Showing papers on "Managerial economics published in 1979"

Transaction-Cost Economics: The Governance of Contractual Relations

Abstract: THE new institutional economics is preoccupied with the origins, incidence, and ramifications of transaction costs. Indeed, if transaction costs are negligible, the organization of economic activity is irrelevant, since any advantages one mode of organization appears to hold over another will simply be eliminated by costless contracting. But despite the growing realization that transaction costs are central to the study of economics,' skeptics remain. Stanley Fischer's complaint is typical: "Transaction costs have a well-deserved bad name as a theoretical device ... [partly] because there is a suspicion that almost anything can be rationalized by invoking suitably specified transaction costs."2 Put differently, there are too many degrees of freedom; the concept wants for definition.

Rights and Production Functions: An Application to Labor-Managed Firms and Codetermination

Abstract: It is traditional in the theory of the firm to define the production opportunity set available to the firm in terms of its boundary-the maximum attainable set of output quantities for various input quantities, given the state of technology and knowledge. This boundary is the production function of the firm. One of our purposes here is to point up the dependence of suchproduction functions on the structure of property rights and contracting rights within which the firm exists. We redefine the production function in order to recognize the dependence of output on the structure of property and contracting rights. That We redefine the production function to incorporate its dependence on the structure of property and contracting rights within which the firm exists. The problems surrounding the role of labor in the firm for a variety of rights str-uctures are analyzed recognizing this dependence. These structures include (1) the "labor-managed firm" system (in which common stock claims are legally prohibited), (2) the codetermination and industrial democracy movements (in which the law requires management participation by labor), (3) cooperatives and professional partnerships (i.e., quasi-labormanaged firms which arise out of voluntary contracting), and (4) the capitalist corporation. We criticize the claim that labor-managed firms are efficient. Presented at the Conference on the Effects of Labor Participation in the Management of Business Firms in the Western World, Dallas, February 1977, sponsored by the Liberty Fund; and at the Fourth Annual Interlaken Seminar on Analysis and Ideology, Interlaken, June 1977, sponsored by the Center for Research in Government Policy and Business at the University of Rochester. We are indebted to David Henderson, Eugene Fama, Keith Leffler, Frank Milne, Tom Russell, Jerold Zimmerman, and the participants in the Economics Workshop at the University of Rochester Graduate School of Management for discussions on these issues, but they should not be held responsible for our refusal to accept some of their suggestions. We are also indebted to an anonymous referee and John Gould for comments, and to Armen Alchian for helping us over the years to understand more clearly the importance of rights in determining human behavior. This work has been partially supported by the Managerial Economics Research Center at the University of Rochester, Graduate School of Management.

Managerial Economics: Applications, Strategies, and Tactics

Abstract: This text seeks to train students to think analytically in a business context. Specifically, it uses over 250 real-world, managerially-oriented applications to show students how managers apply theories and techniques to solve real-world business problems. This approach motivates student learning and extends student thinking well beyond the final exam. The book includes extensive coverage of the latest analytical tools in managerial economics: game-theoretic tactics, best-practices mechanism design, information economics, and organizational architecture, as well as a thorough integration of international issues.

Fundamentals of Managerial Economics

Abstract: (1980). Fundamentals of Managerial Economics. Journal of the Operational Research Society: Vol. 31, No. 7, pp. 672-672.

The Management System: Its Functions and Processes

Abstract: What is management? In recent years, a number of schools or approaches to management have evolved. What is rather upsetting to the manager is that there are a variety of unrelated approaches without any suggestion of their relationship to each other. Even more upsetting is that some of these approaches seem to be based on the disciplines of particular researchers rather than their ability to help managers. The study explores the rationale underlying two predominant orientations. One is concerned with the process of management, while the other emphasizes the function of management. The managerial process involves such intuitive principles as planning, organizing, and staffing. The managerial function involves arranging equipment to perform functions such as procurement, production, and adaptation. The goal is to illustrate the relationship of these approaches to each other and to specific managerial needs. The study was conducted among top managers in six municipal organizations. The research utilized a qu...

Income : An Introduction to Economics

Abstract: The author considers that income as a method of approach to economics is less forbidding, and in a sense more realistic than, for example, the law of supply and demand. His aim is to present to the general reader a substantial part of the theory of economics in a concise, interesting and intelligible form.

Simulation Gaming in the Managerial Economics Course

Abstract: The simulation used in managerial economics classes at Virginia Polytechnic Institute (VPI) beginning in the fall of 1975 was a total enterprise simulation in which students were placed in the position of the top management team of a business firm and were required to make decisions in a number of functional areas, i.e., production, scheduling, pricing, capital budgeting, government relations, etc. The course was designed as an applications course in which pragmatic solution routines could be taught. One point to be made about the effectiveness of simulations concerns the distinction between what we are deciding to teach and what we are teaching inadvertently. A top management simulation, such as the one used at VPI, inadvertently rewards certain kinds of behavior and so encourages them on the part of the student-managers. Those actions appear to be taught inadvertently, i.e., the simulations were not designed with those actions in mind. The inadvertent behavior would include rewarding management teams that set goals, plan ahead, work well with others, etc. Perhaps these unintentional results of using simulation games are their greatest advantage. If we perceive the learning of this behavior as positive, all other things being equal, simulation gaming may be an effective teaching technique (although not necessarily the least costly in terms of faculty effort).