On the natural selection rule in general linear models

We consider a problem of selecting the best treatment in a general linear model. We look at the properties of the natural selection rule. It is shown that the natural selection rule is minimax under to “0–1” loss function and it is a Bayes rule under a monotone permutation invariant loss function with respect to a permutation invariant prior for every variance balanced design. Some other condition on the design matrix is given so that a Bayes rule with respect to a normal prior will be of simple structure.     

The Impact of Survey Methodology and Context on Central Tendency,Nonresponse and Associations of Subjective Indicators of Government Performance

A comparison is given of (ordinal) measures of trust in government institutions that were collected with the aim of facilitating comparisons between different modes and contexts of data collection. Statistical analyses reveal that the mode effect could amount upto a 10% change of item nonresponse and a 9% change of the level of trust, whereas the context effect could lead upto a 19% change of the bivariate associations of trust. The observed changes of both measures of central tendency and of associations affect conclusions of social scientific research in isolated studies, which implies that comparative studies are seriously hampered by bias related to mode and context, two sources of obscurity adding to the two other threats which are differences of sample source and differences of question phrasing.     

„Problemsucher,Problemfinder und Problemlöser in einem sind gefragt“

Ohne Zusammenfassung Dr. Matthias Salge (43) leitet seit 2004 das operative und strategische Controlling der Volksfürsorge. Davor war er in der Corporate-Finance Beratung der Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaft PricewaterhouseCoopers sowie bei der Frankfurter Allianz als Vorstandsassistent und im Vertrieb t?tig. Er hat an den Universit?ten G?ttingen, Kiel und Barcelona Volkswirtschaftslehre studiert und über ein kapitalmarkttheoretisches Thema an der Universit?t Kiel promoviert. Daniele Baldino (32) leitet seit 2005 im Controlling der Volksfürsorge die Abteilung Strategisches Controlling. Die berufliche Laufbahn in der AMB Generali Gruppe begann er 2002 als Vorstandsassistent, zun?chst in der Volksfürsorge, anschlie?end in der Konzernzentrale. Davor war er in der KPMG Unternehmensberatung sowie im Private-Equity-Umfeld t?tig. Baldino hat European Business Studies (EBS) in Regensburg studiert mit Aufenthalten in Frankreich und Gro?britannien.     

The economics of a good party: Social mechanics and the legitimization of art/culture

Putting value on cultural goods is a messy business. Cultural value is not just an economic act but instead part of an intense social process of valorization and legitimization. Art/culture is socially consumed and socially aware. Economic value is determined by intangible (and ephemeral) social value formed from and within specific contexts by particular people, the “scene”, so to speak. What are the mechanisms by which the social dynamics of art/culture impact its economic legitimacy? This article looks at how art/culture attains market value, focusing on the social contexts by which culture is produced, evaluated and distributed.     

Interne Revision &; Controlling — Instrumente moderner Unternehmensführung in Kooperation

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

The Brand Choice Model of Wine Consumers: A Multinomial Logit Model

The objective of this study is to determine factors influencing brand preferences of wine consumers in the Marmara region where viniculture and wine production is so important in Turkey. First, the consumers’ preferences survey has been conducted with 1022 persons in the region randomly selected and evaluated. Then, the informative factors influencing brand preferences collected in these surveys have been determined by the multinomial logit model. A lot of independent variables have been used in the multinomial logit model, but, because some independent variables were not found as significant according to Likelihood Ratio test, these variables are not included in the multinomial logit analysis. Six important factors influencing wine brand preferences have been determined. These factors are brand change causes of consumers, occupation of consumers, marital status of consumers, birthplace of consumers, income of consumers and gender of consumers. In addition, whether the wine brand preferences are independent, has been tested with Testing Independence of Irrelevant Alternatives of Hausman. According to this test, it has been found that the wine brand preferences are independent.     

Systemtheorie,Shareholder Value-Konzept und Stakeholder-Konzept als theoretisch-konzeptionelle Bezugsrahmen der Balanced Scorecard

Zusammenfassung  Die theoretisch-konzeptionelle Würdigung der Balanced Scorecard steht trotz ihres Siegeszuges in der Praxis noch immer in den Anf?ngen. Der vorliegende Beitrag weist die Systemtheorie, das Shareholder Value-Konzept und das Stakeholder-Konzept als theoretisch-konzeptionelle Bezugsrahmen der Balanced Scorecard aus. Damit werden zugleich Modifikationsm?glichkeiten der Balanced Scorecard angedeutet, die sich aus einer noch konsequenteren Anlehnung an einen der drei Ans?tze ergeben k?nnten. Prof. Dr. Jan K?rnert ist Inhaber des Stiftungslehrstuhls für Allgemeine Betriebswirtschaftslehre, insb. Internationales Finanzmanagement/Kapitalm?rkte Dr. Cornelia Wolf ist Gesch?ftsführerin des Studentenwerkes Greifswald     

Reason rules...: the utility of rationality and the rationality of utility

Almost every theory of human behavior is based upon some assumption of rationalty. Such an assumption is commonly believed to be necessary in order to distinguish rational behavior, which is, from non-rational behavior, which is not amenable to scientific investigation. This article presents a thorough re-examination of this assumption, an inquiry which turns out to raise all the central issues of both the methodology and the theory of behavioral inquiry generally. It leads to the somewhat surprising conclusion that the notion of rationality does not have any meaningful role to play in behavioral inquiry, and that there is no sense in distinguishing rational from non-rational or irrational behavior. It also shows that the generalization of the utility notion in terms of information makes it into a much more powerful and subtle tool of analysis than it commonly appears to be taken for.     

India's Evolving Economic Model:

Abstract Over the course of the past 50 years, India has developed as a stable economy. Economic policies of the Indian government have guided and shaped India into a mixed economy. Political stability has been a significant factor in this process. The United States and European economic and political systems had a significant impact on evolution of India's economic model. Financial and economic reforms since 1991 have accelerated the pace of change toward an open market economy both in its internal operations and in its linkages with the global markets. India's economic future is now promising as it moves forward on its unique path of economic policy.     

NUMERICAL METHODS FOR ESTIMATION AND INFERENCE IN BAYESIAN VAR-MODELS

In Bayesian analysis of vector autoregressive models, and especially in forecasting applications, the Minnesota prior of Litterman is frequently used. In many cases other prior distributions provide better forecasts and are preferable from a theoretical standpoint. Several of these priors require numerical methods in order to evaluate the posterior distribution. Different ways of implementing Monte Carlo integration are considered. It is found that Gibbs sampling performs as well as, or better, then importance sampling and that the Gibbs sampling algorithms are less adversely affected by model size. We also report on the forecasting performance of the different prior distributions. © 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.