Is the ‘Globalization’ of Science Always Good for Scientific Productivity and Economic Growth?

Modern science is characterized by an increasing trend in collaborations and interactions among researchers. This paper aims to analyse the effects of this phenomenon on the productivity of the science sector and on the growth rate of the economy. Basic research is modelled as a contest where only those who arrive first at an innovation obtain the reward and where the interactions among researchers do contribute to production of scientific knowledge. An important result is that when interactions are significant multiple steady states emerge. Hence the ‘science globalization’ process could have enhanced the heterogeneity among scientific sectors of different countries. When there are low interactions, policies that increase connectivity could have low or even perverse effect at improving the efficiency of science, the contrary happens in high connectivity environments.     

The Conditional Performance of REIT Stock Repurchases

This paper uses a conditional performance measure to test whether real estate investment trust (REIT) managers announcing stock repurchases have private information about their firms' prospects. We use stock price to condition for public information and measure the managers' implied private information by the covariance between repurchase size and subsequent stock payoffs (or operating performance). Results show that managers have private information but mostly with respect to long-term as opposed to near-term payoffs. We also find that repurchase size is positively related to a stock's idiosyncratic return volatility, perhaps because noisy stocks deviate farther from fundamental value, offering informed managers larger profit potential. JEL Classification G12 G14 G35     

Dynamic factor demands and market structure under rational expectations: some estimates for the Italian manufacturing system

This paper deals with a dynamic model of the behaviour of firms under rational expectations. The adjustment cost framework is followed to describe production technologies. The objective of firms is to maximize the stream of future profits under rational expectation. First-order conditions for the optimum are derived with respect to input demands and one output supply. The output market structure is modelled in order to test price taking behaviour. The adjustment costs of quasi-fixed inputs are internal and interrelated. The model is estimated for the Italian manufacturing system with encouraging results.     

Property Segment and REIT Capital Structure

This paper relies on an increasing number of industry equilibrium studies linking a firm to its industry peers to help explain the observed REIT capital structure variation within property segments beyond what is possible with the traditional partial equilibrium trade-off and pecking order theories, which assume that each firm operates in isolation from other market participants and are not particularly suitable to REITs because of the regulated setting within which these firms operate. We build several proxies for a REIT’s position within its property segment. Consistent with the competitive equilibrium model of Maksimovic and Zechner (1991), we find that a REIT’s volatility of operating performance relative to the median volatility of operating performance of its segment peers is an important determinant of its leverage ratio. We also find that a REIT’s leverage ratio depends on the median leverage ratio in its segment. Leverage is also related to a REIT’s status as an incumbent and its role as a leader in the property segment.     

The dynamics of international competitiveness

The Dynamics of International Competitiveness. — This paper focuses on the determinants of international competitiveness over the seventies and eighties. The theoretical framework adopted here is based on a “technology-gap” account of trade flows. The econometric analysis relies on a dynamic model estimated by pooling time-series across countries. The short- and long-term impacts of both technical change and labour costs on trade performance are investigated. It is found that technological variables (patents and investments) play a major role in shaping dynamics of exportshares, while labour costs asymmetries among countries appear to affect trade performance only in the short term.