京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(工学) / 甲第21425号 / 工博第4535号 / 京都大学大学院工学研究科合成・生物化学専攻 / (主査)教授 浜地 格, 教授 杉野目 道紀, 教授 秋吉 一成 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Philosophy (Engineering) / Kyoto University / DGAM

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This dissertation investigates the impact that a duopoly of a multinational firm and local firm has on a closed economy as they engage in Bertrand competition involving quality and price. It answers the question: Does helping a minor firm reduce welfare? Using a different framework than the existing literature, I examine the following: 1. The welfare effect of a reduction in the R\&D cost parameter induced by ``help'' from the government to one of the firms within a closed economy. 2. The effects of government policy instruments (taxes or subsidies) on welfare considering different ownership of the firms and trade pattern - closed economy and export-oriented economy as government institutes a unilateral policy, discriminatory policy, or non-discriminatory policy. 3. How marginal cost of production of the local firm affects welfare within a closed economy when all consumers are either served or partially-served. In chapter 1, we provide a review of past literature that have studied the endogenous choice of quality by firms and describe how this dissertation is organized. In chapter 2, we examine effect on national welfare from competition in quality between a multinational firm and a local firm operating in a vertically differentiated oligopolistic industry given their strategic use of R\&D costs without any possibility of spillover effects. The model assumes that the multinational firm produces high quality product and the local firm produces low quality product. Both firms have zero marginal production cost. Assuming a closed-economy, we determine the effect of a change in the local firm's R\&D cost parameter on the endogenous variables (prices and qualities) as well as national welfare. We found that a reduction in the cost parameter of the local firm do increase national welfare. Chapter 3 extends the work of Chapter 2. It investigates the incentives to a government for instituting strategic trade policy (unilateral, discriminatory or non-discriminatory) mechanism that would induce R\&D within the duopoly of a multinational and local firms and thereby promote national welfare, under varying assumptions with respect to the ownership structure of the firms and their trade patterns. It determines which policy mechanism would be socially optimal to strategically affect the quality of the target firm (local). We find under an open-economy situation when government policy is unilateral, the optimal policy tool to pursue is a subsidy for the local firm. When the economy is partially-closed, it is optimal for the government to tax the local firm. Besides, under a discriminatory policy mechanism, it is best for government to subsidize the local firm and tax the foreign firm when both export to a third country. However, if both sell to a third country, but profit is retained in the domestic economy, it becomes optimal for the government to tax the local firm. Under a non-discriminatory policy by government when the firms operate within an open-economy, the optimal tool is a tax policy for government that affects both firms. Moreover, when the firms operate within a partially closed-economy, the optimal policy is also a tax policy on both firms. Whereas, given a non-discriminatory policy under a closed-economy framework, it is optimal for the government to subsidize the firms. As a result, these mechanisms by government do promote social welfare as well as correct any distortion that might result into making the multinational firm having a significant market power within the industry. In Chapter 4, we relax the assumption of Chapter 2 that the firms have zero production cost. The duopoly is considered to operate under the condition that one of the firms (local firm) has a production cost disadvantage. The firms are assumed to served the entire market. Hence, the firms compete within a fully covered market scenario. Considering a variable unit (constant marginal) cost of production of the local firm, we determine the effect of an increase in production cost of the local firm on national (total) welfare. We find that within a closed-economy, due to strategic substitutability of the products of both firms, an increase in the marginal cost of production by the local firm would bring about reduction in national social welfare. Chapter 5 continues our welfare analysis. It assumes the firms have asymmetric production costs. The cost of production depends on investment in R\&D to produce an output of quality, $q_i$. Now, we do not associate the output quality to a specific firm in the beginning of our analysis. Notwithstanding, we assume the firms are required to meet a minimum quality standard in the industry. Then, we seek to find the effect of the marginal cost of production of the local firm on national welfare. We find unlike previous chapters, an increase in marginal cost of production by the local firm results into increase benefits to consumers. Hence, national social welfare is improved (positive).

Conventional wisdom is that fiscal policy at the regional level is ineffective. Recent concern about stability of bond-financed fiscal policy imposes an additional constraint on the effectiveness of interregional fiscal policy. In the conventional macroeconomic model, regional public sectors are ignored, or are at most a subset of the national model. Fiscal and financial interrelationships among different levels of government have not been investigated thoroughly in the literature. The purpose of this dissertation is to provide a theoretical framework for the analysis of interregional fiscal policy. We argue that all government budget constraints must be explicitly included in the model, and regions become the major building blocks of the system. Stability of the system then defends on the fiscal and financial interrelationships among different levels of government. We examine a once-and-for-all fiscal policy change in the interregional model with and without the federal sector. The simulated results based on an acceptable range of parameter values show that the system cannot generate a stable long-run equilibrium. At best, a quasi-equilibrium is attainable in that only the overall government budget constraint is satisfied. A once-and-for-all policy change is not only irrelevant in reality since public sectors react to actual economic situations, but also becomes a source of instability in an interregional model. The final version of the interregional model incorporates an endogenous fiscal policy. Government expenditure becomes an endogenous variable and fiscal policies are target-oriented. The income level and balanced-budget are the main targets. A system of government expenditure reaction functions is built into the model with each governnent adopting an active fiscal policy in order to achieve income and balanced-budget targets. The public sector adjusts its fiscal policy according to the last period' s economic situation. The extent of these government expenditure changes is governed by the target-adjustment parameters. Each government has its own priority or objective in determining the target-adjustment parameter values. The simulated results show that the interregional model can generate a stable long-run equilibrium, regardless of the mode of federal financing policy. The effectiveness of an active fiscal policy and the critical limits of these target-adjustment parameters are investigated. Of prime importance is the finding that an independent regional fiscal policy cannot generate a stable long-run equilibrium. Only when all governments cooperate actively in fiscal managanent can the system achieve the targets. Thus, the final version of the interregional model not only rejects independent regional fiscal policies, but requires coordination and cooperation among all governments in devising a viable fiscal policy. Our simulation findings therefore strengthen the case for fiscal federalism. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

This project was an exercise in aligning my intuition, community experience, and design sensitivities under the pretext of an architectural expression. My desire was to work endogenously, or out of my home environment, on a project that had no clear programmatic or formal requirements or limitations. I began by assessing a prevalent issue in my home town (a connection between the river and the town center) both from the top down and the bottom up. Throughout, I sought to challenge my preconceived notions of what might be, and allow a design process to emerge out of the layers of information I had absorbed as a participant in this holistic landscape. Inflection and change became a driving force in this pared down design process, and through them came a working territory that framed the programmatic and formal specificities of the South River P.O.R.T.

This thesis investigates the link between optimal carbon tax and endogenous longevity. It considers an overlapping generation model with clean and dirty intermediate goods. Externality caused by producing dirty intermediate goods damages the final goods productionas well as the agents’ longevity. From the social planner’s problem, the cost of carbon emission is formulated. Then, the Pigouvian carbon tax rate is used to internalize such costs. With the two channels of impact of carbon emission combined, the theoretical results suggest that (i) the current carbon tax may abstract from local health costs of carbon emission, especially in rich economies, (ii) in poor economies, the government may be lowering the carbon tax at the expense of their elderly’s welfare, and (iii) the government in economies transitioning from poverty to richness should raise their carbon tax level above that of poor economies. Deeper investigation into the mechanism and a quantitative analysis would beneeded. Future studies can also include endogenous technological change or extend to amulti-economy model.

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The sodium pump (SP or Na+,K+-ATPase) is a membrane embedded protein complex that pumps 3 sodium ions out and 2 potassium ions into the cell per cycle and in so doing creates a cell membrane electrochemical potential. The membrane potential is critical for any functional cell. In the vasculature, reduction in the voltage potential causes vascular smooth muscle contraction and a narrowing of blood vessels (vasoconstriction) which can lead to increased blood pressure (hypertension). Substantial research over the past several decades has provided a vast amount of research on SP inhibitors, sometimes called endogenous digitalis-like factors (EDLF). Increased levels of these factors have been implicated in many hypertensive disorders including preeclampsia (PE), a life-threatening complication of pregnancy. It has been demonstrated that EDLF might be a causative factor in the pathophysiology of hypertension in PE. In order to elucidate EDLF production and regulation in PE, We developed a radioimmunoassay (RIA) measuring EDLF that could be applied to serum from pregnant women, placental homogenate and placental tissue culture. This assay employs Digibind, a commercially available Fab fragment derived from polyclonal antidigoxin antibodies that cross reacts with EDLF, as the primary antibody. Using Digibind RIA, we demonstrated that placenta is a source of EDLF production and regulation. Moreover, the identification of an inhibitor, ketoconazole and a substrate, 17-hydroxyprogesterone of the synthetic pathway of EDLF in placenta proved that this pathway shares steps with the steroid synthetic pathway. Some potential regulatory agents which have elevated levels in PE or be associated in PE and thus are thought to mediate PE, such as hydrogen peroxide, tumor necrosis factor-α (TNF-α) and hypoxia have also been demonstrated to be stimuli of EDLF production in placenta. These findings are helpful to the further study on EDLF synthesis and regulation in placenta. Once we elucidate the mechanisms, it could be easier to provide deeper insights into the pathogenesis of PE and subsequently develop earlier diagnosis and effective prevention of or therapeutic approaches to PE.

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The visual processing of a stimulus is facilitated by attention when it is at an attended location compared to an unattended location. However, whether attentional selection operates on the basis of visual features (e.g., color) independently of spatial locations is less clear. Six experiments were designed to examine how color information as well as location information affected attentional selection. In Experiment 1, the color of the targets and the spatial distance between them were both manipulated. Stimuli were found to be grouped based on color similarity. Additionally, the evidence suggested direct selection on the basis of color groups, rather than selection that was mediated by location. By varying the probabilities of target location and color, Experiments 2, 3 and 4 demonstrated that the use of color in perceptual grouping and in biasing the priority of selection is not automatic, but is modulated by task demands. Experiments 5 and 6 further investigated the relationship between using color and using location as the selection basis under exogenous and endogenous orienting. The results suggest that the precise nature of the interaction between color and location varies according to the mode of attentional control. Collectively, these experiments contribute to an understanding of how different types of information are used in selection and suggest a greater degree of flexibility of attentional control than previously expected. The flexibility is likely to be determined by a number of factors, including task demands and the nature of attentional control.