Endogenous price leadership

We consider a linear price setting duopoly game with differentiated products and determine endogenously which of the players will lead and which will follow. While the follower role is most attractive for each firm, we show that waiting is more risky for the low cost firm so that, consequently, risk dominance considerations, as in Harsanyi and Selten (1988), allow the conclusion that only the highcost firm will choose to wait. Hence, the low cost firm will emerge as the endogenous price leader.

New opportunities for farm accounting

There is a gap between the importance given to accounting and the low level of bookkeeping and accounting practice in the agricultural sector. Current general accounting rules do not adapt very well to the particularities of farming and are difficult and expensive to implement. The Farm Accountancy Data Network (FADN) and IASC's Proposed International Accounting Standard on Agriculture (PIASA) could be key elements to improve the use of accounting in European farms. The PIASA provides a strong conceptual framework but might need further instruments for its implementation in practice. FADN is an experienced network that has elaborated very detailed farm accounting procedures. Empirical data indicate that current FADN reports are already considered useful by farmers for different purposes. Some changes in the FADN procedures are suggested, while some aspects of FADN are worthwhile for the future IAS on agriculture.

Endogenous Stackelberg leadership

We consider a linear quantity setting duopoly game and analyzewhich of the players will commit when both players have the possibility todo so. To that end, we study a 2-stage game in which each player caneither commit to a quantity in stage 1 or wait till stage 2. We show thatcommitting is more risky for the high cost firm and that, consequently,risk dominance considerations, as in Harsanyi and Selten (1988), allowthe conclusion that only the low cost firm will choose to commit.Hence, the low cost firm will emerge as the endogenous Stackelberg leader.

Revealed preference and indifferent selection

It is shown that preferences can be constructed from observed choice behavior in a way that is robust to indifferent selection (i.e., the agent is indifferent between two alternatives but, nevertheless, is only observed selecting one of them). More precisely, a suggestion by Savage (1954) to reveal indifferent selection by considering small monetary perturbations of alternatives is formalized and generalized to a purely topological framework: references over an arbitrary topological space can be uniquely derived from observed behavior under the assumptions that they are continuous and nonsatiated and that a strictly preferred alternative is always chosen, and indifferent selection is then characterized by discontinuity in choice behavior. Two particular cases are then analyzed: monotonic preferences over a partially ordered set, and preferences representable by a continuous pseudo-utility function.

Reply to drs Bhatt and Hofmann

Coment on : The maximum effective needle-to-nerve distance for ultrasound-guided interscalene block: an exploratory study. [Reg Anesth Pain Med. 2014]

Public and private saving and investment

We decompose aggregate saving and investment into its publicand private components and then document a variety of ``stylized facts''associated with saving and investment rates for a sample of15 countries over the period 1975--1989. In order to seewhether these empirical relationships are consistent with aworld of perfect capital mobility we develop a multi--countrymodel with free trade in a riskfree bond and calibrate it tothe fifteen OECD countries. We pay special attential tomodeling the fiscal policy rules. The model performsremarkably well in accounting for a wide variety of timeseries relationships. Nonetheless the model is not able to capture the crosssectional aspect of the data. In particular, the model cannot accountfor both the large cross country correlation between aggregate saving and investmentrates and the very negative cross country relationship between the public andprivate saving minus investment gaps.

Variation in performance across Swiss mammography screening programmes: the influence of reading strategy and experience.

[Abstract] Reading volume and mammography screening performance appear positively correlated. Performance was compared across organised Swiss screening programmes, which target relatively small populations. Except for accreditation of 2nd readers radiologists (restrictive vs non-restrictive strategy), Swiss programmes have similar screening regimen/procedures and duration, which maximises comparability. Variation in performance was explored in order to improve mammography practice and optimise screening performance. Indicators of quality and effectiveness were evaluated for about 200,000 screens performed over 4 screening rounds in the 3 longest-standing Swiss cantonal programmes (of Vaud, Geneva and Valais). Interval cancers were identified by linkage with cancer registries records. Most European standards of performance were met with a favourable cancer stage shift. Several performance indicators showed substantial variation across programmes. In subsequent rounds, compared with programmes (Vaud and Geneva) which accredited few 2nd readers to increase their individual reading volume, proportions of in situ lesions and of small cancers (? 1cm) were one third lower and halved, respectively, and the proportion of advanced lesions (stage II+) nearly 50% higher in the programme without a restrictive selection strategy. Discrepancy in second-year proportional incidence of interval cancers appears to be multicausal. Differences in performance could partly be explained by a selective strategy for 2nd readers and a prior experience in service screening, but not by the levels of opportunistic screening and programme attendance. This study provides clues for enhancing mammography screening performance in low-volume Swiss programmes.

¿Qué debería hacer una empresa occidental para publicitarse en China?

Aquest treball de final de carrera analitza com les empreses occidentals haurien de publicitar-se a la Xina. De la mateixa manera, s’estudia el mercat chinès en la seva totalitat i a més d’alguns casos reals de l’èxit publicitari. El mercat chinès és molt dinàmic i diferent als mercats occidentals. Això comporta una gran dificultat d’adaptacióper part de les empreses occidentals. Per això és necessari fer un análisis detallat del mercat, els seus mitjans de comunicació, el partit comunista que goberna, de l’àmbit socio-cultural i la importancia de potenciar la marca. Aquest treball finalitza amb l’explicació de l’èxit publicitari de diverses empreses occidentals. Un referent internacional com Coca-Cola, un sector amb molta rellevança com el luxe exclusiu dominat per Louis Vuitton i un mercat amb molt de potencial per a les empreses españoles com l’oli d’oliva il.lustrat amb Borges. Tot aquest treball ens convida a reflexionar sobre la diferencia d’actuació entre dos móns diferents com són els països occidentals i la China. Mentre el sector publicitari europeu s’atura, el chinès no deixa de créixer.

Que promettent les styles d'interactions? Une approche sociologique de l'intimité conjugale

This article intends to grasp the stabilization process, deterioration or improvement of the conjugal intimacy over five years, based on a representative sample of couples living in Switzerland. The dynamics develop in different ways depending on the degree of autonomy of the partners, the gendering of household tasks, conjugal openess and the coping strategies of the couples.

Performance evaluation of MPEG-4 Video encoder on Adres

Actualment un típic embedded system (ex. telèfon mòbil) requereix alta qualitat per portar a terme tasques com codificar/descodificar a temps real; han de consumir poc energia per funcionar hores o dies utilitzant bateries lleugeres; han de ser el suficientment flexibles per integrar múltiples aplicacions i estàndards en un sol aparell; han de ser dissenyats i verificats en un període de temps curt tot i l’augment de la complexitat. Els dissenyadors lluiten contra aquestes adversitats, que demanen noves innovacions en arquitectures i metodologies de disseny. Coarse-grained reconfigurable architectures (CGRAs) estan emergent com a candidats potencials per superar totes aquestes dificultats. Diferents tipus d’arquitectures han estat presentades en els últims anys. L’alta granularitat redueix molt el retard, l’àrea, el consum i el temps de configuració comparant amb les FPGAs. D’altra banda, en comparació amb els tradicionals processadors coarse-grained programables, els alts recursos computacionals els permet d’assolir un alt nivell de paral•lelisme i eficiència. No obstant, els CGRAs existents no estant sent aplicats principalment per les grans dificultats en la programació per arquitectures complexes. ADRES és una nova CGRA dissenyada per I’Interuniversity Micro-Electronics Center (IMEC). Combina un processador very-long instruction word (VLIW) i un coarse-grained array per tenir dues opcions diferents en un mateix dispositiu físic. Entre els seus avantatges destaquen l’alta qualitat, poca redundància en les comunicacions i la facilitat de programació. Finalment ADRES és un patró enlloc d’una arquitectura concreta. Amb l’ajuda del compilador DRESC (Dynamically Reconfigurable Embedded System Compile), és possible trobar millors arquitectures o arquitectures específiques segons l’aplicació. Aquest treball presenta la implementació d’un codificador MPEG-4 per l’ADRES. Mostra l’evolució del codi per obtenir una bona implementació per una arquitectura donada. També es presenten les característiques principals d’ADRES i el seu compilador (DRESC). Els objectius són de reduir al màxim el nombre de cicles (temps) per implementar el codificador de MPEG-4 i veure les diferents dificultats de treballar en l’entorn ADRES. Els resultats mostren que els cícles es redueixen en un 67% comparant el codi inicial i final en el mode VLIW i un 84% comparant el codi inicial en VLIW i el final en mode CGA.

La variété des configurations familiales après une recomposition: choix et contraintes

Les recompositions familiales mettent en exergue les limites des études de la famille fondées sur le ménage. En effet, la famille qui compte dépasse de toute évidence, dans cette situation, les frontières de celui-ci. Sur la base d'un échantillon de 300 femmes ayant un enfant entre 5 et 13 ans, la moitié en situation de recomposition familiale, cette recherche rend compte de la diversité de la composition des contextes familiaux significatifs aux yeux des individus, en distinguant neuf configurations-types. Ces configurations se retrouvent tant dans les familles de première union que dans les familles recomposées. Elles dépassent le cadre du ménage en répondant aux choix familiaux des individus, ainsi qu'aux contraintes socio-démographiques imposées par le réservoir de parenté et l'institutionnalisation du couple.