The mortality among industrial insured lives in Norway 1931–1940

Abstract

Industrial insurance was introduced in Norway in 1903 by The Norwegian Life Insurance Company FRAM which was alone in this branch of life insurance activity until 1918, when The Life Insurance Company Norske Folk adopted industrial insurance also. Later on other companies too have started industrial insurance, but Fram is still by far the largest industrial insurance company in Norway, and to-day works with industrial insurance with weekly, monthly and daily premiums (calendarpremium).     

Adverse selection and bilateral asymmetric information

A simple principal-agent model with bilateral asymmetric information and common values is developed. The agent(s) has private information about his characteristics but does not knowhow these affect outcomes. The principal knows how the characteristics translate into outcomes, but does not observe the characteristics. It is shown that equilibrium contracts aresimple in being designednot to reveal the agent's characteristics. When the agent knows howsome of his characteristics affect the outcome, contracts will be differentiated with respect to precisely those characteristics. An application to the use of genetic information is considered.     

Sequencing and the Adding-up Property in Contingent Valuation of Endangered Species: Are Contingent Non-Use Values Economic Values?

This paper presents tests of the theoretical validity of the contingent valuation (CV) method. The validity of CV is especially a concern when involving environmental goods with a predominant non-use value. One test of theoretical validity is the adding-up property that implies that a specific good should be equally valued irrespectively of it is being valued directly or built-up sequentially. In this CV study four independent sub-samples stated willingness to pay for the same composite good, or package, using different sequences. One sub-sample valued the composite good directly, while two sub-samples faced built-up sequences valuing first subsets of this composite good. A fourth sub-sample valued the composite good from a dividing-out approach, facing first the valuation of a larger multi-package. Theoretically expected sequencing effects were observed; the subset goods obtained higher values earlier in a sequence, and the dividing-out approach decreased the stated value for the composite good. Most importantly, these CV data did pass the tests of the adding-up property.     

Is fairness blind?—The effect of framing on preferences for effort-sharing rules

This paper uses a choice experiment to study citizens' preferences for effort-sharing rules for reducing carbon dioxide emissions. For a given global cost and level of emission reduction, we study the willingness to pay for various rules that imply different distributions of the cost between EU, the US, China and Africa. The focus of this paper is on the use of two different treatments, one where the respondents were informed about the country (or country group) names and one where the names were replaced with anonymous labels A-D. This allows us to test whether people's preferences for effort-sharing rules depend on the framing of the problem. We find that the ranking of the rules and the strength of the preferences are not significantly different between the two treatments, and hence we find no evidence of ingroup bias in preferences for effort-sharing rules.     

Identifying intraorganisational and interorganisational alliance conflicts—A longitudinal study of an alliance pilot project in the high technology industry

The extant literature on alliances tends to neglect the effects of intraorganisational relationships within each alliance partner on the implementation of the alliance. To address this gap, this paper investigates both interorganisational and intraorganisational conflicts occurring during the implementation of a service alliance and aims at developing categories of conflicts as well as analysing how these conflict categories affect the implementation of the alliance. Thus, the overall purpose is to contribute to our understanding of implementation issues in alliances for the delivery of services. In order to do so, one case of a high-technology alliance has been studied longitudinally, with the researcher acting as a participant observer. Three interrelated categories of conflicts are developed through an analysis of the data: 1) the scope of the alliance, 2) the customer relationship, and 3) the implementation process. One important conclusion of this study is that the perspectives of several of the stakeholders, including the customers indirectly involved in the alliance, should be included when implementing service alliances.     

The business model in entrepreneurial marketing: A communication perspective on business angels' opportunity interpretation

Entrepreneurial marketing has emerged as a recent perspective within the marketing field, taking the challenges and characteristics of small firms and founding teams into account. Specifically, in the early stages of entrepreneurial marketing, besides potential customers a variety of other stakeholders tend to be in the center of attention. Among these stakeholders, business angels as early-stage investors represent a vital target group. In this paper, we aim to shed light on entrepreneurial marketing in the early phases of new venture creation, in which entrepreneurial firms have an inherent need to market the value of a business opportunity toward potential investors. In particular, we contribute to the literature by introducing the business model as a narrative device for the marketing of early-stage new ventures toward potential business angels. In this regard, the business model is suggested as playing a critical role through making the inherent economic value of a technology explicit. Building on narrative theory, we investigate the role that the business model plays in the decision-making process of 17 business angels. Based on our findings, we propose a model that links the business model to a business angel's interpretation of an investment opportunity and discuss implications for theory and practice.     

Enhancing Security Through Efficiency Focus—Insights From a Multiple Stakeholder Pilot Implementation

Efficiency and security are often regarded as opposing factors in transport operations, with increased security causing decreased efficiency. The use of information technology holds the promise of enabling improved efficiency in freight transport operations and this article suggests and elaborates on the proposition that “An increased focus on efficiency will result in improved security for carrier operations.” The research for this article involved a literature review, the collection of empirical data through one in‐depth case study, and elaboration on a proposition through a field pilot implementation. The selected focus was carrier operations in connection with port terminals carrying out RoRo operations on trailers. The article explores and describes how measures to increase efficiency result in increased security.     

Exchange rates dynamics revisited: a panel data test of the fractional integration order

We test the possibility that exchange rates from nine developed countries have a unit root against the alternate possibility that they are fractionally integrated. Theoretically, exchange rates are only expected to follow a random walk under restrictive assumptions. However, most traditional unit root tests cannot reject a unit root in exchange rates, and time series tests that allow for fractional integration have given inconclusive results. To increase the power of the test of the integration order we develop two panel data tests of the fractional integration order. Monte Carlo simulations show that these tests are correctly sized and have relatively high power compared to other similar tests. Moreover, our empirical results show that we can reject a unit root in exchange rates with a high probability, but the integration order is close to one. This indicates that exchange rates are mean-reverting, although the reversion is slow, resulting in long swings.