Freedom of choice of specialist physicians is important to Swiss resident: a cross-sectional study.

QUESTION UNDER STUDY: To assess how important the possibility to choose specialist physicians is for Swiss residents and to determine which variables are associated with this opinion. METHODS: This cross-sectional study used data from the 2007 Swiss population-based health survey and included 13,642 non-institutionalised adults who responded to the telephone and paper questionnaires. The dependent variable included answers to the question "How important is it for you to be able to choose the specialist you would like to visit?" Independent variables included socio-demographics, health and past year healthcare use measures. Crude and adjusted logistic regressions for the importance of being able to choose specialist physicians were performed, accounting for the survey design. RESULTS: 45% of participants found it very important to be able to choose the specialist physician they wanted to visit. The answers "rather important", "rather not important" and "not important" were reported by 28%, 20% and 7% of respondents. Women, individuals in middle/high executive position, those with an ordinary insurance scheme, those reporting ≥2 chronic conditions or poorer subjective health, or those who had had ≥2 outpatient visits in the preceding year were more likely to find this choice very important. CONCLUSIONS: In 2007, almost half of all Swiss residents found it very important to be able to choose his/her specialist physician. The further development of physician networks or other chronic disease management initiatives in Switzerland, towards integrated care, need to pay attention to the freedom of choice of specialist physicians that Swiss residents value. Future surveys should provide information on access and consultations with specialist physicians.

El sector hotelero en China : el fenómeno "low cost" en la nueva clase urbana

Aquest treball es justifica per la complementarietat que, d'una banda ofereix el potencial i volum d'un mercat en plena efervescència com és l'àmbit urbà de la Xina, on el seu incipient maduresa, com a conseqüència de l'efecte d'arrossegament que la inversió estrangera - intensa i innovadora - ha provocat, facilitant l'aparició d'una demanda d'un nivell superior, no primària, com les activitats emmarcades en el lleure i el turisme. D'altra banda, per una proposta de negoci dins d'un sector amb grans expectatives de desenvolupament com és el turístic i, finalment, també per l'opció d'un consum basat en el factor preu, amb unes característiques socioeconòmiques determinades de demanda, i en què la societat urbana de la Xina ja comença a veure's reflectida. Més enllà del paper tradicional de la Xina com a procés avantatjós dins de la cadena productiva o com a mercat d'outputs de volum, es dibuixa una nova classe mitjana urbana, inserint-se de ple i en molt poc temps en les dinàmiques de consum global, recolzada en les noves tecnologies - on el procés productiu low cost basa gran part del seu desenvolupament -.

Mate choice evolution, dominance effects, and the maintenance of genetic variation.

Female mate choice influences the maintenance of genetic variation by altering the mating success of males with different genotypes. The evolution of preferences themselves, on the other hand, depends on genetic variation present in the population. Few models have tracked this feedback between a choice gene and its effects on genetic variation, in particular when genes that determine offspring viability and attractiveness have dominance effects. Here we build a population genetic model that allows comparing the evolution of various choice rules in a single framework. We first consider preferences for good genes and show that focused preferences for homozygotes evolve more easily than broad preferences, which allow heterozygous males high mating success too. This occurs despite better maintenance of genetic diversity in the latter scenario, and we discuss why empirical findings of superior mating success of heterozygous males consequently do not immediately lead to a better understanding of the lek paradox. Our results thus suggest that the mechanisms that help maintain genetic diversity also have a flipside of making female choice an inaccurate means of producing the desired kind of offspring. We then consider preferences for heterozygosity per se, and show that these evolve only under very special conditions. Choice for compatible genotypes can evolve but its selective advantage diminishes quickly due to frequency-dependent selection. Finally, we show that our model reproduces earlier results on selfing, when the female choice strategy produces assortative mating. Overall, our model indicates that various forms of heterozygote-favouring (or variable) female choice pose a problem for the theory of sexual ornamentation based on indirect benefits, rather than a solution.

Good genes drive female choice for mating partners in the lek-breeding European treefrog.

Investigating the mechanisms underlying female mate choice is important for sexual-selection theory, but also for population-genetic studies, because distinctive breeding strategies affect differently the dynamics of gene diversity within populations. Using field-monitoring, genetic-assignment, and laboratory-rearing methods, we investigated chorus attendance, mating success and offspring fitness in a population of lek-breeding tree-frogs (Hyla arborea) to test whether female choice is driven by good genes or complementary genes. Chorus attendance explained approximately 50% of the variance in male mating success, but did not correlate with offspring fitness. By contrast, offspring body mass and growth rate correlated with male attractiveness, measured as the number of matings obtained per night of calling. Genetic similarity between mating partners did not depart from random, and did not affect offspring fitness. We conclude that females are able to choose good partners under natural settings and obtain benefits from the good genes, rather than compatible genes, their offspring inherit. This heritability of fitness is likely to reduce effective population sizes below values previously estimated.

Modelling world investment markets using threshold conditional correlation models

In this paper we propose a parsimonious regime-switching approach to model the correlations between assets, the threshold conditional correlation (TCC) model. This method allows the dynamics of the correlations to change from one state (or regime) to another as a function of observable transition variables. Our model is similar in spirit to Silvennoinen and Teräsvirta (2009) and Pelletier (2006) but with the appealing feature that it does not suffer from the course of dimensionality. In particular, estimation of the parameters of the TCC involves a simple grid search procedure. In addition, it is easy to guarantee a positive definite correlation matrix because the TCC estimator is given by the sample correlation matrix, which is positive definite by construction. The methodology is illustrated by evaluating the behaviour of international equities, govenrment bonds and major exchange rates, first separately and then jointly. We also test and allow for different parts in the correlation matrix to be governed by different transition variables. For this, we estimate a multi-threshold TCC specification. Further, we evaluate the economic performance of the TCC model against a constant conditional correlation (CCC) estimator using a Diebold-Mariano type test. We conclude that threshold correlation modelling gives rise to a significant reduction in portfolio´s variance.

Investment, duration, and exit strategies for corporate and independent venture capital-backed start-ups

We propose a model of investment, duration, and exit strategies for start-ups backed by venture capital (VC) funds that accounts for the high level of uncertainty, the asymmetry of information between insiders and outsiders, and the discount rate. Our analysis predicts that start-ups backed by corporate VC funds remain for a longer period of time before exiting and receive larger investment amounts than those financed by independent VC funds. Although a longer duration leads to a higher likelihood of an exit through an acquisition, a larger investment increases the probability of an IPO exit. These predictions find strong empirical support.

Subjective health assessments and active labor market participation of older men: evidence from a semiparametric binary choice model with nonadditive correlated individual-specific effects

We use panel data from the U. S. Health and Retirement Study, 1992-2002, to estimate the effect of self-assessed health limitations on the active labor market participation of older men. Self-assessments of health are likely to be endogenous to labor supply due to justification bias and individual-specific heterogeneity in subjective evaluations. We address both concerns. We propose a semiparametric binary choice procedure that incorporates nonadditive correlated individual-specific effects. Our estimation strategy identifies and estimates the average partial effects of health and functioning on labor market participation. The results indicate that poor health plays a major role in labor market exit decisions.

Patients' and physicians' preferences for type 2 diabetes mellitus treatments in Spain and Portugal: a discrete choice experiment.

OBJECTIVE To assess Spanish and Portuguese patients' and physicians' preferences regarding type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) treatments and the monthly willingness to pay (WTP) to gain benefits or avoid side effects. METHODS An observational, multicenter, exploratory study focused on routine clinical practice in Spain and Portugal. Physicians were recruited from multiple hospitals and outpatient clinics, while patients were recruited from eleven centers operating in the public health care system in different autonomous communities in Spain and Portugal. Preferences were measured via a discrete choice experiment by rating multiple T2DM medication attributes. Data were analyzed using the conditional logit model. RESULTS Three-hundred and thirty (n=330) patients (49.7% female; mean age 62.4 [SD: 10.3] years, mean T2DM duration 13.9 [8.2] years, mean body mass index 32.5 [6.8] kg/m(2), 41.8% received oral + injected medication, 40.3% received oral, and 17.6% injected treatments) and 221 physicians from Spain and Portugal (62% female; mean age 41.9 [SD: 10.5] years, 33.5% endocrinologists, 66.5% primary-care doctors) participated. Patients valued avoiding a gain in bodyweight of 3 kg/6 months (WTP: €68.14 [95% confidence interval: 54.55-85.08]) the most, followed by avoiding one hypoglycemic event/month (WTP: €54.80 [23.29-82.26]). Physicians valued avoiding one hypoglycemia/week (WTP: €287.18 [95% confidence interval: 160.31-1,387.21]) the most, followed by avoiding a 3 kg/6 months gain in bodyweight and decreasing cardiovascular risk (WTP: €166.87 [88.63-843.09] and €154.30 [98.13-434.19], respectively). Physicians and patients were willing to pay €125.92 (73.30-622.75) and €24.28 (18.41-30.31), respectively, to avoid a 1% increase in glycated hemoglobin, and €143.30 (73.39-543.62) and €42.74 (23.89-61.77) to avoid nausea. CONCLUSION Both patients and physicians in Spain and Portugal are willing to pay for the health benefits associated with improved diabetes treatment, the most important being to avoid hypoglycemia and gaining weight. Decreased cardiovascular risk and weight reduction became the third most valued attributes for physicians and patients, respectively.

Permanent demand excess as business strategy: an analysis of the Brazilian higher-education market

Many Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) establish tuition below the equilibrium price to generate permanent demand excess. This paper first adapts Becker’s (1991) theory to understand why the HEIs price in this way. The fact that students are both consumers and inputs on the education production process gives rise to a market equilibrium where some firms have excess demand and charge high prices, and others charge low prices and have empty seats.Second, the paper analyzes this equilibrium empirically. We estimated the demand for undergraduate courses in Business Administration in the State of São Paulo. The results show that tuition, quality of incoming students and percentage of lecturers holding doctorates degrees are the determining factors of students’ choice. Since the student quality determines the demand for a HEI, it is calculated what the value is for a HEI to get better students; that is the total revenue that each HEI gives up to guarantee excess demand. Regarding the “investment” in selectivity, 39 HEIs in São Paulo give up a combined R$ 5 million (or US$ 3.14 million) in revenue per year per freshman class, which means 7.6% of the revenue coming from a freshman class.

Understanding the hierarchy governance choice of some wineries in Brazil - case study of 3 Brazilian wineries

ABSTRACT This study aims to contribute towards understanding the multiple factors, which influence firm's governance decisions. To identify some of these factors, three cases in the Brazilian wine industry were analyzed: Miolo located in Vale dos Vinhedos (South of Brazil) and in Vale do Rio São Francisco (Northeast of Brazil); Don Laurindo located in Vale dos Vinhedos; and ViniBrasil located in Vale do Rio São Francisco. For the most part, all three firms procure the grapes they use for their wine production in-house. Only Miolo purchases an insignificant amount of grapes outside of its production. By Brazilian standards, these regions have a long tradition of grape production and it is not difficult to purchase sufficient quantity of grapes to produce wine. However, the wineries are concerned also about the quality of the grapes they use and purchasing high-quality grapes might be critical issue. On the other hand, the quality of grapes is easily measured and the cost to buy in the market is cheaper than producing in-house. Furthermore, also the level of asset specificity present in the grape-grower-wine-producer transaction seems, by itself, insufficient to justify the use of hierarchical governance forms. Then, the aim of the article is to analyze the reasons why these wineries largely rely on hierarchy governance forms to procure their grape-inputs. What explains their use of hierarchy governance, given that both asset specificity and measurement problems appear to be relatively low?

Information overload, choice deferral, and moderating role of need for cognition: Empirical evidence

ABSTRACT Choice deferral due to information overload is an undesirable result of competitive environments. The neoclassical maximization models predict that choice avoidance will not increase as more information is offered to consumers. The theories developed in the consumer behavior field predict that some properties of the environment may lead to behavioral effects and an increase in choice avoidance due to information overload. Based on stimuli generated experimentally and tested among 1,000 consumers, this empirical research provides evidence for the presence of behavioral effects due to information overload and reveals the different effects of increasing the number of options or the number of attributes. This study also finds that the need for cognition moderates these behavioral effects, and it proposes psychological processes that may trigger the effects observed.