The Non-Trivial Choice between Innovation Indicators

We discuss the strengths and weaknesses of five alternative innovation indicators: R&D, patent applications, total innovation expenditure and shares in sales taken by imitative and by innovative products as they were measured in the 1992 Community Innovation Survey (CIS) in the Netherlands. We conclude that the two most commonly used indicators (R&D and patent applications) have more (and more severe) weaknesses than is often assumed. Moreover, our factor analysis suggests that there is little correlation between the various indicators. This underlines the empirical relevance of various sources of bias of innovation indicators as discussed in this paper.     

Financing R&D in mature companies: An empirical analysis

We study financing patterns of publicly traded R&D-intensive manufacturing firms in Israel. We further characterize R&D-intensive firms by size, physical capital intensity, and whether they issued stocks in the United States, asking whether these features are associated with particular financing patterns. To address these issues, we present, for the first time, adjusted flow of funds charts that treat R&D expenses as a capital outlay (rather than an operating cost that reduces profits, as standard accounting principles prescribe). We also address the question of how R&D inputs should be measured - using R&D expenses or R&D personnel. We construct both expenditure- and personnel-based R&D measures for each firm in our sample, and investigate to what extent these measures are mutually consistent.     

Sushi or Fish Fingers? Seafood Diversity,Collapsing Fish Stocks,and Multispecies Fishery Management*

We present a model of a multispecies fishery, and we show the following. (i) Consumer preferences for seafood diversity can trigger a sequential collapse of fish stocks under open‐access fishery. (ii) The stronger the preferences are for diversity, the higher is the need for coordinated multispecies regulation. (iii) Second‐best optimal management of only one (or a few) species is less strict than socially optimal management of the same species. (iv) Myopic regulation of one species, ignoring spillovers to other species, can cause depletion of other stocks that would not be depleted under open access.     

Capital regulation, bank competition, and financial stability

We analyze capital requirements if banks compete for loans and deposits. Banks and firms are subject to a risk-shifting problem. The ambiguous effect of competition on banks’ risk-taking translates into an ambiguous effect of capital requirements on financial stability.     

Trade‐led growth hypothesis in Cuban commercial regimes since 19601,2

This study examines the impact of trade on Cuban growth during different commercial policy regimes spanning the period from 1960 up to 2004, encompassing two essential economic structural transformations: the Cuban revolution and the fall of the Berlin Wall. For this purpose, the Granger causality is used by means of the modified Wald test for augmented‐level vector autoregressive model with integrated and cointegrated processes introduced by Toda and Yamamoto (1995) and Dolado and Lutekepohl (1996) . We show an import‐led growth hypothesis during the Soviet‐oriented pattern that is rejected after 1990, when exports are not only responsive to growth expansion but also to imports’ behaviour.     

浅谈3D虚拟社区与社交网站的融合发展

SNS网站和3D虚拟社区都是Web2.0时代重要的组成部分,虚拟世界和真实世界的融通已经越来越深刻也影响到人们的生活。作为Web2.0发展过程中的重要产物,3D虚拟社区也遇到了现实的发展困境。在网络和社交相互渗透的大趋势下,研究SNS社交网站和3D虚拟社区的特点和发展,探讨两者结合发展的可行性。     

Conflicts of interest,information provision,and competition in the financial services industry

In some markets sellers have better information than buyers over which products best serve a buyer's needs. Depending on the market structure, this may lead to conflicts of interest in the provision of information by sellers. This paper studies this issue in the market for financial services. The analysis presents a new model of competition between banks, where price competition influences the ensuing incentives for truthful information revelation. We also compare conflicts of interest in two different firm structures, specialized banking and one-stop banking.     

Efficient collusion in optimal auctions

We study collusion in an IPV auction with binary type spaces. Collusion is organized by a third party that can manipulate participation decisions. We characterize the optimal response of the seller to different threats of collusion among the bidders. We show that, contrary to the prevailing view that asymmetric information imposes transaction costs in side contracting, collusion in the optimal auction is efficient when the third party can implement monetary transfers as well as when it can implement monetary transfers and reallocations of the good. The threat of non-participation in the auction by a subset of bidders is crucial in constraining the seller's profit.