This study examines the potential benefits of social networks through the development of high school football players into big-time collegiate football stars. Many of these young men have spent 17 or 18 years surrounded and supported by family members, friends, and religious and civic...

Cornerstone economic growth models as the Solow-Swan model and their modern extensions normally assume the rate of population growth as exogenous without any explanation of the links between economic growth and most important demographic variables. Recently, some articles have presented models...

This paper assesses the relevance of intellectual property rights (IPRs) in the knowledge economy (KE)-finance nexus using the four variables identified under the World Bank's knowledge economy index (KEI) and seven financial intermediary dynamics of depth, efficiency, activity and size. Three...

This paper projects the future of knowledge economy (KE) in SSA and MENA countries using the four components of the World Bank's Knowledge Economy Index (KEI): economic incentive, education, ICTs and innovation. The empirical evidence provides the speeds of integration as well as the time...

The August 15th 2013 Shanghai Academic Rankings of World Universities (ARWU) should leave policy makers wondering about whether the impressive growth experienced by ‘latecomers in the industry' has moved hand-in-hand with contribution to knowledge by means of scientific publications. Against...

This study considers the choice of ownership as a continuous variable, thereby adapting the Grossman-Hart-Moore (GHM) theory of the firm. To do so, it is assumed that parties sign a contract that enables them to divide and use assets even after the negotiation over gains of trade fails. I show...

This paper proposes an alternative to standard cardinal tournaments. The analysis contrasts "hybrid" cardinal tournaments to standard cardinal tournaments and piece rates. It shows that providing for partial insurance against common uncertainty via a hybrid tournament (in which the weights on...

We adapt a genetic-based learning classifier system to a forecast evaluation exercise by making its key parameters endogenous and taking into account the need of convergence of the learning algorithm, an issue usually neglected in the literature. Doing so, we find it hard for the algorithm to...

This note shows that there exists a threshold level of optimal prevention for a risk neutral agent which separates cases where a risk averse agent exerts less effort in prevention than a risk neutral agent and cases where she exerts more effort. We also show that the risk averse agent makes...

This paper proposes a novel method of global optimization based on host-parasite co-evolution. It also develops a Fortran-77 code for the algorithm. The algorithm has been tested on 100 benchmark functions (of which the results of 32 relatively harder problems have been reported). In its search...