Private Health Insurance in Chile: Basic or Complementary Insurance for Outpatient Services?

A private health insurance system has existed in Chile since 1981 and has covered over a quarter of the population of that country since 1995. This article examines that system in economic terms. The analysis focuses on the incentive effects of state regulations governing the formulation of private health insurance policies and the relationship with the state health service. The imbalance in policy termination rights and the unrestricted possibility to return to the state system emerge as central functional elements. The article postulates that the private system represents, for many, not a full coverage scheme but an additional policy for outpatient benefits, regardless of its officially stated aims.     

The Globalization of Migration: Has the World Become More Migratory?

Although it is commonly believed that the volume, diversity, geographical scope, and overall complexity of international migration have increased as part of globalization processes, this idea has remained largely untested. This article analyzes shifts in global migration patterns between 1960 and 2000 using indices that simultaneously capture changes in the spread, distance, and intensity of migration. While the results challenge the idea that there has been a global increase in volume, diversity, and geographical scope of migration, main migratory shifts have been directional. Migration has globalized from a destination country perspective but hardly from an origin country perspective, with migrants from an increasingly diverse array of non‐European‐origin countries concentrating in a shrinking pool of prime destination countries. The global migration map has thus become more skewed. Rather than refuting the globalization of migration hypothesis, this seems to reflect the asymmetric nature of globalization processes in general.     

Ein Optimierungsansatz für ein fortlaufendes Datenqualitätsmanagement und seine praktische Anwendung bei Kundenkampagnen

Zusammenfassung  Die Verbesserung der Datenqualit?t (DQ) wird in Wissenschaft und Praxis intensiv diskutiert. Ob die ergriffenen DQ-Ma?nahmen jedoch ?konomisch überhaupt gerechtfertigt sind und wann und in welchem optimalen Umfang investiert werden soll, wird oftmals nicht analysiert. Zur Untersuchung dieser Fragestellungen entwickeln die Autoren ein Optimierungsmodell, mit dem die Umf?nge und Zeitpunkte für Investitionen in ein fortlaufendes DQ-Management ermittelt werden k?nnen. Hierdurch lassen sich vier Investitionsszenarien mit allgemeinen Handlungsempfehlungen identifizieren. So ist bspw. bei ehemalig intensiven Kundenbeziehungen, die sich inzwischen verschlechtert haben (nur wenige Gesch?ftstransaktionen), zwar über mehrere Perioden zu investieren, jedoch bei einem sich nicht ver?ndernden, geringen Transaktionsanteil, in abnehmender H?he. Daneben l?sst sich u. a. zeigen, dass der Umfang der existierenden Kundendatenmenge und nicht, wie oftmals angeführt, ein schlechtes existierendes DQ-Niveau ma?geblich für die Entscheidung ist, ob überhaupt in DQ investiert werden soll. Anhand einer Fallstudie wird abschlie?end nicht nur die praktische Anwendbarkeit des Optimierungsmodells verdeutlicht, sondern es soll zudem aufgezeigt werden, wie sich für einen konkreten Sachverhalt detaillierte Empfehlungen hinsichtlich des DQM-Einsatzes ermitteln lassen.

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A model based approach for continuous data quality management and its implementation to improve customer campaigns

Summary  The improvement of data quality (DQ) currently finds a great deal of attention in science as well as in practice. Nevertheless there are two fundamental questions that are often ignored in the analysis: i) Are the DQ measures already implemented economically reasonable? ii) When and to what extent is investing into the improvement of DQ justifiable? For an in-depth understanding considering the design of DQ management the authors develop an optimization model which determines the optimal amount and point of time for consecutive DQ investments. Hence they distinguish between four scenarios and propose corresponding action recommendations. For example, a customer relationship with declining intensity up to the present (i. e. diminishing volume of business transactions) requires DQ investments over several future business periods- and at a decreasing investment rate in cases where the transaction volume continues to go down. Additionally it can be shown that in general the amount of available client data is a crucial factor for the decision whether it is reasonable to invest into DQ at all as opposed to a low quality level — which is often claimed. A concluding case study determines the practical applicability of the proposed optimization model.

     

Unemployment and Business Cycles

We develop and estimate a general equilibrium search and matching model that accounts for key business cycle properties of macroeconomic aggregates, including labor market variables. In sharp contrast to leading New Keynesian models, we do not impose wage inertia. Instead we derive wage inertia from our specification of how firms and workers negotiate wages. Our model outperforms a variant of the standard New Keynesian Calvo sticky wage model. According to our estimated model, there is a critical interaction between the degree of price stickiness, monetary policy, and the duration of an increase in unemployment benefits.     

Deservingness put into practice: Constructing the (un)deservingness of migrants in four European countries

The increased comparative research on perceptions of public welfare deservingness studies the extent to which different subgroups of citizens are deemed worthy or unworthy of receiving help from the welfare state. The concept of deservingness criteria plays a crucial role in this research, as it theorizes a universal heuristic that citizens apply to rank people in terms of their welfare deservingness. Due to the mainly quantitative nature of the research and despite the indisputable progress it has made, the subjective existence and actual application of these deservingness criteria remain a bit of a black box. What criteria of deservingness do citizens actually apply, and how do they apply them? This article opens the black box of welfare deservingness and sheds light on the nature and practice of deservingness criteria. Empirically, the paper explores how the deservingness of immigrants is discussed and established within 20 focus groups conducted in Slovenia, Denmark, UK, and Norway in 2016 with a total of 160 participants. All 20 focus groups discussed the welfare deservingness of immigrants based on similar vignette stimuli. Our analysis shows that (1) deservingness criteria are used both to construct images of target groups and as normative yardsticks; (2) deservingness criteria do not work independently of each other, but rather co-function in specific hybridized discourses; and (3) the moral logic of deservingness is supplemented by alternative moral logics, at least in the case of migrants.     

All risk-taking is not the same: examining the competing effects of firm risk-taking with meta-analysis

Although researchers have vigorously studied organizational risk-taking for over 35 years, relatively little emphasis has been placed on theoretically differentiating the unique relationships between the many risk-taking choices organizations make and firm risk or firm performance. In this research, we propose a new framework that builds from March’s exploration–exploitation model to argue that different risk-taking choices can have substantially different influences on firm outcomes. We use meta-analysis to examine the unique and at times competing effects of four of the most commonly studied risk-taking choices on firm risk and firm performance. Results from a meta-analysis of 257 unique studies (N = 499,808) demonstrate support for our proposed framework and cast significant doubt on the idea that commonly studied firm risk-taking choices theoretically aggregate into one overarching risk-taking construct.     

Containment im Coaching

The psychodynamic concept of containment in coaching describes a process where the coach takes on, digests and returns emotional tension, unresolved conflicts und unconscious acting out of the coachee. Using two case studies the article develops the basic elements of containment in coaching. In addition to this interpersonal dimension of containment the article also highlights the structural dimension of containment — to provide sufficient space and conditions for thinking and processing emotional turmoil.     

How do study satisfaction and academic performance interrelate? An investigation with students of Social Work programs

An investigation of study satisfaction and academic performance in the study of Social Work is reported (N=514). The results show that satisfaction (a scale based on 13 items) and performance (undergraduate course marks) hardly correlate with each other (r=?0.05) and are influenced by different variables. Whereas study satisfaction is determined by ‘noncognitive’ factors such as motivation and course organization, academic performance is influenced by ‘cognitive' factors such as final school grade and students' learning behavior. Satisfied and/or successful students are more motivated to complete their course of study within the regular period and to work later as social workers. Vocational training or a university degree before studying Social Work does not affect satisfaction or performance. The findings are discussed in relation to optimal study management and selection criteria.