This work deals with service provision to remote customers.Two examples are: (i) a manufacturer that has to deliver items to customers in a remote destination, and (ii) a company that provides repair and replacement service to distant clients.In both cases the remoteness of customers suggests...

The paper deals with the issue of budget setting to the divisions of a company. The approach is quantitative in nature both in the formulation of the requirements for the set-budgets, as related to different general managerial objectives of interest, and in the modelling of the inherent...

This paper focuses on the choice of a depreciation method, when trying to minimize the expected value of the present value of future tax payments.In a quite general model that allows for stochastic future cash- ows and a tax structure with tax brackets, we determine the optimal choice between...

This paper analyzes the eect of the gender of local policymakers on policy outcomes. Analyzing a rich dataset from Brazilian municipalities and using a regression discon- tinuity design, we nd that municipalities ruled by female mayors have better health outcomes, receive more federal...

The paper examines the role of policy intervention in engendering institutional change. We show that first order changes in the political structure (e.g. introduction of democracy) may be undermined by local political interests and result in persistence in institutions and the (poor) quality of...

In the large literature on firm performance, economists have given little attention to entrepreneurs. We use deaths of more than 500 entrepreneurs as a source of exogenous variation, and ask whether this variation can explain shifts in firm performance. Using longitudinal data, we find large and...

China’s long-term economic dynamics pose a formidable challenge to economic historians. The Qing Empire (1644-1911), the world’s largest national economy before 1800, experienced a tripling of population during the 17th and 18th centuries with no signs of diminishing per capita income. While...