This paper attempts to justify the use of discrete choicemodels to approach the study of adoption of new technology. Ittries to adapt an essentially dynamic theoretical framework suchas the diffusion of innovations to carry out a static analysis.Finally, it suggests the use of ordered models to...

This paper analyses the importance of R&D activities in the explanation of productivitydifferences among the Spanish regions over the period 1986-96. With this aim, we measure the effectof the own technological innovation and the spillovers effects. The analysis is based on the estimationof a...

This study investigates the market valuation of income smoothing by a long run analysis of the relation income smoothing vs. return and risk in the Spanish stock market. Using several methodological approaches to estimate and test abnormal returns, the results suggest some pattern of behaviour...

We construct a model to analyze the willingness of Health Authorities to reach agreements with private hospitals to have some of their public sector patients treated there. When physicians are dual suppliers, we show that a problem of cream-skimming arises and reduces the incentives of the...

We propose an alternative method of obtaining stylized facts on comovement, based on the cross-correlation function of the prewhitened time series, which only depends on the purely stochastic components of the series and the cross efects between them. This approach has the property of being...

The paper studies how does the size of a cartel affect the possibility that its members can sustain a collusive agreement. I obtain that collusion is easier to sustain the larger the cartel is. Then, I explore the implications of this result on the incentives of firms to participate in a cartel....

This paper formally describes the Human Capital Theory as a Research Programme that fits into the classical economic Research Programmes. The fundamental ¿hard core¿ assumption which converts the Human Capital Theory into a Research Programme itself in Lakatosian terms is based upon the...

This paper provides a cardinal welfare measure for the allocation of a bundle of goods among a group of people. Social welfare is measured as the sum of n partial indices, one for each good, each of which consists of a function of the amount of the good availabe and its dispersion, measured by...

There is a substantial amount of microeconomic evidence documenting diferential responses oflabor supply across productivity groups. In partic-ular, more productive individuals: (i) enjoy ahigher employment rate, (ii) have a lower volatility of employment and (iii) spend less time workingat...

The optimal competition policy when licensing is an alternative to a merger to transfer a superior technology is derived in a differentiated goods duopoly, for the cases of Cournot and Bertrand competition. We show that whenever both royalties and fixed fees are feasible, mergers should not be...