Old and Cold: Older People and Policies Failing to Address Fuel Poverty

Research, funded by the British Gas Help the Aged Partnership and carried out by the Institute of Gerontology, King's College London, explored the multidimensional issues of fuel poverty. A sample of older homeowners and private renters living in England, Scotland and Wales were interviewed in the Spring of 2003 to explore their experiences of keeping their homes warm in the preceding winter. It was found that almost half of the sample for whom full information was available were in fuel poverty. Government schemes failed to address some important issues. Grants were only available to those with “passport benefits”, excluding those who had minimal occupational pensions. Although most respondents had central heating, it was often old and ineffective, yet grants were not available to modernize them. Government schemes did not extend to paying for external and internal insulation for solid wall properties yet many older people live in such property. Several older people lived in rural areas not connected to mains gas. As mains gas currently provides the cheapest fuel, they faced high bills, yet government policies do not address the differential fuel costs in these areas. The culture of many older people in the study contributed to their living in cold homes. They lived frugally and usually turned heating off in daylight hours during winter. It was also a common practice to sleep in an unheated bedroom during winter and to keep the window open at night. Such practices are acknowledged to be unhealthy.     

Five tumultuous years in Australian child protection: little progress

In an article published in 2002, one of the authors of this paper offered an analysis of the Australian child protection data from 1999 to 2000 and raised questions about the effectiveness of mandatory reporting. Recently, child protection data for 2003–2004 has been released. This provides an opportunity to re‐examine some child protection issues and the effectiveness of mandatory reporting 5 years on. These have been tumultuous years. Each state and territory has held major inquiries into this area of practice and, as a result, significant organizational changes have taken place and new resources are being made available. Nevertheless, questions about the effectiveness of child protection services remain. There is continuing doubt about the value of comprehensive reporting systems.     

宁波外贸优势解析：制度经济学观点

主流经济学在解释国际贸易原因时,都未考虑制度因素对形成国际贸易优势的影响,将制度视为既定的或者制度的影响可以忽略不计,因而在解释现实世界中暴露出许多局限性。文章从分析宁波外贸优势原因出发,从产权制度、政府政策、人力资本和产业集群等方面分析了制度对宁波外贸发展所起的作用,指出制度因素是决定宁波外贸优势的关键因素。     

西方信贷融资担保理论

西方信贷融资担保理论认为作为融资中介机构的银行和借款者之间在履行信贷融资担保过程中存在一定的交易成本。这种交易成本直接影响贷款利率水平。在信息不对称的信贷市场中，贷款利率和担保要求对于不同风险偏好的款者会产生逆向选择效应，并且可能会引发道德风险。担保对于借款者的品质又具有信号和传递作用，这有利于贷款者更好地进行风险控制。借贷双方在长期业务交往中建立起来的信贷关系本身就是一种担保资源，它既能够产生关系借款者品质的信息，也有利于缓解信贷市场的信息不对称问题。     

A sociological economy of HIV/AIDS vaccine partnerships: case studies from Africa and India

Public–private partnerships (PPPs) are perhaps the key emergent theme in the delivery of what the socio-economic literature terms global public goods. In light of the problems relating to the distribution of health services and products in developing countries, partnerships between public and private institutions are often proposed as an innovative mechanism to reconnect and reorient supply and demand. In this area, the International Aids Vaccine Initiative (IAVI), which is driving the development of candidate HIV/AIDS vaccines through injections of capital into the research process, represents a significant case study. IAVI seeks to form partnerships between key public and private interests committing them to sharing the risks, costs and benefits of research into an effective and affordable vaccine against HIV. Our empirical work covers partnerships based in several countries including Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and India. Our early findings highlight IAVI's ability as a learning institution as it adapts its institutional arrangements to various local contexts. An offshoot of this appears to be the building of real local capacity.     

Customer satisfaction: Cost driver or value driver? Empirical evidence from the financial services industry

We investigate the relation between customer satisfaction, customer servicing costs, and customer value in a financial services firm. We find that customer satisfaction is positively associated with future customer servicing costs, as well as with customer value. The relation between customer satisfaction and customer value appears non-linear; higher customer satisfaction appears to have a higher return for the most profitable customer segments. Our findings indicate that customer satisfaction is a value driver; however, customer satisfaction is not cost-free and managers have to consider the costs, as well as the benefits, of increasing customer satisfaction.     

资源型城市制度弹性、沉淀成本与制度变迁

与非资源型城市相比,资源型城市具有显著的经济性、体制性和社会性沉淀成本,从而导致资源型城市制度需求弹性较小,同时存在阻碍制度变迁的经济学逻辑.假设其他条件不变,同样的制度供给,由于资源型城市各类沉淀成本非常大,该地区的制度需求弹性相对来说较小.因而我们需要从降低沉淀成本角度,增大资源型城市制度需求弹性来深化制度变迁,即采取各种制度安排或者经济政策以降低或减少沉淀成本数量为基本原则,来增大资源型城市制度需求弹性强度.     

Measuring the impact of prices on inequality: With applications to Thailand and Korea

This paper develops a new methodology to compute social cost of living indices. These indices indicate whether or not price changes have a favourable (or unfavourable) impact on the welfare of the poor. The indices are derived on the basis of two alternative classes of social welfare functions. The methodology developed in the paper is applied to compute social cost of living indices for Thailand and Korea. The empirical results show that changes in prices have generally affected the poor more adversely than the non-poor.     

社会保险税:一个新制度经济学的分析框架

征收社会保险缴款的交易费用分为征收费用和损失费用。制度的变迁将使征收费用发生分流和转移,其承担主体也会发生变动。在中国社会保险缴款征收制度变迁过程中,交易费用的存在形式是不断变化的。决策机构在进行社会保险税的制度设计时应考虑留有一定的弹性空间。社会保险费改税付出的代价和取得的效益在整个制度变迁的进程中的分布将会是不均衡的。     

要素禀赋不对称与企业的性质

新制度经济学中关于企业性质的流行观点是企业产生于要素市场对中间产品市场的替代，但是这种“替代”的观点解释不了现实中企业、要素市场、中间产品市场互相促进、共同扩大这一状况。本文引入了“要素禀赋不对称”这一概念，在个体生产者处于要素禀赋不对称状态中时，即使不存在中间产品市场或中间产品市场的交易费用低于要素市场的交易费用的情况，企业也必然产生。出于同样的原因，作为要素市场交易结果的企业能够促进中间产品市场的迅速发展。要素市场与中间产品市场之间的共同发展是常态，而“替代”只能是支流。