This dissertation consists of three separate essays. The first two essays focus on real estate brokerage; one studies the conditions for efficient employment in the real estate brokerage industry under fixed commission rates and the other examines the role of real estate agents in buyer-seller bargaining. The third essay presents an integrated analysis of housing investment and consumption choices that takes into account both the uncertainty in investment returns and liquidity constraints. Essay one presents a model of real estate trading with brokerage that integrates sequential search, two-sided matching, and the competitive entry and effort choice of real estate agents. The equilibrium employment pattern of the model helps to explain the observation that the number of agents is more sensitive to the expected transaction price than to the transaction volume. The condition for efficient employment requires the commission to be proportional to the opportunity cost of search time and the expected trading gain, with the proportion determined by the productivity of brokerage employment. Efficient employment also requires regulating the entry so as to achieve the productivity balance between the number of agents and individual effort. Essay two examines asymmetric information and bargaining within the model of real estate trading developed in essay one. The equilibrium outcomes of bargaining with and without information asymmetry are characterized with the help of mechanism design methodology, and the associated welfare levels are compared. The analysis is applied to evaluating the role of real estate agents in the bargaining. Agents seek compromises between the buyer and seller by providing credible information to both parties. Such a role is welfare improving when the scale economy of brokerage with respect to the stock of buyers and sellers is not strong and brokerage employment is sufficient. In essay three, Pratt's certainty-equivalent approximation is applied to the Henderson-Ioannides (1983) housing tenure choice model. The key trade-offs for housing investment and consumption choices induced by the uncertainty and liquidity constraints are clearly illustrated and the implications for tenure choice examined against the existing empirical evidence. / Business, Sauder School of / Graduate

The purpose of this study was to delineate variables which relate to reported willingness to seek treatment for menstrual-related distress, and to assess treatment preferences in a population of women often tapped for menstrual research that of college students. Of the 198 volunteers included in the study, 71 stated that they were willing to seek some form of treatment for menstrual-related distress, and 127 stated that they were not willing to do so. The Adjective Checklist (ACL), Menstrual Attitude Questionnaire (MAQ), and Menstrual Distress Questionnaire (MDQ), along with a personal data sheet were administered to subjects. In addition, they were asked to read three paragraph-long descriptions of self-administered, medical, and behavioral treatments for menstrual-related distress and to indicate their preference for each.

A topic of this thesis is an analysis of customer preferences in relation to products and services of the company REX Controls s.r.o. that focuses mainly on industrial automation and control systems. The goal of this thesis is to find preferred attributes when acquiring a control system and determine a level of customer satisfaction and loyalty. Product attributes are determined by conducting semi-structured interviews. Analysis of customer preferences is based on a consumer research. Within the survey are involved two groups of experts on automation and regulation. Evaluation of the collected data is performed by using statistical tools. The results of the analysis and formulated recommendations for the company, which could help to achieve its objectives, are discussed in the conclusion part.

The aim of this thesis is to obtain comprehensive results for the population of the Czech Republic in the field of human values, value preferences and value charts by using results from conducted research and data from previous studies. Also an important objective of this thesis is to show the economic behavior of people in the Czech Republic at the time of the financial and economic crisis. As a theoretical basis for the practical part, three major, interrelated areas have been selected: economic behavior, focused on principles of individual decision-making and on media and their possible impact on the economy; life values; and economic development as a source of changes in economic behavior in terms of development on the labour market, development of education and development of ecology. Empirical part, which is called Research - changes in value preferences, is at first focused on the formulation of hypotheses, which relate to the issue, and on the creation of the questionnaire. The analysis and the interpretation of results can be considered as a pivotal chapter of the practical part of this thesis.It is divided into several sub-chapters according to the examined area.

This diploma thesis is concerned with the use of the choice experiment method for modelling travel behaviour. The main scope of this diploma thesis is to find the main attributes for the individual's decision making about the student's choice of mean of transport. The models have been applied to long intercity trips between Prague and Brno. The model specification combines trip-based characteristics with socioeconomic characteristics. There are numerous European and US studies which have been conducted in a national context. In recent years, studies have been implemented also in the Czech Republic, but none of them focus on the specific segment of students. The principles of the choice experiment come out from the Lancaster' characteristics theory of value and random utility theory. The multinominal logit is used to the choice experiment analysis.

This master thesis deals with the analysis of fresh juice and smoothie market in the Czech Republic. The goal of this thesis is to investigate the market of both fresh bars and fresh juices and smoothies that can be bought in the store. Another goal is to determine consomer's needs on this market. For the purpose of finding out those information, a quiestionnare was compiled. The questionnaire was targeting young people age between 20 and 30 years who either live or at least spend most of their time in big cities. The results of the questionnaire then served as a starting point for further analysis. During working on this paper I was doing a regular storecheck in the 4 most visited grocery chains. For a deeper understanding of the target group, two focus groups were held. First one was targeting people that are regularly buying fresh juices and smoothies in grocery chains. Second one targeted the contrary -- people that have never bought such drinks. Reults of all research that were carried out served as a starting point for further recommendation.

The author of the thesis focuses on an analysis of cola-based soft drink market in the Czech Republic, which is by its internal structure different from the standard European market of such a kind.The main goal of the thesis is to describe the cola-based soft drink market in the Czech Republic in detail, identify profiles of cola-based soft drink consumers for the leading brands and evaluate consumer perception of these brands. The aim of the thesis is also to compare subconscious and real taste preferences and to identifiy taste recognizability of tested cola-based soft drinks with a focus on Kofola brand soft drink. To fulfill the goals of the thesis the author works with following datasources: a study of a market research company ACNielsen, the data analysis of research project MML-TGI, results of a consumer survey and of a blind taste test.

This thesis examines people's preferences for housing, specifically for housing in suburbs. Suburbs have negative economic, environmental and social consequences and most cities in developed countries is facing the growth of suburbs. The aim of the thesis was to examine the reasons why people move to satellite villages and how they change their preferences. People's preferences were tested by questionnaire survey conducted in Jesenice u Prahy. Residents are moving to this locality because they want to live in a house with a garden, in a quiet and clean environment. The opinion that people are moving to suburbs due to social status and prestige was not confirmed.

This diploma thesis focuses on the analysis of consumer behaviour and preferences of university students concerning tourism. The aim of the thesis is to prepare set of recommendations of marketing mix tools setting which should help tourism service providers to market effectively to students. The theoretical part deals with the explanation of basic terms that are used in the thesis. Furthermore, it provides the analysis of existing data and description of student consumer behaviour and trends in youth tourism. The practical part focuses on the research itself conducted by interviewing students at the universities all over the Czech Republic. The outcome are the recommendations and tipps which are based on the research analysis how to prepare effective marketing strategy and how to set individual tools of marketing mix in order to attract youth travellers.

This diploma thesis focuses on political-business cycle which is a theme frequently omitted in discussions about economic situation in the Czech Republic. Theoretical part of the work will provide readers with the topic of political-business cycle and its basic models which will serve as a support to the statistical research in the analytical part. Is fiscal policy in hands of Czech politicians an efficient tool to manipulate voters? The aim of the work is to answer this question and thus give a detailed look of political-business cycle on example of four regular electoral periods of Czech Parliament. To reach the goal of diploma thesis, we used regressive analysis to examine hypothesis if the date of elections influences certain folders of income and expenses of government budget. This hypothesis was not accepted on the significance level of 5 per cent. The reasons are mainly short time series of tested indicators.