Arithmetic Properties of Overpartition Pairs

Bringmann and Lovejoy introduced a rank for overpartition pairs and investigated its role in congruence properties of $\bar{pp}(n)$, the number of overpartition pairs of n. In particular, they applied the theory of Klein forms to show that there exist many Ramanujan-type congruences for the number $\bar{pp}(n)$. In this paper, we shall derive two Ramanujan-type identities and some explicit congruences for $\bar{pp}(n)$. Moreover, we find three ranks as combinatorial interpretations of the fact that $\bar{pp}(n)$ is divisible by three for any n. We also construct infinite families of congruences for $\bar{pp}(n)$ modulo 3, 5, and 9.Comment: 19 page

The Equivalence Principle as a Stepping Stone from Special to General Relativity: A Socratic Dialog

In this paper we show how the student can be led to an understanding of the connection between special relativity and general relativity by considering the time dilation effect of clocks placed on the surface of the Earth. This paper is written as a Socratic dialog between a lecturer Sam and a student Kim.Comment: 8 pages, 1 figure, uses the revtex4 documentclass. Submitted to the American Journal of Physics. Minor modification and corrections following referees' comment

Technology transfer from NASA to targeted industries, volume 2

This volume contains the following materials to support Volume 1: (1) Survey of Metal Fabrication Industry in Alabama; (2) Survey of Electronics Manufacturing/Assembly Industry in Alabama; (3) Apparel Modular Manufacturing Simulators; (4) Synopsis of a Stereolithography Project; (5) Transferring Modular Manufacturing Technology to an Apparel Firm; (6) Letters of Support; (7) Fact Sheets; (8) Publications; and (9) One Stop Access to NASA Technology Brochure

A power-law distribution for tenure lengths of sports managers

We show that the tenure lengths for managers of sport teams follow a power law distribution with an exponent between 2 and 3. We develop a simple theoretical model which replicates this result. The model demonstrates that the empirical phenomenon can be understood as the macroscopic outcome of pairwise interactions among managers in a league, threshold effects in managerial performance evaluation, competitive market forces, and luck at the microscopic level

Multinationals Do It Better: Evidence on the Efficiency of Corporations’ Capital Budgeting

This paper examines the effectiveness of multinational enterprises’ capital budgeting decisions as compared to the decisions of purely domestic enterprises. This is an important question because of multinationals’ role in allocating capital globally. Answering this question may also shed light on whether multinationals are indeed better managed than are purely domestic firms. We examine this question empirically using the deviation of a firm’s estimated marginal Tobin’s q from an appropriate benchmark as an indicator of effective resource allocation. We find that multinationals make more efficient capital budgeting decisions than do purely domestic firms. The result stems from multinational enterprises’ exercising greater restraint on over-investment, but is not due to looser liquidity constraints. In obtaining the result, we account for the impact of institutional ownership, managerial ownership, and managerial entrenchment. We also test whether multinationals’ greater capital budgeting efficiency might be due to their investment locations, since they might thereby be monitored by more agents and also may be more successful in resisting pressures from special interest groups and governments to adopt practices that are not consistent with firm value maximization. We do not find support for the monitoring and bargaining hypotheses. Our observations therefore suggest that multinationals may be intrinsically better managed firms than are purely domestic firms