TOO MUCH INVESTMENT : A PROBLEM OF COORDINATION FAILURE

This paper shows that coordination failure and contractual incompleteness can lead to socially excessive investment. Firms and workers choose investment levels, then enter a stochastic matching process. If investment levels are discrete, and match frictions are low, high-investing workers (firms) impose a negative pecuniary externality on any worker (firm) who cuts investment. Specifically, an agent cutting investment subsequently bargains with a partner with a binding outside option due to the fact that it can easily match with another high investor. The deviant thus bears the full loss in revenue from its action. However, given enough complementarity in investments, when one agent cuts investment it is efficient that its partner also does so. So, only part of the cost saving accrues to the deviant, with the implication that the net private gain to cutting investment is less than the social gain. A similar argument establishes that over-investment can occur when agents are heterogenous i.e. differ in their cost of investing, even if investments are continuous. Then, over-investment occurs because low-cost investors have a private incentive to invest to shift rent away from high-cost investors. Our model can also explain some recent trends in graduate/non-graduate wage differentials.hold-up ; coordination failure ; matching ; over-investment

On Lexemic and Morphemic Case

Paper by David G. Lockwoo

Light scattering spectroscopy: studies of electronic excitations and atomic vibrations in matter

This thesis comprises a compendium of forty-two publications on various research topics unified by a common theme s light scattering spectroscopy. The research work presented ranges from experimental studies of the dynamics of atoms in various phases of matter through to theoretical investigations of the light scattering process. The topics discussed are the dynamics of structural phase transitions in proper and improper ferroelectrics, and in antiferroelectrics, for both ordered and disordered systems; the magnetic phase transitions in ordered and disordered compounds; the electronic properties of divalent transition metal ions in pure and dilute systems; the lattice vibrations of ionic, covalent and molecular crystals; the selection rules governing higher-order light scattering processes; the weak interactions occurring between chemical species in both aqueous and non-aqueous solvents; and the use of automation techniques in light scattering spectroscopy

Hello, World: A Simple Application for the Field Programmable Port Extender (FPX)

The FPX provides simple and fast mechanisms to process cells or packets. By performing all computations in FPGA hardware, cells and packets can be processing at the full line speed of the card [currently 2.4 Gbits/sec]. A sample application, called \u27Hello World\u27 has been developed that illustrates how easily an application can be implemented on the FPX. This application uses the FPGA hardware to search for a string on a particular flow and selectively replace contents of the payload. The resulting circuit operates at 119 MHz on a Xilinx XCV 1000E-FG680-7, and occupies less than 1% of the available gates on the device

Too much investment: a problem of coordination failure

This paper shows that coordination failure and contractual incompleteness can lead to socially excessive investment. Firms and workers choose investment levels then enter a stochastic matching process. If investment levels are discrete, then if match frictions are low enough, high investing workers (firms) impose a negative pecuniary externality on any worker (firm) who cuts investment, even by one unit. Specifically, if a worker cuts investment, he subsequently bargains with a firm which has a high outside option due to the fact it can easily match with another high investing worker; this lowers the private net benefit to cutting investment below the social net benefit. A similar argument establishes that over-investment can occur when agents are heterogenous i.e. differ in their cost of investing, even if investments are continuous. Then, over-investment occurs because low-cost investors have a private incentive to invest to shift rent away from high-cost investors. Our model can also explain some recent trends in graduate/non-graduate wage differentials

Quantum confinement in Si and Ge nanostructures: Effect of crystallinity

We look at the relationship between the preparation method of Si and Ge nanostructures (NSs) and the structural, electronic, and optical properties in terms of quantum confinement (QC). QC in NSs causes a blue shift of the gap energy with decreasing NS dimension. Directly measuring the effect of QC is complicated by additional parameters, such as stress, interface and defect states. In addition, differences in NS preparation lead to differences in the relevant parameter set. A relatively simple model of QC, using a `particle-in-a-box'-type perturbation to the effective mass theory, was applied to Si and Ge quantum wells, wires and dots across a variety of preparation methods. The choice of the model was made in order to distinguish contributions that are solely due to the effects of QC, where the only varied experimental parameter was the crystallinity. It was found that the hole becomes de-localized in the case of amorphous materials, which leads to stronger confinement effects. The origin of this result was partly attributed to differences in the effective mass between the amorphous and crystalline NS as well as between the electron and hole. Corrections to our QC model take into account a position dependent effective mass. This term includes an inverse length scale dependent on the displacement from the origin. Thus, when the deBroglie wavelength or the Bohr radius of the carriers is on the order of the dimension of the NS the carriers `feel' the confinement potential altering their effective mass. Furthermore, it was found that certain interface states (Si-O-Si) act to pin the hole state, thus reducing the oscillator strength.Comment: arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1111.201

Response of a zonal climate-ice sheet model to the orbital perturbations during the Quaternary ice ages

The astronomical theory of the ice ages is investigated using a simple climate model which includes the ice sheets explicitly. A one-level, zonally averaged, seasonal energy-balance equation is solved numerically for sea-level temperature T as a function of latitude and month (similar to North, 1975). Seasonally varying snow cover (which affects planetary albedo) is included diagnostically by parameterizing monthly snowfall and snowmelt in simple ways. The net annual accumulation and ablation on the ice sheet surface at each latitude are computed using the same parameterizations as for snow cover above (with T corrected for ice sheet height using a lapse rate of -6.5 °C km^(-1)). Treatment of the ice sheets follows Weertman (1976) with ice flow approximated as perfect plasticity, which constrains the ice sheet profiles to be parabolic. The northern hemisphere's ice sheet is constrained to extend equatorward from 75°N (corresponding to the Arctic Ocean shoreline). Model ice age curves are generated for the last several 100 K years by computing the seasonal climate as above once every 2 K years, with insolation calculated from actual Earth orbit perturbations. The change in ice sheet size for each 2 K year time step depends only on the net annual snow budget integrated over the whole ice sheet surface. In these model runs, the equatorward tip of the northern hemisphere's ice sheet oscillates through ~7° in latitude, correctly simulating the phases and approximate amplitude of the higher frequency components (~43 Kyear and 22 Kyear) of the deep-sea core data (Hays et al., 1976). However, the model fails to simulate the dominant glacial-interglacial cycles (~100 to 120 Kyear) of this data. The sensitivity of the model ice age curves to various parameter changes is described, but none of these changes significantly improve the fit of the model ice age curves to the data. In the concluding section we generalize about the types of mechanisms that might yield realistic glacial-interglacial cycles

Das schwächste Glied in der Kette? Einige Anmerkungen zur marxistischen Handlungstheorie·

Das schwächste Glied in der Kette? Einige Anmerkungen zur marxistischen Handlungstheorie