A note on the “size” of determinacy and indeterminacy

Summary. It is shown in this note that in an incomplete markets economy with uncountably many states of the world there may be uncountably many isolated equilibria as well as uncountably many non-isolated equilibria. Moreover, both subsets can be simultaneously of second category. Therefore, none of the subsets can be considered negligible with respect to the other, neither from a cardinality point of view nor from a topological one. Unfortunately, this fact prevents from claiming that these economies may have “typically” determinate equilibria – even though uncountably many of them – as would have been desirable for comparative statics exercises. Received: May 19, 1995; revised version: March 24, 1997     

Non-neutral responses to money supply shocks when consumption and leisure are Pareto substitutes

Summary. To a greater extent than is often stressed in existing literature, preference assumptions affect responses to money shocks in equilibrium monetary models. Temporary money shocks can have persistent real effects if the marginal utility of leisure is a decreasing function of consumption, where leisure is measured as time endowment less market labor effort, and consumption refers to market produced goods. This condition is an empirically supported implication of home production models. Though not theoretically necessary for supporting the existence of short run real effects, the presence of distortionary taxes and endogenous productivity can have significant quantitative effects on responses to temporary money supply shocks. Received: August 21, 1996; revised version: February 3, 1997     

The last word on Giffen goods?

Summary. Giffen goods have long been a minor embarrassment to economics. While it is customary to dismiss them as empirically irrelevant, this essay argues that a more fundamental difficulty with Giffen goods has somehow been overlooked. Received: March 20, 1996; revised version: February 3, 1997     

Rubinstein bargaining with two-sided outside options

Summary. In this note we show that if in the standard Rubinstein model both players are allowed to leave the negotiation after a rejection, in which case they obtain a payoff of zero, then there exist a continuum of subgame-perfect equilibrium outcomes, including some which involve significant delay. We also fully characterize the case in which, upon quitting, the players can take an outside option of positive value. Received: February 27, 1996; revised version: March 28, 1997     

Reforming state-market relations in rural China1

Because of the political importance of stable and affordable food prices, governments in transitional economies in Europe and Asia fkequently struggle to balance the desire to maintain state controls in the rural sector with the goal of promoting market development and privatizing or commercializing state agencies involved in rural trade or finance. This paper examines institutional change in China's rural state agencies during the reform period, focusing on the conflict between managerial incentives to maximize profits, on the one hand, and implement policy, on the other. We explain the reasons for changing contractual incentives and authority arrangements over time, assess the effects of new institutional forms on economic performance and policy implementation, and consider reform options.     

Russian commodity exchanges: A case study of organized markets in the transition process, 1990-96

Few developments are more significant in transitional economics than the development of organized commodity and financial markets. Working from a transaction costs framework, this paper analyses a set of these markets, the Russian commodity exchanges, and their attempts to order trade in commodities in the period 1990-96. These exchanges have incurred high transaction costs both in defining the property rights involved in trading and in overcoming the problems of agent search and 'immediacy'. Parallels between Russian commodity exchanges and other organized markets in Eastern Europe are drawn and remedies for the problems encountered are suggested.     

Wages distribution in Poland: The roles of privatization and international trade, 1992-96

This paper reports an investigation into the changes in the wage distribution in Poland in the first half of the 1990s. We concentrate on the effects of privatization and international trade. We show that the tendency towards increased dispersion in wages halted between 1992 and 1996, despite a rapid expansion in private-sector work. We also show that, during the same period, private-sector workers typically earned less than their state-sector counterparts on an hourly basis, and this gap widened. However, if one controls for experience, tenure and size of workplace, then there existed a small positive private-sector premium. On the effects of international trade, we find suggestive circumstantial evidence that the increase in trade with Western Europe raised wages and employment in manufacturing.     

Tourism and rural settlements Nepal’s Annapurna region

Functional and humanist perspectives relevant to counterurbanization studies are applied to examine the processes of growth and development of rural settlements affected by tourism. Based on a survey of tourism lodges located in several settlements in the Annapurna region of Nepal, this paper analyzes tourism-induced growth in such accommodations and its implications on changing characteristics. Results suggest the emergence of a hierarchical structure of rural settlements with core and peripheral traits. A normative classification of induced patterns defined by their development stage, size, and function is proposed. Historical, social, and economic influences on the transformation of rural settlements are discussed.     

Taiwan aboriginal ecotourism: Tanayiku Natural Ecology Park

This paper discusses research into an ethno/ecotourism site developed by the Tsou nation of southern Taiwan. The Tanayiku Natural Ecology Park receives approximately 450,000 tourists annually. This paper assesses, from a poststructuralist perspective, the theoretical implications of what is termed an “ecocultural renaissance”. It shows that the park functions in two contradictory ways. First, it is a site of geopolitical resistance to colonization for the Tsou. Second, it is as a site of topological consumption—which is, effectively, continued colonization—by tourists. Paradox notwithstanding, the paper discusses why Tanayiku represents a rare example of a successful community-based ecotourism operation owned and operated exclusively by an aboriginal group.     

建立和实施食品安全应急准备响应机制

依据ISO22000:2005和HAGGP对食品安全的应急准备响应机制进行阐述,提出针对食品链上相关组织的针对食品安全的应急准备与响应的系统模式,并在此基础上提出实施流程和要则。