a comparison of innovation policy in the smart grid industry across the pacific china and the usa abstract utilities are increasing their investment in smart grid technologies because of the rising demand for electricity the aging transmission and distribution infrastructure in developed countries and the need for real time visibility of energy supply and demand to optimize service reliability and cost government policies are contributing to this rising investment in the smart grid in many countries around the globe using rothwell and zegveld s innovation policy framework as a starting point this paper compares innovation policy in smart grids across the pacific specifically china and the usa this research describes the policy tools used by both countries and presents results that indicate national preferences for innovation policy that differ in the ways in which they are linked with the state of the power system china has preferred to use supply side policy which focuses on public enterprise scientific and technical development and legal regulation the usa has preferred to use environmental side policy which focuses on scientific and technical development financial political and public enterprise this paper also describes in detail a number of innovation policies being pursued in the smart grid industry in both china and the usa

complexity and path dependence in biotechnology innovation systems in commercial applications of biotechnology there is no international convergence on many critical dimensions the united states is pulling ahead vis a vis most other developed or emerging countries in spite of the efforts made by the potential catching up nations the article argues that the explanation lies in the institutional fabric that fosters commercial biotechnology this institutional structure is too complex and costly it exists mainly in the united states and the followers either do not understand it or are trapped with more inefficient institutions the paper builds on biotechnology in order to theorize about institutions and their evolution in sectoral innovation systems it also applies concepts and models from complex system theory copyright 2011 the author 2011 published by oxford university press on behalf of associazione icc all rights reserved oxford university press

assessing china s exchange rate regime the imf articles of agreement forbid a country from manipulating its currency for unfair advantage the us treasury has been legally required since 1988 to report to congress biannually regarding whether individual trading partners are guilty of manipulation one part of this paper tests econometrically two competing sets of hypothesized determinants of the treasury decisions 1 legitimate economic variables consistent with the imf definition of manipulation the partners overall current account gdp its reserve changes and the real overvaluation of its currency and 2 variables suggestive of domestic american political expediency the bilateral trade balance us unemployment and an election year dummy the econometric results suggest that the treasury verdicts are driven heavily by the us bilateral deficit though other variables also turn out to be quite important in 2005 china announced a switch to a new exchange rate regime the exchange rate would be set with reference to a basket of other currencies with numerical weights unannounced allowing a movement of up to 0 3 within any given day although this step was originally accepted at face value in public policy circles scepticism is in order the second econometric part of the paper evaluates what exchange rate regime china has actually been following we use the technique introduced by frankel and wei 1994 1 one regresses changes in the value of the local currency in this case the rmb against changes in the values of the dollar euro yen and other currencies that may be in the basket we find that within 2005 the de facto regime remained a peg to a basket that put virtually all weight on the dollar subsequently there has been a modest but steady increase in flexibility with some weight shifted to a few non dollar currencies but not those one might expect in any case the weight on the dollar was still fairly heavy in 2006 the paper tests whether the decline in the implicit weight on the dollar is related to the pressure from us officials it also considers whether the increase in flexibility that we have seen small though it is has been gradually accelerating at a rate that would suggest the likelihood of some genuine flexibility in the not so distant future jeffrey a frankel and shang jin wei 1 ref 18

coase theorem complexity and transaction costs this paper by introducing complexity considerations provides a dynamic foundation for the coase theorem and highlights the role of transaction costs in generating inefficient bargaining negotiation outcomes we show when the players have a preference for less complex strategies the coase theorem holds in negotiation models with repeated surplus and endogenous disagreement payoffs if and only if there are no transaction costs specifically complexity considerations select only efficient equilibria in these models without transaction costs while every equilibrium induces perpetual disagreement and inefficiency with transaction costs we also show the latter is true in the rubinstein bargaining model with transaction costs

breaking free of the triple coincidence in international finance the traditional approach to international finance is to view capital flows as the financial counterpart to savings and investment decisions assuming further that the gdp boundary defines both the decision making unit and the currency area this triple coincidence of gdp area decision making unit and currency area is an elegant simplification but misleads when financial flows are important in their own right first the neglect of gross flows when only net flows are considered can lead to misdiagnoses of financial vulnerability second inattention to the effects of international currencies may lead to erroneous conclusions on exchange rate adjustment third sectoral differences between corporate and official sector positions can distort welfare conclusions on the consequences of currency depreciation as macroeconomic risks may be underestimated this paper illustrates the pitfalls of the triple coincidence through a series of examples from the global financial system in recent years and examines alternative analytical frameworks based on balance sheets as the unit of analysis

new perspectives on the innovation strategies of multinational enterprises lessons for technology policy in europe abstract the aim of this contribution is to learn more about changes in the innovation strategies of large multinational corporations whereby one focus is on internationalization aspects as sources for our analyses we reviewed the main empirical studies and gathered information and insights from 21 corporations our results show firstly that the internationalization of research and technology is still characterized by triadization involving companies from the us the european union and japan secondly qualitative motives are increasingly driving r d location decisions like learning from technological excellence and lead markets and dynamic interactions within the value chain thirdly the process of internationalization in research and technology has been accompanied by an increasingly selective focus on a very few locations and the concentration of innovation activities on worldwide centers of excellence we conclude that these changes in the innovation strategies of large multinational companies put several topics on the agenda for technology policy in europe 1 a stronger focus on extra european collaboration and mobility 2 strengthening the attractiveness of the european union to foreign r d investment and 3 the absorptive capacities of r d organizations in europe 4 a stronger integration of different policy areas and of indirect policy measures 5 as well as the establishment of a transparent and global framework for policy coordination and priority setting worldwide

future governance of innovation policy in europe three scenarios in europe public research technology and innovation policies are no longer exclusively in the hands of national authorities increasingly national initiatives are supplemented by or even competing with regional innovation policies or transnational programmes in particular the activities of the european union at the same time industrial innovation increasingly occurs within international networks are we witnessing a change of governance in european innovation policy based on a set of hypotheses concerning the co evolution of political systems and innovation systems in europe the paper speculates about the future governance of innovation policies trying to pave the ways for empirical analyses it sketches three scenarios stretching from 1 the idea of an increasingly centralised and dominating european innovation policy arena to 2 the opposite i e a progressive decentralisation and open competition between partly strengthened partly weakened national or regional innovation systems and finally to 3 the vision of a centrally mediated mixture of competition and co operation between diverse regional innovation cultures and a related governance structure

a key currency view of global imbalances abstract this study divides the world into currency zones according to the co movement of each currency with the key currencies the dollar zone groups economies that produce well over half of global gdp the euro zone now includes almost all of europe and some commodity producers but remains less than half the size of the dollar zone the dollar zone share has shown striking stability despite big shifts across zones over time these include the demise of the sterling zone and the expansion of the dm euro from northwestern europe to europe and beyond global imbalances look very different from a currency perspective in the 2000s the dollar zone s current account improved and became more or less balanced around the time of the global financial crisis gfc even as the us current account plumbed all time lows the dollar zone s net international investment position was also balanced around the time of the gfc thus neither flow nor stock readings on the dollar zone support widespread predictions in the early 2000s of an imminent dollar crash in fact most of the secular widening of current accounts occurred within currency zones where by construction investors bear relatively limited currency risk our account of the dollar s dominance rests not on the us economy s size but rather on the size of the zone with limited currency risk vis a vis the dollar in such a world the rise of another large economy poses the question not of relative size but rather of re alignment of third currencies what if the renminbi becomes a key currency alongside the dollar and the euro already some emerging market currencies are co moving with the renminbi against the dollar on current evidence a renminbi zone would shrink the dollar zone and widen its current account deficit

bargaining and markets complexity and the competitive outcome abstract rubinstein and wolinsky rev econ stud 57 1990 63 78 consider a simple decentralised market game in which agents meet randomly or voluntarily and bargain over the terms of trade they show that any individually rational price can be sustained as a sequential equilibrium even though the model has a unique competitive outcome here i consider rubinstein and wolinsky s model and show that if complexity costs of implementing strategies enter players preferences together with the standard payoff in the game then every equilibrium is stationary markov and induces the unique competitive price thus i demonstrate that aversion to complexity may provide a justification for the competitive outcome

the floating pound and the sterling area 1931 1939 1 introduction the sterling area in the 1930s 2 sterling and the rupee 3 the canadian debate over money and exchanges 1930 1934 4 south africa sterling and the gold standard 1931 and thereafter 5 australia and new zealand 1930 1939 6 monetary preparations for the world economic conference 7 united kingdom policy at the world monetary and economic conference 8 talking about exchange stabilization autumn 1933 through june 1936 9 the tripartite agreement of 1936 10 intergovernmental conversations and the management of sterling 1936 1939 11 conclusion the significance of sterling

public procurement and innovation resurrecting the demand side abstract demand is a major potential source of innovation yet the critical role of demand as a key driver of innovation has still to be recognised in government policy this article discusses public procurement as one of the key elements of a demand oriented innovation policy the paper starts by signaling the new significance of public procurement for innovation policy strategies at the eu level and in a range of european countries it then defines the concept of public procurement and embeds this concept within a taxonomy of innovation policies the rationales and justifications of public procurement policies to spur innovation are discussed followed by a consideration of the challenges and potential pitfalls as well as appropriate institutional arrangements and strategies including some recent empirical examples of good practice it concludes by confronting the public procurement approach with two of the most common objections to it and by considering future prospects

comparing innovation systems a framework and application to china s transitional context abstract this paper proposes a generic framework for analyzing innovation systems anchored around five fundamental activities r d implementation end use education linkage and focused on the performance implications of a system s structure and dynamics rather than simply describing the role and performance of particular actors institutions and policies this approach focuses on system level characteristics including the distribution of these activities within the system the organizational boundaries around them coordination mechanisms evolutionary processes and the effectiveness of the system in introducing diffusing and exploiting technological innovations the framework is applied to a comparison of china s national innovation system under central planning and since reforms revealing the evolving structure and dynamics of this system and current inconsistencies and perverse incentives that policymakers must address to realize their development goals more generally it provides a basis for addressing the implicit assumptions of organizational types roles and convergence among innovation systems emerging in very different contexts whether national regional or industrial

the dynamic capabilities of firms an introduction an expanded paradigm is needed to explain how competitive advantage is gained and held firms resorting to resource bas ed strategy attempt to accumulate valuable technology assets and employ an aggressive intellectual property stance however winners in the global marketplace have been firms demonstrating timely responsiveness and rapid and flexible product innovation along with the management capability to effectively coordinate and redeploy internal and external competences this source of competitive advantage dynamic capabilities emphasizes two aspects first it refers to the shifting character of the environment second it emphasizes the key role of strategic management in appropriately adapting integrating and re configuring internal and external organizational skills resources and functional competences toward changing environment 3 only recently have researchers begun to focus on the specifics of developing firm specific capabilities and the manner in which competences are renewed to respond to shifts in the business environment the dynamic capabilities approach provides a coherent framework to integrate existing conceptual and empirical knowledge and facilitate prescription this paper argues that the competitive advanis tage of firms stems from dynamic capabilities rooted in high performance routines z operating inside the firm embedded in the firm s processes and conditioned by its history it offers dynamic capabilities as an emerging paradigm of the modern business j firm that draws on multiple disciplines and advances with the help of industry studies in the usa and elsewhere

will there be a dollar crisis almost everyone believes that the us current account deficit must eventually end and that this end will involve dollar depreciation however many believe that this depreciation will take place gradually this paper shows that any process of gradual dollar decline fast enough to prevent the accumulation of implausible levels of us external debt would impose capital losses on investors much larger than they currently expect as a result there will at some point have to be a wile e coyote moment a point at which expectations are revised and the dollar drops sharply it is much less clear however whether this crisis will produce macroeconomic problems paul krugman

mapping the institutional capital of high tech firms a fuzzy set analysis of capitalist variety and export performance we examine how institutional configurations not single institutions provide companies with institutional capital building on the varieties of capitalism approach it is argued that competitive advantage in high tech industries with radical innovation may be supported by combinations of certain institutional conditions lax employment protection weak collective bargaining coverage extensive university training little occupational training and a large stock market furthermore multinational enterprises engage in institutional arbitrage they allocate their activities so as to benefit from available institutional capital these hypotheses are tested on country level data for 19 oecd economies in the period 1990 to 2003 a fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis yields several interesting findings a high share of university graduates and a large stock market are complementary institutions leading to strong export performance in high tech employment protection is neither conducive nor harmful to export performance in high tech a high volume of cross border mergers and acquisitions as a form of institutional arbitrage leading to knowledge flows acts as a functional equivalent to institutions that support knowledge production in the home economy implications of these findings for theory policy and the analysis of firm level behavior are developed

recent renminbi policy and currency co movements abstract this study investigates how variation in chinese authorities renminbi management since the august 2015 exchange rate reform maps onto variation in the co movement between the renminbi with regional and other emerging market currencies we first identify three post reform periods of rmb management transition basket management and countercyclical management across these periods the reaction of the official fixing rate to market movements differed significantly the co movement with regional and latin american currencies peaked in the basket period when the management was most multilateral making it possible to discern a renminbi zone in this period by contrast the decline in co movement in the countercyclical management period since may 2017 leaves it premature to speak of a renminbi bloc the dependence of the co movements on renminbi management has important implications for renminbi internationalisation

adaptations of renewable energy policies to unstable macroeconomic situations case study wind power in brazil despite the massive cost reduction in the last decade wind power generation is generally still more expensive than conventional energy sources which benefit from the exclusion of externality costs in the price structure support policies for renewable energies guarantee the economic viability of this type of electrical power generation in many european countries in latin america brazil has become the pioneer state for renewable energy with the implementation of the proinfa programme that supports among other sources wind power development of 1100 mw this article presents an overview of the differences between the german and brazilian wind power promotion policies with a special focus on how proinfa can be adapted to the unstable macroeconomic situation of brazil the document specifically examines the adaptation of wind power promotion policies to large inflation and interest rates in brazil

the policy implications of the globalisation of innovation abstract the paper develops a taxonomy of the globalisation of innovation based on three categories a the international exploitation of technology produced on a national basis b the global generation of innovations c the global technological collaborations the most evident changes implied by the increasing globalisation of innovation and technology are the tougher and increased competition and the greater collaboration between actors both across and within national boundaries the advantages just as the costs of these tendencies can be substantial leading to a higher risk of winners and losers the paper analyses the different impact that each category might have on the economic and innovative performance of countries and regions with the aim of defining the implications for national policies it is suggested that public policies play a different role in each of the three processes of the globalisation of innovation and that a single strategy does not exist neither from a firm s nor from a government s perspective the paper emphasis that none of the three categories in this taxonomy renders national policy obsolete on the contrary public policies are necessary on a far wider range than those currently implemented in the majority of countries

complexity and competition extensive form market games typically have a large number of noncompetitive equilibria in this paper we argue that the complexity of noncompetitive behavior provides a justification for competitive equilibrium in the sense that if rational agents have an aversion to complexity at the margin then maximizing behavior will result in simple behavioral rules and hence in a competitive outcome for this purpose we use a class of extensive form dynamic matching and bargaining games with a finite number of agents in particular we consider markets with heterogeneous buyers and sellers and deterministic exogenous sequential matching rules although the results can be extended to other matching processes if the complexity costs of implementing strategies enter players preferences lexicographically with the standard payoff then every equilibrium strategy profile induces a competitive outcome

a letter to the editor on wage bargaining abstract the rubinstein perfect information alternating offers bargaining model is problematic when applied to wage negotiations a strike or any other industrial action is not an automatic consequence of a delay in reaching an agreement because production can continue normally also when negotiations take place this paper extends the rubinstein model to incorporate the choice of calling a strike and it is shown that in this model there is no longer a unique subgame perfect equilibrium and that strikes with a length in real time can occur in equilibrium

national systems of innovations are x efficient and x effective why some are slow learners the growing literature on national systems of innovations nsis are creating a crucial new perspective on the institutional infrastructure of the knowledge based economy however this literature tends to be somewhat optimistic it often takes for granted that nsis are sets of institutions facilitating learning particularly about technology and organization this paper reconsiders the efficiency of nsis it suggests that nsis are x inefficient and x effective it develops some of the major factors explaining inefficiencies and proposes methods to measure the efficiency and effectiveness of nsis it offers some examples of inefficiencies from a comparison between selected nsis and suggests indicators of efficiency and effectiveness 2002 elsevier science b v all rights reserved

renewable energy policy and electricity restructuring a california case study abstract many countries are in the process of deregulating and restructuring their electric power industries although the introduction of retail competition may have negative impacts on the development of renewable energy a number of countries are establishing new programs to support these clean energy technologies in the united states debate has centered on three primary renewables support mechanisms 1 the renewables portfolio standard 2 programs funded by an electricity distribution surcharge and 3 voluntary renewable energy purchases by electricity customers via green power marketing california provides a good case study of the design of renewables support programs within industry restructuring because policymakers considered all three of these options during the state s restructuring proceedings moreover many of the same policy options design issues and political conflicts that have arisen in california are likely to recur in other states and countries some of the most important lessons from the california experience include 1 renewable energy and environmental advocates must clearly articulate the need and rationale for continued support of renewables 2 cost containment and competitive neutrality concerns must be addressed head on 3 combinations of policies are likely to be far more effective than any single renewables policy and 4 the effectiveness of renewable energy policies developed during the restructuring process will be strongly linked to their duration and stability

improving energy efficiency and smart grid program analysis with agent based end use forecasting models electric utilities and regulators face difficult challenges evaluating new energy efficiency and smart grid programs prompted in large part by recent state and federal mandates and financial incentives it is increasingly difficult to separate electricity use impacts of individual utility programs from the impacts of increasingly stringent appliance and building efficiency standards increasing electricity prices appliance manufacturer efficiency improvements energy program interactions and other factors this study reviews traditional approaches used to evaluate electric utility energy efficiency and smart grid programs and presents an agent based end use modeling approach that resolves many of the shortcomings of traditional approaches data for a representative sample of utility customers in a midwestern us utility are used to evaluate energy efficiency and smart grid program targets over a fifteen year horizon model analysis indicates that a combination of the two least stringent efficiency and smart grid program scenarios provides peak hour reductions one third greater than the most stringent smart grid program suggesting that reductions in peak demand requirements are more feasible when both efficiency and smart grid programs are considered together suggestions on transitioning from traditional end use models to agent based end use models are provided

an integrated energy policy for korea the case of an energy importing country economic theory defines a market failure when competitive markets cannot reach an equilibrium maximizing social welfare one of its most typical examples has proved to be the energy market exhaustible energy resources provide the limits to economic growth at least in the short term thus an energy policy for energy importing countries like korea has been focused on minimizing the negative influences of external energy price shocks to the domestic economy this study suggests one of the possible directions for an integrated energy policy which seeks to present a flow of policy rules which lead government policy to attain equilibrium maximizing the national economic benefits by offsetting the market failure

currency composition of foreign exchange reserves abstract this paper analyses the factors that govern the choice of the currency composition of official foreign exchange reserves first we introduce a new panel dataset on the key currencies in foreign exchange reserves of about 60 economies in the 1999 2017 period second we show that the currency composition of reserves relates strongly to the co movement of the domestic currency with key currencies and the currency invoicing of trade these factors represent attributes of the dollar or the euro rather than of the united states or the euro area they exert about equal effects on the currency composition of foreign exchange reserves we demonstrate that these findings are robust to a host of other possible factors

costly bargaining and renegotiation we identify the inefficiencies that arise when negotiation between two parties takes place in the presence of transaction costs first for some values of these costs it is efficient to reach an agreement but the unique equilibrium outcome is one in which agreement is never reached secondly even when there are equilibria in which an agreement is reached we find that the model always has an equilibrium in which agreement is never reached as well as equilibria in which agreement is delayed for an arbitrary length of time finally the only way in which the parties can reach an agreement in equilibrium is by using inefficient punishments for some of the opponent s deviations we argue that this implies that when the parties are given the opportunity to renegotiate out of these inefficiencies the only equilibrium outcome which survives is the one in which agreement is never reached regardless of the value of the transaction costs

efficient repeated implementation this paper examines repeated implementation of a social choice function scf with innitely lived agents whose preferences are determined randomly in each period an scf is repeated implementable in nash equilibrium if there exists a sequence of possibly history dependent mechanisms such that i its nash equilibrium set is non empty and ii every nash equilibrium outcome corresponds to the desired social choice at every possible history of past play and realizations of uncertainty we show with minor qualications that in the complete information environment an scf is repeated implementable in nash equilibrium if and only if it is ecient we also discuss several extensions of our analysis including constructions employing only nite mechanisms

striking for a bargain between two completely informed agents this paper models the wage contract negotiation procedure between a union and a firm as a sequential bargaining process in which the union must decide in each period whether or not to strike for the duration of that period we show that there exist subgame perfect equilibria in which the union engages in several periods of strikes prior to reaching a final agreement although both parties are completely rational and fully informed this has implications for other inefficient phenomena such as tariff wars debt negotiations and wars in general we characterize the set of equilibria show that strikes can occur in real time and discuss extensions of the model such as lockouts and the possibility of multiple recontracting opportunities copyright 1991 by american economic association

national innovation systems and the intermediary role of industry associations in building institutional capacities for innovation in developing countries a critical review of the literature abstract developed over the past three decades the national innovation system concept nis has been widely used by both scholars and policy makers to explain how interactions between a set of distinct nationally bounded institutions supports and facilitates technological change and the emergence and diffusion of new innovations this concept provides a framework by which developing countries can adopt for purposes of catching up initially conceived on structures and interactions identified in economically advanced countries the application of the nis concept to developing countries has been gradual and has coincided in the nis literature with a move away from overly macro interpretations to an emphasis on micro level interactions and processes with much of this work questioning the nation state as the most appropriate level of analysis as well as the emergence of certain intermediary actors thought to facilitate knowledge exchange between actors and institutions this paper reviews the nis literature chronologically showing how this shift in emphasis has diminished somewhat the importance of both institutions particularly governments and the political processes of institutional capacity building in doing so the paper suggests that more recent literature on intermediaries such as industry associations may offer valuable insights to how institutional capacity building occurs and how it might be directed particularly in the context of developing countries where governance capacities are often lacking contributing to less effective innovation systems stagnant economies and unequal development

sme internationalization modes in the german biotechnology industry the influence of imitation network position and international experience in this article we reveal how network enabled imitation processes impact young small and medium sized enterprises smes internationalization and how a firm s network position as well as its experiential knowledge moderate imitative behavior in internationalization modes building on institutional network and organizational learning theory we suggest that firms imitate the internationalization modes of their peers in their network moreover we argue that a firm s imitation propensity depends on two important boundary conditions network position and past experience applying a longitudinal event history analysis to analyze the complete population of 977 german biotechnology firms between 1996 and 2012 largely supports our hypotheses our findings reveal that firms imitate the internationalization modes of their peers in a precise manner this implies that the imitation of others can initially serve as a presumably convenient low risk shortcut to a planned or experience driven internationalization process furthermore our results confirm that this imitation process is channeled through formal network relations and that central network positions that are associated with superior information access enhanced legitimacy and status may promote deviating behavior acknowledging the interplay of different learning sources our findings additionally show that initial internationalization mode choices of smes can have a lasting effect on subsequent internationalization behavior overall our study contributes to a more nuanced view of imitative behavior of internationalizing smes and its boundary conditions and highlights future research opportunities that exist for considering imitation and its implications in international business research

the external wealth of nations measures of foreign assets and liabilities for industrial and developing countries abstract although capital flows are closely monitored surprisingly little is known about the accumulated stocks of foreign assets and liabilities held by various countries especially in the developing world this paper constructs estimates of foreign assets and liabilities and their equity and debt subcomponents for a sample of 67 industrial and developing countries it characterizes the stylized facts of international balance sheets and asks whether there are trends in net foreign asset positions and shifts in debt equity ratios over time finally it explores the sensitivity of estimated stock positions to the treatment of valuation effects not captured in balance of payments data

innovation policies within the framework of internationalization abstract in this article the remaining scope for national policy making in the framework of internationalization especially in the field of innovation policies is investigated four ideal typical policy directions are sketched which in actual policy making are always combined 1 adaptation to international requirements 2 international co operation 3 policy competition as creative bookkeeping and 4 national specialization or differentiation for each of these possible directions a 4 3 matrix has been composed in which four government roles providing the necessary infrastructures organizing and supporting necessary economic and political processes providing the intellectual framework and setting the overarching ambition of the nation are looked at for science technology and innovation policy respectively the main thesis is that countries will have to go on combining these policy directions but with a stronger emphasis on the fourth direction i e national differentiation building on the upgrading and knowledge intensification of already proven industrial strengths also criteria are given on the basis of which the assessment can be made which policy direction to follow in a certain case

state renewable energy electricity policies an empirical evaluation of effectiveness over the past decade state governments have emerged as us energy policy leaders across the country states are adopting policy instruments aimed at carbon mitigation and renewable energy deployment one of the most prevalent and innovative policy instruments is a renewable portfolio standard rps which seeks to increase the share of renewable energy electrification in the electricity market this analysis evaluates the effectiveness of state energy programs with an empirical investigation of the linkage between state rps policy implementation and the percentage of renewable energy electricity generation across states we use a variant of a standard fixed effects model referred to as a fixed effects vector decomposition with state level data from 1998 to 2006 results indicate that rps implementation is not a significant predictor of the percentage of renewable energy generation out of the total generation mix yet for each additional year that a state has an rps policy they are found to increase the total amount of renewable energy generation these findings reveal a potentially significant shortcoming of rps policies political institutions natural resource endowments deregulation gross state product per capita electricity use per person electricity price and the presence of regional rps policies are also found to be significantly related to renewable energy deployment

complexity and repeated implementation this paper examines the problem of repeatedly implementing an ecient social choice function when the agents preferences evolve randomly we show that the freedom to set dierent mechanisms at dierent histories can give the planner an additional leverage to deter undesirable behavior even if the mechanisms are restricted to be simple and nite specically we construct a history dependent sequence of simple mechanisms such that with minor qualications every pure subgame perfect equilibrium delivers the correct social choice at every history while every mixed equilibrium is strictly pareto dominated more importantly when faced with agents with a preference for less complex strategies at the margin the ecient social choice function can be repeatedly implemented in subgame perfect equilibrium in pure or mixed strategies our results demonstrate a positive role for complexity considerations in mechanism design

comparative economic analysis of supporting policies for residential solar pv in the united states solar renewable energy credit srec potential numerous studies and market reports suggest that the solar photovoltaic markets rely heavily if not entirely upon governmental support policies at present unlike in other countries where these policies are enacted at a national level the 50 states in the us pursue different policies in an attempt to foster the growth of renewable energy and specifically solar photovoltaics this paper provides an economic and financial analysis of the us federal and state level policies in states with solar targeted policies that have solar renewable energy credits srec markets after putting a value on srecs this study further compares solar carve outs with other incentives including the federal tax credit net metering and state personal tax credits our findings show that srec markets can certainly be strong with new jersey delaware and massachusetts having the most potential despite their strong potential as effective renewable policies the lack of a guaranteed minimum and the uncertainty attached are major drawbacks of srec markets however the leveraging of this high value offers hope that the policies will indeed stimulate residential solar photovoltaic markets

sectoral systems of innovation and production the concept sectoral system of innovation and production provides a multidimensional integrated and dynamic view of sectors it is proposed that a sectoral system is a set of products and the set of agents carrying out market and non market interactions for the creation production and sale of those products a sectoral systems has a specific knowledge base technologies inputs and demand agents are individuals and organizations at various levels of aggregation they interact through processes of communication exchange co operation competition and command and these interactions are shaped by institutions a sectoral system undergoes change and transformation through the co evolution of its various elements 2002 elsevier science b v all rights reserved

governing the transition of socio technical systems a case study of the development of smart grids in korea abstract this paper examines the motivations processes and outcomes of the development of smart grids in south korea through the perspectives of governance and innovation systems drawing on desktop research and semi structured interviews this paper has two major findings first the development of smart grids in korea has been shaped by various factors including macroeconomic policy the role of the government and experimentation the complex interactions between these factors at the landscape regime and niche levels has impacted on the development of smart grids second while korea s government led approach has its strengths in driving change it has also exposed weaknesses in the country s ability to mobilise the private sector and consumer participation major obstacles including partial electricity market reform and public distrust exist a systemic perspective is needed for policy in order to accommodate the changes required for smart grid development regulatory reforms particularly price setting mechanisms and consumer engagement are priority areas for policy change

socio economic acceptability for smart grid development a comprehensive review abstract a deep transformation of the electrical grid system at the global level is expected in the near future with new economic relations between energy suppliers and consumers this is the smart grid framework which can integrate the behavior of all connected users who become prosumers to ensure a sustainable energy supply in an efficient economical and safe manner smart grid projects have a significant impact on electricity consumers through shifts in consumer behavior culture and lifestyle the aim of this paper is to explore the degree of investigation of the main socio economic features in terms of private and social costs which are relevant for smart grids development and public acceptance to this aim a literature review of 148 peer reviewed scientific journal articles on smart grids has been conducted developing an original taxonomy for the socio economic features in terms of private direct costs directly associated with the monetary costs paid by consumers and social indirect costs constituted by consumers perception privacy cyber security and regulation the importance of the analysis of social costs arising from externalities is that they may hinder the deployment of specific technologies even if these technologies appear to be useful based on private costs the results reveal that the explored literature mainly deals with private costs although an emerging literature starts to address the social costs that may hamper smart grids deployment the paper reviews new opportunities and challenges for further research bridging the gap between engineering and socio economic research areas including business organizational applications policy and security issues the resulting enrichment of interdisciplinary know how can be the basis for the sustainable development of current and future generations

the contrasting roles of government in the development of biotechnology industry in the us and germany abstract during the last 30 years biotechnology development has charted different paths in the us and in germany even though in germany federal support programs started very early to target biotechnology the innovative performance of this sector has been lagging behind that of the us where the federal support was less direct this article compares the two national science and technology s t policies and analyzes the political economic and social factors that determined the different paths the paper concludes that an indirect s t policy that tries to spread the factors thereby enabling a preferable economic ecology for biotech development is more successful than an interventionist policy political action however is limited and can only enhance science and technology development if the policies mesh with the social and economic dispositions

a currency union for hong kong and mainland china abstract this paper investigates the degree and the evolution of business cycle synchronization between hong kong sar and mainland china as well as hong kong sar and the united states with a two step procedure a structural var model is first set up to capture the dynamics of shocks to different regions then a state space model is used to gauge the degree of symmetry of regional shocks and to examine whether business cycles have been more synchronized over time our results cast doubt on the feasibility of a currency union between hong kong and mainland china in the foreseeable future

sterling s relationship with the dollar and the deutschemark 1976 89 this paper evaluates the linkages between bilateral exchange rates using a time varying parameter model which can be estimated using the kalman filter the technique solves many of the statistical problems which arise when ordinary least squares is used to estimate currency correlation applying the technique to the dollar sterling dm sterling and dm dollar bilateral exchange rates the results suggest a market weakening strengthening of sterling s relationship with the dollar dm since the mid 1970s additionally these currency linkages are shown to have undergone a number of regime shifts suggesting that the timing of the weakening of the dollar sterling relationship is different to that proposed by previous studies copyright 1991 by royal economic society

testing for convergence between uk regional house prices drake l 1995 testing for convergence between uk regional house prices reg studies 29 357 366 this paper uses the kalman filter time varying parameter estimation technique to test for convergence between uk regional house prices this issue is significant given the historical disparities in regional house price inflation rates and the unprecedented downturn in both uk and most regional house prices in the late 1980s and early 1990s the evidence suggests that there are clear regional differences in the pattern of uk house price movements in particular house prices in the north and scotland show evidence of greater divergence from prices in the rest of the south east region than do the southern and midlands regions drake l 1995 une analyse pour determiner la convergence des prix du marche immobilier regionaux au royaume uni reg studies 29 357 366 cet article se sert de la technique dite kalman filter afin de determiner la convergence des prix du marche immobilier regionaux au royaume uni c

the reconfiguration of national innovation systems the example of german biotechnology abstract the concept of the national system of innovation nsi has been applied in order to analyze the interrelation of institutions and technological development it has been diversified as a growing number of studies recognized the emergence of autonomous innovation systems at various territorial levels focusing on german biotechnology this article takes an alternative perspective arguing that functions of the nsi became part of a multi level governance system by proposing a multi level approach which directs on the dynamic reconfiguration of nsis towards the subnational as well as the international level we are trying to bridge the gap between innovation system approaches that analytically highlight one specific territorial level only

perfect equilibria in a negotiation model rubinstein s alternating offers bargaining model is enriched by assuming that players payoffs in disagreement periods are determined by a normal form game it is shown that such a model can have multiple perfect equilibria including inefficient ones provided that players are sufficiently patient delay is possible even though there is perfect information and the players are fully rational the length of delay depends only on the payoff structure of the disagreement game and not on the discount factor not all feasible and individually rational payoffs of the disagreement game can be supported as average disagreement payoffs indeed some negotiation games have a unique perfect equilibrium with immediate agreement

international currency exposures valuation effects and the global financial crisis abstract we examine the evolution of international currency exposures with a particular focus on the 2002 12 period during the run up to the global financial crisis there was a widespread shift towards positive net foreign currency positions such that relatively few countries exhibited the archetypal emerging market short foreign currency position on the eve of the global financial crisis during the crisis the upheaval in currency markets generated substantial currency generated valuation effects much of which were not reversed there is some evidence that the distribution of valuation effects was stabilizing in the sense of showing a negative covariation pattern with pre crisis net foreign asset positions