The Politics of Inequality as Organised Spectacle: Why the Swiss Do Not Want to Tax the Rich

In 2015, Swiss voters had the opportunity to impose a tax on the super rich in a popular vote and thereby fund a redistributive policy. However, a large majority voted against its seemingly obvious self-interest and rejected the tax. We propose an explanation for this puzzling outcome, bridging the usually separate behavioralist and institutionalist perspectives on the politics of inequality. We start from the observation that political economy tends to neglect processes of preference formation. Theorising preferences as socially constructed, we show that interest groups played a major role in shaping the outcome of the vote. Business frames were multiplied through allied parties and the media and had a major impact on individual voting behaviour. In addition, we demonstrate that interest groups representing business interests derive the content of their communication from business’s structurally privileged position in the capitalist economy. Specifically, creating uncertainty about possible perverse effects of government policies on jobs and growth is a powerful tool to undermine popular support. Frames based on this structural power ultimately explain why the Swiss refrained from ‘soaking the rich.’     

Addressing the sustainable development through sustainable procurement: What factors resist the implementation of sustainable procurement in Pakistan?

Sustainable Public Procurement is an integral part of sustainable development because of ever increasing government expenditures. Most of the developing countries lack the required infrastructure which may support public sector sustainability. The aim of this study is to assess the critical factors which resist the implementation of sustainable procurement in public sector of Pakistan. We used Interpretive Structural Model to investigate and rank the interrelationships among different factors of sustainable procurement. With the help of literature and Likert scale instrument, we found twelve key barriers that resist sustainable procurement implementation. We also examined tender documents of 75 different public sector universities of Pakistan but found absence of sustainability element in the documents. External factors namely government legislation and stakeholders' pressure are found most critical barriers as compared to inter organizational factors. The study is also important to highlight the hurdles in the way of sustainable development. First, the government must introduce rules and regulations to implement the sustainable procurement. Stakeholders and donors must put pressure on organizations for adopting sustainable procurement. Sustainability education should be made mandatory part of curriculum and employees should be given regular training on sustainability. Further, public procurement policies at government and institutional levels are required to be revisited towards a circular economy.     

A hybrid information approach to predict corporate credit risk

This study proposes a hybrid information approach to predict corporate credit risk. In contrast to the previous literature that debates which credit risk model is the best, we pool information from a diverse set of structural and reduced‐form models to produce a model combination based on credit risk prediction. Compared with each single model, the pooled strategies yield consistently lower average risk prediction errors over time. We also find that while the reduced‐form models contribute more in the pooled strategies for speculative‐grade names and longer maturities, the structural models have higher weights for shorter maturities and investment grade names.     

工程投标报价的优化

在报价低者为优的评标规则下，报价、中标可得利润与中标概率总是成反比，最优报价为中标可得利润与中标概率的乘积最大时所对应的报价。结合案例详细分析了只有一个具体竞争对手，有若干具体竞争对手，已知对手数目但不知具体对象，既不知对手数目也不知具体对象四种情况下的报价决策方法。     

国债规模的均衡数量及优化

笔者基于世代交叠模型,假定政府执行赤字预算体制,在市场结清的均衡状态下得到了确定国债规模与私人资本规模之比值的解析式。通过模拟发现税率、基本财政支出率、产出关于私人资本的弹性等是决定该比值大小的主要因素。     

基于聚类分析电信运营企业仓库布局优化研究

以某电信运营企业为例,在现场调研的基础上,分析了企业仓库布局的主要问题,应用聚类分析方法,提出了仓库布局优化方案,并进行了方案的综合评价.     

精馏过程的节能和优化设计的探讨

精馏过程的节能,对于减少能源消耗,降低生产成本和保护环境具有十分重要的意义.在精馏过程中可以采用最适宜回流比操作和最佳进料状态,使用中间冷凝器和中间再沸器,高效精馏、热泵精馏.合理安排多组分物料分离流程,直接利用过程热量及开发应用高效换热器等措施.本文从最佳回流比R的选择、进料温度及进料状态的确定等方面,详细的分析了在精馏塔的设计过程中,如何实现设计的优化问题,以实现节能降耗.     

试论新制度经济学与中国体制改革的契合

中国正在经历一个制度变迁的时代。新制度经济学对中国体制改革实践有很强的解释力和指导性，它与马克思主义经济学在机理上的相通及其与中国的传统政治文化的契合促进了它在中国的进一步发展。中国正处于一个制度变迁的时代，新旧体制转轨使中国有了对新的经济制度变革理论的强烈需要。新制度经济学适应了这种需求，对中国体制改革实践有很强的解释力和指导性。新制度经济学与马克思主义政治经济学有相通之处，这有利于发展新制度经济学，也有利于中国经济理论的衔接和发展。中国的传统政治文化与新制度经济学理论的契合，既有利于新制度经济学的传播，也有利于中国体制改革的进一步发展。     

Stability and Segregation in Group Formation

This paper presents a model of group formation based on the assumption that individuals prefer to associate with people similar to them. It is shown that, in general, if the number of groups that can be formed is bounded, then a stable partition of the society into groups may not exist. (A partition is defined as stable if none of the individuals would prefer be in a different group than the one he is in.) However, if individuals' characteristics are one-dimensional, then a stable partition always exists. We give sufficient conditions for stable partitions to be segregating (in the sense that, for example, low-characteristic individuals are in one group and high-characteristic ones are in another) and Pareto efficient. In addition, we propose a dynamic model of individual myopic behavior describing the evolution of group formation to an eventual stable, segregating, and Pareto efficient partition. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: C72, H41.