Welche privaten Veräußerungsgewinne sollten besteuert werden?

This paper analyses for various corporate tax systems whether the capital gains tax distorts investment decisions and how tax effects could eventually be neutralized. In case of the disposal of shares between private investors the capital gains tax, the corporate tax and the income tax on dividends induce a triple taxation. On the contrary, distributing cash via share repurchases instead of paying out dividends can lower the tax burden in a classical corporate tax system and a shareholder relief system respectively. These findings necessitate the differentiation between share repurchases and other realizations of stocks in order to establish a neutral capital gains tax. While the capital gains taxation on transactions between private investors has to be reduced, the taxation of share repurchases must be matched with the respective dividend taxation.     

Sample size considerations for Japanese patients in a multi‐regional trial based on MHLW guidance

Since the publication of the International Conference on Harmonization E5 guideline, new drug approvals in Japan based on the bridging strategy have been increasing. To further streamline and expedite new drug development in Japan, the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare, the Japanese regulatory authority, recently issued the ‘Basic Principles on Global Clinical Trials' guidance to promote Japan's participation in multi‐regional trials. The guidance, in a Q&A format, provides two methods as examples for recommending the number of Japanese patients in a multi‐regional trial. Method 1 in the guidance is the focus of this paper. We derive formulas for the sample size calculations for normal, binary and survival endpoints. Computations and simulation results are provided to compare different approaches. Trial examples are used to illustrate the applications of the approaches. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The public problem of ‘Aboriginal gambling‘: winning the struggle for an urban space

Gambling by Aboriginal people is increasingly identified as a significant public problem in Australia, eliciting responses mainly concerned with measurement and harm minimisation. We adopt the utilitarian philosophy of John Dewey to critically examine the way this ‘problem’ is socially constructed. We recast our roles as pragmatic researcher‐activists in the ongoing struggle to have Aboriginal practices taken seriously We draw particularly on the work of a group of senior Yolnu Aboriginal consultants and re‐present their story of gambling alongside other research on the Aboriginal use of urban gambling spaces. This helps us develop a nuanced explication of the public problem, one that challenges existing discourses and proposed solutions. We identify an Aboriginal space being produced within existing casinos which is only supported reactively by government and casino owners, and met with anxiety by community service providers. We propose the radical idea of Aboriginal urban gambling venues as indicators of what is needed for a successful, state‐supported, socially inclusionary and non‐exploitative space for Aboriginal people, and what obstacles may stand in the way of achieving this. Through this process, we assess how, as participant researchers, we can help to reformulate of the public problem in a way that is more closely aligned to Aboriginal needs and aspirations.     

Reference priors for linear models with general covariance structures

We develop a new class of reference priors for linear models with general covariance structures. A general Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithm is also proposed for implementing the computation. We present several examples to demonstrate the results: Bayesian penalized spline smoothing, a Bayesian approach to bivariate smoothing for a spatial model, and prior specification for structural equation models.     

Union Instability as an Engine of Fertility? A Microsimulation Model for France

Opportunities for conceiving and bearing children are fewer when unions are not formed or are dissolved during the childbearing years. At the same time, union instability produces a pool of persons who may enter new partnerships and have additional children in stepfamilies. The balance between these two opposing forces and their implications for fertility may depend on the timing of union formation and parenthood. In this article, we estimate models of childbearing, union formation, and union dissolution for female respondents to the 1999 French Etude de l’Histoire Familiale. Model parameters are applied in microsimulations of completed family size. We find that a population of women whose first unions dissolve during the childbearing years will end up with smaller families, on average, than a population in which all unions remain intact. Because new partnerships encourage higher parity progressions, repartnering minimizes the fertility gap between populations with and those without union dissolution. Differences between the two populations are much smaller when family formation is postponed—that is, when union formation and dissolution or first birth occurs after age 30, or when couples delay childbearing after union formation.     

Monte carlo approximation to edgeworth expansions

Since the 1930s, empirical Edgeworth expansions have been employed to develop techniques for approximate, nonparametric statistical inference. The introduction of bootstrap methods has increased the potential usefulness of Edgeworth approximations. In particular, a recent paper by Lee & Young introduced a novel approach to approximating bootstrap distribution functions, using first an empirical Edgeworth expansion and then a more traditional bootstrap approximation to the remainder. In principle, either direct calculation or computer algebra could be used to compute the Edgeworth component, but both methods would often be difficult to implement in practice, not least because of the sheer algebraic complexity of a general Edgeworth expansion. In the present paper we show that a simple but nonstandard Monte Carlo technique is a competitive alternative. It exploits properties of Edgeworth expansions, in particular their parity and the degrees of their polynomial terms, to develop particularly accurate approximations.     

Union views of managerial prerogatives revisited: The prospects for labor-management cooperation

Using data from a survey of AFL-CIO affiliated unions, I compare union views of managerial prerogatives in 1997 with those reported in a 1968 study. Unions today desire more input into the firm's decision-making process than in 1968, particularly with regard to issues traditionally reserved to management. Given management's traditional resistance to “outside” interference, more cooperative relationships between unions and managment may be problematic. I thank Richard Hoppins and Edwin Sexton for research assistance.     

Reconstructing developmental psychology—some first steps

My starting point is the claim that developmental psychology has traditionally projected a standardised image of childhood, especially through the emphasis on describing universal stages of psychological growth within what are assumed to be normal childhood environments. These reifications of universality and normality have in turn regulated social action at individual, family and school level. Increasingly, these same images are being idealised and treated as a standard for judging the quality of childhood in contexts far removed from their Euro-American origins. I explore the historical roots of universalistic thinking about children's nature, their needs and what constitutes healthy development and consider the opportunities for a new psychology of childhood to be reconstructed in ways that pay more attention to the cultural dimensions of the subject. I illustrate the growing interest amongst psychologists in studying children's development as a socio-cultural process, as well as the lessons of social constructionist critiques of the developmental paradigm itself. I conclude by reflecting on some of the challenges facing psychological studies of childhood issues that are more reflexive, inclusive and cultural. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Existence and Uniqueness of Maximal Reductions Under Iterated Strict Dominance

Iterated elimination of strictly dominated strategies is an order dependent procedure. It can also generate spurious Nash equilibria, fail to converge in countable steps, or converge to empty strategy sets. If best replies are well–defined, then spurious Nash equilibria cannot appear; if strategy spaces are compact and payoff functions are uppersemicontinuous in own strategies, then order does not matter; if strategy sets are compact and payoff functions are continuous in all strategies, then a unique and nonempty maximal reduction exists. These positive results extend neither to the better–reply secure games for which Reny has established the existence of a Nash equilibrium, nor to games in which (under iterated eliminations) any dominated strategy has an undominated dominator.