A Game Theoretic Analysis of the Conditions of Knowledge Transfer by New Employees in Companies
Sidonia vonLedebur
IWH Discussion Papers,
No. 3,
2006
Abstract
The availability of knowledge is an essential factor for an economy in global competition. Companies realise innovations by creating and implementing new knowledge. Sources of innovative ideas are partners in the production network but also new employees coming from another company or academia. Based on a model by HECKATHORN (1996) the conditions of efficient knowledge transfer in a team are analysed. Offering knowledge to a colleague can not be controlled directly by the company due to information asymmetries. Thus the management has to provide incentives which motivate the employees to act in favour of the company by providing their knowledge to the rest of the team and likewise to learn from colleagues. The game theoretic analysis aims at investigating how to arrange these incentives efficiently. Several factors are relevant, especially the individual costs of participating in the transfer. These consist mainly of the existing absorptive capacity and the working atmosphere. The model is a 2x2 game but is at least partly generalised on more players. The relevance of the adequate team size is shown: more developers may increase the total profit of an innovation
(before paying the involved people) but when additional wages are paid to each person a greater team decreases the remaining company profit. A further result is
that depending on the cost structure perfect knowledge transfer is not always best for the profit of the company. These formal results are consistent with empirical studies to the absorptive capacity and the working atmosphere.
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Can Export Activities of Firms Contribute to the Catching-Up Process of Transitional Economies?
Brigitte Loose, Udo Ludwig
Can the transitional and development economies ever catch up? The Materials from The International Scientific Conference Cracow,
2006
Abstract
In contrast to the majority of the former centrally planned economies, the East German economy has suffered from enormous losses in the transformation process. In the study the question is analyzed whether exports can contribute to the catching-up process in transitional economies. Here it must be explained why the firms emerging out of the privatization process in economies in transition are successful if the export sector consists of small and medium sized enterprises. That is the case with East German manufacturing industry. The study is based on individual company data from the surveys of the East Germany's and North Rhine Westphalia's manufacturing industry between 1995 and 2001 stemming from official statistics.
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Eastern Germany in the process of catching-up: the role of foreign and Western German investors in technological renewal
Jutta Günther, Oliver Gebhardt
Eastern European Economics,
No. 3,
2005
Abstract
Foreign direct investment as a means to support system transformation and the ongoing process of catching-up development has caught researcher’s attention for a number of Central and Eastern European countries. Not much research, however, has been carried out for East Germany in this respect although FDI plays an important role in East Germany too. Descriptive analysis by the use of unique survey data shows that foreign and West German affiliates perform much better with respect to technological capability and labor productivity than domestic companies in East Germany. The results of the regression analysis, however, show that it is not the status of ownership as such that forms a significant determinant of innovativeness in East Germany but rather general firms specific characteristics attached to it such as firm size, export-intensity, technical state of the equipment, and R&D activities. Due to the fact that foreign and West German affiliates perform better with respect to exactly all of these characteristics, they can be considered as a means to support the process of technological renewal and economic development.
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Why do banks hold capital in excess of regulatory requirements? A functional approach
Diemo Dietrich, Uwe Vollmer
IWH Discussion Papers,
No. 192,
2004
Abstract
This paper provides an explanation for the observation that banks hold on average a capital ratio in excess of regulatory requirements. We use a functional approach to banking based on Diamond and Rajan (2001) to demonstrate that banks can use capital ratios as a strategic tool for renegotiating loans with borrowers. As capital ratios affect the ability of banks to collect loans in a nonmonotonic way, a bank may be forced to exceed capital requirements. Moreover, high capital ratios may also constrain the amount a banker can borrow from investors. Consequently, the size of the banking sector may shrink.
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Markets for Bank Subordinated Debt and Equity in Basel Committee Member Countries
Reint E. Gropp, Jukka M. Vesala
BCBS Working Papers, No. 12,
No. 12,
2003
Abstract
This Basel Committee working paper is a study of the markets for banks' securities in ten countries (Belgium, France, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States). It aims at contributing to the assessment of the potential effectiveness of direct and indirect market discipline. This is achieved through collecting a rich set of data on the detailed characteristics of the instruments used by banks to tap capital markets, the frequency and size of their issuance activity, and the share of issuing banks in national banking systems. Further, information is collected on the amounts of debt and equity outstanding and about trading volumes and liquidity. Developments over the period from 1990-2001 are evaluated.
The paper focuses on subordinated bonds among banks' debt instruments, because they are the prime class of uninsured instruments suited to generate market discipline and have been proposed by some observers as a mandatory requirement for banks.
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Vertical and horizontal patterns of intra-industry trade between EU and candidate countries
Hubert Gabrisch
IWH-Sonderhefte,
No. 2,
2003
Abstract
Trade between the European Union (EU) and the Transition Economies (TE) is increasingly characterised by intra-industry trade. The decomposition of intra-industry trade into horizontal and vertical shares reveals predominantly vertical structures with decisively more quality advantages for the EU and less quality advantages for TE countries whenever trade has been liberalised. Empirical research on factors determining this structure in a EU-TE framework lags behind theoretical and empirical research on horizontal and vertical trade in other regions of the world. The main objective of this paper is therefore to contribute to the ongoing debate on EU-TE trade structures by offering an explanation of vertical trade. We utilise a cross-country approach in which relative wage differences, country size and income distribution play a leading role. We find first that relative differences in wages (per capita income) and country size explain intraindustry trade when trade is vertical and completely liberalised, and second that crosscountry differences in income distribution play no explanatory role. We conclude that EU firms have been able to increase their product quality and to shift low-quality segments to TE countries. This may suggest a product-quality cycle prevalent in EU-TE trade.
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Intra-industry trade between European Union and Transition Economies. Does income distribution matter?
Hubert Gabrisch, Maria Luigia Segnana
IWH Discussion Papers,
No. 155,
2002
Abstract
EU-TE trade is increasingly characterised by intra-industry trade. For some countries (Czech Republic), the share of intra-industry trade in total trade with the EU approaches 60 percent. The decomposition of intra-industry trade into horizontal and vertical shares reveals overwhelming vertical structures with strong quality advantages for the EU and shrinking quality advantages for TE countries wherever trade has been liberalised. Empirical research on factors determining this structure in an EU-TE framework has lagged theoretical and empirical research on horizontal trade and vertical trade in other regions of the world. The main objective of this paper is, therefore, to contribute to the ongoing debate over EU-TE trade structures, by offering an explanation of intra-industry trade. We utilize a cross-country approach in which relative wage differences and country size play a leading role. In addition, as implied by a model of the productquality
cycle, we examine income distribution factors as determinates of the emerging
EU-TE structure of trade flows. Using OLS regressions, we find first, that relative
differences in wages (per capita income) and country size explain intra-industry trade, when trade is vertical and completely liberalized and second, that cross country differences in income distribution play no explanatory role. We conclude that if increasing wage differences resulted from an increasing productivity gap between highquality and low-quality industries, then vertical structures will, over the long-term create significant barriers for the increase in TE incomes and lowering EU-TE income differentials.
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The Total Cost of Trading Belgian Shares: Brussels versus London
Hans Degryse
Journal of Banking and Finance,
No. 9,
1999
Abstract
Since 1990, London’s SEAQ International (SEAQ-I) has attracted considerable trading volume in Belgian equities. This paper investigates competition between the Brussels CATS market and London’s SEAQ-I. Toward this end, we gathered extensive limit order book data as well as transactions and quotation information. With regard to liquidity (indirect costs), measured by the quoted and effective bid–ask spread, the paper concludes that CATS outperforms SEAQ International for both measures. The effective spread is of course substantially smaller than the quoted spread, with the CATS effective spread showing a U-shaped form. This paper, unique in employing an extensive data set that includes all hidden orders and the whole limit order book, produces results in line with the different market microstructure models. Total trading costs on CATS are lower (higher) for small (large) trade sizes.
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Company size and labor productivity in the East German manufacturing sector
Joachim Ragnitz, Siegfried Beer
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 16,
1997
Abstract
Das ostdeutsche Verarbeitende Gewerbe wird von kleinen und mittleren Unternehmen geprägt. Darin wird eine Ursache für den Produktivitätsrückstand gegenüber Westdeutschland vermutet. Berechnungen auf der Grundlage von Daten aus dem Jahr 1995 haben ergeben, dass die Betriebsgrößenstruktur keinen sehr großen Einfluss auf das durchschnittliche Produktivitätsniveau hat und somit nur ein relativ kleiner Teil der Produktivitätslücke erklärt werden kann.
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Changing Structures, Functions, and Townscape. The Transformation of a Middle-Sized City in Thuringia
Peter Franz, Inge Cornelsen, Ulfert Herlyn
Netherlands Journal of Housing and the Built Environment,
1995
Abstract
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