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2758 items in total found

Working Papers | 2001

Constitutional Review: The Right of an Unborn Generation

Singh J P

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Working Papers | 2001

Axiomatic Characterisation of Weighted Boolean Vote Aggregators

Lahiri Somdeb

A Federation Boolean Vote Aggregator allows a finite set of coalitions to unilaterally elect any candidate from a set containing exactly two candidates. There are several special types of Federation Boolean Vote Aggregators, all of which share a property: the candidates are assigned weights, and for a coalition to be decisive, it is necessary that the sum of the weights of its members exceed a pre-assigned quota. In this paper we address the following question: When is a Federation Boolean Vote aggregator a Weighted Boolean Vote Aggregator?

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Working Papers | 2001

Axiomatic Analysis of Vote Aggregators

Lahiri Somdeb

In this paper a model for the aggregation of ballot profiles is considered. In this framework some new results are obtained: the characterization of oligarchic aggregators, the characterization of the plurality aggregator and the non existence of a vote aggregator which is anonymous and yet preserves proximity. In the context of there being precisely two candidates from which voters are required to choose from we provide axiomatic characterizations of the majority vote aggregator and the two single valued selections from it.

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Working Papers | 2001

Globalization and Consumer Choice

Singh J P

Based on simple examples, the note highlights the inadequate provisions in policy and law for promoting competition and consumer choice in the market place. Thus contrary to promise, globalization is limiting consumer choice while simultaneously fuelling prices. If the trend continues, the note argues, the country will be left with just a couple of big players for various consumer products with mock competition battles in the advertisement arena with song and dance. Meanwhile the issues of hunger, literacy and primary health will get pushed back further. Given the inevitability and irreversibility of the globalization process, the note highlights the need to put in place laws and policies that promote a fair competition while also protecting the small niche players.

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Working Papers | 2001

Expenditure Allocation and Welfare Returns to Government Efforts - A Suggested Model and its Application

Ravindra H. Dholakia and Dholakia Archana R

The paper addresses the question of government expenditure allocation among sectors by extending the model developed by Archana Dholakia (1993) and illustrates its application by using the data on major Indian states from 1971 to 1991. It is argued that on margin, the changes in the expenditure allocation are determined not by the magnitude of the marginal productivities of the government effort (as several people seem to be thinking), but by the behaviour of the marginal returns in relative terms. A lot of emphasis is put on the appropriate measurements of al the variables flowing from the theoretical framework so as to ensure proper interpretation of the coefficients of the model. The dependent variable is the disparity reduction rate (DRR) in the index of basic welfare that is measured by 9 indicators from education, health and nutrition & other sectors. The independent variables are the average per capita annual development expenditures at constant prices by state governments on revenue and capital accounts in different sectors reflecting the change in the government efforts in different directions; and the level of real per capita state income. In the illustrative exercise, the economic (physical capital) sector and social (human capital) sectors are considered. Similarly, two t!me periods -1971-81 and 1981- 91 are considered to examine the stability of the coefficients. Statistical tests of equality of the coefficients of revenue and capital expenditures are also carried out. The coefficients are stable and equality restrictions are valid. The government efforts on the social (human capital) sector show increasing returns whereas on the economic (physical capital) sector show diminishing returns. Based on our findings, it is advisable for the government to spend more on social sector and less on economic sectors than what it is doing in the recent past.

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Working Papers | 2001

Justifiable Preferences for Freedom of Choice

Lahiri Somdeb

In this paper we say that a preference for freedom of choice is justifiable if there exists a reflexive and complete binary relation on the set of alternatives, such that one oppurtunity is atleast as good as a second, if and only if the there is at least one alternative from the first set which is no worse than any alternative of the two sets combined together, with respect to the binary relation on the alternatives. In keeping with the revered tradition set by von Neumann and Morgenstern we call a reflexive and complete binary relation, an abstract game (note: strictly speaking von Neumann and Morgenstern refer to the asymmetric part of a reflexive and complete binary relation as an abstract game; hence our terminology though analytically equivalent, leads to a harmless corruption of the original meaning). It turns out that if a preference for freedom of choice is justifiable, then the base relation with respect to which it is justifiable, is simply the restriction of the preference for freedom of choice, to the set of all singletons. Our main result is about the justifiability of transitive preferences for freedom of choice. It says that such preferences are justifiable if and only if they satisfy Monotonicity and Concordance. Concordance says that if one opportunity set is at least as desirable as a second then it should also be the case that the first opportunity set is at least as desirable as the union of the two. Since, for the case of transitive preferences for freedom of choice, our notion of justifiability coincides with that of Arrow and Malishevsky, our axiomatic characterization can throw some light on properties of indirect utility functions.

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Working Papers | 2001

The Business Logic for Dotcom Businesses

Ramachandran K

The rise and fall of a number of dotcoms has attracted a lot of attention in business press, but there does not seem to have been any in depth study to understand the economic logic of dotcom businesses. A close analysis of these businesses would show that many of them actually do not have any sound business model. Many of their assumptions are questionable. This paper attempts to provide an explanation to it using original concepts such as latent want, zero customer dissatisfaction and customer dissatisfaction elimination chain. It is argues that many firms fumbled because they did not try to see whether there existed any customer dissatisfaction and subsequent need for a dot com firm to eliminate the dissatisfaction. It is also found that firms did not see their capabilities to provide overall positive value when they focused on eliminating dissatisfaction at one point.

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Working Papers | 2001

Influencing Human Resource Management Practices of Subsidiaries by Parent Companies Empirical Evidences from India

Sunil Kumar Maheshwari

Effective management of transfrontier operations of Multinational Companies (MNCs) requires integration of subsidiaries for global competitiveness and autonomy of subsidiaries for local responsiveness. With the increased turbulence in the environment it is increasingly important to these subsidiaries to act fast to retain and build local competitive advantage in different countries of operations. These twin demands to manage global organizations are primarily centered on the following question that the managers at the parent company need to respond. “How to ensure subsidiaries managers to act in autonomous manner to respond effectively to local needs- yet, be able to influence the actions of these managers whenever the need arises?” This can be effectively achieved through staffing and other HRM practices in such diversified companies. The study examined the HR practices of the subsidiaries in this context. The study indicates that HR systems continue to remain autonomous with subsidiaries, though, there are differences across different HR activities. Subsidiarys turnover and age are the two variables that influence the subsidiary autonomy on different HR issues most. Increased turnover of the subsidiary is positively related to parents influence on HR related matters at subsidiary. India remains to be the host nation with less expatriation of managers from parent companies. Parent companies employ multiple influencing mechanisms in subsidiaries to achieve the task of global integration. The intensity of influence increases with increase of equity stakes of companies. Increased expatriation and cultural proximity are frequently used by MNCs to influence their subsidiaries in India.

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Working Papers | 2000

Investment Pattern And Decision Making: The Role of Working Women

Pestonjee D M and Balsara Anita H

An attempt is made to study how far working women enjoy freedom to take investment related decisions on their own and the pattern of investments in the male dominated investment world in India. The questions related to investment pattern and its decision maker with respect to working women was studied by taking, 227 respondents from 3 cities: 108 in Ahmedabad, 60 in Solapur, 59 in Gulbarga. Questionnaire method was administered and data were collected on saving, types of investment, influencers, expenditure and decision-makers. In order to answer the questions, conventional and non-conventional statistics were used. There is no significant difference among the respondents across the cities with respect to age, family size, type of family, marital status, level of education, occupation and annual income. No cultural and demographical patterns are associated with decision making of working women.

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Working Papers | 2000

The Weighted Fair Division Problem

Lahiri Somdeb

The exact problem we are concerned with in this paper is of the following nature. There are a finite number of producers each equipped with a utility function of the standard variety, which converts and input into a producer specific output. An allocation of the input among the producers is sought which is Pareto efficient i.e. there is no reallocation which increases the output of one producer without decreasing the output of any other. This, as is very widely known, corresponds to maximizing the weighted sum of the utility functions subject to a resource constraint. Alternatively, the weights can be interpreted as exogenously specified prices of the separate outputs and then the problem reduces to maximizing the aggregate revenue subject to a resource constraint. Out analysis focuses on the relations between the optimal solutions and the price and aggregate resource pair. Further, we also study the effect on the former of varying the latter pair.

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