OUTPUT,OUTCOME, AND QUALITY ADJUSTMENT IN MEASURING HEALTH AND EDUCATION SERVICES

This paper provides an overview of measuring price and volume changes of the output of health and education providers. In the national accounts, outputs should reflect the results of production and these cannot normally be captured by outcome, the state of health or education of the population. However, we show that outcome information is required when it comes to quality adjustment of output measures. The paper clarifies terminology, and discusses output measurement and quality adjustment methods with a focus on health and education services.     

A cognition paradigm clash: Simon,situated cognition and the interpretation of bounded rationality

Simon’s notion of bounded rationality is deeply intertwined with his activity as a cognitive psychologist and founder of so-called cognitivism, a mainstream approach in cognitive psychology until the 1980s. Cognitivism, understood as ‘symbolic information processing,’ provided the first cognitive psychology foundation to bounded rationality. Has bounded rationality since then fully followed the development of cognitive psychology beyond symbolic information processing in the post-Simonian era? To answer this question, this paper focuses on Simon’s opposition during the 1990s to a new (paradigmatic) view of cognition called situated cognition, which has since put into question the entire view in cognitive psychology of humans as symbolic information processors. This paper then reads the cognitivism/situated cognition debate through the lens of current bounded rationality research in economics, in order (i) to inquire into whether it has tackled the issues in that controversy; (ii) to envisage possible new foundations for a cognitive psychology-based bounded rationality.     

有限理性条件下民营企业资源配置欠优的机理研究

以浙江民营企业为例,借鉴有限理性博弃的相关理论,本文建立了有限理性条件下我国民营企业资源配置协调博弃的快速学习模型和复制动态进化模型;详细分析了存在理性局限的情况下,民营企业资源配置策略结果偏离最优状态的机理,并指出改善这种欠优资源配置策略的可能途径.     

Towards a Measure of Core Inflation using Singular Spectrum Analysis

This paper constructs a number of possible core measures of inflation using singular spectrum analysis (SSA). Annual changes in monthly inflation are decomposed into its trend, oscillatory and noise components in order to develop an understanding of the trend and cyclicality in South African headline inflation. Three cyclical components with differing amplitude and frequency are identified. The trend and cyclical components of inflation are found to be a good approximation of core inflation, the inertial part of inflation. These core measures are compared with other candidate core measures based on the properties of a good core inflation measure. Generally, the SSA measures outperform commonly used measures of core inflation based on both in‐ and out‐of‐sample performance.     

Evaluating,Comparing, Monitoring,and Improving Representativeness of Survey Response Through R‐Indicators and Partial R‐Indicators

Non‐response is a common source of error in many surveys. Because surveys often are costly instruments, quality‐cost trade‐offs play a continuing role in the design and analysis of surveys. The advances of telephone, computers, and Internet all had and still have considerable impact on the design of surveys. Recently, a strong focus on methods for survey data collection monitoring and tailoring has emerged as a new paradigm to efficiently reduce non‐response error. Paradata and adaptive survey designs are key words in these new developments. Prerequisites to evaluating, comparing, monitoring, and improving quality of survey response are a conceptual framework for representative survey response, indicators to measure deviations thereof, and indicators to identify subpopulations that need increased effort. In this paper, we present an overview of representativeness indicators or R‐indicators that are fit for these purposes. We give several examples and provide guidelines for their use in practice.     

The Interaction of Global Value Chains and Rural Livelihoods: The Case of Smallholder Raspberry Growers in Chile

This paper integrates aspects of global value chain and sustainable rural livelihoods analyses in an exploration of the local impacts of agri‐food globalization in Chile. In particular, it examines the evolution of the raspberry export sector in the context of Chile's non‐traditional agricultural export boom, and considers its importance to smallholder growers and rural households in central Chile. The paper first outlines the geography and structural configuration of the global value chain for Chilean raspberries, and considers modes of governance and forms of coordination between key actors within the chain. Second, the terms and implications of smallholder grower participation in the value chain are explored in a discussion of access to key livelihoods assets. The paper concludes that institutional support to smallholders, even in the case of a crop that is widely seen to have a small‐scale ‘size bias’, remains integral to their capacity to comply with required safety and quality standards and gain and retain market access via the value chain.     

Pricing options on discrete realized variance with partially exact and bounded approximations

We derive efficient and accurate analytic approximation formulas for pricing options on discrete realized variance (DRV) under affine stochastic volatility models with jumps using the partially exact and bounded (PEB) approximations. The PEB method is an enhanced extension of the conditioning variable approach commonly used in deriving analytic approximation formulas for pricing discrete Asian style options. By adopting either the conditional normal or gamma distribution approximation based on some asymptotic behaviour of the DRV of the underlying asset price process, we manage to obtain PEB approximation formulas that achieve a high level of numerical accuracy in option values even for short-maturity options on DRV.     

对政府储蓄与民间储蓄及国民总储蓄关系的考察

文章分析了政府储蓄与民间储蓄和国民总储蓄的关系,提出了通过政府储蓄提升国民储蓄水平的相关条件及制度建设,而政府部门应保持一个高于民间部门的边际储蓄倾向,税收制度的安排上要尽可能消除或减少税收对民间储蓄的抑制,将税收比重始终控制在纳税人可承受的限度之内。     

商业银行中间业务发展的比较研究

在过去的20年间,欧美发达国家银行的盈利模式和收入结构经历了一场重大变革,其非利息收入占比逐年攀升,并在总收入中占有日趋重要的地位.随着我国经济金融市场的发展,资本市场的日益成熟,国内银行业中间业务市场将进一步快速增长.为解决当前制约中间业务发展的突出问题,国内银行应找准市场定位,科学布局;进一步加大中间业务产品开发、创新与拓展力度;逐步加强和完善中间业务产品组织建设;加强联动营销、交叉营销和综合营销,打造中间业务的经营合力;进一步完善中间业务考核与激励机制等.     

NOT REPORTING A PROFIT: CONSTRUCTING A NON‐PROFIT ORGANISATION

Public sector reformers advocate contracting‐out as a means of improving cost‐effectiveness. In the health sector, market‐based contracts with for‐profit organisations can reduce equity of access and divert public funds to private gain. Such issues have prompted policy makers to seek alternative contracting strategies. This paper examines a primary health care policy whereby government contracts with private non‐profit organisations to increase efficiency and meet World Health Organisation ideals. The study found that the policy's implementation has not achieved these aims when for‐profit providers masquerade as non‐profit organisations. The implication is that governments may find it more effective to manage for structural diversity than mandate homogenisation.