Strict dominance solvability without equilibrium

A game in strategic form is strict dominance solvable if iterative elimination of strictly dominated strategies yields a unique strategy profile (strict dominance solution). Textbook presentations of this material are framed in the context of finite games and it is argued that if a strict dominance solution exists, it must also be the unique Nash equilibrium. We construct a simple counter example demonstrating that strict dominance solutions need not constitute Nash equilibria in infinite games, even if each player has a unique undominated strategy. This conclusion has special pedagogical significance as the sensitivity of results to the finite game context can often be lost on those being introduced to the material for the first time. As an additional pedagogical exercise, we establish that the traditional textbook conclusion extends to settings in which strategy spaces are compact and utility functions are continuous.

Equity Basis Selection in Allocation Environments

The successful formation and long-term stability of a cooperative venture is often linked to the perceived fairness of the associated cost or resource allocation. In particular, the effectiveness of such collaborations can be hampered by the lack of a consensus view on what basis should be used for gauging an allocation’s “fairness.” Standards of equity in traditional cost-sharing applications could be assessed on many dimensions: per capita, per unit of demand, or per unit of revenue, to mention a few. This multiplicity of logically compelling “equity bases” is a feature common to many practical cost-sharing applications. Our analysis shows that features of the allocation environment are capable of explaining a substantial amount of the variation in the equity bases employed in practice and are consistent with the axiomatic principles of collective behavior.cooperative games; cost allocation; equity; probit model

Technology, Agglomeration, and Regional Competition for Investment

The active 'courting' of firms by municipalities, regions, and even nations has a long-standing history and the competition for firm location through a wide variety of incentives seems to have escalated to new heights in recent years. We develop a model that explores technology development by firms that face regional competition for their investment and examine the endogenous determination of regions' policies, firm technology, and agglomeration externalities. In particular, we find that regional competition leads firms to inefficiently distort their research and development efforts in hopes of improving their standing in the competition amongst regions for their investment. This loss in efficiency is aggravated by the agglomeration externalities that are inherently present in many industries. We offer several case studies that provide evidence consistent with our theoretical conclusions.

The Environmental Kuznets Curve from Multiple Perspectives

The analysis finds that in addition to U-shaped paths of environmental quality arising for growth in income per capita, growth in population can also produce socially efficient patterns that are U-shaped. Sufficient conditions for both types of paths are identified for a range of models and parameters, including symmetrical models with homothetic, constant-returns functions such as with CES functions. Similar results are also shown to arise in decentralized economies under either homogeneous or heterogeneous income levels.Environmental Kuznets Curve, Economic Growth, Environmental Quality

Experiments on Jet Flows and Jet Noise Far- Field Spectra and Directivity Patterns

Jet flows and jet noise far-field spectral and direction pattern

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in Crossover Youth: The Pathway to Development and the Relationship with Life-Time Offending

A large portion of justice-involved youth have previously been involved with the child welfare system; termed crossover youth. What is less understood is the trajectory of crossing over and the potential role of mental health problems. Using the theories of developmental traumatology and Moffitt’s developmental taxonomy of antisocial behaviour, the present study investigated the ability of several factors to distinguish and predict crossover youth who develop posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). In this study of 299 justice-involved youth, chi-squared analyses found that several factors were able to differentiate youth with PTSD and/or associated symptoms from those without. Logistic regression indicated that the number of maltreatment types significantly contributed to the prediction of clinically diagnosed PTSD, while the number of maltreatment types and the presence of sexual abuse significantly contributed to the prediction of a diagnosis or symptoms. The clinical and policy relevance for working with crossover youth is discussed

The rural culture and ministry responses

The leaders of the Catholic Church need to understand their people and the lives they live. This is a basic component in being able to minister to peoples\u27 needs. The main purpose of this study was to explore the rural culture, the farm crisis and the rural Catholic Church experience in order to discover what are some steps the Catholic Church can take, from the local level to the international level, in order to truly walk with the people who live in rural areas

Asymmetric Policy Interaction among Subnational Governments: Do States Play Welfare Games?

This paper explores the possibility that states respond asymmetrically to increases versus decreases in their neighboring states’ welfare benefit levels. We present a theoretical model suggesting that states respond more to decreases than to increases in their neighbors’ benefit levels. To test this proposition empirically, we use a panel of annual state-level data from 1983 to 1994 for each of the contiguous United States and the District of Columbia, and we observe changes in state demographic and economic characteristics as well as changes in state welfare benefits. We find substantial empirical evidence that uniformly supports our argument. State responses to neighbor benefit decreases tend to be at least twice as large as their responses to neighbor benefit increases. Our empirical results are robust to modeling neighbor benefits as endogenous. Our results, therefore, have substantial implications for public policy in the wake of the increased decentralization of welfare policy associated with the welfare reforms of 1996.

Fight the Dead, Fear the Living: Post-Apocalyptic Narratives of Fear, Governance and Social Control

Post-apocalyptic narratives and themes have become increasingly popular in film, television and graphic novels. By imagining a society without the state, post-apocalyptic narratives are able to explore concerns about current forms of governance and social control. The post-apocalyptic narrative is particularly relevant in a post-9/11 society where public concerns about security and governance are prominent. In this study, I examined the potential allegorical function of the zombie narrative found in Robert Kirkman’s The Walking Dead. Specifically, this project involves an ethnographic content analysis of issues 1-100 of The Walking Dead graphic novel series. Analysis focused on the allegorical purposes of the zombie in relation to neoliberal governance, Agamben’s state of exception, security and surveillance, and biopower/biopolitics. Utilizing the concept of the \u27hall of mirrors\u27, to extend the ambivalence reflected in this study to the general feelings of members of society, this study suggests that the population may struggle with a somewhat complicated and ambiguous relationship with strategies utilized under a neoliberal style of governance