15,381 research outputs found
Corporate Hierarchies and the Size of Nations: Theory and Evidence
Corporate organization varies within a country and across countries with country size. The paper starts by establishing some facts about corporate organization based on unique data of 660 Austrian and German corporations. The larger country (Germany) has larger firms with flatter more decentral corporate hierarchies compared to the smaller country (Austria). Firms in the larger country change their organization less fast than firms in the smaller country. Over time firms have been introducing less hierarchical organizations by delegating power to lower levels of the corporation. We develop a theory which explains these facts and which links these features to the trade environment that countries and firms face. We introduce firms with internal hierarchies in a Krugman (1980) model of trade. We show that international trade and the toughness of competition in international markets induce a power struggle in firms which eventually leads to decentralized corporate hierarchies. We offer econometric evidence which is consistent with the models predictions
Power in the Multinational Corporation in Industry Equilibrium
Recent theories of the multinational corporation introduce the property rights model of the firm and examine whether to integrate our outsource firm activities locally or to a foreign country. This paper focus instead on the internal organization of the multinational corporation by examining the power allocation between headquarters and subsidiaries. We provide a framework to analyse the interaction between the decision to serve the local market by exporting or FDI, market acces and the optimal mode of organization of the multinational corporation. We find that subsidiary managers are given most autonomy in their decision how to run the firm at intermediate levels of local competition. We then provide comparative statics for changes in fixed FDI entry costs and trade costs, information technology, the number of local competitors, and in the size of the local market
Inhomogeneous mechanical losses in micro-oscillators with high reflectivity coating
We characterize the mechanical quality factor of micro-oscillators covered by
a highly reflective coating. We test an approach to the reduction of mechanical
losses, that consists in limiting the size of the coated area to reduce the
strain and the consequent energy loss in this highly dissipative component.
Moreover, a mechanical isolation stage is incorporated in the device. The
results are discussed on the basis of an analysis of homogeneous and
non-homogeneous losses in the device and validated by a set of Finite-Element
models. The contributions of thermoelastic dissipation and coating losses are
separated and the measured quality factors are found in agreement with the
calculated values, while the absence of unmodeled losses confirms that the
isolation element integrated in the device efficiently uncouples the dynamics
of the mirror from the support system. Also the resonant frequencies evaluated
by Finite-Element models are in good agreement with the experimental data, and
allow the estimation of the Young modulus of the coating. The models that we
have developed and validated are important for the design of oscillating
micro-mirrors with high quality factor and, consequently, low thermal noise.
Such devices are useful in general for high sensitivity sensors, and in
particular for experiments of quantum opto-mechanics
Detection of weak stochastic force in a parametrically stabilized micro opto-mechanical system
Measuring a weak force is an important task for micro-mechanical systems,
both when using devices as sensitive detectors and, particularly, in
experiments of quantum mechanics. The optimal strategy for resolving a weak
stochastic signal force on a huge background (typically given by thermal noise)
is a crucial and debated topic, and the stability of the mechanical resonance
is a further, related critical issue. We introduce and analyze the parametric
control of the optical spring, that allows to stabilize the resonance and
provides a phase reference for the oscillator motion, yet conserving a free
evolution in one quadrature of the phase space. We also study quantitatively
the characteristics of our micro opto-mechanical system as detector of
stochastic force for short measurement times (for quick, high resolution
monitoring) as well as for the longer term observations that optimize the
sensitivity. We compare a simple, naive strategy based on the evaluation of the
variance of the displacement (that is a widely used technique) with an optimal
Wiener-Kolmogorov data analysis. We show that, thanks to the parametric
stabilization of the effective susceptibility, we can more efficiently
implement Wiener filtering, and we investigate how this strategy improves the
performance of our system. We finally demonstrate the possibility to resolve
stochastic force variations well below 1% of the thermal noise
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A Century of Arbitrage and Disaster Risk Pricing in the Foreign Exchange Market
A long-standing puzzle in international finance is that a positive interest rate differential systematically forecasts an exchange rate appreciation - the Uncovered Interest Parity (UIP) puzzle. Hence, a carry trade portfolio long in high yield currency bonds funded by borrowing in low yield currencies can be expected to yield positive profits. Following the Great Financial Crisis, however, the sign of the puzzle has changed - positive differentials forecast excessive depreciation - and carry trade has withered after the large losses suffered by investors in 2007-2008. In this paper, we use a century-long time series for the GBP/USD exchange rate to show that a sign switch is neither new, nor, arguably, a new puzzle. First, it is not new in the data|by virtue of a long sample featuring infrequent, non-overlapping currency crashes, we document that switches systematically occur in crises such as the Great Depression in the 1930s and the exchange rate turmoil of the 1990s. However, UIP deviations, sharp in either direction for short - to medium-horizon portfolios, remain small to almost negligible for long-horizon investment portfolios. Second, we argue that our century-long evidence is consistent with models featuring a time-varying probability of disasters or 'Peso events,' specified so to account for the difference in UIP deviations in crisis and normal times, as well as for a decreasing term structure of carry trade returns that on average characterize the data
Dynamical two-mode squeezing of thermal fluctuations in a cavity opto-mechanical system
We report the experimental observation of two-mode squeezing in the
oscillation quadratures of a thermal micro-oscillator. This effect is obtained
by parametric modulation of the optical spring in a cavity opto-mechanical
system. In addition to stationary variance measurements, we describe the
dynamic behavior in the regime of pulsed parametric excitation, showing
enhanced squeezing effect surpassing the stationary 3dB limit. While the
present experiment is in the classical regime, our technique can be exploited
to produce entangled, macroscopic quantum opto-mechanical modes
An ultra-low dissipation micro-oscillator for quantum opto-mechanics
Generating non-classical states of light by opto-mechanical coupling depends
critically on the mechanical and optical properties of micro-oscillators and on
the minimization of thermal noise. We present an oscillating micro-mirror with
a mechanical quality factor Q = 2.6x10^6 at cryogenic temperature and a Finesse
of 65000, obtained thanks to an innovative approach to the design and the
control of mechanical dissipation. Already at 4 K with an input laser power of
2 mW, the radiation-pressure quantum fluctuations become the main noise source,
overcoming thermal noise. This feature makes our devices particularly suitable
for the production of pondero-motive squeezing.Comment: 21 pages including Supplementary Informatio
Control of Recoil Losses in Nanomechanical SiN Membrane Resonators
In the context of a recoil damping analysis, we have designed and produced a
membrane resonator equipped with a specific on-chip structure working as a
"loss shield" for a circular membrane. In this device the vibrations of the
membrane, with a quality factor of , reach the limit set by the intrinsic
dissipation in silicon nitride, for all the modes and regardless of the modal
shape, also at low frequency. Guided by our theoretical model of the loss
shield, we describe the design rationale of the device, which can be used as
effective replacement of commercial membrane resonators in advanced
optomechanical setups, also at cryogenic temperatures
Calibrated quantum thermometry in cavity optomechanics
Cavity optomechanics has achieved the major breakthrough of the preparation
and observation of macroscopic mechanical oscillators in peculiarly quantum
states. The development of reliable indicators of the oscillator properties in
these conditions is important also for applications to quantum technologies. We
compare two procedures to infer the oscillator occupation number, minimizing
the necessity of system calibrations. The former starts from homodyne spectra,
the latter is based on the measurement of the motional sidebands asymmetry in
heterodyne spectra. Moreover, we describe and discuss a method to control the
cavity detuning, that is a crucial parameter for the accuracy of the latter,
intrinsically superior procedure
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