Are Bar Associations Anticompetitive? An Empirical Analysis of Recommended Prices for Legal Services in Spain

The European Commission Report on Competition in Professional Services found that recommended prices by professional bodies have a significant negative effect on competition since they may facilitate the coordination of prices between service providers and/or mislead consumers about reasonable price levels. Professional associations argue, first, that a fee schedule may help their members to properly calculate the cost of services avoiding excessive charges and reducing consumers’ searching costs and, second, that recommended prices are very useful for cost appraisal if a litigant is condemned to pay the legal expenses of the opposing party. Thus, recommended fee schedules could be justified to some extent if they represented the cost of providing the services. We test this hypothesis using cross‐section data on a subset of recommended prices by 52 Spanish bar associations and cost data on their territorial jurisdictions. Our empirical results indicate that prices recommended by bar associations are unrelated to the cost of legal services and therefore we conclude that recommended prices have merely an anticompetitive effect.

Understanding Tariff Deficit and its Challenges

Regulators and market participants have become increasingly concerned about the Spanish electricity tariff deficit due to its size and the difficulties to control its growth. The deficit can be traced to inefficiencies in market organization and solutions should be designed to mitigate those inefficiencies. Tariff deficits have allowed for the transfer of part of the present costs of electricity services to future consumers, but this situation has reached a limit and a deep revision of regulation in this market cannot be postponed. In general, solutions that interfere with market prices and signals are not appropriate.

Democratic Values Transmission

This study addresses the issue of intergenerational transmission of democratic values embedded in social choice rules. We focus on a few rules which have been the focus of social choice theory: plurality, plurality with a runoff, majoritarian compromise, social compromise and Borda rule. We confront subjects with preferences profiles of a hypothetical electorate over a set of four alternatives. Different rules produce different outcomes and subjects decide which alternative should be chosen for the society whose preference profile is shown. We elicit each subject's preferences over rules and his/her parents' and check whether there is any relationship; 186 students and their parents attended the sessions at Istanbul Bilgi University. Overall, we find support for the hypothesis of parental transmission of democratic values and gender differences in the transmitted rule.

Hacia una historia de la traducción en la España de Franco

Eterio Pajares, Raquel Merino y José Miguel Santamaría (eds.)

An austerity-driven energy reform

In July 2013, the government approved a major overhaul of the Spanish electricity sector to correct existing imbalances that have led to an exponential increase of regulated electricity costs and a huge tariff deficit. The reform addresses the problem of financial sustainability of the sector, severely affected by weak demand and overcapacity. Previous regulation introduced in 2012 and early 2013, also aimed at restoring financial stability of the sector, failed to correct the tariff shortfall and new regulatory measures were needed to reduce the 4.5 billion euros forecasted deficit for 2013. The frequent change of the rules of the game in the sector has created regulatory uncertainty, more so as it is not clear that the present reform will be sufficient to eliminate the deficit. Moreover, the government has left the door open to new regulation that would deal with the price formation system. In general, short run financial criteria have prevailed, while efficiency principles and a long run perspective have little weight in the reform.

Global Self-Organization of the Cellular Metabolic Structure

Background: Over many years, it has been assumed that enzymes work either in an isolated way, or organized in small catalytic groups. Several studies performed using "metabolic networks models'' are helping to understand the degree of functional complexity that characterizes enzymatic dynamic systems. In a previous work, we used "dissipative metabolic networks'' (DMNs) to show that enzymes can present a self-organized global functional structure, in which several sets of enzymes are always in an active state, whereas the rest of molecular catalytic sets exhibit dynamics of on-off changing states. We suggested that this kind of global metabolic dynamics might be a genuine and universal functional configuration of the cellular metabolic structure, common to all living cells. Later, a different group has shown experimentally that this kind of functional structure does, indeed, exist in several microorganisms. Methodology/Principal Findings: Here we have analyzed around 2.500.000 different DMNs in order to investigate the underlying mechanism of this dynamic global configuration. The numerical analyses that we have performed show that this global configuration is an emergent property inherent to the cellular metabolic dynamics. Concretely, we have found that the existence of a high number of enzymatic subsystems belonging to the DMNs is the fundamental element for the spontaneous emergence of a functional reactive structure characterized by a metabolic core formed by several sets of enzymes always in an active state. Conclusions/Significance: This self-organized dynamic structure seems to be an intrinsic characteristic of metabolism, common to all living cellular organisms. To better understand cellular functionality, it will be crucial to structurally characterize these enzymatic self-organized global structures.

Estudios sobre identidad nacional en el Perú y sus correlatos psicológicos, sociales y culturales

322 p.

The omega failure in the crash-recovery model

190 p.

Síndrome Postparada Cardiaca: una resivisión bibliográfica sistemática

Desde el desarrollo de la resucitación cardiopulmonar (RCP) y la optimización de los cuatro eslabones de la cadena de supervivencia, el número de pacientes que se recupera de la parada cardiaca (PC), recuperando la circulación espontánea ha aumentado considerablemente. Sin embargo, este mismo aumento de la supervivencia ha generado a su vez, una nueva condición clínica, conocida como Síndrome Post parada cardiaca (SPP), que es responsable de que un importante número de estos pacientes fallezca al de pocos días, generalmente por daño cerebral. Algunos autores han propuesto los cuidados postparada cardiaca como el quinto eslabón de la cadena de superviencia; pero, por ahora es el eslabón más débil y del que menos información disponemos. Objetivos: realizar una lectura crítica de las publicaciones sobre el SPP, sintetizando el material publicado hasta ahora e identificando los aspectos relevantes del mismo. Metodología: revisión bibliográfica sistemática a través de las bases de datos electrónicas: MedLine, PubMed, Crochane, Dialnet, Scopus, Cuiden. Resultados: en general, la calidad de los artículos revisados es baja debido, principalmente, a que la metodología utilizada para la selección y evaluación de los estudios individuales no está descrita en ninguno de ellos. Conclusiones: Aún existe escasa investigación sobre el SPP, y la mayoría de estudios publicados parten de los datos obtenidos en el artículo de consenso ILCOR 2008.

Procesamiento de Imágenes Satelitales Multiespectrales

En este proyecto se ha realizado el procesamiento de una imagen satelital multiespectral de México concretamente centrada en la región del Lago de Chapala. Este proceso tiene como objetivo la distinción de tierra y agua mediante un proceso semi-automático utilizando distintos software o herramientas informáticas. Dentro del proyecto podemos destacar ciertas fases u operaciones como el preprocesado realizado a la imagen satelital donde se han aplicado una serie de transformaciones, la aplicación de técnicas de clasificación supervisada mediante la realización de entrenamiento y testeo con regiones de interés extraídas de la imagen satelital para la obtención de clasificadores o la aplicación de estos clasificadores en la binarización de la imagen, obteniendo una imagen binaria donde un valor representa agua y otro tierra. También podemos destacar el empleo de índices de agua y vegetación como una herramienta fundamental en la detección y en el análisis de cuerpos de agua. Éstos han marcado la calidad de los resultados obtenidos en el proyecto.

Essays on economics networks

This thesis belongs to the growing field of economic networks. In particular, we develop three essays in which we study the problem of bargaining, discrete choice representation, and pricing in the context of networked markets. Despite analyzing very different problems, the three essays share the common feature of making use of a network representation to describe the market of interest.

In Chapter 1 we present an analysis of bargaining in networked markets. We make two contributions. First, we characterize market equilibria in a bargaining model, and find that players' equilibrium payoffs coincide with their degree of centrality in the network, as measured by Bonacich's centrality measure. This characterization allows us to map, in a simple way, network structures into market equilibrium outcomes, so that payoffs dispersion in networked markets is driven by players' network positions. Second, we show that the market equilibrium for our model converges to the so called eigenvector centrality measure. We show that the economic condition for reaching convergence is that the players' discount factor goes to one. In particular, we show how the discount factor, the matching technology, and the network structure interact in a very particular way in order to see the eigenvector centrality as the limiting case of our market equilibrium.

We point out that the eigenvector approach is a way of finding the most central or relevant players in terms of the “global” structure of the network, and to pay less attention to patterns that are more “local”. Mathematically, the eigenvector centrality captures the relevance of players in the bargaining process, using the eigenvector associated to the largest eigenvalue of the adjacency matrix of a given network. Thus our result may be viewed as an economic justification of the eigenvector approach in the context of bargaining in networked markets.

As an application, we analyze the special case of seller-buyer networks, showing how our framework may be useful for analyzing price dispersion as a function of sellers and buyers' network positions.

Finally, in Chapter 3 we study the problem of price competition and free entry in networked markets subject to congestion effects. In many environments, such as communication networks in which network flows are allocated, or transportation networks in which traffic is directed through the underlying road architecture, congestion plays an important role. In particular, we consider a network with multiple origins and a common destination node, where each link is owned by a firm that sets prices in order to maximize profits, whereas users want to minimize the total cost they face, which is given by the congestion cost plus the prices set by firms. In this environment, we introduce the notion of Markovian traffic equilibrium to establish the existence and uniqueness of a pure strategy price equilibrium, without assuming that the demand functions are concave nor imposing particular functional forms for the latency functions. We derive explicit conditions to guarantee existence and uniqueness of equilibria. Given this existence and uniqueness result, we apply our framework to study entry decisions and welfare, and establish that in congested markets with free entry, the number of firms exceeds the social optimum.

Learning and management skills: the internationalization of Grupo Arcor. Analysis from a process-based approach

This paper analyzes the path of the international expansion of Grupo Arcor, an Argentine multinational company specializing in confectionery. The objective is to entify corporate strategies and business learning that led this Latin American firm to establish itself as one of the leading manufacturers in confectionery industry ,particularly in the 21st Century. The analysis is primarily qualitative in order to identify the economic dimension as a determinant in the internationalization process; a processbased approach from the Uppsala Model is used for this. However, the study is also complemented with a regression analysis to test if the firm was driven to expand internationally by the expectations on the degree of globalization of the industry and the accumulation of experience in foreign markets, and if the company was influenced by psychic distance in choosing the location of its investment; given the influence of these variables in Grupo Arcor business strategies. Our findings suggest that Grupo Arcor, was able to become global due to strategies such as vertical integration, diversification of products and geographical markets (based on psychic distance) and indeed some strategies were consequence of the globalization of the sector and the accumulation of experience in foreign markets.

Hacia un ética universal para la profesión contable: análisis de las restricciones socioeconómicas y culturales en la convergencia del código de ética internacional

Máster en Dirección Empresarial desde la Innovación y la Internacionalización. Curso 2011/2012

Análisis económico-financiero de las empresas del sector de la construccion en el País Vasco

Análisis económico-financiero de las empresas de construcción del País Vasco sementadas en micros, medianas y grandes empresas, comparándolo con la tendencia que siguen en España.

Factores explicativos del fraude empresarial y medidas adoptadas : caso español

El objetivo de este trabajo es analizar la situación del fraude empresarial y su evolución en España, explicando a su vez las diferentes formas de defraudar más habituales en las entidades. Veremos si el fraude se ha visto condicionado por la crisis financiera actual y qué consecuencias acarrea para las entidades afectadas. Por otro lado, existe la creencia generalizada de que en España se defrauda más que en los países del norte de Europa, por razones sociológicas, culturales y educativas. Pero, ¿es este tópico cierto? ¿cuáles son las variables que determinan la ocurrencia de delitos económicos en las organizaciones? Para lograr soluciones eficaces en la lucha contra el fraude es necesario comprender previamente cuáles son las razones que lo motivan. Por ello, se prestará especial atención a los factores socioculturales que influyen en el comportamiento del defraudador, intentando calibrar la importancia de estas variables. Esto nos permitirá conocer si existe un perfil de defraudador más frecuente, y en caso afirmativo saber cuál es. Una vez analizadas las razones por las que se defrauda, se procederá a estudiar la legislación existente referida a la lucha contra el fraude a nivel nacional, y la normativa europea adoptada en España. Asimismo, se comentarán algunas de las herramientas que las sociedades españolas emplean de forma más habitual para detectar irregularidades y las medidas internas que se toman al respecto. Finalmente, se extraen una serie de conclusiones que nos permitirán avanzar en el conocimiento de la situación del fraude corporativo en España y en su prevención.