Promoting Age Equality in the Delivery of Health Care

Research across Europe suggests that most health care systems are ill-equipped to address the needs of the ageing populations they are meant to serve. Modern health care systems were founded on the principles of acute care and are dominated by a focus on growing specialization, efficiency, and expediency. Yet older patients presenting with chronic illness and comorbidities require continuity of care that bridges across traditional medical boundaries and care settings

Industry sunk costs and entry dynamics

We explore an investment game where industry sunk costs provide anincentive for a firm to be a follower into the market as opposedto a leader. For some parameter values, every firm could have adominant strategy to wait, even though immediate entry is sociallyoptimal - this is a like prisoners' dilemma. In equilibrium, afirm is more likely to have a dominant strategy to wait with anincrease in the number of potential entrants. Finally, theequilibrium can display an entry cascade.coordination game

Who Decides about Change and Restructuring in Organizations?

We model the determinants of who makes decisions, the principal or an agent, when there are multiple decisions. Decision making takes effort and time; and, once implemented, the expected loss from a particular decision (or project) increases with the length of time since the last decision was made. The model shows delegation is more likely as: (i) controllable uncertainty increases; (ii) uncontrollable uncertainty decreases; (iii) the number of plants in the firm decreases; (iv) the complexity of the decision increases; and (v) the importance of the decision increases. The theoretical predictions are consistent with our novel empirical results on the delegation of major organizational change decisions using workplace data. Our unique data allows us to identify who made a decision to implement a significant change, as well as key internal and external factors highlighted as potentially important in our theory. Empirically, delegation is more likely in organizations that: face a competitive product market; export; have predictable product demand; have a larger workplace; and that have fewer other workplaces in the same organization producing a similar output. We find business strategy is not related to the allocation of decision making authority; delegation, however, is associated with the use of human resource techniques such as the provision of bonuses to employees.decision making authority, decentralization, delegation, competition, exports, uncertainty, principal and agent

Timing of Investments, Hold-up and Total Welfare.

We explore hold-up when trading parties can make specific investments simultaneously or sequentially. With simultaneous investment both investors are held-up. With sequential investment contracting becomes possible after the project has commenced, so the second investor avoids being held-up. If the two investments are independent three effects are identified when comparing the total welfare of the two regimes: sequential investment increases the costs of delay; sequential investment reduces the incentive for the first player to invest; and the sequential regime increases the second player’s incentive to invest. Given this, the (second-best) optimal regime will favour the more important investment. Similarly, if the choice of investment level of an investor is inelastic to the regime adopted, the timing regime adopted should maximise the incentive for the other party to invest. The paper also shows the timing of investment can act as an additional form of hold-up; if they have the option when to invest, a party may choose the regime that does not maximise total welfare.INVESTMENTS ; COSTS ; GAMES

Coordination games and the option to wait

We take a coordination game and add the option to wait each player can opt to take an action in the standard game or they can decide to wait. If one player has taken a standard option, the waiting player can adopt their best response to this action. Interpreting the payoff in the final period (when there is no waiting possible) as a outside option or default, we show that a party's equilibrium payoff can be decreasing in their default. Further, a player''s role of leader or follower alternates as the number of waiting periods changes.

Hold-up and Sequential Specific Investments.

We explore the hold-up problem when trading parties can make specific investments simultaneously or sequentially. As previously emphasized in the literature, sequencing of investments can allow some projects to proceed that would not be feasible with a simultaneous regime. This is not always the case, however. A cost of sequencing investment is that it can disadvantage some parties, reducing their incentive to invest. The mere possibility of sequential investment can be detrimental to welfare; it can even prevent trade from occurring. This is a new result: it allows the choice about the timing of investment to be interpreted as a new form of hold-up. We also examine an investment game in which both parties would prefer to invest second (follow) rather than lead. This game displays some interesting dynamics. As the the number of potential investment periods is increased, the subgame perfect equilibrium can switch between a prisoners’ dilemma and a coordination game.TRADE ; INVESTMENTS ; GAMES

Ownership, access and sequential investment

We extend the property-rights framework to allow for: a separation of the ownership rights of access and veto; and sequential investment. Parties investing first (ex ante) do so before contracting is possible. Parties that invest second (ex post) can contract on (at least some) of their investment costs. Along with this cost-sharing effect, the incentive to invest is affected by a strategic effect generated by sequential investment. Together these effects can overturn some of the predictions of the property-rights literature. For example, the most inclusive ownership structure might not be optimal, even if all investments are complementary.property rights; access; veto; firm organization; sequential investment; holdup

Housing Review: Stroup

Deciding where to live on campus can be confusing, especially when you don’t know the ups and downs of every housing option. In an effort to provide some insight on the issue, GWU-Today is tackling each housing option available to undergrad students on GWU’s campus.https://digitalcommons.gardner-webb.edu/gwu-today/1282/thumbnail.jp