Best-shot versus weakest-link in political lobbying: an application of group all-pay auction

We analyze a group political lobbying all-pay auction with a group specific public good prize, in which one group follows a weakest-link and the other group follows a best-shot impact function. We completely characterize all semi-symmetric equilibria. There are two types of equilibria: (1) each player in the best-shot group puts mass at the upper bound of the support, whereas each player in the other group puts mass at the lower bound of the support; (2) players in the best-shot group put masses at both the lower and the upper bounds, while the other group randomizes without a mass point. An earlier and longer version of this study was circulated under the title “The Group All-pay Auction with Heterogeneous Impact Functions.” We appreciate the comments of an Associate Editor and two anonymous referees, Kyung Hwan Baik, Walter Enders, Matt Van Essen, Paan Jindapon, David Malueg, Paul Pecorino, Seth Streitmatter, Ted Turocy, the participants at the 2015 conference of ‘Contest: Theory and Evidence’ at the University of East Anglia, and the seminar participants at the University of Alabama and Korea University. Iryna Topolyan gratefully acknowledges the support from the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center. Any remaining errors are our own

Designing the digital organization

Abstract Increasingly, organizations are assessing their opportunities, developing and delivering products and services, and interacting with customers and other stakeholders digitally. Mobile computing, social media, and big data are the drivers of the future workplace, and these and other digitally based technologies are having large economic and social impacts, including increased competition and collaboration, the disruption of many industries, and pressure being put on organizations to develop new capabilities and transform their cultures. In this article, we provide a conceptual framework for the design of effective digital organizations. Our framework is predicated on the current state of digitization across diverse sectors of the global economy. In the digital world, all activities and transactions leave digital marks, and all actors, things, and places can be reached and affected digitally. As a result, we can design for self-organization rather than using hierarchical mechanisms for control and coordination. Such designs require the strategic and cultural alignment of digital technologies within the organization and externally with stakeholders. We propose that “actor-oriented” principles are at the heart of designing digital organizations and that, if properly applied, can result in a workplace where organization members are highly engaged and productive

Probiotic Microbes Sustain Youthful Serum Testosterone Levels and Testicular Size in Aging Mice

The decline of circulating testosterone levels in aging men is associated with adverse health effects. During studies of probiotic bacteria and obesity, we discovered that male mice routinely consuming purified lactic acid bacteria originally isolated from human milk had larger testicles and increased serum testosterone levels compared to their age-matched controls. Further investigation using microscopy-assisted histomorphometry of testicular tissue showed that mice consuming Lactobacillus reuteri in their drinking water had significantly increased seminiferous tubule cross-sectional profiles and increased spermatogenesis and Leydig cell numbers per testis when compared with matched diet counterparts This showed that criteria of gonadal aging were reduced after routinely consuming a purified microbe such as L. reuteri. We tested whether these features typical of sustained reproductive fitness may be due to anti-inflammatory properties of L. reuteri, and found that testicular mass and other indicators typical of old age were similarly restored to youthful levels using systemic administration of antibodies blocking pro-inflammatory cytokine interleukin-17A. This indicated that uncontrolled host inflammatory responses contributed to the testicular atrophy phenotype in aged mice. Reduced circulating testosterone levels have been implicated in many adverse effects; dietary L. reuteri or other probiotic supplementation may provide a viable natural approach to prevention of male hypogonadism, absent the controversy and side-effects of traditional therapies, and yield practical options for management of disorders typically associated with normal aging. These novel findings suggest a potential high impact for microbe therapy in public health by imparting hormonal and gonad features of reproductive fitness typical of much younger healthy individuals.National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant P30-ES002109)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant U01 CA164337)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (Grant RO1CA108854

Choice of Tax Base Revisited: Cash Flow vs. Prepayment Approaches to Consumption Taxation

This paper re-examines the issues involved in the design of a direct tax on consumption, an idea that has received a fair degree of acceptance in the transition countries over the past decade (e.g., tax reforms in Croatia and Moldova). First we argue that on the subject of equivalence among a set of taxes, the only meaningful comparison is along the ex-ante concept of equivalence, and not ex-post. The latter as we shall see requires highly implausible, and often arbitrary, choice scenarios. We carry out the analysis in a variety of models starting with the two-period consumption-saving choice under full certainty. However, a good part of the discussion is carried out where the portfolio choice behaviour is embedded in an intertemporal savings model that has been widely discussed in the literature. We then take up more complete (and necessarily more complex) choice situations for examination. Indeed the first of two variations of the above is a model where individuals make work-leisure (for a given skill level) as well as the safe-risky asset choice. The last is of risky human capital choice, where the physical investment is restricted to a single non-risky asset. For the purposes of the paper, the models are very general, and the precise choice context is open to wider interpretations than how they are actually phrased. In spite of our preoccupation with the efficiency aspects, we are interested in other important issues of equity, and those of an administrative nature. But our remarks on the latter fronts are limited to the insight that we directly gain from the analytics