economics of leadership and hierarchy this paper explores leadership within hierarchical organizations for each hierarchy i consider a dynamic signaling game in which each player observes only the actions of his direct superiors before choosing his action at the top of the hierarchy are the leaders who learn the state from nature the hierarchy controls the flow of information and the timing of the game and determines the equilibrium output and welfare i show that the welfare optimal hierarchy is the chain because it maximizes the incentive of players to lead by example for their subordinates the chain remains optimal even in the presence of verifiable or unverifiable costly information acquisition by the leaders

the political economy of opec abstract we develop a conceptual model that captures opec pricing behavior and apply it to explain the large gap observed between domestic fuel prices in opec countries and prices in the rest of the world we model opec as a cartel of nations not firms and assume that politicians use two instruments production quotas and domestic fuel consumption subsidies the cartel of nations model suggests that introduction of alternatives to petroleum products may lead opec to reduce exports and increase domestic fuel consumption the empirical analysis suggests that when opec sets production quotas it places similar weights on consumer and producer surplus but when opec countries set domestic fuel subsidies on average 6 more weight is given to consumer surplus with some of the opec countries pursuing very aggressive domestic cheap fuel policies

energy demand in ghana a disaggregated analysis this paper presents a comprehensive analysis of energy demand in ghana by estimating demand functions for key disaggregated energy components including gasoline diesel liquefied petroleum gas lpg kerosene biomass residual fuel oil rfo and electricity our results show that energy prices income urbanization and economic structure are significant demand drivers of the different energy types in ghana with varying estimated elasticities further there is evidence of high degree of inter fuel substitution in energy demand in ghana particularly from gasoline diesel and kerosene towards lpg consumption we recommend among different policy options a customization of energy price subsidization policies especially on lpg to reduce the unintended beneficiary dilemma or spillover effect of current government policy other policies such as intensification of energy conservation programs and market entry of independent power trading companies to enhance energy service delivery through competition are also discussed

fuel taxes an important instrument for climate policy abstract this article shows that fuel taxes serve a very important role for the environment and that we risk a backlash of increased emissions if they are abolished fuel taxes have restrained growth in fuel demand and associated carbon emissions although fuel demand is large and growing our analysis shows that it would have been much higher in the absence of domestic fuel taxes people often assert that fuel demand is inelastic but there is strong research evidence showing the opposite the price elasticity is in fact quite high but only in the long run in the short run it may be quite inelastic which has important implications for policy makers had europe not followed a policy of high fuel taxation but had low us taxes then fuel demand would have been twice as large hypothetical transport demand in the whole oecd area is calculated for various tax scenarios and the results show that fuel taxes are the single most powerful climate policy instrument implemented to date yet this fact is not usually given due attention in the debate

commercial energy subsidies in developing countries opportunity for reform abstract energy subsidies are still pervasive in many developing countries oil exporters heavily subsidize all domestic oil consumption while several importers subsidize particular petroleum products estimates of foregone revenues in the oil exporting countries approximate one third of all oil export revenues finally subsidies for electricity natural gas and coal are even more pervasive in virtually all of the countries studies the prices of these fuels do not reflect marginal costs

the demand for road diesel in canada abstract in this paper we estimate the demand for road diesel in canada using aggregate annual data for the period 1986 2008 using a partial adjustment model pam we find short and long run price elasticities of 0 43 and 0 8 respectively however using cointegration techniques we obtain price elasticities that are 30 to 50 lower the short run elasticity with respect to gdp per capita is evaluated at 0 5 with the pam and 1 55 with cointegration in the long run both estimation techniques indicate an income elasticity around 0 9 our results underline the importance of controlling for the expansion of the primary sector which has been characterizing the canadian economy in the 2000s

domestic demand for petroleum products in mena countries abstract the purpose of this paper is to analyse the domestic demand for petroleum products in the middle east and north african mena countries employing a recent data series 1982 2005 understanding the domestic demand of oil producing countries is important due to the existence of subsidised supply loss of foreign exchange income and the environmental effects of oil use the paper analyses the evolution of petroleum product demand in mena and presents an econometric analysis of demand using a simple log linear specification for four petroleum products namely gasoline diesel kerosene and fuel oil the study covers seven mena countries namely algeria iran kuwait libya saudi arabia uae and qatar the results show that demand has grown quite fast in these countries probably because the fuel price has been kept very low while income has risen fast and thus demand has grown fast the gasoline demand model has performed better than other models in terms of producing expected signs for the parameters the results for the kerosene model was the least satisfactory as most of the coefficients were found to be statistically insignificant however in terms of numerical results this study compares well with other similar studies of the past

acquiring information through peers we develop an endogenous network formation model in which agents form connections to acquire information our model features complementarity in actions as agents care not only about accuracy of their decision making but also about the actions of other agents in equilibrium the information structure is a hierarchical network and under weakly convex cost of forming links the equilibrium network is core periphery although agents are ex ante identical there is ex post heterogeneity in payoffs and actions

analysis of oil export dependency of mena countries drivers trends and prospects abstract the purpose of this paper is to analyse how oil export dependencies of middle east and north african mena oil producers have evolved over the past two decades and to identify the main driving factors from an energy policy perspective the paper expresses the oil export dependency of each economy in terms of a multiplicative identity that captures effective export price export to primary oil supply ratio oil dependency and oil export intensity of the country using the data for 1980 2006 the evolution in these factors is investigated for seven mena countries and the influence of the above factors is decomposed using the laspeyres index the analysis shows that energy price and increasing energy intensity in the mena countries have influenced the overall oil export dependency reducing the energy intensity can improve oil export revenue share to gdp by 5 10 in most of the countries while iran can gain significantly by increasing its export volume

modelling energy demand of developing countries are the specific features adequately captured abstract this paper critically reviews existing energy demand forecasting methodologies highlighting the methodological diversities and developments over the past four decades in order to investigate whether the existing energy demand models are appropriate for capturing the specific features of developing countries the study finds that two types of approaches econometric and end use accounting are commonly used in the existing energy demand models although energy demand models have greatly evolved since the early seventies key issues such as the poor rich and urban rural divides traditional energy resources and differentiation between commercial and non commercial energy commodities are often poorly reflected in these models while the end use energy accounting models with detailed sectoral representations produce more realistic projections as compared to the econometric models they still suffer from huge data deficiencies especially in developing countries development and maintenance of more detailed energy databases further development of models to better reflect developing country context and institutionalizing the modelling capacity in developing countries are the key requirements for energy demand modelling to deliver richer and more reliable input to policy formulation in developing countries

review of key international demand elasticities for major industrializing economies abstract this paper conducts a selective review of various estimates for energy demand responses focused specially upon lower income industrializing economies rather than richer mature nations it emphasizes recent trends from empirical studies that have been published after 2000 emphasis is placed on the five major emerging or transitional economies in brazil china india mexico and russia although other important nations like chile and south korea are also discussed when studies are available the review focuses attention on the long run responses to changes in prices and income after capital stock turnover has been completed the terminology often refers to elasticities or the percentage change in energy use divided by the percentage change in price or income holding constant all other factors that could influence energy use decisions estimates cover petroleum products natural gas and electricity although the available studies often ignore coal they also include the economy wide impacts real gdp to price changes most studies have focused upon household and transportation use of liquid fuels many fewer studies have investigated fuels used by industry or commerce or for electric generation based upon the available estimates price and income elasticities for liquid fuels are generally less than one unity for many countries and sectors except for the long run income effect for transportation purposes which can range widely by country between 0 24 and 1 75 while averaging 0 94 for all countries

a theory of yes men this paper illustrates an incentive for workers to conform to the opinion of their supervisors when firms use subjective performance evaluation this desire to conform arises endogenously from the firm s need to induce the worker to exert effort the author shows that firms may optimally eschew the use of incentive contracts to retain workers incentives for honesty the author illustrates that the incentive to conform implies inefficiencies even when workers are risk neutral and is likely to lead to more centralized decision making than in the absence of the desire to conform copyright 1993 by american economic association

toward an economic theory of leadership leading by example this paper explores leadership within organizations leadership is distinct from authority because following a leader is a voluntary rather than coerced activity of the followers this paper considers how a leader induces rational agents to follow her in situations when the leader has incentives to mislead them copyright 1998 by american economic association

how price inelastic is demand for gasoline in fuel subsidizing economies abstract in recent years governments that have historically subsidized domestic fuel consumption face an ever growing challenge in maintaining fuel subsidies and have embarked on subsidy reform this paper estimates the price and income elasticity of demand for gasoline in countries where fuel prices are government subsidized we make use of biennial panel road sector data for 32 countries over the 1998 2010 period and find demand for gasoline to be price inelastic both in the short run and long run we estimate the short run price and income elasticities at 0 05 and 0 16 and the long run price and income elasticities at 0 25 and 0 81 respectively it is our contention that concerned governments should play an active role in identifying and committing to a road map to progressively abandoning fuel subsidies they should also not be discouraged by relatively small consumption corrections in the short run a reduction in subsidies can eventually release considerable amount of resources for more crucial and potentially growth enhancing public services such as education and health

expectations network centrality and public good contributions experimental evidence from india do individuals in a position of social influence contribute more to public goods than their less connected partners can we motivate these influential individuals by disclosing how others expect them to act to answer these questions we play a public good game on a star network the experimental design is such that efficiency and equality considerations should motivate central players to contribute more than others using a subject population familiar with contributions to public goods on social networks we find that central players contribute just as much as the average of other players leading to a large loss of efficiency when we disclose the expectations of other players we find that central players often adjust their contributions to meet the expectations of the group expectations disclosure leads to higher contributions in groups that have weak social ties outside of the experiment in groups where ties are strong it has no significant effect this evidence casts doubt on the idea that individuals who by their social position can contribute more effectively to the public good rise to the challenge by contributing more than others in some but not all social groups these individuals can be motivated to increase contributions by disclosing the expectations of others

leadership based on asymmetric information rational players unconstrained by contracts or formal authority choose to follow a better informed leader whose action reveals part of her information if the leader satisfies a credibility condition then the unique nondegenerate equilibrium solves distinct shirking and coordination problems and achieves the first best if credibility fails as is more likely for a large organization then followers ignore the leader and equilibria are very inefficient appointing multiple leaders or a high cost leader can restore credibility if players invest privately in information then a leader often appears endogenously the equilibrium concept is an original extension of sequential equilibrium to continuous states

metaanalisis de las elasticidades ingreso y precio de la demanda de energia algunas implicaciones de politica publica para america latina the aim of this paper is to analyze the variation in empirical estimates of the income and price elasticities of energy demand the evidence presented through a meta analysis allows identification of the weighted average of the income and price elasticities shows that the estimates are very heterogeneous that there is publication bias and that factors such as region energy sector among others affect its volatility the evidence also indicates that income elasticity in latin america is greater than in the oecd countries and that the price elasticity of energy demand is lower in latin america than in the oecd countries therefore continued economic growth in latin america will be accompanied by a growth in energy demand moreover the establishment of a tax in latin america under the current elasticities is less effective and will be insufficient to control the increase in energy consumption

modelling demand for crude oil products in spain this paper develops an econometric model for the five most important crude oil products demand in spain the aim is the estimation of a range of elasticities of such demands that would serve as the basis for an applied general equilibrium model used for forecasting energy demand in a broader framework the main distinctive features of the system with respect to previous literature are i it takes advantage of monthly information coming from very different information sources and ii multivariate unobserved components uc models are implemented allowing for a separate analysis of long and short run relations uc models decompose time series into a number of unobserved though economic meaningful components mainly trend seasonal and irregular a module is added to such structure to take into account the influence of exogenous variables necessary to compute price cross and income elasticities since all models implemented are multivariate in nature the demand components are allowed to interact among them through the system noises similar to a seemingly unrelated equations model the results show unambiguously that the main factor driving demand is real income with prices having little impact on energy consumption

ethanol demand in brazil regional approach abstract successive studies attempting to clarify national aspects of ethanol demand have assisted policy makers and producers in defining strategies but little information is available on the dynamic of regional ethanol markets this study aims to analyze the characteristics of ethanol demand at the regional level taking into account the peculiarities of the developed center south and the developing north northeast regions regional ethanol demand is evaluated based on a set of market variables that include ethanol price consumer s income vehicle stock and prices of substitute fuels i e gasoline and natural gas a panel cointegration analysis with monthly observations from january 2003 to april 2010 is employed to estimate the long run demand elasticity the results reveal that the demand for ethanol in brazil differs between regions while in the center south region the price elasticity for both ethanol and alternative fuels is high consumption in the north northeast is more sensitive to changes in the stock of the ethanol powered fleet and income these among other evidences suggest that the pattern of ethanol demand in the center south region most closely resembles that in developed nations while the pattern of demand in the north northeast most closely resembles that in developing nations

wealth human capital and family across racial ethnic groups integrating models of wealth and locational attainment this is a us investigation of the relationship between individuals neighbourhood characteristics and their familial and socioeconomic resources with special emphasis on wealth spatial assimilation theorists propose that racial ethnic differences in where people live can be explained by the demographic economic and familial characteristics of individuals while place stratification theorists argue that group differences in neighbourhood characteristics are not fully explained by personal resources there is evidence for the persisting effects of race ethnicity on locational attainment but support is also found for wealth influences on locational attainment in addition there is evidence of an interaction effect between race and wealth in predicting neighbourhood racial composition and neighbourhood ses but the nature of the interaction varies by group and outcome

leading for the long term abstract how do leaders build credibility and what happens if they can t or don t existing economic models of leadership consider static settings only and thus are not well suited for addressing such issues moreover an important phenomenon of leadership is its persistence to allow for credibility and other behaviors that make sense only in repeated games such as the followers paying the leader tribute this paper considers a repeated game version of hermalin b e 1998 toward an economic theory of leadership leading by example american economic review 88 1188 1206 leadership model

leadership and information an organization makes collective decisions through neither markets nor contracts instead rational agents voluntarily choose to follow a leader in many cases incentive problems are solved the unique nondegenerate equilibrium achieves the first best even though every agent has incentives to free ride the leader has no special talents but is distinguished by getting exclusive access to information a crucial feature is that the leader reveals part but not all of her information it is this maintenance of informational asymmetry that permits achieving the first best jel d23 m54

endogenous leadership in incentive contracts abstract we study the effect of leadership on incentive contracts in a moral hazard framework in our model agents are allowed to choose the timing of their actions the agents may choose their effort levels simultaneously or sequentially we show that relative performance evaluation leads to a subgame in which agents make simultaneous effort choices whereas joint performance evaluation yields a subgame in which agents make sequential effort choices since agents exert more effort in the sequential game the principal uses joint performance evaluation to induce the leader follower relationship among agents