Optimal Pricing Effect on Equilibrium Behaviors of Delay-Sensitive Users in Cognitive Radio Networks

This paper studies price-based spectrum access control in cognitive radio networks, which characterizes network operators' service provisions to delay-sensitive secondary users (SUs) via pricing strategies. Based on the two paradigms of shared-use and exclusive-use dynamic spectrum access (DSA), we examine three network scenarios corresponding to three types of secondary markets. In the first monopoly market with one operator using opportunistic shared-use DSA, we study the operator's pricing effect on the equilibrium behaviors of self-optimizing SUs in a queueing system. %This queue represents the congestion of the multiple SUs sharing the operator's single \ON-\OFF channel that models the primary users (PUs) traffic. We provide a queueing delay analysis with the general distributions of the SU service time and PU traffic using the renewal theory. In terms of SUs, we show that there exists a unique Nash equilibrium in a non-cooperative game where SUs are players employing individual optimal strategies. We also provide a sufficient condition and iterative algorithms for equilibrium convergence. In terms of operators, two pricing mechanisms are proposed with different goals: revenue maximization and social welfare maximization. In the second monopoly market, an operator exploiting exclusive-use DSA has many channels that will be allocated separately to each entering SU. We also analyze the pricing effect on the equilibrium behaviors of the SUs and the revenue-optimal and socially-optimal pricing strategies of the operator in this market. In the third duopoly market, we study a price competition between two operators employing shared-use and exclusive-use DSA, respectively, as a two-stage Stackelberg game. Using a backward induction method, we show that there exists a unique equilibrium for this game and investigate the equilibrium convergence.Comment: 30 pages, one column, double spac

Does High Involvement Management Lead to Higher Pay?

Using nationally representative survey data for Finnish employees linked to register data on their wages and work histories we find wage effects of high involvement management (HIM) practices are generally positive and significant. However, employees with better wage and work histories are more likely to enter HIM jobs. The wage premium falls substantially having accounted for employees' work histories suggesting that existing studies' estimates are upwardly biased due to positive selection into HIM. Results do not differ significantly when using propensity score matching as opposed to standard regression techniques. The premium rises with the number of HIM practices and differs markedly across different types of HIM practice.wages, high involvement management, high performance work system, incentivepay, training, team working, information sharing, propensity score matching

Sharing delay information in service systems: a literature survey

Service providers routinely share information about upcoming waiting times with their customers, through delay announcements. The need to effectively manage the provision of these announcements has led to a substantial growth in the body of literature which is devoted to that topic. In this survey paper, we systematically review the relevant literature, summarize some of its key ideas and findings, describe the main challenges that the different approaches to the problem entail, and formulate research directions that would be interesting to consider in future work

SOME STYLIZED FACTS OF THE INFORMAL SECTOR IN BRAZIL IN THE LAST TWO DECADES

Two facts have characterized the evolution of the informal sector in Brazil during the last two decades: the increase in the proportion of non-registered workers and the diminishing wage gap between non-registered and registered workers. In this paper, we document both the increase of the informal sector and the fall in the wage gap in Brazil. Besides, we investigate which factors were responsible for the fall in the wage gap and how this reduction has contributed to reduce wage inequality between 1981 and 1999. Among our findings, we would highlight: 1) the coincidence between these two movements and the market-oriented reforms of the early 1990's; 2) that the fall in the formal/informal wage gap has substantially contributed to the decrease in wage inequality. After education, the fall in the wage premium due to the possession of a work-card was the main responsible for bringing down wage inequality. Why and how it happened is an open debate. We speculate that the trade liberalization process of the early 1990's and the increasing indexation of informal sector wages to the minimum wage may be behind these phenomena.

Enforcement of Labor Regulation and Informality

Enforcement of labor regulations in the formal sector may drive workers to informality because they increase the costs of formal labor. But better compliance with mandated benefits makes it attractive to be a formal employee. We show that, in locations with frequent inspections workers pay for mandated benefits by receiving lower wages. Wage rigidity prevents downward adjustment at the bottom of the wage distribution. As a result, lower paid formal sector jobs become attractive to some informal workers, inducing them to want to move to the formal sector.labor regulation, informality

Enforcement of labor regulation and informality

Enforcement of labor regulations in the formal sector may drive workers to informality because they increase the costs of formal labor. But better compliance with mandated benefits makes it attractive to be a formal employee. We show that, in locations with frequent inspections workers pay for mandated benefits by receiving lower wages. Wage rigidity prevents downward adjustment at the bottom of the wage distribution. As a result, lower paid formal sector jobs become attractive to some informal workers, inducing them to want to move to the formal sector.

Three Essays on the Determinants and Effects of Public Sector Bargaining Laws.

The theoretical foundation of this model is the economic theory of regulation as developed by Stigler; in addition, modifications of the economic or special interest theory implied by the Public Choice school of thought are employed. A synthesis of these two theories of regulation, then, provides the framework upon which to develop a general model of the causes and consequences of laws regulating the bargaining rights of state employees. Topic One is devoted exclusively to the determinants of state-wide bargaining rights laws. The data are pooled over two years, and state laws are classified into one of three possible categories: bargaining prohibition (or nonexistence of a law), mandatory meet and confer, and mandatory bargaining. The dependent variable, then, is ordinal. Each observation is a discrete realization of the underlying, unobservable variable, sentiment toward public unionism. Estimation proceeds by the technique of McKelvey and Zavonia (1976). The independent variables are divided into two categories: economic/demographic, and political. Inclusion of variables in the former category is motivated by the Chicago School\u27s interest group theory, while the Public Choice School and Economics of Legislatures School suggest variables proxying characteristics of the political process. Topic Two, employing the basic model developed in Topic One, estimates the determinants and effects of bargaining laws simultaneously. The dependent variable in the effects equation is union density. Single equation estimation of either process is assumed to suffer from simultaneous equations bias, the consequences of which are biased and inconsistent parameter estimates. An econometric technique developed by Heckman (1978) is employed in order to account for the estimation of an ordinally measured endogenous variable within a simultaneous equations system. Topic Three applies the simultaneously estimated general model developed in Topic Two to three separate employee groups: teachers, firefighters, and police officers. By doing this, comparisons may be made among individual sub-groups, and the applicability of the general model tested

Discrete time-series models when counts are unobservable

Count data in economics have traditionally been modeled by means of integer-valued autoregressive models. Consequently, the estimation of the parameters of these models and their asymptotic properties have been well documented in the literature. The models comprise a description of the survival of counts generally in terms of a binomial thinning process and an independent arrivals process usually specified in terms of a Poisson distribution. This paper extends the existing class of models to encompass situations in which counts are latent and all that is observed is the presence or absence of counts. This is a potentially important modification as many interesting economic phenomena may have a natural interpretation as a series of 'events' that are driven by an underlying count process which is unobserved. Arrivals of the latent counts are modeled either in terms of the Poisson distribution, where multiple counts may arrive in the sampling interval, or in terms of the Bernoulli distribution, where only one new arrival is allowed in the same sampling interval. The models with latent counts are then applied in two practical illustrations, namely, modeling volatility in financial markets as a function of unobservable 'news' and abnormal price spikes in electricity markets being driven by latent 'stress'.Integer-valued autoregression, Poisson distribution, Bernoulli distribution, latent factors, maximum likelihood estimation