UNION STRUCTURE AND THE INCENTIVES FOR INNOVATION IN OLIGOPOLY

In this paper we consider the effect of union structure on the adoption of innovation in the context of Cournot duopoly. With a market size large enough we show that the incentive to innovate is higher under a decentralized union structure (with each firm facing its own independent union) than under an industry-wide union. However, for a small market size (or, equivalently, for sufficiently drastic potential innovation) the new technology is more likely to be adopted in the presence of a centralized union. This result goes against the conventional view that unionization harms the incentive to innovate.Oligopoly, Unions, Innovation.

Putting health in all policies: The National Institute for Welfare Enhancement

Welfare is a rather vague term whose meaning depends on ideology, values and judgments. Material resources are just means to enhance people’s well-being, but growth of the Gross Domestic Production is still the standard measure of the success of a society. Fortunately, recent advances in measuring social performance include health, education and other social outcomes. Because “what we measure affects what we do” it is hoped that social policies will change. The movement Health in all policies and its associated Health Impact Assessment methodology will contribute to it. The task consists of designing transversal policies that consider health and other welfare goals, the short term and long-term implications and intergenerational redistributions of resources. As long as marginal productivity on health outside the healthcare system is higher than inside it, efficiency needs cross-sectoral policies. And fairness needs them even more, because in order to reduce social inequalities in health, a wide social and political response is needed. Unless we reduce the well-documented inefficiencies in our current health care systems the welfare states will fail to consolidate and the overall economic wellbeing could be in serious trouble. In this article we sketched some policy solutions such as pricing according to net benefits of innovation and public encouragement of radical innovation besides the small type incremental and market-led innovation. We proposed an independent agency, the National Institute for Welfare Enhancement to guarantee long term fair and efficient social policies in which health plays a central role.Public health policies; Health Impact Assessment; Welfare; Health in All Policies.

Ar:N2_2 - a non-universal glass

The bias energies of various two-level systems (TLSs) and their strengths of interactions with the strain are calculated for Ar:N$_2$ glass. Unlike the case in KBr:CN, a distinct class of TLSs having weak interaction with the strain and untypically small bias energies is not found. The addition of CO molecules introduces CO flips which form such a class of weakly interacting TLSs, albeit at much lower coupling than are typically observed in solids. We conclude that because of the absence of a distinct class of weakly interacting TLSs, Ar:N$_2$ is a non-universal glass, the first such system in three dimensions and in ambient pressure. Our results further suggest that Ar:N$_2$:CO may show universal properties, but at temperatures lower than $\approx 0.1$ K, much smaller than typical temperature $\approx 3$ K associated with universality, because of the untypical softness of this system. Our results thus shed light on two long standing questions regarding low temperature properties of glasses: the necessary and sufficient conditions for quantitative universality of phonon attenuation, and what dictates the energy scale of $\approx 3$ K below which universality it typically observed.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures, results for excitations densities of states are added, presentation improve

Recasens Siches: Filosofía del derecho y sociología

[Resumen] Se trata de presentar a Luis Recasens Siches como un referente en el marco teórico de las ciencias sociales en general y de la sociología en particular, ya que ha dedicado una parte de su vida al estudio y reflexión de los marcos teóricos de la sociología. En este trabajo se contextualiza al autor, a la obra y a las corrientes que aparecían en su horizonte perceptivo tanto académico como divulgativo de los distintos saberes que afectaban a la filosofia, al derecho y a la sociología, resaltando la estimativa jurídica y el lagos de 10 razonable, así como las configuraciones sociales y los marcos prenormativos y normativos de la conducta. En su análisis desde la sociología realiza una visión sobre las corrientes y las aportaciones que el enfoque sociológico ofrece en el análisis de la realidad social, donde aparecen perfiladas las referencias y los referente

Diálogo y convivencia

[Resumen] El diálogo como expresión ha tenido una vigencia determinante en la relación con los otros. El diálogo se convirtió en soporte, instrumento, referencia y medio para establecer un marco preceptivo y cognitivo de la vida de los otros, por lo que representa el encuentro, la relación y la institucionalización de la vida con los demás con semejantes horizontes perceptivos. A lo largo de este estudio fenomenológico del diálogo hemos delimitado el marco estratégico y táctico en la alteridad[Abstract] The dialogue as expression has had a very important validity in the relationship with the others. The dialogue changed to sport, instrument, reference and mass to establish a cognitive frame of the others life, so it represents the meeting, the relationship and the institutionalize of the life with the rest with the same cognitive horizon. In this phenomenology study of the dialogue we have delimited the strategic and tactic frame in the other