Measuring and Achieving Equity in Multiperiod Emergency Material Allocation

Emergency material allocation is an important part of postdisaster emergency logistics that is significant for improving rescue effectiveness and reducing disaster losses. However, the traditional single‐period allocation model often causes local surpluses or shortages and high cost, and prevents the system from achieving an equitable or optimal multiperiod allocation. To achieve equitable allocation of emergency materials in the case of serious shortages relative to the demand by victims, this article introduces a multiperiod model for allocation of emergency materials to multiple affected locations (using an exponential utility function to reflect the disutility loss due to material shortfalls), and illustrates the relationship between equity of allocations and the cost of emergency response. Finally, numerical examples are presented to demonstrate both the feasibility and the usefulness of the proposed model for achieving multiperiod equitable allocation of emergency material among multiple disaster locations. The results indicate that the introduction of a nonlinear utility function to reflect the disutility of large shortfalls can make the material allocation fairer, and minimize large losses due to shortfalls. We found that achieving equity has a significant but not unreasonable impact on emergency costs. We also illustrate that using differing utility functions for different types of materials adds an important dimension of flexibility.     

试论权利的演变及其成本——基于政府实现公共利益能力的视角

无论从任何角度考察，权利都以政府的巨大财政成本作为后盾，否则权利便无从实现。当现代政府的公共利益责任与权利成本发生矛盾时，如何协调二者之间的关系，将权利成本最小化、公共利益最大化，就成为理论界与实务界必须承担的责任。     

可持续发展理论的经济学反思

由于可持续发展理论自身存在着一定的缺陷 ,使得这一理论在实践中实施效果不佳。在对可持续发展的概念、可持续发展与外部性的关系、生态成本等基本问题进行反思的基础上 ,提出在可持续发展的实施过程中要区分两类不同的问题。对于代内的现期环境问题可采取科斯手段与庇古手段来加强治理 ,而对于代际累积的生态问题则需要通过强化制度安排和政策引导来予以解决。     

Sampling Returns for Realized Variance Calculations: Tick Time or Transaction Time?

This article introduces a new model for transaction prices in the presence of market microstructure noise in order to study the properties of the price process on two different time scales, namely, transaction time where prices are sampled with every transaction and tick time where prices are sampled with every price change. Both sampling schemes have been used in the literature on realized variance, but a formal investigation into their properties has been lacking. Our empirical and theoretical results indicate that the return dynamics in transaction time are very different from those in tick time and the choice of sampling scheme can therefore have an important impact on the properties of realized variance. For RV we find that tick time sampling is superior to transaction time sampling in terms of mean-squared-error, especially when the level of noise, number of ticks, or the arrival frequency of efficient price moves is low. Importantly, we show that while the microstructure noise may appear close to IID in transaction time, in tick time it is highly dependent. As a result, bias correction procedures that rely on the noise being independent, can fail in tick time and are better implemented in transaction time.     

美国农业保护政策简介

农业是美国所有产业中竞争最激烈的产业之一 ,农业的激烈竞争主要是由进入“门槛”低所致。在 1981到 1990年期间 ,美国联邦政府花在农业上的补贴超过 2 50 0亿美元。价格补贴是美国农业保护政策的基础 ,成本补贴又使因价格补贴导致的市场过剩更加严重。对农民采取直接收入补贴政策的好处在于 :该政策能在不引起市场价格和农业产出扭曲的情况下 ,保证农民收入能达到一定水平     

非对称信息条件下成本控制模型研究

运用委托代理理论方法探讨了信息不对称条件下,生产管理者如何激励生产者努力降低成本的问题。信息不对称情况下,管理者不能观测到生产者为降低成本而付出的努力,因此管理者需要对生产者进行激励。管理者根据自己的要求和生产者的自报数确定了一个合约基数,并建立了满足生产者个体理性约束和激励相容约束条件下的管理者期望效用最大化模型,分别以奖励系数和惩罚系数为决策主量。运用进化规划算法作了仿真计算。     

公司并购绩效与公司边界:交易费用的视角

公司并购重组是重新确定公司边界的一种有效机制。本文充分整合产权理论、交易费用经济学、影响成本理论以及公司并购协同效应理论,推导出影响公司边界的若干因素,确定出影响公司并购绩效的主要潜在因素,再在此基础上建立一个分析公司并购绩效与公司边界的综合性理论框架。结果发现,资产专用性、影响成本与公司并购协同效应都将对公司边界的调整和公司并购绩效产生决定性的影响,而且这个影响的大小又取决于治理结构、融资工具以及组织结构等诸多因素。     

Institutionalising the evaluation function: A South African study of impartiality,use and cost

PurposeThis article explores the implications of outsourcing the evaluation function in South Africa, a context where there is a mismatch between evaluation supply and demand. It unpacks the tradeoffs between internal and external evaluation, and challenges some commonly held assumptions about both.ApproachBased on experiences as an internal evaluator, external evaluator, evaluation manager, and building evaluation capacity, the author explores how each role changes when evaluation is a scarce skill, and looks at implications outsourcing has for both the organization, and the evaluation.FindingsThe purpose of the evaluation must drive the decision to outsource. However, with changing models of collaboration, there may be hybrid options that allow organizations to build evaluation capacity.Practical implicationsOrganisations are faced with a trade-off between commissioning an evaluation, and building internal evaluation capacity. To better understand each approach, it is important to consider the purpose and context of the evaluation. This shifts some commonly held assumptions about internal and external evaluations. Re-examining these assumptions will help organizations make a more informed decision about an evaluation approach.Originality/valueThe field of evaluation is particularly concerned with evaluation use. Most of the literature on this has focused on the approach of individual evaluators, and insufficient attention has been paid to the institutional architecture of the evaluation. This article considers how some of the organisational structures around an evaluation contribute to evidence use, and the case study of South Africa also shifts the focus to the central but overlooked role of context in the debate.     

Imposing and Testing for Shape Restrictions in Flexible Parametric Models

In many economic models, theory restricts the shape of functions, such as monotonicity or curvature conditions. This article reviews and presents a framework for constrained estimation and inference to test for shape conditions in parametric models. We show that “regional” shape-restricting estimators have important advantages in terms of model fit and flexibility (as opposed to standard “local” or “global” shape-restricting estimators). In our empirical illustration, this is the first article to impose and test for all shape restrictions required by economic theory simultaneously in the “Berndt and Wood” data. We find that this dataset is consistent with “duality theory,” whereas previous studies have found violations of economic theory. We discuss policy consequences for key parameters, such as whether energy and capital are complements or substitutes.     

产业协同集聚的资源错配效应研究

利用2003－2016年中国280个地级市的数据,分别测算了产业协同集聚指数、资本错配和劳动力错配指数,采用差分GMM方法考察产业协同集聚对资源错配的影响。结果发现：产业协同集聚的提高,会显著降低资本错配和劳动力错配指数;分地区的回归发现,东部地区产业协同集聚改善了资本错配,对劳动力错配负向作用不显著,中部地区产业协同集聚会改善资本错配,但会恶化劳动力错配,西部地区产业协同集聚则加剧了资本错配,但可以缓解劳动力错配情况。进一步作用机制分析表明,产业协同集聚水平的提高,会显著提高金融业的专业化分工,进而改善资本错配,同时会提高劳动力成本,改善劳动力错配。文章的政策含义是通过产业协同集聚,可以提高金融业的专业化分工和劳动力成本,进而缓解资本和劳动力的错配,提高经济效率,促进经济增长。