Joint Ordering and Pricing Strategies for Managing Substitutable Products

Starr and Rubinson (1978) develop a model to establish the relationship between product demand and relative prices. The notion of relative prices motivates us to consider a situation in which a retailer would either charge the same retail price for all products if he adopts a ‘fixed’ pricing strategy or charge different prices for different products if he adopts a ‘variable’ pricing strategy. In this paper, we develop a base model with deterministic demand that is intended to examine how a retailer should jointly determine the order quantity and the retail price of two substitutable products under the fixed and variable pricing strategies. Our analysis indicates that the optimal retail price under the variable pricing strategy is equal to the optimal retail price under the fixed pricing strategy plus or minus an adjustment term. This adjustment term depends on product substitutability and price sensitivity. We also present two different extensions of our base model. In the first extension, our analysis indicates that the underlying structure of the optimal retail price and order quantity is preserved when there is a limit on the total order quantity. The second extension deals with the issue of retail competition. Relative to the base case, we show that the underlying structure of the optimal retail price and order quantity is preserved in a duopolistic environment. Moreover, our analysis suggests that both retailers would adopt the variable pricing strategy at the equilibrium.     

Colourism and African–american wealth: evidence from the nineteenth-century south

Black is not always black. Subtle distinctions in skin tone translate into significant differences in outcomes. Data on more than 15,000 households interviewed during the 1860 US federal census exhibit sharp differences in wealth holdings between white, mulatto, and black households in the urban South. We document these differences, investigate relationships between wealth and recorded household characteristics, and decompose the wealth gaps to examine the returns to racial characteristics. The analysis reveals a distinct racial hierarchy. Black wealth was only 20% of white wealth, but mulattoes held nearly 50% of whites’ wealth. This advantage is consistent with colourism, the favouritism shown to those of lighter complexion.

Gay and lesbian partnership: Evidence from California

Much recent research on sexual minorities has used couples-based samples, which--by construction--provide no information on nonpartnered individuals. We present the first systematic empirical analysis of partnership and cohabitation among self-identified gay men and lesbians using two independent, large, population-wwbased data sources from California. These data indicate that 37%-46% of gay men and 51%-62% of lesbians aged 18-59 are in cohabiting partnerships (compared with 62% of heterosexual individuals in coresidential unions at comparable ages). Unlike previous research, we find that white and highly educated gay men and lesbians are more likely to be partnered, and we confirm that same-sex cohabiting partners in our data have demographic characteristics that are similar to California same-sex couples from Census 2000. We also present the first detailed analysis of officially registered domestic partnerships in California. We find that almost half of partnered lesbians are officially registered with the local or state government, while less than a quarter of partnered gay men are officially registered. We conclude with implications of our findings for couples-based research on gay men and lesbians, as well as recommendations for survey data collection.     

A flexible particle Markov chain Monte Carlo method

Particle Markov Chain Monte Carlo methods are used to carry out inference in nonlinear and non-Gaussian state space models, where the posterior density of the states is approximated using particles. Current approaches usually perform Bayesian inference using either a particle marginal Metropolis–Hastings (PMMH) algorithm or a particle Gibbs (PG) sampler. This paper shows how the two ways of generating variables mentioned above can be combined in a flexible manner to give sampling schemes that converge to a desired target distribution. The advantage of our approach is that the sampling scheme can be tailored to obtain good results for different applications. For example, when some parameters and the states are highly correlated, such parameters can be generated using PMMH, while all other parameters are generated using PG because it is easier to obtain good proposals for the parameters within the PG framework. We derive some convergence properties of our sampling scheme and also investigate its performance empirically by applying it to univariate and multivariate stochastic volatility models and comparing it to other PMCMC methods proposed in the literature.     

Indigenous and gendered persons and peoples in business ethics education: Intersections of Indigenous wisdoms and de Beauvoirian existentialism

The purpose of this paper is to explore how business ethics textbooks include Indigenous and gendered persons and peoples and whether they acknowledge Indigenous philosophies and theories. We explore 363 cases from eighteen (18) business ethics textbooks. A form and theme based content analysis was employed to help us better understand the inclusion, obfuscation and omission of Indigenous and gendered persons. A purpose of business ethics education is to disrupt injustice and oppressive practices in business. We find that business ethics education can provide more inclusive and respectful cases as it relates to Indigenous and gendered characters. There are cases that marginalize, obfuscate and omit Indigenous peoples, females, and gender diverse persons. This study contributes to diversity scholarship by identifying ways in which Indigenous and gendered persons and peoples can be included in management and business ethics education.     

Energizing the ordinary: Biographical work and the future in stroke recovery narratives

Historically, the life course has been constructed as an organized and linear temporal progression. This holds true in various disciplines from education, to psychology, to counseling. The foundation of a life unfolding through temporal categorizations is documented in textbooks and theories that straddle these disciplines as well as many others, including the sociology of health and illness, which has often conceptualized the illness experience as embedded in a recovery trajectory.Here, we take this to task. Using Gubrium and Holstein's [Sociol. Inq. 65 (1995) 207; Gubrium, J., & Holstein, J., (1997). The new language of qualitative method. New York: Oxford University Press] analytic vocabulary of biographical work, we analyze narratives of stroke survivors by emphasizing the ordinary resources used as discursive foundations for the narrative production of the future in illness. Ordinary resources focused on include God and spirituality, comorbidities, and activity and leisure. The discussion is embedded in overarching concerns with “healthy aging” in gerontology and geriatrics.