a three gap model of foreign transfers and the gdp growth rate in developing countries abstract a simplified macroeconomic framework is developed for the fiscal gap which is considered to be an important stumbling block for adjustment with growth in highly indebted developing countries distinctive characteristics of a fiscally constrained economy are compared with those of economies constrained either by the availability of savings or foreign exchange tentative implications for external conditionality accompanying debt relief measures are derived

emotional bidders an analytical and experimental examination of consumers behavior in a priceline like reverse auction e commerce has proved to be fertile ground for new business models which may be patented for up to 20 years and have potentially far reaching impact on the e commerce landscape one such electronic market is the reverse auction model popularized by priceline com there is still uncertainty surrounding the survival of such new electronic markets currently available on the internet understanding user behavior is necessary for better assessment of these sites survival this paper adds to economic analysis a formal representation of the emotions evoked by the auction process specifically the excitement of winning if a bid is accepted and the frustration of losing if it is not we generate and empirically test a number of insights related to 1 the impact of expected excitement at winning and frustration at losing on bids across consumers and biddings scenarios and 2 the dynamic nature of the bidding behavior that is how winning and losing in previous bids influence their future bidding behavior

framing the deal the role of restrictions in accentuating deal value we propose that consumers use the presence of a restriction i e purchase limit purchase precondition or time limit as a source of information to evaluate a deal in a series of four studies we present evidence suggesting that restrictions serve to accentuate deal value and act as promoters of promotions we begin by using aggregate level scanner data to test our hypothesis that a sales restriction e g limit x per customer results in higher sales via three subsequent experiments we then investigate contextual and individual factors moderating this effect study 2 suggests that restrictions only have a positive effect for low need for cognition individuals study 3 explores the potential mediating role of deal evaluations on purchase intent across discount levels study 4 examines the effect of three types of restrictions purchase limits time limits and purchase preconditions across discount levels and explores the underlying beliefs driving these effects an integrative model across studies demonstrates the robustness of the restriction effect and supports the premise that restrictions work through signaling value implications for how consumers determine promotional value are discussed

rent dissipation through electricity prices of publicly owned utilities a public choice model is presented in order to explain the fact that publicly owned electricity utilities rarely price at marginal cost in practice it is shown that if i government revenues are raised through proportional taxes ii median income is less than mean income and iii the share of a consumer s spending on electricity decreases with income then the price resulting from a majority rule and universal voting is below marginal cost the determination of a fixed subscription fee is also considered empirical evidence of our results is obtained from pricing and consumption data for hydro qu6bec

modelling state energy consumption abstract econometric models can provide national and state policy makers with frameworks for evaluating past developments and formulating future energy policies this study models energy consumption in the residential commercial industrial and transport sectors of florida own cross price and scale elasticities are estimated for major energy types twenty year forecasts are presented to show how projected relative price changes can be expected to further alter final energy consumption and total primary energy consumption

quebec residential electricity demand a microeconometric approach in this paper we use a micro approach to model quebec residential demand for electricity the model incorporates a joint continuous discrete decision framework which allows for interrelationships between decisions on electricity related durable holdings and those on usage in the spirit of recent studies which used a continuous discrete frame work the model parameters are estimated using a two stage approach at the first stage the decisions regarding space and water heating systems are modelled with a very flexible multinomial probit mnp framework then at the second stage the demand for electricity conditional on the chosen heating system is estimated using ordinary least squares and a correction is applied in order to eliminate a potential estimation bias the estimated short run and long run price and income elasticities have the correct signs and are rather small as is expected under such circumstances

residential energy demand an integrated two levels approach abstract previous studies of residential energy demand in canada have relied on the top down or two levels approach at the first level total energy demand measured in thermal units is made a function of its relative price real income and other explanatory variables at the second level energy market shares depend on energy sources relative prices the aggregate energy price is the link between the two levels the measurement of energy consumption in terms of energy equivalence introduces systematic biases in aggregate energy price and income elasticities in this paper we adopt the two levels approach but abandon measurement of energy use in terms of energy equivalence the presence of an explanatory variable other than energy sources prices in the energy unit cost function brings the integration of the two levels at the estimation stage wood is included as a separate fuel along with electricity oil and natural gas the model is applied to quebec residential sector the main results are as follows first quebec aggregate residential energy demand is found to be price and income inelastic second electricity and oil own price elasticities are less than one however they are above one for natural gas and wood third gross substitution prevails among the four energy sources and fourth the expansion of the national gas distribution network contributed to a lower aggregate energy price

financial deprivation prompts consumers to seek scarce goods consumers assess their well being subjectively largely by comparing the present state of their lives to the state of comparable others and to their own state earlier in time the authors suggest that consumers similarly assess their financial wellbeing and when these evaluations highlight a deficit in their financial position they pursue strategies that mitigate the associated sense of financial deprivation specifically consumers counteract the relative deficit in their financial resources by acquiring goods that are consequently unavailable to other consumers in their environment the results from five studies suggest that the inferiority and unpleasant affect associated with financial deprivation motivates consumers to attend to choose and consume scarce goods rather than comparable abundant goods these effects diminish when scarce goods are limited because other people have already obtained them and when consumers attribute their unpleasant feelings to a source unrelated to financial deprivation

social incidence and economic costs of carbon limits a computable general equilibrium analysis for switzerland this paper discusses both distributional and allocational effects of limiting carbon dioxide emissions in a small and open economy it starts from the assumption that switzerland attempts to stabilize its greenhouse gas emissions over the next 25 years and evaluates costs and benefits of the respective reduction program from a methodological viewpoint this paper illustrates how a computable general equilibrium approach can be adopted for identifying economic effects of cutting greenhouse gas emissions on the national level from a political economy point of view it considers the social incidence of a greenhouse policy it shows in particular that public acceptance can be increased and economic costs of greenhouse policies can be reduced if carbon taxes are accompanied by revenue redistribution

general equilibrium effects of environmental policy a cge modeling approach estimation of emission control cost functions is often carried out in a partial equilibrium framework i e under the assumption that emission control measures have negligible effects on input and output prices in this paper a computable general equilibrium model is used for simulation of the impact on factor prices and resource allocation of reductions of so infx sup no infx su and co2 emissions thus the model includes markets for tradable emission permits and the equilibrium prices of permits reflect the marginal costs of emission control the results suggest that major emission reductions are likely to have general equilibrium effects and thus that emission control cost functions that fail to take these effects into account may give a distorted picture of the economic impact of emission control

economic development and environmental policy in turkey an institutionalist critique turkey has had a prolonged exemplary experience with economic development in this paper we will trace the emergence of an environmental concern within development planning in turkey after a brief theoretical discussion on rival frameworks it is our contention that whereas economic policies are planned to meet certain goals environmental policies are formulated after observing the results of these economic policies and only in a fragmented manner what is needed is an alternative comprehensive policy based on a theoretical framework in tune with karl polanyi gunnar myrdal william kapp and nicholas georgescu roegen in order to uplift the analysis and policy design to a comprehensive level copyright oxford university press

the dark side of scarcity promotions how exposure to limited quantity promotions can induce aggression marketers frequently use scarcity promotions where a product or event is limited in availability the present research shows conditions under which the mere exposure to such advertising can activate actual aggression that manifests even outside the domain of the good being promoted further we document the process underlying this effect exposure to limited quantity promotion advertising prompts consumers to perceive other shoppers as competitive threats to obtaining a desired product and physiologically prepares consumers to aggress seven studies using multiple behavioral measures of aggression demonstrate this deleterious response to scarcity promotions

the environmental consequences of stagnation in nicaragua abstract a decade of war and revolution under the sandinistas caused macroeconomic chaos but may have been indirectly beneficial to the environment now the country is a ward of the international financial community with foreign debt at almost six times gdp and few policy options the chamorro government elected in 1990 has reduced the role of government and restored the price system as the principal means of resource allocation and income distribution a three gap model is used to show that environmental deterioration is likely to accelerate as a result of pursuing neoliberal policies the analysis is based on a distinction between intensive and extensive environmental decay

scarcity polarizes preferences the impact on choice among multiple items in a product class this research examines how the salience of scarcity influences choices of individual items from a product class the authors propose that overall perception of scarcity versus overall perception of abundance increases choice share of the most preferred item from a product class they argue that this phenomenon occurs because scarcity induces arousal and the heightened arousal polarizes the evaluations of individual items contained in the choice set the results from five experiments show that scarcity versus abundance broadens the discrepancy between the liking of the favorite and nonfavorite items and leads to a greater choice share of the favorite item the findings provide support for the arousal based explanation showing that the effect of scarcity salience on choices is mediated by consumers reported arousal level and moderated by an experimentally induced arousal state

dilemmas of structural adjustment and environmental policies under instability post 1980 turkey abstract the turkish structural adjustment since 1980 has been associated with chronic instability since the late 1980s the weaknesses in the fiscal system and the premature external liberalization emerge as the main factors hindering the passage toward stable growth enforced and erratic distributional changes and relative stagnation of capital accumulation have undermined the growth potential of the economy further it is demonstrated that existing market structures may negate environmental policies based on market incentives these observations as well as those on the interactions of the market system and the environment create strong arguments in favor of an active state

limits to alternative forms of capitalization the case of anatolian holding companies summary since the late 1960s alternative forms of capitalization have emerged in the absence of an effective capital markets regime in turkey we can see these alternative forms in the failed attempts to create anatolian holding companies through the direct investment of small savings this article shows how anatolian holding companies became victims of poor institutional and regulatory regimes and how the lack of institutions to promote impersonal trust in the economy in turn permitted widespread abuses we identify populist politics lax oversight and social norms that incorporated gambling as three interlinked reasons which hindered the genesis and development of viable capital market reform and regulatory institutions in turkey 2003 elsevier ltd all rights reserved

the world bank and the environment the world development report 1992 abstract despite its biases toward market friendliness the world bank s latest world development report on the whole gives a sympathetic review of the environmental difficulties confronting developing countries the bank s preferred market based policies however will not be able to resolve these problems fully and it is by no means certain that funding for required investments and development of new technologies will be at hand

editorial the revival of the liberal creed the imf and the world bank in a globalized economy abstract this editorial reviews problems arising from the popular washington consensus economic package as economies become more globalized and the reasons why they occur suggestions for improving the performance of the institutions behind the policies the world bank and international monetary fund are provided

when do price promotions affect pretrial brand evaluations the authors investigate the conditions in which price promotions affect pretrial brand evaluations a price promotion is theorized to be informative about brand quality when it stands out because i

limited availability reduces the rate of satiation in general consumers enjoy products less with repeated consumption unfortunately there are few known ways to slow such satiation the authors show that consumers satiate more slowly on a product when it is available for consumption only at limited times specifically they find that perceived limited availability made a product more enjoyable and yet this effect largely emerged only after repeated consumption the authors attribute this finding to an urge to take advantage of a rare consumption opportunity which leads people to pay less attention to the quantity consumed and subsequently to experience less satiation a series of studies establish the effect of perceived limited availability on the rate of satiation show that it influences how much people eat provide mediation evidence of the proposed theoretical account and eliminate the effect by making salient the total amount consumed the authors conclude with implications of these findings

a consumer perspective on price matching refund policies effect on price perceptions and search behavior although price matching refund policies are common in many retail environments the impact of such policies on consumers has largely been ignored this article reports the results of three studies that examine price matching policies from a consumer perspective study 1 shows that consumers perceive price matching policies as signals of low store prices and that the presence of a refund increases the likelihood of discontinuing price search contrary to the predictions based on signaling theory in information economics studies 2 and 3 show that when search costs are low the number of stores searched increases in the presence versus absence of a price matching policy when search costs are high consumers appear to accept the price matching signal at face value and search less in the presence of a refund the article concludes by discussing the theoretical implications of the findings and suggesting directions for future research