Excessive Price Research Articles

Empirical Evidence on Analysing the Quality of Life of Informal Settlement for Regeneration Project: Case Study of Boa Wala Settlement, Lahore

The empirical evidence from literature has disclosed that the extensive share of world’s population continues to live in informal settlements due to extensive economic, social, and welfare disparities. These informal settlements possess the attributes of poor infrastructure and utilities services. In reality, due to excessive housing prices, economic incapacity, and insufficient technical abilities among poor people, they are forced to live in such dilapidated settlements. However, over the times, governmental institutes have adopted several distinct strategies to enhance the quality of life (QOL) of inhabitants living in informal settlement. Therefore, this research study intends to examine the contemporary living conditions in informal settlement using multi-indicator analysis. To assess the QOL, five leading indicators including building density, utilities services, road infrastructure, urban furniture, and social services and their associated 29 sub-indicators was identified and Bao wala as informal settlement in Lahore, Pakistan has been selected as case study area. A semi structured questionnaire was formed and sample size of 99 was calculated to perform socio-economic surveys. In the surveys, proportionate and random sampling technique was used to gain diverse outcomes. In the data analysis, descriptive analysis technique was used to examine the public perceptions regarding contemporary utilities services and regression analysis techniques was used to explore the relation between perceived and dependent variables. The results outcomes have shown that majority of the population of Bao wala settlement express extreme dissatisfaction regarding all the perceived indicators based on the provision, maintenance, and operation quality; however, the regression analysis indicates that all the five leading indicators have strong and significant relation with the dependent variable.

Do telecommunications prices depend on consumer engagement?

This paper analyzes how customers’ heterogeneous search and switching habits affect the prices paid for telecommunication services in a context in which operators use price discrimination strategies to retain their customers and attract those of their rivals. Drawing on a representative sample of Spanish households (N=3,113), we show that engaged consumers pay 9.4% less than completely unengaged consumers for their telecommunication services, after controlling for the characteristics of the bundle of services contracted. We also find that highly engaged consumers (i.e. those that have called their operator to obtain a better deal and who have switched to a different operator at least once) pay 13.6% less for their services than unengaged consumers, that consumers who have switched operator at least once pay 8.4% less, and that consumers who call their operator to request better conditions for their contracts pay 5.8% less. Finally, we show that the excess price paid by unengaged consumers increases as they contract more sophisticated services, such as premium television content and additional mobile lines.

Unmasking Excessive Pricing: Evolution of EU Law on Excessive Pricing from United Brands to Aspen

Unmasking Excessive Pricing: Evolution of EU Law on Excessive Pricing from United Brands to Aspen

Geospatial characteristics of allotment garden provision in Tokyo

Abstract Allotment gardens (AGs), one of the most popular forms of urban agriculture (UA), have attracted social attention because of the ecosystem services they provide to citizens. However, the services and availability of AGs may be unevenly distributed, owing to their geographic location. The patterns underlying the provision of AG plots and facilities to users in Tokyo are unclear. Thus, this study quantitatively examines the characteristics of different types of AG provision and their determinants in the metropolitan region of Tokyo. We classified a sample of 313 AGs gathered from governmental open data via a non-hierarchical cluster analysis of AG provision patterns based on their properties, including number of plots, plot size, contract price and duration, and facilities such as agricultural equipment and access to instructors. Moreover, we examined the influence of urban development and residential characteristics on these classes using the Kruskal–Wallis test. The analysis identifies six AG provision patterns based on their properties. It also revealed that AG provision in Tokyo was differentiated by the percentage of agricultural land and the socio-demographic characteristics of residents, including population, percentage of young population, and income levels from the city center to the suburban areas, corresponding to urban sprawl. These findings could provide valuable insights to help local governments, farmers, and non-profit organizations address the challenges and opportunities arising from each AG provision pattern and to make AG plots and facilities more adaptable to upcoming urban shrinkage, business opportunities, and possible excessive subdivision and price hikes.

Prosecuting Excessive Pricing of Pharmaceuticals under Competition Law: Evolutionary Development

Prosecuting Excessive Pricing of Pharmaceuticals under Competition Law: Evolutionary Development

Rethinking the legal test for excessive pricing: Insights from the Landmark UK CMA v Pfizer/Flynn Case and Its Legal Implications

Rethinking the legal test for excessive pricing: Insights from the Landmark UK CMA v Pfizer/Flynn Case and Its Legal Implications

ЎЗБЕКИСТОНДА СОЛИҚ МАЪМУРЧИЛИГИ ОРҚАЛИ РАҚОБАТ МУҲИТИНИ ТАКОМИЛЛАШТИРИШ МАСАЛАЛАРИ

In order to create an effective competitive environment by gradually reducing monopoly in the commodity and financial markets in the Republic of Uzbekistan, reducing the participation of the state in the economy of our country, abandoning excessive price regulation and reducing the influence of the state on the economy, to further reduce the negative impact of the monopoly of business entities on competitiveness of the economy, granting privileges and preferences that increase the efficiency of the system, as well as reducing the regulatory burden on business entities and implementation of tax administration of taxpayers and special attention is paid to the fundamental improvement of the provision of services on the basis of mutual cooperation to fulfill tax obligations.

Customer Perception towards Green Products in Pokhara Valley

This study aims to explore customer awareness and perception towards green products in Pokhara valley. It focuses on customer perception on price, quality, availability, and promotional strategy of green products. For this purpose, the sample size was taken from the entire population of Green Product users in Pokhara Valley. Among them, 110 respondents have been selected on non-probability purposive sampling technique for determining sample size. Primary data was collected by using of structural questionnaire from the targeted respondents. Data analysis was done using the SPSS tool. Descriptive analysis was used for analyzing data. The majority of respondents feel green products as environmentally friendly and healthy and safe products. They declared that they mostly purchase organic food. An advertisement was an important source for providing information about green products to the customers. The majority of customers were not having a precise opinion about the excessive prices of green products but a larger portion were agreed to pay more for green products and to purchase green products in case of the same price as non-green products. Customers were satisfied with the quality of green products. They were aware of their harmless nature of them. They were dissatisfied with the availability of green products. Most of the respondents possessed a very pessimistic opinion towards the promotional strategies of green products. They agreed to take environmental consideration and read the product’s label while buying these products. This study contributes to analyzing the customers’ perception towards Marketers and manufacturers and mainly focuses on the improvement of the quality of green products and making it convenient to buy through increasing its availability and accessibility.

Strategic trading with information acquisition and long-memory stochastic liquidity

This paper investigates the strategic interaction of information acquisition, information-based dynamic trading, and noise trading patterns, as well as its significant implications on market equilibrium outcomes. We consider a market where the strategic trader can dynamically acquire costly information about an asset’s payoff via private signals instead of endowing him with its full information. The noise trading, which provides necessary liquidity for the market, has the feature of long-range dependence. The risk-neutral market maker then sets the equilibrium price for the asset based on information gleaned from the market total order flow. We characterize the equilibria for both opaque and transparent markets depending on whether or not the trader’s order flow is disclosed. In particular, closed-form solutions are obtained for two special cases and associated financial interpretations are provided. We find that: (1) the endogenous information acquisition and information-based trading help improve the price informativeness over time, while the information efficiency could be decreasing; (2) long-memory stochastic liquidity leads to an excessive price volatility; and (3) in a transparent market, the trader should adopt a mixed strategy by adding an additional noise term to the trading strategy to prevent rapid information leakage.

Procure, Bank, Release: Carbon Removal Certificate Reserves to Manage Carbon Prices on the Path to Net-Zero

The European Union cap-and-trade emissions trading system (EU ETS) faces two challenges in the context of the European Green Deal. First, to meet the Paris temperature target, emissions in the energy and industrial sectors must fall to net-zero and then even become net-negative. Second, there is a concern that excessive CO2 price spikes and volatility on this path will jeopardize the political acceptance and support for emissions trading as a climate policy instrument. Conditional supply of carbon removal credits (CRCs) to support dynamic carbon price caps would make it possible to stabilize the market in the transition from positive to net-negative emissions trading while keeping the net-emissions path unchanged. CRCs would be assigned for carbon removal achieved for example with methods like Direct Air Carbon Capture and Storage or Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage and would be used by companies under the EU ETS to compensate for their emissions. However, we suggest that there would be no direct exchange between emitting companies under the EU ETS and carbon removal companies, i.e., the demand and supply side of CRCs, during an initial phase. Instead, we suggest assigning an institutional mandate to for example a carbon central bank (CCB) to organize the supply of CRCs. Under this mandate, carbon removal would be procured, would be translated into a corresponding number of CRCs, and a fraction of it could be auctioned to the market at a later point in time, provided that market prices exceed a certain (dynamic) price cap.

Options for states to constrain pricing power of health care providers.

Health care is becoming increasingly unaffordable for both individuals and employers and prices vary in nearly incomprehensible ways that do not correlate with quality. In many areas, consolidation of insurers and providers resulted in market failure that needs policy interventions. With federal gridlock, state policymakers are seeking options for controlling health care costs in markets where competition has failed. In this article, we discuss a spectrum of options that policymakers have to more directly control healthcare prices: (1) establishing a cost-growth benchmark, (2) creating a public option, (3) capping or establishing a default out-of-network payment rate for health care services, (4) creating affordability standards that authorize the insurance commissioner to reject contracts with excessive rate increases, (5) creating global budgets for hospital-based care, (6) capping excessive prices and/or tiering allowed rate updates, and (7) creating a population-based payment model. We provide a roadmap for state policymakers to consider these options, review the experiences with states who have tried these models, and discuss additional design considerations that policymakers should consider with any of these models. In the 1970's and 1980's, during a time of rapid growth in health care prices and spending, states took a decisive leadership role in developing regulatory models to curb the growth in health care costs and improve affordability for their citizens. It is time for states to lead the nation once again in addressing the current health care cost and affordability crisis in the U.S.

Repeat tourists’ perceived unfavorable changes and their effects on destination loyalty

PropósitoLos turistas que repiten son muy valiosos para los destinos turísticos. Sin embargo, sus percepciones y reacciones ante los cambios desfavorables en el destino han sido poco exploradas. Esta investigación tiene como objetivo responder dos preguntas importantes y no resueltas: ¿Cómo reaccionan los turistas que repiten un destino ante los cambios desfavorables percibidos? ¿Cuáles son los principales cambios desfavorables en el destino para los turistas que repiten?Diseño/metodología/enfoqueEsta investigación se fundamenta en la teoría de la protección estratégica de la memoria. Consta de dos estudios (uno cuantitativo y otro cualitativo) realizados en China. El estudio cuantitativo propuso y evaluó un modelo de ecuación estructural que vincula los cambios desfavorables percibidos, los recuerdos contaminados, la satisfacción de la revisita y la lealtad al destino. Los datos se recopilaron a través de un cuestionario distribuido en una plataforma de encuestas en línea con 416 respuestas válidas. El estudio cualitativo se realizó para determinar los cambios desfavorables en el destino que perciben los turistas. Se utilizaron noventa y cinco respuestas válidas para el análisis.ResultadosEsta investigación demuestra empíricamente que los cambios desfavorables percibidos disminuyen la lealtad de los turistas que repiten un destino, al empañar sus recuerdos iniciales y reducir la satisfacción de la revisita. Esta mediación total confirma la importancia de los recuerdos personales y la psicología en las experiencias turísticas. Esta investigación descubre, además, dos tipos principales de cambios desfavorables en el destino: mala gestión del destino (es decir, comercialización excesiva, instalaciones insuficientes, mala administración, precios excesivos y disminución de la calidad del servicio) y cambios ambientales negativos (turistificación excesiva, cambios en los entornos naturales y sociales, y cambios en los sitios y actividades turísticas).Originalidad/valorEsta investigación contribuye a la literatura sobre la lealtad al destino, al desvelar las percepciones de los turistas que repiten visita, y sus procesos psicológicos hacia los cambios desfavorables en los destinos. También identifica los cambios desfavorables típicos percibidos por los turistas que vuelven a un destino.

Did the Inclusion of China’s A-Shares in the MSCI Index Improve the Information Content of Listed Firms? Analysis Based on Stock Price Synchronisation and Environmental Social Governance

Chinese A-shares were officially included in the Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) Emerging Markets Index from June 2018. The inclusion of the A-share market into the MSCI Index is one of the most influential events in the opening up of the capital market of China. However, China’s A-share market has an imperfect system compared with that of developed countries. Stock price synchronisation is more serious in China than in developed countries, and Environmental Social Governance (ESG) disclosures are imperfect. Excessive stock price synchronicity can affect the information content of stock prices, and imperfect ESG disclosures are not conducive to the investment decisions of investors and thus not conducive to the price mechanism for adjusting the market. From the perspective of stock price synchronisation and ESG disclosure, this study discusses the impact of the exogenous event of the inclusion of A-shares in the MSCI Index on China’s capital market. Based on data of listed firms from 2011 to 2019, this study determines whether MSCI target stocks have high stock price information content and explores the ESG disclosure level based on a difference-in-differences (DID) model. In addition, this study conducts a parallel trend hypothesis test and propensity score matching (PSM) to test the robustness of the results. Empirical results show that the inclusion of A-shares in the MSCI Index increased the stock price information content and reduced the stock price synchronisation of MSCI target stocks. At the same time, this study tests the quality of the ESG information disclosure of A-shares after their inclusion in the MSCI Index and finds that the level of disclosure of the underlying stocks improved. This finding indicates that the inclusion of A-shares in the MSCI Index plays a role in improving the quality of ESG disclosure through information channels. The research conclusions have important implications for the active promotion of the expansion of the MSCI Index and further opening up of the capital market of China. In addition, the conclusions can provide a reference for subsequent MCSI decision-making and insights into the capital markets of other emerging-market countries.

Behavioral finance and COVID-19

According to Ram, characterized by a market crash and excessive stock price volatility, the COVID-19 pandemic had striking financial impacts. Some of the phenomena that occurred through the catastrophe, like the extreme volatility and unshakable confidence of fiscal associations, are not sufficiently explicated by the conventional financial paradigm. In addition to the effect of COVID-19 on financial markets of the globe, this paper explores the decisions and actions of investors and financial institutions from a behavioral finance perspective. Relevant during and after the crisis, various cognitive biases and errors are also discussed. The current paper is a literature review of the existing research on behavioral finance’s effect on the COVID-19 epidemic. A cautious evaluation of these 13 articles divulged no material pertinent to behavioral finance. The remaining 27 articles were incorporated in this analysis. We explore these phenomena and evaluate their significance to financial markets and institutions and the global crisis stimulated by COVID-19.

Accounting comparability and relative performance evaluation by capital markets

This paper examines how accounting comparability affects the monitoring role and the risk allocation role of capital markets. We develop the statistical and informational properties of accounting reports under varying degrees of comparability. A perfectly comparable accounting information system enables investors to perfectly infer the difference between any two firms' future cash flows although investors remain uncertain about either firm's cash flow. Comparability alleviates entrepreneurs' moral hazard problem by strengthening the price response to the relative accounting performance, but can induce excessive price risk as well as residual systematic cash flow risk. Unlike the investors (users) who earn their surplus by bearing the residual systematic risk, the entrepreneurs (preparers) do not find perfect comparability desirable. Hence, a standard setter would mandate higher comparability than preferred by preparers, but not perfect comparability.

The potential for exchange-traded futures on recycled materials to improve recycling efficiency

Recycling has substantial environmental and economic benefits, but the recycling industry is relatively inefficient. Approximately half of all recyclable material is not actually recycled, and this inefficiency is economically and environmentally costly. This paper investigates the potential for exchange-traded futures on recycled materials to increase efficiency for the recycling industry by improving the market quality for firms that buy and sell recycled materials. The aim of this study is to statistically analyze a novel data set of prices for recycled materials to demonstrate the potential efficiency gains to introducing exchange-traded futures on recycled materials. The theoretical basis for this financial innovation is numerous previous studies showing that introducing exchange-traded derivatives improves the market quality of the underlying asset. The results of the analysis show that price volatility of recycled materials is generally high, with monthly standard deviation greater than 6%. Price volatility of recycled materials is excessive compared to price volatility of analogous new materials. Also, stock price volatility of waste management firms is positively related to price volatility in recycled materials. Price volatility of recycled materials explains 12% of the excess stock price volatility for waste management firms. This paper includes a practical discussion of proposed specifications and standards for these new financial contracts and plans for further research studies. Along with previous studies on the listing of exchange-traded derivatives, the conclusion of the statistical analysis is that there are large potential economic and environmental benefits to listing exchange-traded futures on recycled materials.

Proposal Evaluation and Contract Performance

It is believed by many academics and practitioners that supplier and vendor selection decisions are often too focused on price, and that this excessive price focus can contribute to subpar performance in the subsequent engagement. Testing this belief is complicated by various challenges, including measuring post-award overall performance and finding variance in decision-making approaches on spend with similar characteristics. We use a novel approach, employing longitudinal U.S. federal government purchasing data, to deal with these issues. We match transactions on spend and stakeholder characteristics to focus our analysis only on comparable, non-trivial decisions. We use whether the chosen bidder was recontracted, given that the opportunity existed, as our measure of overall performance. We find that excessive price focus does lead to worse performance when there is no explicit incentive for or against focusing on price. Interestingly, we find no effect of price-based decision making on performance when selecting based primarily on price requires explicit written justification. Taken together, we infer that price-based bias occurs even when it is not incentivized, but can be muted by making it difficult to select primarily based on price.

Implementing Lean Six Sigma Concepts in Audiology Practices

Implementing Lean Six Sigma Concepts in Audiology Practices

The Application of Competition Law to the Pharmaceutical Sector in the European Union and United Kingdom

This survey article discusses European competition law developments in the pharmaceutical sector from January 2021 through December 2021. Section II reviews developments that continue in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Section III covers cases involving competition from generics and biosimilar suppliers. Section IV deals with recent judgments and cases on excessive pricing. Section V addresses developments on the ongoing issue of parallel trade and distribution. Section VI looks at investigations and recent national enforcement regarding cartels and information exchange. Finally, Section VII provides an overview of the scrutiny of mergers by competition authorities. In response to the COVID crisis, the European Commission (Commission) published a Temporary Framework in April 2020 indicating that certain forms of business cooperation among competitors might exceptionally be allowable in order to address the shortage of essential products and services triggered by the ‘rapid and exponential growth of demand’ engendered by the crisis.1 At the same time, the Commission issued its first comfort letter addressed to ‘Medicines for Europe’ (MfE), a trade association of generic and biosimilar suppliers, supporting MfE’s collective response to address medicine shortages caused by a surging demand for treatment of COVID-19 in hospitals.2

The South African competition agency response to COVID19

Abstract South Africa, as with the rest of the world, faced an unexpected crisis on many levels with the onslaught of the Covid-19 virus. In addition to the human casualties, South Africa experienced a sharp rise in prices for essential goods, such as masks and sanitisers, threatening an economic crisis for South Africa's poor and unemployed. The South African Competition Commission chose to intervene using the regulatory tools available in competition law to tackle excessive pricing. This resulted in the investigation and prosecution of several companies for charging excessive prices for a range of goods and services such as masks, sanitisers and Covid-19 testing services.