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No. 328 |
JULY 2002 |
Vol LXXXIII |
ISSN 0019-5170 |
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Contents
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Profit Function for General Hospital with Relative Service Efficiency
MIAO-SHENG CHEN, CHE LIN AND CHIEN-CHUNG LEE
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This paper proposes a method to search the optimal service
level tor maximizing the overall profit of the general hospital. The patient
arrival rate, subsidiary of the government, variable/fixed contribution of a
patient, and the cost for operating the general hospital are considered
simultaneously into this study. In addition, the indicator introduced to
measure the service level is the relative service efficiency in this paper.
This indicator doesn't focus on the absolute performance result, but emphasizes
on the relative service efficiency of a general hospital. Therefore, a fairer
evaluation of the service level is established. Moreover, this paper also
constructs a Profit Function (PF) Model for seeking the optimal employee
operation hour input in each medical care item as well as the expected service
level. Through this study, a Two-Step Method for achieving the optimal solution
of the PF Model is developed, and the numerical example is followed. |
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States of India are Not Converging
TAPEN SINHA AND DIPENDRA SINHA
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A vast literature has developed around convergence of per
capita income across different regions both within a country and across
different countries. There seems to be a consensus that regions converge at
least in the conditional beta sense of convergence. The evidence to date has
been based mostly on developed countries only. For India, a developing country,
we show that neither beta convergence nor conditional beta convergence holds.
The results for India are in sharp contrast with results from other countries. |
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Managerial
Discretion, Public Sector Reform and Industry Performance
SOUMYEN SIKDAR AND ANINDYA SEN
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The present paper adds a new dimension to the literature on
mixed oligopolies by introducing managerial discretion in state owned
enterprises (SOEs). The resulting inefficiency has led policymakers to consider
the options of privatization and liberalization, and these issues are sought to
be modeled in the paper. In our paper, the manager of the SOE pursues his own
interest by choosing the cost function. The explicit modeling of managerial
discretion allows us to rank different post-reform market structures both in
terms of social welfare and managerial utility. |
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Energy and
Environment: South Asia Perspective
SITESH BHATIA
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As a nation develops economically, its needs for energy
increase exponentially, and quest for more, renewable energy sources becomes
imperative. The energy-environment problems of today have attained
global dimensions.
(a) Conservation of energy and environment: and
(b) Generation of energy.
The need for technology transfers and technical co-operation has been stressed
by two SAARC regional studies also, emphasizing the need for technology
transfers in the field of alternative and renewable energy system, energy
conservation and monitoring of environmental impact of energy producing
systems.
The World Energy Council recommended developing at the regional level an energy
master plan with an emphasis on maximizing the use of clean energy e.g.
hydro-electricity, wind energy and solar energy. India has a vast potential of
renewable energy sources specially hydroelectricity and solar power.
However the pace of development of renewal energy sources has been slow due to
several factors. With continued co-operation amongst various countries of the
world in research and development, and transfer to technology of renewable
energy sources, use of the non-conventional sources of energy can become
technically feasible, commercially viable, and therefore universally
acceptable. |
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The Imperative of
Reducing Government Participation in the Economy of Niegeria
SAMSON E. EOO
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The Nigerian economy has stagnated below the desired
minimum growth rate for a lengthy period of time. There is a popular opinion
that the relatively large size of government, among other factors, is
responsible for this problem. In this paper, attempt is made to empirically
verify that opinion, with the aid of appropriate models and estimation
techniques. The results from the empirical investigation reveal that government
size is indeed large, and also contributed significantly to the stagnation in
the economy of Nigeria. Although other factors, such as openness of the
economy, made their own contributions to the stagnation, the impact of
government size was much more significant. Arising from this finding,
therefore, is the overriding imperative of reducing government participation in
the economy, in order to facilitate more rapid growth and development. This
could be done in several ways, some of which may include privatization,
deregulation, fiscal restraint, as well as the provision of enabling
environment for private sector to expand and assume the role of economic prime
mover. |
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Uncertainty in
Nigeria's Political Economy and growth in Private Investment, 1970-1996 : A Co
integrated Approach
MERCY ADA ANYIWE AND FAMOUS O. I. IZEOONMI
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The Nigerian government had long realized the importance of
a large private sector and hence, has implemented programmes meant to directly
increase the level of private investment in Nigeria. But the uncertainty in a
given political economy determines to a large extent the level of success of a
programme, or the extent of growth of private investment or the increase in the
size of the private sector. Premised on this stance, the objective of this
study is to find out the relationship between the uncertainty in Nigeria's
political economy and growth in private investment. Statistical and econometric
methods including co integration were employed for data analyses. The results
among other things show that uncertainties of some variables, namely, gross
domestic product, industrial capacity utilization. credit to the private sector
and the real foreign exchange rate had significant negative impact on growth of
private investment in Nigeria within the sample period. To set uncertainties in
their paths, Nigeria should foster increase productivity among her citizens,
provide or rehabilitate existing infrastructures and nurture the nascent
democratic government. |
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Corruption and Rent
Seeking in Less Developed Countries: An Indian Perspective
I. D. GUPTA
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Corruption had been endemic in economic and political system
since ages like cough, cold and fever and its remedy too was present in the
form of police, intelligence and judicial institution. However, of late it has
become cause of concern owing to its serious proportion and penetration in the
system of economy and policy. It is infringing upon and distorting the
institutions and forces of growth and development in many of the Less Developed
Countries where growth is basic priority to remove poverty-absolute and
relative- and establish social justice.
The study is divided into five parts: part one begins with observations of
Kautilya and other scholars in this regard; the second, attempts to analysis
the things in economic demand supply framework; the third, deals how even in
democracies corruption is prevalent; the fourth, attempts to know what went
wrong in India and the next part tries to suggest the way out.
The paper focuses attention on normal to systemic to secondary corruptions in
the Less Developed Countries. It makes an attempt to analyze the interplay of
political and economic corruption in India. Developments in the past five
decades in the Indian economy, the impact of Land Reforms, the Green Revolution
and rising 'expectations' of rich peasantry to share political power since late
sixties, and subsequent caste based politics after Mandai divide have also been
analyzed. The change of scenario since 1991 and impact of globalization in
reducing corruption by assigning lower rule to state in production process and
freeing the economy from excessive regulations have also been touched upon.
In our analysis it has been observed that corruption is 'independent' of
economic or political systems as it is rooted in human nature and its driving
force is one of six evil elements (defects) in human namely greed. However, it
could be controlled and contained, if not altogether abolished, more
effectively by strengthening the institutions of 'democracy' itself. It is only
through properly functioning democratic institutions that the county could move
towards 'freedom from corruption'. Non- democratic societies without any viable
opposition, free press, freedom of expression and independent judiciary are
less likely to be free from corruption. |
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The Human Development
Index: A Contribution to its Construction
P. K. CHAUBEY
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This paper essentially addresses to correct a serious lapse
in the construction of human development index proposed by the UNDP. This lapse
occurs in the income component of the index. After pointing out the weaknesses
that it inheres, an appropriate alternative is suggested. |
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A Discussion of Human
Capital Expenditure Classification: Toward the Competitive Advantages of a
Taiwan Company
HAl MING CHEN AND KU JUN LIN
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Traditional financial do not provide proper disclosure and
relevant data for modern businesses which derive their competitive advantages
and profitability mainly from human capital. This paper provides an alternative
way to measure and disclosure human capital items. We define and classify
company's human capital in line with a theoretical framework we provided, sort
out company's human capital investments according to cost development stages in
human resources, and finally isolates human capital from expenses and suggests
the disclosure way in the financial statements. In addition, an electronics
company of Taiwan is studied to explain how to identity the human capital. |
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Problems with UNDP
Multi-Step Utility Function and Their Resolutions: Generalization of Some
Results
RAVIKANT BHATNAGAR
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The 'first dollar anomaly' was empirically discovered by
Harald Trabold-Nubler (1991). Chaubey (1998) showed that it is k-iong stretch,
not the first dollar and k is dependent on the Order of range. Further
generalization of the result obtained by Chaubey (1998) has been presented in
this paper.
Trabold-Nubler (1991) had observed that after a certain range the
utility-income curve becomes altogether perverse. The present paper
mathematically demonstrates as to why that happens.
Following the same fragmentation of the income range as adopted by UNDP's HDRs,
a multi-step formulation of the utility function which conforms to the
principle of diminishing returns from the income is proposed in the paper as a
generalization of the two- step formulation due to Chaubey (1998). |
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