The regulatory environment of the section of the non-standardized goods market - The findings of an interview research on Hungarian construction industry small enterprises

In this paper the behavior of economic actors shown in the uncertain quality goods markets is examined from the perspective of the sociology of markets. The analysis uses the findings of in-depth interviews conducted in 2011 and 2012 respectively amongst small and medium size entrepreneurs working in construction industry. In the Hungarian construction industry neither formal rules, nor vocational chambers, are able to create a safe environment for entrepreneurs. Nevertheless, networks created as a result of micro-selection steps might be able to enforce the quality of services, observe deadlines and what is more, ensure payment discipline. In this market, the typical high risk can be reduced by relationships. Networks reduce also the cost of transactions, since the important part of the services in this field could only be standardized at significant costs.

Az egyensúlyi ráták unicitása és a bérráta pozitivitása a Neumann-modell általánosításaiban (Uniqueness of equilibrium rates and the positive value of the wage rate in generalizations from the Neumann model)

Cikkünk arról a paradox jelenségről szól, hogy a fogyasztást explicit módon megjelenítő Neumann-modell egyensúlyi megoldásaiban a munkabért meghatározó létszükségleti termékek ára esetenként nulla lehet, és emiatt a reálbér egyensúlyi értéke is nulla lesz. Ez a jelenség mindig bekövetkezik az olyan dekomponálható gazdaságok esetén, amelyekben eltérő növekedési és profitrátájú, alternatív egyensúlyi megoldások léteznek. A jelenség sokkal áttekinthetőbb formában tárgyalható a modell Leontief-eljárásra épülő egyszerűbb változatában is, amit ki is használunk. Megmutatjuk, hogy a legnagyobbnál alacsonyabb szintű növekedési tényezőjű megoldások közgazdasági szempontból értelmetlenek, és így érdektelenek. Ezzel voltaképpen egyrészt azt mutatjuk meg, hogy Neumann kiváló intuíciója jól működött, amikor ragaszkodott modellje egyértelmű megoldásához, másrészt pedig azt is, hogy ehhez nincs szükség a gazdaság dekomponálhatóságának feltételezésére. A vizsgált téma szorosan kapcsolódik az általános profitráta meghatározásának - Sraffa által modern formába öntött - Ricardo-féle elemzéséhez, illetve a neoklasszikus növekedéselmélet nevezetes bér-profit, illetve felhalmozás-fogyasztás átváltási határgörbéihez, ami jelzi a téma elméleti és elmélettörténeti érdekességét is. / === / In the Marx-Neumann version of the Neumann model introduced by Morishima, the use of commodities is split between production and consumption, and wages are determined as the cost of necessary consumption. In such a version it may occur that the equilibrium prices of all goods necessary for consumption are zero, so that the equilibrium wage rate becomes zero too. In fact such a paradoxical case will always arise when the economy is decomposable and the equilibrium not unique in terms of growth and interest rate. It can be shown that a zero equilibrium wage rate will appear in all equilibrium solutions where growth and interest rate are less than maximal. This is another proof of Neumann's genius and intuition, for he arrived at the uniqueness of equilibrium via an assumption that implied that the economy was indecomposable, a condition relaxed later by Kemeny, Morgenstern and Thompson. This situation occurs also in similar models based on Leontief technology and such versions of the Marx-Neumann model make the roots of the problem more apparent. Analysis of them also yields an interesting corollary to Ricardo's corn rate of profit: the real cause of the awkwardness is bad specification of the model: luxury commodities are introduced without there being a final demand for them, and production of them becomes a waste of resources. Bad model specification shows up as a consumption coefficient incompatible with the given technology in the more general model with joint production and technological choice. For the paradoxical situation implies the level of consumption could be raised and/or the intensity of labour diminished without lowering the equilibrium rate of the growth and interest. This entails wasteful use of resources and indicates again that the equilibrium conditions are improperly specified. It is shown that the conditions for equilibrium can and should be redefined for the Marx-Neumann model without assuming an indecomposable economy, in a way that ensures the existence of an equilibrium unique in terms of the growth and interest rate coupled with a positive value for the wage rate, so confirming Neumann's intuition. The proposed solution relates closely to findings of Bromek in a paper correcting Morishima's generalization of wage/profit and consumption/investment frontiers.

Közjavak optimális előállítása (Optimal production of public goods)

A közjavak közgazdaságilag optimális szintjének előállítása piaci körülmények között általában nehézségekbe ütközik. Napjainkban számos országban többféle közjószág áll rendelkezésre, a szakirodalomban pedig például a nyugdíjrendszer egyes elemeinek közjószágjellegével kapcsolatos felvetések is megjelentek már. Ezzel összefüggésben is érdekes a kérdés, milyen körülmények között fordulhat elő, hogy racionális egyéni döntéshozók egyénileg optimális döntéseikkel valamely közjószág optimális szintjét hozzák létre. Jelen tanulmány ezzel a kérdéssel foglalkozik. / === / It is difficult to produce the economically optimal level of public goods in a market environment. There are many different types of public goods, and today even some aspects of the pension system are considered as such. Still, it is an interesting question if individually optimal decisions made by rational individuals could lead to an optimal level of public goods. The paper attempts to analyze this question.

A fogyasztói etnocentrizmus új koncepcionális modelljének kialakítása és verifikálása = Forming and verification of a new conceptual model of the customer ethnocentrism

A szerzők cikke az etnocentrikus érzelmek hatását mutatja be a hazai és a külföldi termékek megítélésére. Empirikus kutatásaikra és regressziós modelljeikre támaszkodva felvázolják azt a hatásmechanizmust, amely a szakirodalomba a fogyasztói etnocentrizmus néven vonult be. Megállapítják, hogy másképp hatnak a patrióta és a nacionalista érzelmek a hazai és a külföldi termékek iránti attitűdökre. Míg a hazai termékeknél egy karakterisztikus, többdimenziós kép tárul elénk, addig a cseh, kanadai és német termékek megítéléséből általánosított, külföldi termékek esetében csak a termékkel való azonosulást tudták kiemelni. A megkérdezettek demográfiai jellemzői közül egyedül a férfiak mutattak statisztikailag azonos irányú és erősségű kapcsolatot a hazai és a külföldi termékek megítélésénél. _______________________ The authors’ article presents effects of the ethnocentric emotion of the appreciation of the domestic and foreign goods. Based on their empirical and regressive models they feature that effectmechanism, which is named consumer ethnocentrism in the special literature. They set that the patriot and the nationalist emotions acting differently on attitudes of the domestic and the foreign goods.

The evolution of the car-making industry

Mass-production, cars, pollution – they all have long become well known and well connected phenomena of the modern life. Nowadays the people can also add to the list such items like awareness, scientific approach, long-term thinking, and environmental responsibility. They are surrounded by a multitude of consumer goods, most of which are produced in a scientific manner, and all of which will more sooner than later end up in the garbage. Cars are the most noticeable – both by size and by numbers – and also the most expensive of all the mass products in people’s view. For many of them they are a clear target for reprimand and regulation, and, as a result, the automotive industry is being increasingly brought under bureaucratic control, together with its whole supplier and distributor network. The author started writing this article in an attempt to place the above process under scrutiny, because it is his firm belief that similar measures, similar tough governmental control will inevitably spill over to other industries, which at the moment are producing more inconspicuous, but still polluting products. The present paper shows the relationship between car-making, supply chain management and the efforts of public administration to protect the environment – a connection with clear practical implications.

On axiomatizations of the Shapley value for assignment games

We consider the problem of axiomatizing the Shapley value on the class of assignment games. We first show that several axiomatizations of the Shapley value on the class of all TU-games do not characterize this solution on the class of assignment games by providing alternative solutions that satisfy these axioms. However, when considering an assignment game as a communication graph game where the game is simply the assignment game and the graph is a corresponding bipartite graph buyers are connected with sellers only, we show that Myerson's component efficiency and fairness axioms do characterize the Shapley value on the class of assignment games. Moreover, these two axioms have a natural interpretation for assignment games. Component efficiency yields submarket efficiency stating that the sum of the payoffs of all players in a submarket equals the worth of that submarket, where a submarket is a set of buyers and sellers such that all buyers in this set have zero valuation for the goods offered by the sellers outside the set, and all buyers outside the set have zero valuations for the goods offered by sellers inside the set. Fairness of the graph game solution boils down to valuation fairness stating that only changing the valuation of one particular buyer for the good offered by a particular seller changes the payoffs of this buyer and seller by the same amount.

The 3 per cent Barcelona Target: A Critical Appraisal of the Failure of the Lisbon Strategy’s Knowledgebased Economy and Society Project

Ten years after the unanimous approval of the Lisbon Strategy at a special meeting of the European Council on 23-24 March 2000 in Lisbon, it will be inevitable for the European Council, the European Commission and the majority of the EU member states to face with its fi asco and to account for the reasons of their fundamental policy, governance and economic failures in 2010. The recent turbulence of the global economy offers some excuses for the underperformance of the main objectives of the Lisbon Strategy in the essential social and economic domains, like job creation, economic growth, and environmental sustainability. Negative growth rates, macroeconomic and fi nancial instability, the contraction of the internal and external markets of the European economy, drop in demand for capital investment, goods and services, sinking corporate revenues, depreciation of corporate assets, increasing private and public indebtedness, falling rate of employment, weakening social cohesion, widening social inequality, and so forth not only deprive the majority of the EU member states of fulfi lling the main objectives of the Lisbon Strategy but also drive them into worse social and economic conditions in many policy domains than they were in 2000.