Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Economics / Yang M. Chang / There have been considerable discussions about why countries have interests in forming preferential trade agreements (PTAs), which typically take the forms of a “free trade area” (FTA) with Rules of Origin (ROO) and a “customs union” (CU) (World Bank, 2005). This dissertation contains three essays with three different models of trade under oligopoly to analyze various issues on preferential trade agreements. The first essay examines welfare implications of forming preferential trade arrangement (PTAs) between two asymmetric countries that differ in their market sizes. Key findings are as follows. First, when market size asymmetry between two countries is not too large and ROO requirements are not too restrictive, the formation of an FTA with effective ROO can be welfare-improving to both members. Second, the formation of a PTA is more likely to emerge between countries of similar in their market sizes, ceteris paribus. Third, compared to the pre-PTA equilibrium, there are greater reductions in external tariffs under an FTA than under a CU such that a non-member country is relatively better off under the FTA. The second essay presents a three country model of trade under Bertrand price competition to analyze differences in welfare implications between an FTA with ROO and a customs union (CU). It is shown that the maximum limit of ROO requirements over which there are welfare gains from trade for FTA members depends crucially on the degree of substitutability of final goods (or the intensity of product market competition). It is also found that member countries and their final-good exporters are better off in a CU than in an FTA. There are greater reductions in external tariffs under an FTA than under a CU such that a non-member country is relatively better off under the FTA. The third essay presents a three country model of FTA with Cournot quantity competition and derives the maximum enforceable level of ROO over which there are welfare gains from trade to each member country. It is shown that ROO and external tariffs are strategic complements such that the higher is the regional input restrictions, the higher is the external tariff necessary to induce firms to fully comply with ROO requirements. It is also shown that an FTA with effective ROO has a positive effect on the final-good trade. But the trade-diverting effect does not occur in the final-good sector.

<p> The dynamics of expanding polities and relationships between cultural core groups, peripheral populations and sites in semi-peripheral areas between the two groups are important topics in studies of complex societies. One area where these distinctions are clearly identified within the settlement pattern formed by the relationship between the cultural and the natural landscape is the Tequila Valleys of Western Mexico. The Teuchitl&aacute;n culture of the Late Formative and Early Classic periods formed distinctive settlements around the edges of the valleys, which were also marginally bound to most complex social developments within the cultural core region near the center of the valleys. Semi-peripheral sites between cultural traditions are of particular interest as focal points for economic, political, and social relationships. This thesis focuses on two sites which occupied very different environments, namely Llano Grande and Las Navajas. I ask whether these sites show different degrees of emphasis on two basic economic strategies in ways which capitalized on the advantages of each site's respective environment. Specifically, did Llano Grande's relative physical isolation from the cultural core area, more distant location and differences in available resources reflect a greater reliance on trade via exported obsidian? Alternatively, did Navajas' closer relation to the core allow a continuance of the core's degree of emphasis on the staple-oriented economy, with less emphasis on obsidian production and trade than Llano Grande? This thesis draws upon the work of Earle (1991) to structure the analysis, particularly his contrast between wealth and staple finance. Past research is reviewed to develop expectations for each model, which are tested using the analysis of obsidian debitage and products within the ritual centers of each site.</p>

Sexual economics theory (SET) innebär att kvinnor kan använda sin sexualitet som resurs mot mäns materiella och emotionella resurser. Sexual double standards (SDS) innebär att män och kvinnor uppmanar män men avråder kvinnor från casual sex. Ökad medvetenhet kan leda till att skillnader mellan råd till män respektive kvinnor undviks, vilket minskar SDS och främjar jämställdhet. Studien undersökte om SET har fäste i ett samhälle som anses jämställt. Ett tillgänglighetsurval på 125 kvinnor och 75 män gjordes vid en högskola i Mellansverige. Enkätundersökningen berörde råd om casual sex, aspekter som söks i en partner samt påståenden relaterade till SET. Män uppvisade SDS eftersom de uppmanade andra män mer än de uppmanade kvinnor till casual sex. Däremot visade kvinnor tendens till omvänd SDS gällande casual sex, vilket tyder på ojämställdhet i Sverige. I framtida studier rekommenderas specificering av person som får råd, då mätningen blir mer reliabel och resultat kan generaliseras.

Thesis advisor: Richard McGowan / Can statistical analysis of professional basketball players lead to a more efficient evaluation of a player's worth? Following the recent success of statistic-driven baseball franchises, many basketball executives and followers are beginning to mine the sport's production in search of an all-encompassing player value rating. Teams could thus exploit undervalued players, leading to increased team and fan welfare. My thesis addresses this ongoing debate by examining various player and team statistics in the National Basketball Association (NBA). While I find significant relationships between individual efficiency statistics and team success, I also discover the paramount importance of defensive statistics and balanced team payrolls. This paper proposes a model that would help team executives find players who promote team efficiency, rather than individual production. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2006. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Economics. / Discipline: College Honors Program.

International trade often occurs in imperfectly competitive markets. If these markets are profitable, a government may want to intervene in order to increase the market share of domestic firms via subsidies, or may try to capture a share of foreign firm profits by levying tariffs on imports. Early papers by Brander and Spencer (1983, 1984) and Eaton and Grossman (1986) began investigations into the benefits of trade intervention. They showed that governmental intervention into oligopolistic markets can result in greater national welfare than what would result under free trade This dissertation provides three extensions to the trade literature. A common link among the three essays is the concept of incomplete information. An optimal output level for a firm is a function of the market demand, the firm's cost, and the competitor's cost. If the firm is uncertain about one of these parameters, they may end up over-producing or under-producing. If the domestic firm shares its private information only with the domestic government, any action by the government may signal the competitiveness of the domestic firm to the foreign firm. This in turn will have a Bayesian updating effect, causing the foreign firm to alter its level of production Firm and market structures vary in the different essays. Uncertainty may be in the form of costs, or with regard to market demand. Production flexibility varies, as does the concentration of competition. The essays examine both unilateral and bilateral intervention. Subsidizing a domestic firm, or imposing a tariff on a foreign firm, may make the domestic firm more competitive. However, if domestic and foreign governments intervene simultaneously, it may not be possible to gain welfare at the other's expense The dissertation is from a domestic government's perspective, which is solely concerned with maximizing national welfare. The government's goal is to shift profits from foreign firms to domestic firms, consumers, or government coffers. The essays compare the expected welfare that would result from the usage of different policy instruments, and show the problem that uncertainty can create in achieving effective policy coordination. This addresses how the government may select an optimal trade policy / acase@tulane.edu

The prime objective of a client in a building project is to attain a successful project, a project that has been properly planned, designed and constructed in accordance with plans and specifications, and completed within time and cost originally anticipated. However the success of a building project depends on a number of variables one of them is the way the building team approach conflicts facing the project. This study examines the causes and management approaches of conflicts in building projects in Tanzania. The main objective of the study is to identify issues/areas on which conflicts occur, factors causing them and how conflicts are managed in building projects in Tanzania. As a means to achieve the above objective, the study was structured into two main parts; the first part aimed at mapping up the nature of conflicts in building projects in Tanzania by establishing critical symptoms of conflicts, factors causing them and the approaches used in resolving the conflicts. This was done through literature review, interviews and questionnaire survey. The second part aimed at in-depth study of conflicts from their root cause, how they develop/progress and how they are managed in a real building project setting. Four case studies of building projects were studied for this part. The study found that factors causing conflicts are in several forms. There are those related to the nature of contracts, where the contracts are unclear and ambiguous they give room for contracting parties to develop opportunistic behaviour when post adjustments are needed. There are those factors which are related to role functions when the parties fail to perform as expected. As such the study confirmed that contractual incompleteness and consequent post contract adjustments and opportunistic behaviour of some project participants are root causes of conflicts in building projects in Tanzania. However, the study established that there are sufficient mechanisms to deal with conflicts in the standard forms of building contracts used and when the provisions are against the interests of the parties, the parties resort to amicable resolution approaches. Notwithstanding the availability of mechanisms in the standard forms of contracts to deal with conflicts, the study proposes the framework as a strategy that could reduce effectively the occurrences of conflicts in building projects. / QC 20110223

Relationships Between Political Competition and Socioeconomic Status in the United States

<p>This dissertation uses game theoretic models to examine the effects of agent anonymity on markets for goods and for information. In open, anonymous settings, such as the Internet, anonymity is relatively easy to obtain --- oftentimes another email address is sufficient. By becoming anonymous, agents can participate in various mechanisms (such as elections, opinion polls, auctions, etc.) multiple times. The first chapter (joint work with Vincent Conitzer) studies elections that disincentivize voters from voting multiple times. A voting rule is false-name-proof if no agent ever benefits from casting additional votes. In elections with two alternatives, it is shown that there is a unique false-name-proof voting rule that is most responsive to votes. The probability that this rule selects the majority winner converges to 1 as the population grows large. Methods to design analogous rules for elections with 3 or more alternatives are proposed. The second chapter (also joint work with Vincent Conitzer) extends the analysis in the first chapter to broader mechanism design settings, where the goal is to disincentivize agents from participating multiple times. The cost model from the first chapter is generalized and revelation principles are proven. The third chapter studies a setting where firms are able to recognize their previous customers, and may use information about consumers' purchase histories to price discriminate (which may incentivize consumers to be anonymous). The formal model considers a monopolist and a continuum of heterogeneous consumers, where consumers are able to maintain their anonymity at some cost. It is shown that when consumers can costlessly maintain their anonymity, they all individually choose to do so, which paradoxically results in the highest profit for the monopolist. Increasing the cost of anonymity can benefit consumers, but only up to a point; at that point, the effect is reversed. Some of the results are extended to a setting with two competing firms selling differentiated products. Finally, the cost of maintaining anonymity is endogenized by considering a third party that can make consumers anonymous for a fee of its choosing. It is shown that this third party would prefer to be paid by the firm for allowing consumers to costlessly maintain their anonymity.</p> / Dissertation

<p>This dissertation computes the optimal monetary and fiscal policy for small open and emerging economies in an estimated medium-scale model. The model departs from the conventional approach as it encompasses all the major nominal and real rigidities normally found in the literature in a single framework. After estimating the model using Bayesian techniques for one small open economy and one emerging economy, the Ramsey solution for the optimal monetary and fiscal policy is computed. Results show that foreign shocks have a strong influence in the dynamics of emerging economies, when compared to the designed optimal policy for a developed small open economy. For both economies, inflation is low, but very volatile, while taxes follow the traditional results in the literature with high taxes over labor income and low taxes for capital income.</p> / Dissertation

In Chapter 1, we construct a model to illustrate conditions under which a government controlled Post, Telephone, and Telegraph ministry (PTT), which is a monopolist in multiple demand-complementary markets, can increase its profit by exiting some of its markets. The PTT may increase profit by exiting one market, provided that a foreign firm can supply the market at lower cost and the PTT retains market power in a complementary market, where it recovers the difference. The PTT will generally earn greater income by regulating and taxing the abandoned market than by allowing it to become competitive. However, consumer welfare would be greater if the PTT were to permit competition in the abandoned market. In Chapter 2, we use Heckman's model for consistent estimation on selected data, modified to allow for group dummies in the second-stage regression, to estimate supply of wireless telephone subscription, on a panel of data. The modification enables us to control for country-specific effects, and to adjust for the penetration that would otherwise exist in years and countries where wireless is unavailable. We find substantial bias in the estimate of the supply function. That is, equivalent economic conditions in countries where wireless is not yet available will likely result in lower levels of supply than those where wireless is available. The quantity of wireless telephones supplied is explained by time, the number of existing fixed telephone lines, and telephone company revenues, but not by prices. In Chapter 3, we construct a means of resource allocation on a data network when bandwidth becomes scarce. Our approach extends Elwalid and Mitra's (1992) model so that two users may send streams of information to a router, which employs an auction mechanism to award priority to one stream when the router is congested. The high bidder in this auction enjoys the right to transmit data without risk of loss, whereas the low bidder loses data during congested periods. The second-price auction offers its property of incentive compatibility in this real-time framework. Allocations arising from this mechanism are more economically efficient than those in which information is discarded without regard to economic value.