In-house competition, organizational slack, and the business cycle

Multiplant firms pit their facilities against each other for production assignments. The present paper studies the consequences of this practice in a model where production is limited by capacity constraints and asymmetric information allows facilities to accumulate slack. It shows the amount of slack per unit of output to be pro-cyclical. Indeed, as capacity constraints become more acute in economic booms, the power of in-house competition for quota assignments is reduced and slack per unit of output increases, while the opposite is true in downturns. Moreover, in downturns firms may use higher cost facilities even when lower cost plants are not running at capacity since this boosts X-efficiency in low-cost plants.     

GTCP131-9B型APU引气系统故障浅析

本文针对GTCP131-9B型APU引气系统故障,提出了相应的解决思路。     

W. H. Hutt (1899–1988): Free Markets and Social Justice

W.H. Hutt reaffirmed the principles of classical economics and classical liberalism and, by applying them to urgent issues he observed in the world around him, he demonstrated the contemporary relevance of freedom and competitive institutions. A wide‐ranging critique of Keynes was founded upon a classical analysis of the labour market, while his trenchant opposition to apartheid advanced along economic and political paths. Hutt questioned the justice of the accumulation of wealth from the exploitation of monopoly power over generations. In all of these respects there are affinities between Hutt's thought and that of ‘Bleeding Heart Libertarians’.     

B2C电子商务中带退货的多配送站点车辆路径优化问题研究

研究了一个带退货的多配送站点车辆路径优化问题,建立了求解该问题的0-1整数规划模型,以实现各个配送站点在给他们客户配送货物的同时,沿途取回这些客户的退货,以节约运输成本的目的。设计了一种新的解的表示方法和邻域变换,以此为基础构造出直接求解多配送站点车辆路径优化问题的禁忌搜索算法,在该禁忌搜索算法中首先通过一个启发式算法求得了0-1整数规划模型的一个较好的初始可行解,从而提高了禁忌搜索算法的收敛速度及性能,最后通过例子对禁忌搜索算法及其性能进行了说明。     

Heuristic learning and the discovery of specialization and exchange

I develop and calibrate an agent-based model of boundedly rational, adaptive agents in a two-good production and exchange economy to replicate human-subject outcomes in the same eight-person experimental economy. To test agents’ ability to capture human behavior, I extend the model and use its output to make predictions about a second experimental environment in which the group of eight agents is slowly constructed by merging smaller groups. This environment improves human-subject performance in the specialization and exchange task, and commensurate improvement emerges for some parameterizations of the agent-based model. This iterative process yields incremental improvement of decision-level theories about economic discovery.     

电网故障模型中贝叶斯网络和DS证据理论的应用

由于电网的复杂性和多变性,导致电网故障中存在信息不确定性问题,这就需要依靠贝叶斯网络和DS证据理论的自动生成方法。文章主要描述了这两种方法的原理,讨论了贝叶斯网络和DS证据理论在电网故障模型领域应用的可能方式和情况,并运用一些实例证明了这种方法的可靠性。     

Resolvable semi-balanced incomplete split-block designs

A method for constructing some new incomplete split-block designs with desirable properties is given. The new class of the designs is characterized with respect to the general balance property. Moreover, the efficiency factors of the designs proposed are given.Received: July 2003 / Revised: November 2003     

How Would One Extra Year of High School Affect Academic Performance in University? Evidence from an Educational Policy Change

This paper uses a unique policy change in Ontario, Canada, to provide direct evidence on how reducing the length of high school would impact student performance in university. After a five‐year educational program was eliminated from Ontario high schools and replaced with a four‐year program, two graduating cohorts with different amounts of high school education simultaneously entered university. The results demonstrate that students who receive one less year of high school education perform significantly worse than their counterparts in all subjects, even after the age difference between the cohorts is accounted for.     

Is money where the fun ends? Material interests and individuals’ preference for direct democracy

Are people’s attitudes towards referendums as a decision-making procedure predominantly driven by their material self-interest, or do individuals also value direct democracy as such, regardless of the material payoffs associated with anticipated policy outcomes? To answer this question, we use a survey data set that offers information on respondents’ support for referendums as a procedure to decide on tax policy, their income levels, socio-economic characteristics, and, most importantly, their expectation about the majority’s support for higher taxes. We find that the support of low-income individuals for referendums increases substantially if they expect a clear population majority in favor of more redistribution. Conversely, individuals with a high income who expect a majority in favor of higher taxes do not reject referendums more strongly than individuals with an average income who share these expectations.     

The asymmetry of the New Keynesian Phillips Curve in the euro-area

Using a two-stage quantile regression framework, we uncover significant asymmetries across quantiles for all coefficients in an otherwise standard New Keynesian Phillips Curve (NKPC) for the euro area. A pure NKPC specification accurately captures inflation dynamics at high inflation quantiles.