Nonparametric Evaluation of Economies of Scope in the Context of Technical Efficiency: The Case of Rice and Vegetable Farms in Korea

This paper provides a nonparametric evaluation of economies of scope in the context of technical efficiency allowing for non‐convexity, with an application to Korean rice and vegetable farms. Relying on non‐parametric‐free disposal hull and data envelopment analysis approaches and input–output data for rice and vegetable farms from the Korea Farm Household Economy Survey data collected in 2007, this article examines technical inefficiency and its decomposition under non‐convexity and convexity. Empirical measures of technical inefficiency and its decomposition results are provided, with a focus on a component of technical inefficiency associated with economies of scope (i.e. diversification benefits) under non‐convexity in production technology. The decomposition measures of technical inefficiency include pure technical inefficiency, size inefficiency and diversification inefficiency. The results provide empirical evidence supporting size‐dependent diversification strategies, where benefits of diversification are larger for small farms on average compared to those of large farms.     

Micromultinationals: Some Preliminary Evidence on an Emergent ‘Star’ of the International Entrepreneurship Field

This paper provides some preliminary evidence on the behaviour of the micromultinational, an emergent player in the international entrepreneurship field. Using survey data from the Scottish Council for Development and Industry, it found that mMNEs originate from a mixture of high and low technology sectors and employ Foreign Direct Investment as well as international contractual approaches in servicing their foreign target markets. It also concluded that micromultinationals overseas market selection decisions were mainly influenced by market- and knowledge-seeking factors rather than considerations of psychic proximity. The implications of these summary findings for policy, theory and future research are discussed in the paper.     

Peers Versus National Culture: An Analysis of Antecedents to Ethical Decision-making

Given the recent ethics scandals in the United States, there has been a renewed focus on understanding the antecedents to ethical decision-making in the research literature. Since ethical norms and standards of behavior are not universally consistent, an individual’s choice of referent may exert a large influence on his/her ethical decision-making. This study used a social identity theory lens to empirically examine the relative influence of the macro- and micro-level variables of national culture and peers on an individual’s intention to behave ethically. Our sample consisted of respondents from Germany, Italy, and Japan. The results indicated that both national culture and peers were found to act as significant referents in ethical decision-making dilemmas. Although peers exerted a much stronger influence on an individual’s ethical decision-making, the impact of peers varied depending on the national culture levels of individualism and power distance. James W. Westerman is an Associate Professor of Management at Appalachian State University. He received his Ph.D in Management from the University of Colorado at Boulder and an MBA from Florida State University. His research interests include person-organization fit, compensation, and employee ethics, and has been published in the Journal of Organizational Behaviour, Journal of Business Ethics, Academy of Management Learning and Education, Group and Organization Management and the Journal of Business and Psychology, among others. Rafik I. Beekun (Ph.D., the University of Texas at Austin) is Professor of Management and Strategy in the Managerial Sciences Department at the University of Nevada. Reno, and Co-director, Center for Corporate Governance and Business Ethics. His current research focuses on business ethics, national cultures and the link between management and spirituality. He has published in such journals as the Journal of Applied Psychology, Human Relations, Journal of Management, Journal of Business Ethics and Decision Sciences. Yvonne Stedham is a Professor of Management in College of Business at the University of Nevada, Reno. She received a Ph.D. in Business and an MBA from the University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas and undergraduate degrees in Economics and Business from the University of Bonn, Germany. She joined the University of Nevada, Reno in 1988 and served as Chair of the Managerial Sciences Department from 1999-2002. Dr. Stedham's research covers a broad spectrum of management issues with a special focus on international, business ethics and gender aspects, and has been published in the Journal of Management. Women in Management Review, the Journal of Management Studies, the Journal of Business Ethics,the Journal of European Industrial Training, and the Journal of Knowledge Management Practice, Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resource, and others. Jeanne H. Yamamura, CPA, MIM, PHD, is Associate Professor at the University of Nevada Reno. Her research is focused in the area of the international management of accounting professionals and in ethical decision making. She has published in journals such as the International Journal of Accounting, the International Journal of Accounting, Auditing and Performance Evaluation and the International Journal of Human Resource Management.     

求半正定Hermitian矩阵特征向量的改进乘幂法

经典乘幂法结合压缩法是计算半正定Hermitian矩阵最大前n个特征值对应特征向量的重要方法,但其固定的迭代次数使得待分解矩阵的随机变化和初始向量的不同选择导致计算精度波动较大,同时,较大特征值对应特征向量的计算误差也会影响较小特征值对应特征向量的计算。为克服这些缺点,提出了一种将前后两次迭代所求向量的距离作为迭代终止条件的改进乘幂法,并证明了它在有误差传播时的收敛性。理论计算结果表明,对4阶半正定Hermitian随机矩阵,在相同计算精度前提下,所提方法比经典方法可至少降低一半计算复杂度。     

Estimating persistent and transient technical efficiency and their determinants in the presence of heterogeneity and endogeneity

We develop an estimation procedure that generates consistent estimates of the technology parameters, long-run (persistent) and short-run (transient) technical inefficiencies and the marginal effects of their determinants for the stochastic frontier model developed by Colombi et al. (2014, Journal of Productivity Analysis 42, 123) and Kumbhakar et al. (2014, Journal of Productivity Analysis 41, 321). Our approach accounts for three sources of potential endogeneity: (i) unobserved heterogeneity; (ii) simultaneity of input use with both types of technical efficiency; (iii) potential correlation of the noise term with the regressors. Using this approach we examine the effect of direct payments and farm size on the persistent and transient technical efficiency of French crop farms before and after the European Union's Common Agricultural Policy decoupling reform of 2003. Our results show that subsidy payments per hectare of utilised agricultural land had a significant positive effect on persistent technical efficiency and a significant negative effect on transient technical efficiency during the period before decoupling. For the period after the reform, the effect of subsidies is found to be significantly negative for persistent technical efficiency and insignificant for transient technical efficiency. The overall effect of subsidies on technical efficiency is found to be negative in both periods, albeit substantially lower in the period after decoupling. The effect of farm size on technical efficiency is found to be significant only for the period prior to the reform: it reduced persistent technical inefficiency but increased transient technical inefficiency during that period.     

低综采工作面远距离供电及供液设计与应用

为了解决低综采工作面设备列车的布置及拉移等问题,设计了远距离供电及供液方案。从设备选择、电压损失及供电安全性等方面校验了远距离供电的可行性,从压力损失及压力脉动等方面校验了远距离供液的可行性。经实际效果检验,1600m远距离供电、1350m远距离供液安全可靠。     

Institutional distance among country influences and environmental performance standardization in multinational enterprises

This research compares and contrasts the findings in Aguilera-Caracuel et al. (2013) with the outcomes of applying fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) — a methodological strategy that gathers quantitative and qualitative information to explain complexity at the case level and generality across cases. Using the same sample of 128 multinational enterprises (MNEs) with headquarters and subsidiaries based in the USA, Canada, France, and Spain, we identify a set of relevant configurations of causes and conditions to explain environmental performance standardization. By avoiding separate treatments for each variable, which is typical in multiple regression analysis (MRA), we overcome prior limitations and propose a new way of understanding this phenomenon. In summary, our results significantly reinforce and complement the previous results.     

Where do international board members come from? Country-level antecedents of international board member selection in European boards

In this paper, it is argued that boards internationalize by recruiting international directors in order to increase companies’ performance. However, increasing nationality diversity on a board can be costly considering that it potentially creates cooperative problems on a board due to fault-lines and separation processes. As a result, boards will prefer international candidates who are more similar to themselves on a variety of ‘distances’. Based on data collected regarding 5683 board members of 361 companies from 15 countries in 2005–2007, we discover that the greater the distance (cultural, institutional and geographical) between the candidates’ and the companies’ country-of-origin, the lower the fraction of board members of that nationality on boards. Subsequently, it is argued that historical ties between countries play a ‘distance compressing’ role and partially compensate for the effects of distance. A colonial tie between countries will make recruitment of these particular nationalities more likely than others.     

陆基链式超短波监测网布站仿真测算

无线电用户移动性的增加对低干扰的电磁环境提出了更高的要求。陆基链式超短波监测网可以为高速移动的无线电用户提供这种保障。该网络在用户移动路线周边布站,及时发现判定路径周边的干扰隐患,可以提升保障覆盖范围。通过设计仿真测算方法和计算公式,在设定的仿真条件下计算出直线线路条件下陆基链式监测站的理论布站距离为10~25 km,为今后该网的设计提供了参考依据。     

40~50 GHz固定无线接入系统干扰共存分析

为了分析在40.5~42.3 GHz和48.4~50.2 GHz频段引入固定无线接入系统的可行性,对该频带固定无线接入系统与频率划分表中各主要业务系统间的共存问题进行了研究。通过计算机静态建模方法,分析了此频段内固定无线接入系统对固定、卫星固定、广播、射电天文等业务系统的干扰功率密度随距离变化情况,并根据相关业务的干扰保护准则获得对不同业务的隔离距离,从而证明在一定隔离距离条件下,固定无线接入系统不易对同频段的主要业务造成有害干扰,可以在该频段引入固定无线接入系统。研究成果可支撑我国无线电频谱管理部门对该频段业务的再次划分。