a multidimensional conceptualization of empathy from the psychology literature with existing theory from marketing literature to suggest that perspective taking, empathic concern, emotional contagion, and controlling behaviors will differentially effect salesperson performance. Responses from a survey of business-to-business salespeople indicate that empathy has both positive and negative effects. Implications of the findings are explored. © 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

The future of Europe - and Britain's economic future in Europe: the perspective of a Europe-based multinational

The paper asks why Europe matters, what a company like Unilever wants from Europe, what developments will deliver these conditions and whether it matters if Britain is in or out of Europe. It concludes that the most important benefit from Europe has been the Single Market. Developments which promote it such as EMU should be supported but other economic issues such as competitiveness and unemployment also need to be addressed. The benefits of the Single Market can most easily be secured inside Europe.     

Equalizing opportunity through small business development: A south african perspective

The active development of the small firm sector is thought to present a vehicle highly appropriate to the task of equalizing opportunity in a very unequal society—the developing country of South Africa. This article seeks to evaluate the merits of the above assumption. It calls for a closer understanding of the unique difficulties encountered by a minority business group that has experienced a long history of prejudice and discrimination, namely the black, essentially small business sector of South Africa. The author calls for careful appraisal of available development initiatives in order to effectively serve the interests of this group.     

PRACTITIONERS CORNER: Tests for Cointegration in Models with Regime and Trend Shifts

ABSTRACT Recently Gregory and Hansen (1996) proposed a number of residual-based tests for cointegration in models with the possibility of a structural break. They considered three models: (i) level shift; (ii) level shift with trend; and (iii) regime shift (both level shift and slope coefficients can change). We introduce a more general model that permits a trend shift as well as a regime shift and we provide the critical values appropriate for testing this hypothesis.     

Social Cost and Groves Mechanisms

When an individual's reported preference scheme makes a difference to the selection of a policy, that individual's report imposes a cost on the rest of society because the selected policy would have been different had the individual's reported preference been different. In a paper in Economic Notes, Giacomo Bonanno argues that the penalty assessed by the pivotal mechanism is not equal to the cost that the individual's participation imposes on the rest of society. This note argues to the contrary, by presenting what we believe to be the correct definition of social cost.
(J.E.L: D62, D71, H41).