cssi/SciSciGPT-SciSciNet huggingface dataset:
Channel Strategies for Durable Goods: Coexistence of Selling and Leasing to Individual and Corporate Consumers

In durable goods markets, such as those for automobiles or computers, the coexistence of selling and leasing is common as is the existence of both corporate and individual consumers. Leases to corporate consumers affect the price of used goods on the second-hand market which in turn affect the buying and leasing behavior of individual consumers. The setting of prices (or volumes) for sale and lease to individual and corporate consumers is a complicated problem for manufacturers. We consider a manufacturer who concurrently sells and leases a finitely durable good to both individual and corporate consumers. The interaction between the manufacturer and consumers is modeled as a dynamic sequential game, where each player seeks to maximize its own payoff over an infinite horizon. We study how the corporate channel substitutability of new goods and used goods and transaction costs in the second-hand market affect the manufacturer's pricing decisions, consumer behavior, and social welfare in the retail market. Making a number of simplifying assumptions, including two-period lifetime for the finitely durable goods, we consider Markov Perfect Equilibrium as the solution concept. We show that the manufacturer can maximize her profit by segmenting consumers according to their willingness to pay. Selling and leasing are the mechanisms used for price discrimination in the retail market. We show that as she leases a larger share of her production to the corporate consumer, (1) the manufacturer does not necessarily have to adjust the optimal selling price of new goods to individual consumers, and the volume of sales of new goods to individual consumers can stay the same; (2) the manufacturer does increase the retail lease price, and the number of individual leases decreases; (3) the net supply of used goods on the market increases, leading to a lower market price for used goods; and (4) more individual consumers are able to participate in the market, and their collective welfare or net utility improves. We also show that as production costs increase the manufacturer increases prices, reducing volumes across all channels. When transaction costs increase, the manufacturer reduces leasing in both corporate and retail channels.
Mercy in Immigration Law

What role should mercy play in immigration law? This Article draws on the robust debate in the criminal law about the role of mercy in the hopes of starting a conversation among immigration law scholars and practitioners. Mercy skeptics argue that mercy contravenes justice, while advocates argue that mercy is a necessary countermeasure to the unrelenting harshness of criminal law today. I argue that the problems of mercy in the criminal law are amplified in the immigration law context. The lack of procedural and substantive protections for immigrants, the acceptance of unfettered discretion and lack of oversight of agency action, and the political subordination of noncitizens all push in the same direction—towards sovereign mercy rather than equitable justice. Sovereign mercy can have laudable effects, as when it encourages the creation of humanitarian programs of immigrant admission. But it can also have harmful effects, departing from important rule of law norms and placing recipients outside the law rather than within its protections. I do not seek to resolve these contradictions but rather to draw our attention to them and to encourage scholars and practitioners of immigration law to look critically at the role of mercy.
Symmetry and symmetry breaking in coupled oscillator communities

With the recent development of analytical methods for studying the collective dynamics of coupled oscillator systems, the dynamics of communities of coupled oscillators have received a great deal of attention in the nonlinear dynamics community. However, the majority of these works treat systems with a number of symmetries to simplify the analysis. In this work we study the role of symmetry and symmetry-breaking in the collective dynamics of coupled oscillator communities, allowing for a comparison between the macroscopic dynamics of symmetric and asymmetric systems. We begin by treating the symmetric case, deriving the bifurcation diagram as a function of intra- and inter-community coupling strengths. In particular we describe transitions between incoherence, standing wave, and partially synchronized states and reveal bistability regions. When we turn our attention to the asymmetric case we find that the symmetry-breaking complicates the bifurcation diagram. For instance, a pitchfork bifurcation in the symmetric case is broken, giving rise to a Hopf bifurcation. Moreover, an additional partially synchronized state emerges, as well as a new bistability region.
Discouraging Times: The Labor Force Participation of Married Black Women, 1930–1940

Abstract The extraordinary unemployment rates of black women during the Great Depression caused a sizeable number to leave the labor force as “discouraged workers.” Consequently, while married white women entered the labor force in increasing numbers, the participation rate of married black women stagnated. The higher unemployment of black women was not primarily a function of their occupational or industrial distribution, but reflected unequal treatment within markets. This article adds support to the view of black economic progress as episodic in nature, with the Depression as a period of relative retrenchment for African Americans.
Speaking in Tongues: Some Comments on Multilingualism

The topic is language, and I would like to begin my comments on this morning's papers by pulling together some of the threads of yesterday's discussion. Two themes in particular seem relevant. The first, is the power of language not only to communicate, but also to exclude. Yesterday morning, we held a panel discussion in which the participants spoke about their first experiences with enforced bilingualism. Olga Moya, for example, spoke movingly of her first day in school when she and several of her classmates were punished for lapsing into Spanish in a moment of crisis. She also observed that many of these same students did not remain in school for very long. The second is the power of language to shape identity and self expression. Yesterday morning, Yvonne Tamayo spoke about the many things she could say in Spanish but was unable to express in English. Berta Hernandez-Truyol made a similar point at the first plenary when she talked about how she often thinks in English but experiences her emotions in Spanish. And Madeleine Plasencia elaborated on the subject when she spoke about how languages are an integral element of who we are; how they shape not only our personal sense of self, but also our identity in the outside world.
Labor mobility of scientists, technological diffusion, and the firm's patenting decision

We develop and test a model of the patenting and R&D decisions of an innovating firm whose scientist-employees sometimes quit to join or start a rival. In our model, the innovating firm patents to protect itself from its employees. We show theoretically that the risk of a scientist's departure reduces the firm's R&D expenditures and raises its propensity to patent an innovation. We find evidence from firm-level panel data that is consistent with this latter result. Our results suggest that scientists' turnover is associated with cross-industry patenting variation and with recent economy-wide increases in patenting. Scientists' turnover may also partly account for why small firms have high patent-R&D ratios.
Corporate Social Responsibility in China: Window Dressing or Structural Change?

In recent years many indigenous corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives have emerged in China. The Chinese CSR initiatives include laws and regulations, governmental instructions and guidelines, non-governmental standards and organizations. The recent growth of the Chinese CSR initiatives deserves an analysis of the CSR development in China, especially given that China's international image is usually associated with human rights abuses, substandard products, sweatshops, and serious environmental pollution. How sincere and serious are the Chinese CSR measures? Are they simply window dressing or is there any real structural change? This Article overviews major Chinese CSR initiatives and analyzes the Chinese CSR development from the perspectives of the historical and ideological foundations, instrumental motivations, and institutional environments in China.
Banishment By a Thousand Laws: Residency Restrictions on Sex Offenders

In 1932, the Soviet Union instituted the policy of propiska to control the internal movements of its population. As a component of the propiska system, people without an “acceptable occupation” were exiled from major cities. The exiles were instructed not to live within 100 kilometers of designated cities within the Soviet Union. The practice of banishing people to the 101 kilometer was later expanded to include criminals, homeless persons, prostitutes, and political dissidents. One of the last great purges to the 101 kilometer accompanied the 1980 Moscow Olympic Games as the Soviet Union sought to project a positive image of its capital city to the world community. The practice gave rise to the expression “taken to the 101 kilometer” which is still a storied and harrowing phrase in Russia and other former Soviet states. Members of exile communities lived in a social “abyss” where people were separated from their families, friends, and the only places they had ever known. Even after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the resultant
Off-Label Drug Marketing, the First Amendment, and Federalism

For decades, the government has tried to promote the public’s health by regulating the flow of information from physicians, drug companies, and other persons or businesses to consumers and patients. Sometimes, the federal government requires disclosure of health risks; other times, it prohibits disclosures of information that it deems harmful to health. But what may be good for health may not be constitutional. The First Amendment rightly recognizes that people generally must be able to speak freely without the government telling them what to say or what not to say.In this essay, I consider the FDA’s restrictions on “off-label” promotional speech by pharmaceutical companies. The FDA limits the freedom of companies to market their drugs for unapproved uses — even though physicians are free to prescribe the drugs for those uses. In recent years, the FDA’s authority to regulate off-label promotional speech has been called into question. According to critics of FDA regulations, the regulations create a conflict between government power and the safeguards provided by the First Amendment against an overreaching state, and the government’s desire to regulate must yield to the Constitution’s interest in personal liberty. If the FDA wants to limit off-label uses of drugs, it can regulate those uses directly rather than regulating them indirectly through the suppression of promotional speech.However, direct regulation of off-label use raises its own constitutional concerns. Limits on off-label prescribing also implicate a fundamental constitutional principle that is designed to safeguard individual liberty — the principle of federalism. Restricting off-label use rather than off-label promotion may allow the FDA to avoid First Amendment problems, but it forces the FDA to intrude into matters traditionally regulated by state governments — it is state legislatures and licensing boards, rather than the federal government, that oversee doctors as they practice their craft, including as they decide about treatment options for their patients. In other words, when it comes to the regulation of off-label uses of drugs, federalism is just as much at stake as is freedom of speech. Because of the FDA’s desire to respect state government authority, together with other considerations discussed in this essay, courts should give the FDA a good deal of leeway in its regulation of off-label marketing.
Educational Investments in a Dual Economy

We present a simple two-period, dual-economy model in which migration options may affect the informal financing of educational investments. When credit contracts are universally available and perfectly enforceable, spatially varied returns to human capital have no effect on educational investment patterns. But when financial markets are incomplete and informal mechanisms with imperfect contract enforcement must fill the breach, attributes that affect the returns to education will affect educational lending and, consequently, educational attainment. Migration options can increase the returns to education, but can also choke off the informal finance on which poorer rural households may depend for long-term, lumpy investments like children's education.
Capital Account Convertibility and Risk Management in India

This paper takes a closer look at the prudential and regulatory measures needed to prepare India's financial system to manage the risks arising from fuller capital account convertibility (FCAC). The paper contributes to the debate on FCAC in two ways. First, it reviews the potential and existing financial stability challenges to FCAC in India. Second it studies how prudential regulation and supervision is addressing these challenges. The main conclusion is that regulatory and supervisory measures alone are not enough and will need to be complemented by improvements in Indian banks' risk management and further development of the domestic capital markets.
Limited attention and portfolio choice: The impact of attention allocation on mutual fund performance

This study proposes that the performance of mutual fund managers is linked to how efficiently they allocate attention across assets in their investment set. Motivated by existing models of optimal portfolio choice and rational inattention, we posit that the efficiency of attention allocation increases when a manager chooses larger (smaller) active positions in assets which need more (less) information acquisition effort to resolve uncertainty about future payoffs. We show that the efficiency of attention allocation has a significantly positive impact on future fund performance. Efficient attention allocation has a lesser impact on performance as the total demands on a manager’s limited attention increase.
Half-Baked: The Demand by For-Profit Businesses for Religious Exemptions from Selling to Same-Sex Couples

Should bakers be required to make cakes for same-sex weddings? With the announcement of a constitutional right to same-sex marriage in Obergefell, one of the next confrontations in the struggle for expanded equality will involve the demand for religious exemptions from nondiscrimination laws in the public marketplace. The present discussion unravels the eclectic arguments that are repeatedly offered in support of such an exemption. The initial feint invokes a fundamental right to exclude, which fails for two reasons. First, the right to exclude is a fundamentally racist rule devised to prevent African-Americans from participating in free society. Rather than attempt to revive it in order to likewise bar gays from the marketplace, the rule should be reset to the antebellum standard of free access to all public places of commerce. A second effort defending discrimination on conduct like marriage rather than status such as sexual orientation has found no positive reception in the courts. The principle legal conclusions are twofold. First, although free speech defenses have been easily rebuffed, the possibility of a coerced speech defense that has been contextualized to the receiving audience and read against the background social norms should be recognized. Messages arise when actions cut against stereotyped expectations as they currently stand. To evaluate a forced speech claim we must know what are the routine understandings of same-sex marriage within the relevant community. Only then can a court ascertain whether the service provider has been asked to send a message about same-sex marriage against its will. The free exercise claim presents a less likely chance of success, especially in states without a RFRA law. In those settings the court will analyze the religious exercise argument under the Smith criteria which invariably find the contested nondiscrimination law to be of enforceable general applicability. In jurisdictions that have enacted a local version of RFRA, it is unclear how judges will assess the government’s compelling interest to prevent sexual orientation discrimination. That analysis will involve a description of the harms threatening both sides of the conflict. While the injuries arising from the violation of sincerely held religious beliefs are to be assumed, the dignitary harms to the same-sex couple should not be mischaracterized and trivialized as a “minor inconvenience.” For those that insist on concessions to the demand for religious exceptions, the most defensible compromise approach may carve out a small group of professionals who exercise “editorial judgment” in the same manner as the courts have described for newspapers.
Employer Reputation at Work

Employer reputational costs - that is, the loss in value of the firm's reputational assets if the firm reneges on its promises to workers, both express and implied, - has played an important role in the economic literature of employment contracts, but this factor has itself generated little sustained analysis. Reputation is often offered as a late-appearing deus ex machina explaining why opportunistic behavior by employers even in internal labor markets is likely to be relatively unimportant. This standard explanation for the enforceability of implicit labor contracts in internal labor markets is problematic for at least three reasons. It assumes a well-functioning market in information about past and projected firm behavior, for a loss in employer reputation can only occur if job applicants from the external labor market are able readily to distinguish between "opportunistic" behavior (where, say, a termination of employment reflects an employer's reneging on implied promises of deferred compensation or late-career immunity from close monitoring of performance) and legitimate behavior (where a discharge reflects an appropriate response to shirking on the job or unforeseen business conditions). Second, the reputational-loss account is a static one; it assumes that employers in the first period (when they make the implied promise of deferred compensation or late-career job security) are in the same product market position in the later period (when they are expected to perform these implied promises). If the employer in the later period has disappeared, operates in a different product market, or has a need for workers with a different skill mix than in the first period, it will become even more difficult for job applicants in the external labor market to evaluate whether the firm's past behavior is a good predictor of their probable job experience with that firm. Finally, the explanation also makes certain problematic assumptions about how workers process information. The deficiencies of the standard explanation require either a reconsideration of implied labor market theory, or if implied labor market arrangements remain economically desirable an identification and possible strengthening of institutions that might enhance the firm's reputational costs in breaking promises to workers.
The Influence of the Home Owners' Loan Corporation on Housing Markets During the 1930s

Problems with mortgage financing are widely considered to be a major cause of the recent financial meltdown. Several modern programs have been designed to mimic the Home Owners' Loan Corporation (HOLC) of the 1930s. We analyze the impact of the HOLC on the nonfarm rental and owned home markets for over 2,800 counties in the United States in the 1930s. In sparsely populated counties, where financial markets were not as well developed as in larger cities, the HOLC stimulated demand for owned housing more than it influenced supply. In rental markets the HOLC appears to have contributed to an increase in supply. The Author 2011. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Society for Financial Studies. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com., Oxford University Press.
Government debt and private leverage: An extension of the Miller theorem

Abstract This paper shows how government financing decisions can influence the corporate decision to use debt or equity finance. In particular, it is shown that an increase in the stock of taxable government debt reduces the equilibrium quantity of corporate debt, and that an increase in the stock of tax-free government debt reduces the equilibrium quantity of corporate equity. The effects of inflation rate and tax rate changes are also considered.
Is Knowledge of the Tax Law Socially Desirable

This paper considers whether knowledge of the tax law is socially desirable. Unlike other laws, which most often attempt to channel behavior, revenue-raising taxes attempt to avoid changing behavior; so, it is not obvious whether or when knowledge of the tax law is desirable. I argue that whether knowledge of the tax law is desirable depends on three factors: expectations about the tax in the absence of knowledge, the type of tax, and the quality of the tax. These factors may often be hard to observe, which leads to the conclusion that it may often not be desirable to try to manipulate knowledge of the tax law. Copyright 2013, Oxford University Press.
Does Recognition versus Disclosure Matter? Evidence from Value‐Relevance of Banks' Recognized and Disclosed Derivative Financial Instruments

We provide evidence on how investor valuation of derivative financial instruments differs depending upon whether the fair value of these instruments is recognized or disclosed. Expanded disclosures and accounting practices prior to SFAS No. 133 and mandatory recognition of derivative fair values after SFAS No. 133 provide a natural setting for comparing the valuation implications of recognized and disclosed derivative fair value information. This unique setting mitigates many of the research design problems with recognition versus disclosure studies. Using a sample of banks that simultaneously hold recognized and disclosed derivatives prior to SFAS No. 133, we find that the valuation coefficients on recognized derivatives are significant, whereas the valuation coefficients on disclosed derivatives are not significant. Further, using a sample of banks that have only disclosed derivatives prior to SFAS No. 133, which are recognized after SFAS No.133, we find that while the valuation coefficients on disclose...
On Lawyers and Moral Discernment

Drawing on Jacques Maritain's doctrine of Knowledge through Connaturality, and on other authors including David Hume and Edmond Cahn, this article argues that judgments of right and wrong are arrived at primarily through immediate discernment, and only secondarily through the application of general principles. It is possible, therefore, for lawyers and clients to arrive at agreement on how to handle their cases, even though they do not agree on the general principles that apply.
Of Smart Phone Wars and Software Patents

We present specifi c empirical evidence regarding the examination by the Patent Offi ce of software patents, their validity, and their role in the smart phone wars. The article of software patents, their validity, and their role in the smart phone wars. The article concludes with an outlook for systematic policymaking within the patent system in concludes with an outlook for systematic policymaking within the patent system in the wake of major recent legislative and administrative reforms. Principally, the article the wake of major recent legislative and administrative reforms. Principally, the article highlights how the US Patent Offi ce acts responsibly when it engages constructively highlights how the US Patent Offi ce acts responsibly when it engages constructively with principled criticisms and calls for reform, as it has during the passage and now with principled criticisms and calls for reform, as it has during the passage and now implementation of the landmark Leahy–Smith America Invents Act of 2011. implementation of the landmark Leahy–Smith America Invents Act of 2011.
Recent Evidence on the Impact of Federal Government Budget Deficits on the Nominal Long Term Mortgage Interest Rate in the U.S.

This study provides recent empirical evidence on the impact of the federal budget deficit on the nominal long term mortgage interest rate yield in the U.S. The study is couched within a loanable funds model that includes the cost to financial institutions of borrowing funds, expected inflation, and the percentage growth rate of real GDP, as well as the federal budget deficit expressed as a percent of GDP. Using annual data for the period 1970-2008, two-stage least squares autoregressive estimation reveals that the federal budget deficit, expressed as a percent of GDP, exercised a positive and statistically significant impact on the long term mortgage interest rate yield.
Post-purchase Counseling and Default Resolutions among Low- and Moderate- Income Borrowers

The rise of delinquencies and foreclosures in a softening housing market calls for systematic studies of default behavior and efforts to minimize the default risks. Using a sample of residential mo...
Considerations in the Design and Construction of Investment Real Estate Research Indices

This paper surveys some of the major technical issues in the design and construction of real estate research indices, both appraisal-based and transactions-based. The paper considers property sampl...
Fuel Tax Incidence and Supply Conditions

Abstract The incidence of taxes on consumers and producers plays a central role in evaluating energy tax policy, yet the literature testing the main predictions of the tax incidence model is sparse. In this paper, we examine the pass-through rate of state gasoline and diesel taxes to retail prices, and importantly we estimate the dependence of pass-through on factors constraining the gasoline and diesel supply chains. We consider several factors that alter the elasticity of supply, including within state heterogeneity in gasoline content requirements, refinery capacity utilization, inventory constraints, and variation in the demand for untaxed uses of diesel. In general, we find that in periods of time when the supply chain is constrained, and the constraint is plausibly unrelated to shifts in demand, the pass-through rate of fuel taxes declines. We describe several potential implications for tax policy, including tax breaks during peak driving season and during times of supply disruptions such as after major hurricanes.
Ten Questions for Social Change Lawyers

This article provides ten question about social change lawyering designed to help lawyers focus their efforts to work towards social justice.
WHY ANGLO CORPORATIONS SHOULD NOT BE TRUSTED: AND HOW THEY COULD BE TRUSTED

This paper identifies eight reasons why it is rational not to trust large complex Anglo corporations and how these reasons could be removed. Two reasons are that directors are overloaded with information but also lack information independent of management to evaluate management and the business. A third reason is that directors do not have systemic processes to discover if their trust in management is misplaced. A fourth and fifth reason is that directors have absolute power to manage their own conflicts of interest and a dominant shareholder can enter into related party transactions that can unfairly extract value. The sixth and seventh reasons are the incentive for directors not to blow the whistle on their colleagues and the impotence of a director to act alone. The eighth reason is that shares can be manipulated and traded covertly. Four changes in corporate constitutions are identified that could remove these concerns. These are to establish a watchdog board, introduce cumulative voting for directors, establish stakeholder councils and introducing sunlight share trading.
The Profitability of Currency Speculation

Abstract This paper presents the results of a post-sample simulation of a speculative strategy using a portfolio of foreign currency forward contracts. The main new features of the speculative strategy are (a) the use of Kalman filters to updata the forecasting equation, (b) the allowance for transactions costs and margin requirements and (c) the endogeneous determination of the leveraging of the portfolio. While the forecasting model tended to overestimate profit and underestimate risk, the strategy was still profitable over a three year period and it was possible to reject the hypothesis that the sum of profits was zero.
Induced Innovation and Energy Prices

This paper uses U.S. patent data from 1970 to 1994 to study the impact of energy prices on energy-efficient innovations. Theories of technological change have focused both on demand-side factors, which spur innovative activity by increasing the value of new innovations, and supply-side factors, such as scientific advancements that make new innovations possible. Data on demand-side factors are easily obtained, but data on supply-side factors that influence innovation are not readily available. This paper uses patent citations as a measure of the usefulness of the existing base of scientific knowledge. Citations to previous patents are used to construct productivity estimates, which measure the usefulness of the existing stock of knowledge to inventors in a given energy field for any given year. These estimates are then combined with data on demand-side factors to estimate a model of induced innovation in energy technologies. The results indicate that both energy prices and the supply of knowledge have strongly significant positive effects on innovation. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implication of this work for environmental policy.
Monetary Policy Regimes, Expected Inflation, and the Response of Interest Rates to Money Announcements

This paper examines the response of the term structure of interest rates to weekly money announcements. Estimated responses for both the pre- and post-October 1979 periods are first presented. Then, two competing hypotheses involving the policy anticipations and expected inflation effects are formally specified and compared with the estimated responses. Both hypotheses are found to be consistent with the responses, but they have sharply different implications about the Federal Reserve's short-run monetary policy. By exploiting these different implications, additional empirical results focusing directly on the money stock process support the policy anticipations hypothesis.
Let the Punishment Fit the Crime: Sanctioning Absent Class Members for Failure to Respond to Postcertification Discovery Requests

Courts rarely allow defendants to take discovery of absent class members after class action certification. However, if a court does permit such discovery and some absentees fail to respond, should the court sanction the nonresponsive absentees? Under what circumstances should the court dismiss the nonresponsive absentees? When considering whether and what sanctions to impose, courts make a decision about the rights and role of absentees in class actions. This Note examines postcertification absentee discovery sanctions through a discussion of group litigation. Next, it analyzes the reasoning of courts that have dismissed absentees, declined to dismiss absentees, and imposed other sanctions on absentees. Finally, this Note concludes that courts should generally dismiss opt-out absentees without prejudice, and dismiss opt-in absentees with prejudice.
The Quality of Analysts' Cash Flow Forecasts

ABSTRACT: This study examines properties of analysts' cash flow forecasts and compares them to those exhibited by analysts' earnings forecasts. Our results indicate that analysts' cash flow forecasts are less accurate than analysts' earnings forecasts and improve at a slower rate during the forecast period. Further, cash flow forecasts appear to be a nai¨ve extension of analysts' earnings forecasts, thus providing limited information on expected changes in working capital. We also find that analysts' forecasts of cash flows are of limited information content and are only weakly associated with stock returns. Finally, estimating expected accruals as the difference between analysts' earnings forecasts and their cash flow forecasts does not result in a better detection of earnings management than achieved by commonly used accrual models.
Beyond diffusion: an affordability model of the growth of new consumer durables

A firm’s ability to compete in new product markets is vital to its profitability and long-term survival. Therefore, it is important to understand the development and growth of these markets. Following a pioneering study by Bass (1969), diAusion models have traditionally provided this understanding in marketing. The great appeal of the Bass model is that it is a simple one that fits the data very well and provides parameters that have an intuitive behavioural interpretation. The model suAers from three wellknown limitations: (1) it does not include marketing variables that could influence new product diAusion and sales; (2) the model’s parameters are unstable; and (3) the model’s forecasts are inaccurate before the sales peak and especially prior to the point of inflection. Subsequent research has made progress especially in extending the Bass model to include marketing variables. However, the extensions have come at the cost of simplicity: the new models are far more complex than the simple Bass model. We propose an alternate simple model of new product growth for consumer durables, based on the concept of aAordability rather than on diAusion. We compare this model with the diAusion model in terms of fit, stability and validity of parameters, and forecasting ability. The alternate model is a little inferior to the diAusion model in fit, but superior in terms of the stability and validity of parameters and forecasting ability. We discuss the limitations and implications of our model. #1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Communication intensity, goal congruence, and uncertainty in buyer–supplier new product development

Abstract Manufacturers involve suppliers in new product development in order to access knowledge and resources, but these benefits only occur with effective project-level integration. Adopting a contingency theory view, we develop hypotheses concerning how two integrative devices, intensive communication and congruent goals, influence project performance under various conditions of uncertainty. We test our theoretical model with a sample of 214 buyer–supplier joint new product development projects. Results suggest that communication intensity is positively associated with project performance when either task or relational uncertainty is high, but is also negatively associated with performance when task uncertainty is low. Goal congruence is positively associated with project performance, especially when either task uncertainty is low or relational uncertainty is high. We discuss the implications of these findings for theory and practice.
Estimating the Elasticity of Growth in the US Using the Generalized Means of Income

Economic growth has been a key mantra to promote poverty reduction in developing countries. Studies have shown that a 1 % GDP growth can reduce absolute poverty (or increase the average income of the poorest quintile) by 1 % or more in developing countries. The literature calls this relationship between poverty reduction and growth as growth elasticity. However, there is very little research available studying the extent of growth elasticity in a developed economy. I fill this vacuum in literature by applying the method of generalized means of income outlined in Foster and Szekely (Int Econ Rev 49(4):1143–1172, 2008) on micro-level data to estimate the elasticity of growth in the US. The generalized means of income of Foster and Szekely (Int Econ Rev 49(4):1143–1172, 2008) satisfies all the axioms of a good income standard, which makes it a preferred method to measure the elasticity of growth. My analysis shows that most of the growth in the US is driven by the richer segment of the society. The ‘wealthier’ poor get some benefit from growth—a 1 % increase in per-capita state-level income leads to about 0.9 % increase in their income both in the short and long-run. However, this relationship diminishes when I calculate the growth elasticity of those in deeper poverty. Sector-wise decomposition of income shows that the ‘wealthier’ poor benefits from an increase in the size of the service sector, but those in deeper poverty do not see this benefit.
Optimality of Base-Stock and ( s , S ) Policies for Inventory Problems with Information Delays

Information delays exist when the most recent inventory information available to the inventory manager (IM) is dated; namely, the IM observes only the inventory level of an earlier period. We introduce information delays into the standard multiperiod stochastic inventory problem with backorders. We consider two types of information delays: (i) a constant delay and (ii) a random delay. We define an appropriate reference inventory position, which is a sufficient statistics for finding the optimal order quantity. We show that the optimal ordering policy is of base-stock type with respect to the reference inventory position and is of (s, S) type if there is also a fixed cost of ordering.
The curious incident of the supreme court in Myriad Genetics

© 2014 Dan L. Burk. Often what is not said is as significant as what is said. In its recent Myriad Genetics decision, the United States Supreme Court is curiously silent about the relationship between its holding in that case and the holding in its immediately previous patent subject matter case, Mayo v. Prometheus. This reticence is all the more puzzling given that the Court initially remanded Myriad to the lower courts for reconsideration in light of the Mayo holding. The Court's silence regarding Mayo leaves uncertain the relationship between the products of nature doctrine that serves as the basis for the Myriad decision, and the laws of nature doctrine that has been the basis of nearly all of its other subject matter cases. In this Article I assemble the clues in the laws of nature cases to suggest what the Court might have said or might still say regarding products of nature.
Corporate Governance Consequences of Accounting Scandals: Evidence from Top Management, CFO and Auditor Turnover

This paper examines the consequences of accounting scandals to top management, top financial officers and outside auditors. We examine a sample of 518 U.S. public companies that announced earnings-decreasing restatements during the 1997–2002 period and an industry-size matched sample of control firms. Using logistic regressions that control for other determinants of management turnover, we find strong evidence of greater turnover of chief executive officers (CEOs), top management and chief financial officers (CFOs) of restating firms compared to the control sample. On average, over the three-year period surrounding the year of restatement announcement, CEOs and CFOs face, respectively, a 14% and 10% greater probability of being replaced in restating firms than in control firms, after controlling for other factors. These represent increases of about 42% and 23%, respectively, compared to the usual turnover probabilities for CEOs and CFOs. The magnitudes of these effects are even larger for restatements that are more serious, have worse effects on stock prices, result in negative restated earnings, are initiated by outside parties, are accompanied by Accounting and Auditing Enforcement Releases (AAERs), or trigger securities class action lawsuits. We find little systematic evidence that auditor turnover is higher in restating firms. Our paper provides evidence of effective functioning of internal governance mechanisms following accounting scandals.
Court Intervention as a Governance Mechanism over CEO Pay: Evidence from the Citigroup Derivative Lawsuit

AbstractWe use an unanticipated court ruling in a lawsuit against Citigroup claiming corporate waste related to CEO pay to analyse court intervention as an alternative governance mechanism in cases of excess pay. We find a negative relation between announcement returns and excess pay, consistent with shareholders of these firms perceiving court intervention as net costly. However, we find a positive relation between announcement returns and excess pay accompanied by poor performance, suggesting that intervention is welcome when pay is more egregious. Finally, we find that firms with excess pay and whose shareholders welcome intervention reduce future pay relative to other firms, suggesting that the threat of court intervention is a potential mechanism to control excess pay.
Binary data, hierarchy of attributes, and multidimensional deprivation

Empirical estimation of multidimensional deprivation measures has gained momentum in the last few years. Several existing measures assume that deprivation dimensions are cardinally measurable, when, in many instances, such data is not always available. In this paper, we propose a class of deprivation measures when the only information available is whether an individual is deprived in an attribute or not. The framework is then extended to a setting in which the multiple dimensions are grouped as basic attributes that are of fundamental importance for an individual’s quality of life and non-basic attributes which are at a much lower level of importance. Empirical illustrations of the proposed measures are provided based on the estimation of multidimensional deprivation among children in Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam.
Qat expenditures in Yemen and Djibouti: an empirical analysis

Using household surveys from Yemen and Djibouti, the paper analyzes determinants of qat consumptions in two countries. The results confirm huge importance of qat in daily life: with between one-half (in Djibouti) and 70 percent (in Yemen) of all households reporting at least one user. But in Yemen, qat consumption is remarkably flat across income groups, age, and between rural and urban areas. Qat is a normal good and there is no indication that its use substitutes for food. In Djibouti, however, qat consumption increases with income, and appears to act as a substitute for food consumption. In both countries however there is a strong gender bias in the use: men are much more likely to use qat than women.
Evaluating preschool programs when length of exposure to the program varies a nonparametric approach

This brief summarizes the results of a gender impact evaluation study, entitled Evaluating preschool programs when length of exposure to the program varies a nonparametric approach, conducted between the duration of exposure of the program, in Bolivia. The study observed that non experimental data are used to evaluate impacts of a Bolivian preschool program on cognitive, psychosocial, and anthropometric outcomes. Impacts are shown to be highly dependent on age and exposure duration. The program significantly increases cognitive achievement and psychosocial test scores, especially for children who participated in the program for at least seven months. The impact is greater at longer duration of exposure to the program. Funding for the study derives from NSF grant.
Fixing the CEC Submissions Procedure: Are the 2012 Revisions Up to the Task?

As it enters its third decade, the citizen submissions procedure of the North American Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC) has real achievements to its credit. By issuing independent investigative reports on alleged failures of the North American governments to effectively enforce their domestic environmental laws, the procedure can help to embarrass the governments into improving their environmental performance. To avoid such embarrassment, however, in recent years the governments have weakened the procedure by delaying reports, limiting their scope, and refusing to follow them up. In partial response to criticisms of these actions, the governments revised the procedure in 2012. This article explains that while the 2012 revisions may help to reduce delays in the process, they do little or nothing to address other problems.
Legislation and Regulation in the Core Curriculum: A Virtue or a Necessity?

Introduction The first-year curriculum at American law schools has been remarkably stable for more than 100 years. Many would say ossified. At Harvard, the First-Year Course of Instruction in 1879-80 consisted of Real Property, Contracts, Torts, Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure, and Civil Procedure.1 These five courses—focused heavily on judge-made common law—dominated Harvard’s 1L curriculum from the law school’s founding into the 21st century.2 The same five subjects have long commanded the primary attention of first-year students at Fordham, founded in 1905,3
Payoff uncertainty, bargaining power, and the strategic sequencing of bilateral negotiations

This article investigates the sequencing choice of a buyer who negotiates with the sellers of two complementary objects with uncertain payoffs. The possibility of inefficient trade may generate strict sequencing preference. The buyer begins with the weaker seller if the sellers have diverse bargaining powers and with the stronger one if both sellers are strong bargainers. This sequencing is likely to increase the social surplus. Moreover, the buyer may find it optimal to raise her own acquisition cost by committing to a minimum purchase price or outsourcing. The first- and second-mover advantages for the sellers are also identified.
Accounting earnings and gross domestic product

We document that aggregate accounting earnings growth is an incrementally significant leading indicator of growth in nominal Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Professional macro forecasters, however, do not fully incorporate the predictive content embedded in publicly available accounting earnings data. As a result, future nominal GDP growth forecast errors are predictable based on accounting earnings data that are available to professional macro forecasters in real time.
The dynamics of behavior change: Evidence from energy conservation

Abstract Little is known about the effect of message framing on conservation behavior over time. In a randomized controlled trial with residential households, we use advanced metering and information technologies to test how different messages about household energy use impact the dynamics of conservation behavior down to the appliance level. Our results, based on 374 million panel observations of kilowatt-hour (kWh) electricity consumption for 118 households over 9 months, show that differences in behavioral responses due to message framing become more significant over time. We find that a health-based frame, in which households consider the human health effects of their marginal electricity use, induced persistent energy savings behavior of 8–10% over 100 days; whereas a more traditional cost savings frame, drove sharp attenuation of treatment effects after 2 weeks with no significant savings versus control after 7 weeks. We discuss implications for the design of effective information campaigns to engage households in conservation behavior.
Property tax on privatized roads

Roads cover a significant fraction of the land area in many municipalities. The public provision of roads means this land is exempt from the local property tax. Transferring roads from public to private ownership would not only remove maintenance costs from city budgets, but increase potential property tax revenue as well. This paper calculates the value of the land occupied by roads in sample cities and determines the potential revenue increase if they were subject to property tax. Further calculation computes the extent to which the property tax rate could be reduced if the land values of roads were added to the tax base.
Motivated Happiness Self-Enhancement Inflates Self-Reported Subjective Well-Being

Three studies support the contention that self-enhancement motivation distorts self-reports of subjective well-being (SWB). Both individual differences in self-enhancement (Studies 1 and 2) and exp...