Measurement of Productivity and Efficiency


Book Description

Provides a comprehensive approach to productivity and efficiency analysis using economic and econometric theory.




X-Efficiency: Theory, Evidence and Applications


Book Description

My interest in X-Efficiency (XE) dates back to 1978. At the time, I was writing the dissertation for my Ph. D. at Washington State University. My dissertation was concerned with the role of attitudes in the school-to-work transition among young men. I was advised by Professor Millard Hastay (a member of my committee) to look at Leibenstein's "new" book, Beyond Economic Man. One of the things that caught my attention was his be havioral description of (selective) rationality. It seemed that Leibenstein's behavioral description of a (selectively) rational individual was very similar to what psychologists such as Abraham Maslow were reporting as being the product of a particular motivational system. In other words, I was im pressed with the idea that what Leibenstein was referring to as X-ineffi ciency was being discussed by psychologists as "the way it (often) is. " So from the beginning I always considered the concept of X-(in)efficiency to be a valuable one for understanding human behavior. I have since come to believe that this is particularly true when considering behavior in non market environments, i. e. , within the firm. Work on this book, however, can most realistically said to have started with work which I began in 1982 while I was a Visiting Scholar at Harvard University. Professor Leibenstein suggested that I consider how some em pirical evidence which was being cited as evidence for the role of property rights might also be consistent with XE theory.




The Theory of Dynamic Efficiency


Book Description

This book gathers a collection of multidisciplinary essays by Jess Huerta de Soto, examining the dynamic processes of social cooperation which characterize the market, with particular emphasis on the role of both entrepreneurship and institutions.




Theory for Economic Efficiency


Book Description

Paul Samuelson once noted that "Abba Lerner has been a great theoretical economist in a vintage epoch for theorists. This last third of a century he has poured out one brilliant paper after another-in micro theory and macro, in pure thought, and in the realms of policy."Lerner's colleagues at Queens College have assembled these essays on issues of considerable importance in the world economy, particularly in areas of social welfare, as "a tribute to a great economist who has made significant and long-lasting contributions to many fields of economic theory and policy."




Wealth Expanding Theory Under the Principle of Efficiency-Equity Equilibrium


Book Description

It has been suggested that national economic policies should focus on taxation to achieve social equity and interest rates for economic efficiency; wealth distribution can balance efficiency and equity through tax rates, interest rates, and exchange rates. Additionally, while the economic system seeks efficiency and the social system pursues equity, common interest modifications with elastic exchange and tax rates should be applied for balancing efficiency and equity. Wealth Expanding Theory Under the Principle of Efficiency-Equity Equilibrium is a comprehensive reference source that considers economic philosophy for extending economic cognition, balancing economic efficiency and social equity, and future interstellar economics. Covering key topics such as poverty, fiscal policy, and macroeconomics, this reference work is ideal for policymakers, government officials, business owners, economists, managers, researchers, scholars, academicians, practitioners, instructors, and students.




The Efficient Market Theory and Evidence


Book Description

The Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH) asserts that, at all times, the price of a security reflects all available information about its fundamental value. The implication of the EMH for investors is that, to the extent that speculative trading is costly, speculation must be a loser's game. Hence, under the EMH, a passive strategy is bound eventually to beat a strategy that uses active management, where active management is characterized as trading that seeks to exploit mispriced assets relative to a risk-adjusted benchmark. The EMH has been refined over the past several decades to reflect the realism of the marketplace, including costly information, transactions costs, financing, agency costs, and other real-world frictions. The most recent expressions of the EMH thus allow a role for arbitrageurs in the market who may profit from their comparative advantages. These advantages may include specialized knowledge, lower trading costs, low management fees or agency costs, and a financing structure that allows the arbitrageur to undertake trades with long verification periods. The actions of these arbitrageurs cause liquid securities markets to be generally fairly efficient with respect to information, despite some notable anomalies.




Financial Markets Theory


Book Description

This work, now in a thoroughly revised second edition, presents the economic foundations of financial markets theory from a mathematically rigorous standpoint and offers a self-contained critical discussion based on empirical results. It is the only textbook on the subject to include more than two hundred exercises, with detailed solutions to selected exercises. Financial Markets Theory covers classical asset pricing theory in great detail, including utility theory, equilibrium theory, portfolio selection, mean-variance portfolio theory, CAPM, CCAPM, APT, and the Modigliani-Miller theorem. Starting from an analysis of the empirical evidence on the theory, the authors provide a discussion of the relevant literature, pointing out the main advances in classical asset pricing theory and the new approaches designed to address asset pricing puzzles and open problems (e.g., behavioral finance). Later chapters in the book contain more advanced material, including on the role of information in financial markets, non-classical preferences, noise traders and market microstructure. This textbook is aimed at graduate students in mathematical finance and financial economics, but also serves as a useful reference for practitioners working in insurance, banking, investment funds and financial consultancy. Introducing necessary tools from microeconomic theory, this book is highly accessible and completely self-contained. Advance praise for the second edition: "Financial Markets Theory is comprehensive, rigorous, and yet highly accessible. With their second edition, Barucci and Fontana have set an even higher standard!"Darrell Duffie, Dean Witter Distinguished Professor of Finance, Graduate School of Business, Stanford University "This comprehensive book is a great self-contained source for studying most major theoretical aspects of financial economics. What makes the book particularly useful is that it provides a lot of intuition, detailed discussions of empirical implications, a very thorough survey of the related literature, and many completely solved exercises. The second edition covers more ground and provides many more proofs, and it will be a handy addition to the library of every student or researcher in the field."Jaksa Cvitanic, Richard N. Merkin Professor of Mathematical Finance, Caltech "The second edition of Financial Markets Theory by Barucci and Fontana is a superb achievement that knits together all aspects of modern finance theory, including financial markets microstructure, in a consistent and self-contained framework. Many exercises, together with their detailed solutions, make this book indispensable for serious students in finance."Michel Crouhy, Head of Research and Development, NATIXIS




Performance Theory


Book Description

First Published in 1988. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.




Dynamics of Data Envelopment Analysis


Book Description

Data envelopment analysis develops a set of nonparametric and semiparametric techniques for measuring economic efficiency among firms and nonprofit organizations. Over the past decade this technique has found most widespread applications in public sector organizations. However these applications have been mostly static. This monograph extends this static framework of efficiency analysis in several new directions. These include but are not limited to the following: (1) a dynamic view of the production and cost frontier, where capital inputs are treated differently from the current inputs, (2) a direct role of the technological progress and regress, which is so often stressed in total factor productivity discussion in modem growth theory in economics, (3) stochastic efficiency in a dynamic setting, where reliability improvement competes with technical efficiency, (4) flexible manufacturing systems, where flexibility of the production process and the economies of scope play an important role in efficiency analysis and (5) the role of economic factors such as externalities and input interdependences. Efficiency is viewed here in the framework of a general systems theory model. Such a view is intended to broaden the scope of applications of this promising new technique of data envelopment analysis. The monograph stresses the various applied aspects of the dynamic theory, so that it can be empirically implemented in different situations. As far as possible abstract mathematical treatments are avoided and emphasis placed on the statistical examples and empirical illustrations.




Theory of Innovation


Book Description

The current economic theory of innovation mainly analyses the technology factor and its impact on economic growth. In today's world, growth in information technology and knowledge of new ideas has altered the business paradigm dramatically. Modern economies have undergone a dynamic shift from material manufacturing to a new information technology model with research and development (R&D) and human capital. Through information and communications technology efficient information usage has achieved substantial productivity gains through learning by doing and incremental innovations. The present volume discusses this new paradigm in terms of both theory and industry applications, including Schumpeter in his innovation model and the emphasis on new innovations replacing the old. Growth of business networking and R&D consortium have dramatically helped the modern business to reduce their unit costs and improve efficiency. This volume presents some new models emphasizing knowledge sharing and R&D cooperation. Rapid growth in recent times in some south Asian countries have been cited as growth miracles are largely caused by knowledge spillover and learning by doing, and this volume also investigates the role of incremental innovations. With a strong focus and extension of the current theory of innovation and industry growth experiences of both the US and Asian countries, this book will be of interest to MBA and graduate students in economics, innovation management, and applied industrial economics.