Mercredi 28 novembre 2007
Eugenio PELUSO
University of Verona, Italy
About sharing rules
Abstract: The effect of a change in wealth on its allocation between two attributes is examined for three classes of utility function that generate non-linear sharing rules. Our results allow for a very wide range of applications: the Arrow-Debreu contingent claims case, the risk-sharing problem, including the standard portfolio choice, intertemporal individual consumption, the demand for insurance and tax evasion.
Vendredi 23 novembre 2007
Joëlle VANHAMME
Erasmus University (Rotterdam), Netherlands
“Surprise Gift” Purchases: Customer insights from the small electrical appliances market
Abstract: From a managerial point of view, surprise gifts offer more opportunities than gifts suggested by recipients, because a larger part of the selection and purchase processes remains to be molded. Research shows that unexpected gifts that surprise are especially valued by recipients, but the extant literature on gift selection and purchase explicitly takes into account neither the giver’s intention to surprise nor the consequences for gift selection and purchase processes.
Vendredi 16 novembre 2007
Henri LOUBERGE
University of Geneva and Swiss Finance Institute
Hybrid Cat-bonds (text)
Abstract: Natural catastrophes attract regularly the attention of media and have become a source of public concern. From a financial viewpoint, natural catastrophes represent idiosyncratic risks, diversifiable at the world level. But for reasons analyzed in this paper reinsurance markets are unable to cope with this risk completely. Insurance-linked securities, such as cat bonds, have been issued to complete the international risk transfert process, but their development is disappointing so far. This paper argues that downside risk aversion and ambiguity aversion explain the limited sucess of cat bonds. Hybrid cat bonds, combining the transfert of cat risk with protection against a stock market crash, are proposed to complete the market. Using the concept of market diversified risk measure, the paper shows that replacing simple cat bonds with hybrid cat bonds would lead to an increase in market volume.
Jeudi 25 octobre 2007
Isaac EHRLICH
SUNY & UB Distinguished Professor
and Chair of Economics
Melvin H. Baker Professor of American Enterprise.
Director, Center of Excellence on Human capital
Research Associate, NBER
Asset management, human capital, and the market for risky assets
Jeudi 16 octobre 2007
Anoop MADHOK
Schulich School of Business
University of York (Canada)
Towards an Integrative Perspective on Alliance Governance: Connecting Contract design, Trust Dynamics, and Contract Application
Abstract: Based on a case-study of two sequential alliances between the same pair of firms, we develop a more integrative perspective on alliance governance, providing insights into the interactions between structural and relational aspects, both within and between transactions. In particular, we (a) provide a process-oriented view on the relationship between contract design and trust (b) conceptualize goodwill trust as a condition that determines how contracts are applied (c) define the contracting process as an incremental learning process that is sensitive to changes in relative bargaining power, and (d) question the role of goodwill trust as a necessary condition for initiating subsequent transactions. Moreover, in contrast to studies that examine relationship deterioration, we contribute to understanding of the revitalization of interfirm relationships.
Vendredi 12 octobre 2007
Dan HAUSMAN
Herbert A. Simon Professor
Department of Philosophy
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Valuing health (text)
Abstract: This paper sketches a new proposal for health measurement for the purpose of guiding allocations of health-related resources. Such a proposal might appear to be timed badly. Enormous resources have been already gone into devising systems of generic health measurement. At least a half-dozen health measurement systems are in use, and over the past generation several other scales have been proposed. At this point, one might reasonably conclude that efforts should go toward consolidating this work and comparing the results of measurements employing these indexes rather than toward developing another way to measure health. Nevertheless, I shall sketch a new proposal, though one which is closely related to an old one, which was abandoned a generation ago. This proposal should make possible major improvements conceptually, ethically, and empirically.
Vendredi 12 octobre 2007
Marc FLEURBAEY
Centre de recherche Sens, Ethique, Société (CERSES)
Université Paris V
Erik SCHOKKAERT
Faculteit Economische en Toegepaste Economische Wetenschappen
Katholieke Universiteit Leuven
Unfair inequalities in health and health care (text)
Abstract: Inequalities in health and health care caused by different factors. Measuring « unfair » inequalities implies that a distinction is introduced between causal variables leading to ethically legitimate inequalities and causal variables leading to ethically illegitimate inequalities. An example of the former could be life-style choices, an example of the latter is the situation in early childhood or parent’s health. We show how to derive measures of unfair inequalities in health and in health care delivery from a structural model of health care and health production. Direct unfairness is linked to the variations in medical expenditures and health in the hypothetical distribution in which all legitimate sources of variation are kept constant. The fairness gap is linked to the differences between the actual distribution and the hypothetical distribution in which all illegitimate sources of variation have been removed. These approaches are related to the conditional egalitarian and the egalitarian-equivalent solutions analyzed in the theory of fair allocation. In general they lead to different results. We propose to analyze the resulting distributions with the traditional apparatus of Lorentz cures and inequality measures. We compare our proposal to the more common approach using concentration curve and analyze the relationship with the methods of direct and indirect standardization. We discuss how inequalities in health care can be integrated in an overall evaluation of social inequality.
Mercredi 20 juin 2007
Pierre OUELLETTE
Département des sciences économiques
Université du Québec à Montréal
Comparaison de l’efficience des hôpitaux privés et publics : Québec vs Californie
Résumé : Après une revue de l’évolution de la situation budgétaire du système de santé québécois, nous mesurons l’efficience technique et allocative des hôpitaux québécois et californiens dans le but de comparer les niveaux d’efficience selon le type d’organisation. Alors que dans le système québécois les hôpitaux sont essentiellement contrôlés par l’État, les hôpitaux californiens sont contrôlés par plusieurs types d’organisation (privé vs publics, sans but lucratif ou avec profit). Notre objectif est de vérifier si le recours au privé est une solution à l’impasse budgétaire du gouvernement provincial.
Mercredi 13 juin 2007
Steven VAN PASSEL
Policy Research for Sustainable Agriculture, Belgium
Guido VAN HUYLENBROECK
University of Ghent, Belgium
Factors of Farm Performance: An Empirical Analysis of Structural and Managerial Characteristics
Abstract: The agricultural sector faces a continuous process of structural change, which has important consequences for productivity and efficiency of farming. A consistent way of monitoring this process, and to support related policy making, is to analyse the performance of agricultural farms with productive efficiency techniques. In this contribution, the impact of managerial and structural characteristics on farm efficiency is analysed with stochastic frontier model. First, an overview is given of similar studies looking to relations between structural characteristics, agent factors, and efficiency. Next, an empirical productive efficiency analysis is done on an unbalanced panel of 1018 Flemish farms over a 14-years period (1989-2002). The stochastic production frontier is estimated using the random-effects model with time-invariant efficiency, and with the translog as functional form. Finally, the stochastic production function is extended with extra regressors, to understand why farms differ in their relative efficiency. Empirical results show significant effects of education, the prospect of succession, farm size, type and location, age of farmers, solvency, and dependency on subsidies. Results are discussed in terms of capacities and incentives to perform better. Insight of the impact of these determinants helps to understand the driving factors of structural change and how policy may respond to it.
Mercredi 30 mai 2007
Louis EECKHOUDT
Facultés Catholiques de Mons et de Lille
Some new results about an old topics: properties of the utility functions
Abstract : Many results in economics, finance or decision sciences depend upon the signs of the successive direct and cross derivatives of the utility function. While the first and second order derivatives of such functions are easily interpreted, matters are much less clearcut for higher order derivatives.
In this presentation we propose a general principle of interpretation that applies as well to the first derivatives as to the successive ones of the objective function. We also discuss some economic implications of the result.
La présentation de Louis EECKHOUDT est basée sur les deux papiers suivants :
EECKHOUDT L, B REY, H SCHLESINGER (2007) A Good Sign for Multivariate Risk Taking. Management Science; 53(1): 117-124. (texte)
EECKHOUDT L, H SCHLESINGER (2005)Putting Risk in Its Proper Place. American Economic Review; 96(1): 280-289.
Vendredi 4 mai 2007
Séminaire thématique sur la responsabilité sociale de l'entreprise au cours duquel sont intervenus :
Angéline RINGEVAL : La consommation durable
Christelle DIDIER : Le droit/devoir d'alerte
Romain HUET : La construction d'une approche communicationnelle entre les organisations. Une analyse des écrites de la négociation
Didier CAZAL : RSE et parties prenantes : approches critiques et perspectives
Jeudi 5 avril 2007
Ann LANGLEY
HEC Montréal
Décision et indécision dans un contexte pluraliste: Deux cas contrastés dans les organisations de santé
La présentation de Ann LANGLEY est basée sur les deux papiers suivants :
DENIS JL, DOMPIERRE G, LANGLEY A, ROULEAU L (2006) Escalating indecision: The micro-dynamics of strategic instability. Communication EGOS 2006, Bergen 2006,
The Organizing Society.
DENIS JL, LANGLEY A, ROULEAU L (2006) The power of numbers in strategizing. Strategic Organization; 4(4): 349-377.
Jeudi 5 avril 2007
Erkan BAYRAKTAR
Bahcesehir University, Industrial Engineering Department, Istanbul (Turkey)
The Impact of Forecasting on the Bullwhip Effect
Abstract: The bullwhip effect represents the information distortion in customer demand between orders to supplier and sales to the buyer. Demand forecasting is one of the. main causes of the bullwhip effect. The purpose of this study is to analyze the impact of exponential smoothing forecasts on the bullwhip effect in a linear-seasonal demand environment for a two-stage supply chain. A simulation model is developed to experiment the different scenarios of selecting right parameters for exponential smoothing forecasting technique. It is found that longer lead times and poor selection of forecasting model parameters lead to strong bullwhip effect. In contrast, increased seasonality helps to reduce the bullwhip effect. The most significant managerial implication of this study lies in the need to reduce lead times along the supply chain to mitigate the bullwhip effect. While high seasonality would reduce the forecast accuracy, it has a positive influence on the reduction of bullwhip effect. Supply chain managers are therefore strongly suggested to utilize exponential smoothing by selecting lower values for a and R and a mid-value for y to keep the bullwhip ratio low, while at the same time to increase forecast accuracy.
Mercredi 4 avril 2007
Pierre-Thomas LEGER
HEC Montréal, CIRANO et CIRPEE
Physician Payment Mechanisms : Dynamics, Diagnostic Ability and, Altruism
Abstract: Much of the literature in health economics has focused on examining patient and physician behaviour within different institutional frameworks in order to ultimately suggest policies that will encourage the efficient provision of care. Although much has been written on the topic, most of the results have been derived from a static model where illness is assumed to be a one-time event. However, these models may be limiting as patient health and physician-patient relationships are likely to evolve over time. For example, actions taken by General Practitioners (GPs) are likely to affect their patients' need for future care. That is, they are likely to affect patients' future consumption of medical services in general, but also their need for specialty or hospital care (which may be more complicated, invasive and costly). In response to this limitation, we propose a theoretical model where dynamics in the health production function are introduced in a meaningful way. By doing so, we can solve for the efficient physician treatment and referral behaviour as well and physicians' likely behaviour under different payment mechanisms (i.e., Fee-for-service and Capitation). We then examine physician treatment and referral behaviour when physicians are allowed to select into different (competing) payment mechanisms. We compare the results from these three different systems to those derived in the first-best.
Lundi 26 février 2007
Pierre-Yves GEOFFARD
CNRS, Paris School of Economics
Decomposition of multivariate inequality indices by attribute
Abstract: In multi-dimensional contexts, inequality indices provide a simple statistic that summarises many different notions: (1) dispersion of the distribution of each attribute and social aversion to such dispersion; (2) association between various attributes and social attitudes towards such association. A multi-dimensional index is said to be "decomposed" when it may be written as the sum of inequality indices for each marginal distribution, and some indices based on the copula function of the joint distribution. We provide a complete characterisation of this decomposition in the case of multi-dimensional Atkinson-Kolm-Sen indices, and extend this case to a semi-parametric index based on weaker axiomatic restrictions.
Lundi 19 février 2007
Mugur JITEA
Université des sciences agricoles de Cluj
An application of positive mathematical programming to analyse the effects of the Common Agriculture Policy in Transylvania (texte)
Abstract : Presently, Romanian agriculture is part of a complex process of changes that are meant to create the legislative, organizational and institutional framework required in order to join the European Union, process politically accomplished in the 1st of January 2007. With the help of a "positive" recursive single period model, three North - Western Romanian agricultural farms (Transylvanian) specialized in field crops were modelled. Based on this model six scenarios are evaluated: Romania won't apply the CAP starting with 2007; the prices of Romanian agricultural products will decrease to the European level due to the trade liberalization; Romania will gradually apply the Common Agricultural Policy as a unique payment surface scheme starting with 2007; besides the European unique payments per hectare the farmers will receive national compensatory payments at different levels (10 % in the forth scenario; 20 % in the fifth scenario or 30 % in the sixth scenario).
The results show that the trade liberalization will decrease the net income of the farmers without CAP payments. These will sustain their revenue, but for those who practice bigger prices than the EU ones, even in the optimist financial scenario, the revenue won't maintain to the same level as before joining. Furthermore, the production will suffer great changes: the farms will be specialized in those productions in which they have comparative advantages. For the others (wheat especially for the Transylvanian region) they have to change their technologies. In the matter of the financial constraints, the model shows that the credit access has a greater impact over the farms revenue than the interest rate level. So after joining, such measures should be taken to ensure their modernization.
Lundi 29 janvier 2007
Philippe DELQUIE
INSEAD, Decision Sciences Area
The Value of Information is driven by the Intensity of Preference (texte)
Abstract : According to previous research, the value of information about a risky decision does not seem to depend in any consistent or predictable fashion on the features of the decision problem. For instance the relationship between value of information and the degree of risk aversion can be non-monotonic, seemingly counterintuitive in some cases.
In this presentation, I will show that the value of information obeys a simple and general principle. The value of information (VOI), measured in utility units, is systematically driven by the intensity of preference between the decision alternatives: VOI is maximal when the decision maker is indifferent between the prior alternatives, and decreases as the preference for one of the alternatives gets stronger. This result holds for any given choice alternatives, information structure, random background wealth, and utility function. It indicates that quasi-concave relationships should generally be expected between value of information and specific parameters of the decision problem.
The result has intuitive appeal, and I will examine whether it holds when other measures of information value is used, such as maximum buying price, certainty equivalence increase, or minimum selling price. Finally, I will present the results of some experiments on individuals' subjective valuation of information.