Diversification of infrastructure projects for emergent and unknown non‐systematic risks

Allocating resources to competing large‐scale infrastructure projects involves multiple objectives. Traditional decision‐aiding methodologies focus on the trade‐offs among performance and resource objectives. Existing methodologies may fail to account for unknown and emergent risks that are typical of large‐scale infrastructure investment allocation problems. In modern portfolio theory, it is well known that a diversified portfolio can be very effective to reduce non‐systematic risks. The approach of diversification is equally important in choosing robust portfolios of infrastructure projects that may be subject to emergent and unknown risks. In this paper, we demonstrate a methodology to analyze and compare the diversification of portfolios of large‐scale infrastructure projects. We classify and explore several metrics of diversification and integrate them with risk and other performance objectives in a multiobjective approach. We test the new metrics and the methodology in a case study of hundreds of millions of dollars of infrastructure investments. The results suggest that the solutions that consider diversification are more robust to emergent risks, thus, identifying an opportunity to incorporate diversification‐based optimization methodologies to support a variety of problems involving large‐scale infrastructure investments.     

From real estate to consumption: the role of credit markets in the USA

The aim of this article is to test whether the credit market conditions affect the strength of transmission of real estate wealth effects on household consumption in the US economy. Although many different works have dealt with the analysis of the existence of a real estate wealth effect, most of them as a reaction to the dramatic increase of housing prices in several OECD countries, there are only few papers analysing whether the consumption response depends on the positive or negative sign of the wealth shock and, as far as we know, none of them takes the effects of credit market conditions on that asymmetric response into account. This article tries to fill the existing gap in the literature on this matter. From an econometric perspective, we estimate the asymmetries in the consumption response within the momentum threshold autoregressive model (M-TAR) proposed by Enders and Siklos (2001), but following Stevans (2004), it is applied to a multivariate framework. The main results show that the credit market conditions play a significant role in the transmission of changes in real estate wealth to consumption. In addition, we find that there exists an asymmetric behaviour in the US aggregate consumption spending responses to real estate wealth and credit market shocks, which is only significant when a negative shock takes place.     

Do downturns cause desperation? The effect of economic conditions on suicide rates in Canada

There is conflicting evidence concerning the impact of macroeconomic conditions on suicide rates. To help resolve this pertinent question, we present evidence using Canadian data. We estimate feasible generalized least squares models of annual gender-specific suicide rates in the working age population (aged 25–64) using data from each of the 10 Canadian provinces over the period 1982 to 2007. We allow for heteroscedasticity across provinces and first-order autocorrelation common to all provinces. We posit that suicide rates in this population are a function of macroeconomic conditions (current and lagged unemployment rates and real per capita GDP) and other determinants that might be correlated with macro conditions, such as physician supply. We find that different factors affect suicide rates across genders and that some of the results are sensitive to the specification of the model we use and the regressors included. Generally, economic conditions affect men more than women; suicide rates are counter-cyclical and a higher supply of psychiatrists in a province is correlated with lower suicide rates.     

The changing employment situation in some cities with living wage ordinances

More than 120 municipalities (cities, towns, and counties) have introduced living wage ordinances. These laws mandate that certain employers in their jurisdiction pay their workers wages that are above federal and state minimum levels. The opponents of these laws argue that these ordinances have adverse impacts on local labor markets. This study considers rates of growth of employment and unemployment trends in a sample of these cities before and after they introduced their living wage ordinances. It finds that while a few cities have had negative labor market experiences after introducing their living wage law these cities represent the exception rather than the rule.     

黑龙江省大型企业支持中小企业发展的思路与对策

黑龙江省中小企业在发展"吃配经济"的过程中存在的问题,主要是在"吃配"双方契约关系不稳定;产业集聚发展的基础设施建设有待加强;大型企业依托规模优势,对"吃配"企业的回款慢;受融资、技术、人才等制约,配套企业的综合配套能力较弱,满足不了龙头企业需求;发展不同步不协调,中小配套企业发展跟不上龙头企业发展步伐等。黑龙江省各级政府应做好"吃"与"配"企业的协调和服务工作,创新思路,找准定位,把握关键,坚持兼顾市场机制与政府规划引导作用有机结合、统筹协商、互利共赢、可持续发展的原则,从而促进装备制造中小企业"吃配经济"的又好又快发展。     

Protecting Intellectual Property Rights: The Special Case of China

China is the largest source of counterfeit goods. Both U.S. and European Union customs statistics put the People's Republic of China at the top of the list of pirated product seizures. Along with the remarkable growth in the Chinese economy and exports has come the growth of counterfeit product production and distribution throughout the world. To present a full picture of the many intellectual property rights (IPR) protection problems in China this article reviews Chinese history and traditional attitudes toward individual ownership of IP under Confucianism and communism. Finally, the article presents a view of the current enforcement of IPR rights in China describing the major difficulties encountered by rights owners.     

论转型社会的法治之道--基于中国国情的考察

中国社会正处于传统社会向现代社会、农业社会向工业社会、乡土社会向信息社会、熟人社会向陌生人社会转型的时期,社会转型决定了当代中国的法治结构是二元的,即乡土社会的法和现代社会的法并存与对立。现阶段的法治建设的理念和路径选择都要立足于转型社会或社会主义初级阶段这个最大的国情,既不能墨守成规、裹足不前,也不能好高骛远、一蹴而就,而是要在坚持法治基本理念、价值、规律---法治之道的基础上,探索法治实现的独特策略、方法、技术---法治之术。     

市场营销蒙授专业人才培养模式改革的探索

市场营销蒙授专业现有人才培养模式存在着培养目标单一、生源基础不同的学生使用同一套培养方案、专业课设置面窄过细、实践教学环节薄弱等弊端,限制了学生个性的发展,导致学生消极对待学习,影响学生实际操作能力的锻炼和提高,难以适应就业市场的多样化需求。因此,必须通过确立多样化的培养目标、制定个性化的人才培养方案、构建合理化的人才培养质量评价体系、打造高水平的师资队伍、强化教学运行管理、重视对蒙汉双语授课专业学生的管理等措施,对蒙汉双语授课学生因材施教、个性化培养,才能适应社会对少数民族人才的多样化需求。     

The link between intraday signals and call warrant mispricing

This study proposes a linkage between intraday variables (signal amounts and signal duration) and the mispricing of Taiwan call warrant prices, based on the lower boundary condition of Merton [1973. Theory of rational option pricing. Bell Journal of Economics and Management Science, 4(1), 141–183] as modified by Galai [1978. Empirical tests of boundary conditions for CBOE options. Journal of Financial Economics, 9(2), 321–346]. Trading mispriced call warrants associated with a riskless hedging strategy over the period January 2004–December 2005 on average produces abnormal profits after taking into account transaction costs, as indicative of an inefficient market.     

Profitability and opportunity of conservation agriculture in acid savannah grasslands of Laos

In north-eastern Laos, the savannah grasslands of the Plain of Jars cover vast areas of potentially cultivable land. However, soil acidity, low inherent fertility, and the absence of alternatives to tillage represent significant constraints to the development of sustainable smallholder agriculture. Our objective was to evaluate the potential for conservation agriculture (CA) to enhance soil productivity and farming system profitability. A three-year rotation of rice/maize/soybean was tested under three fertilization levels and four agricultural systems: one conventional tillage-based (CT) system and three CA systems based on no-tillage with cover crops. After four cropping seasons, our results show that, compared with CT, CA systems led to similar-to-higher grain production, similar-to-higher profits, higher opportunity of livestock system intensification, and higher labour productivity regardless of fertilization levels. While CA represents a relevant alternative to current practices, our results suggest that its contribution to the emergence of a sustainable smallholder agriculture is conditioned by broader institutional transformations, including the enrolment of local manufacturers and traders for deploying no-till implements and seed market channels for cover crops, long-term public support to maintain active research and technical mentoring to farmers, and possibly the integration of ecosystem services in agricultural policy.