We explore hold-up when trading parties can make specific investments simultaneously or sequentially. With simultaneous investment both investors are held-up. With sequential investment contracting becomes possible after the project has commenced, so the second investor avoids being held-up. If...

We explore the hold-up problem when trading parties can make specific investments simultaneously or sequentially. As previously emphasized in the literature, sequencing of investments can allow some projects to proceed that would not be feasible with a simultaneous regime. This is not always the...

Market failure exists in the provision of residential aged care services in Australia due to imperfection of competition that arises out of government actions. The Commonwealth Government has the exclusive right to grant provider rights and control over the number of beds that will be funded to...

In the literature, two important views concerning the conduct of monetary policy are construed. One view is that the central banks’ monetary policy must be credible if the authorities want to curb inflation. A second view is that central banks set their monetary policy by using all the...

One of the enduring linkages between financial markets and the real economy is that the shape of the interest rate curve is seen as a good predictor of future output growth. However, little is known about the effect of globalisation on this relationship. This paper examines whether, in the wake...

There have been few reliable published data for housing prices in Australia (as in many other countries). In this paper we attempt to provide an authoritative account of prices for houses and apartments (units) in Australia from 1970 to 2003. Where possible we draw directly on data from land...

There is widely perceived to be a public liability crisis in Australia. This paper analyses whether court awards for injuries are excessive. The paper has two main parts. The first part outlines a normative basis for the sizes of awards based on the principles of welfare economics and the...

There has been much recent interest in forecasting based on factor analysis models for large numbers of observable variables (p) and large numbers of observations (T). Some nice asymptotic results have been produced showing that under certain conditions, as (p,T) ? (8, 8) principal components...

In answer to the long-standing question, what kinds of knowledge and skills should economics majors master, Lee Hansen has advocated a proficiencies approach. According to this approach, the teaching and learning of economics undergraduates should be based on the attainment of (six) specified...

This paper considers cost and profit efficiency for Australian banks between 1995 and 2002. Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) is used to construct an efficient frontier for ten banks listed on the Australian Stock Exchange. Empirical results indicate the major banks have improved their cost and...