Socialist enterprises in Yugoslav agriculture show higher levels of productivity than private producers. The author examines the sources of these differences with total factor productivity estimates based on sectoral aggregate Cobb-Douglas production functions which permit separation of environmental, policy, and organizational effects. The results support the following conclusions: cooperative socialist enterprises are not inherently inefficient and can even outperform private producers; both types of producers were responding to their environment and their differential rates of technological change reflect the different constraints they faced; and socialist enterprises exhibited technology adoption behavior similar to nonsocialist enterprises elsewhere. Copyright 1987 by MIT Press.

There has been considerable controversy about the role of financial factors as determinants of savings in developing countries. This paper explores the importance of two such factors, namely, real interest rate and financial intermediation. Using pooled time- series, cross-section data, a model of savings is estimated for Asia, Latin America, and for the total sample. Particular attention is paid to the error structure in estimation. The results suggest that pooling is not justified. Further, there is no unequivocal support for the effect of either of the two factors; some qualified support is found for Asia but none for Latin America. Copyright 1987 by MIT Press.

Victor L. Bernard, Thomas J. Frecka, Commodity Contracts and Common Stocks as Hedges against Relative Consumer Price Risk, The Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis, Vol. 22, No. 2 (Jun., 1987), pp. 169-188

Abstract. The study and evaluation of internal control requires an auditor to analyze all key controls and control relationships included in each major transaction cycle. Gaining the requisite level of understanding can become a formidable task where complex systems with intricate control relationships, computer‐based accounting systems, or systems with suspected collusion, are involved. This study describes an audit simulation model which is designed to assist auditors in evaluating and documenting the reliability of complex internal control systems. The proposed simulation extends previous ones in two primary respects. First, dependencies between error and control processes can be modeled, which allows an auditor to investigate the effects of collusion on system reliability and final balance error amounts. Second, the simulation is an interactive computer model which can be tailored to different client applications without the need for programming knowledge. An application of the simulation approach in a typical payroll cycle is described. Résumé. L'étude et l'évaluation du contrôle interne nécessitent de la part du vérificateur d'analyser l'ensemble des contrôles‐clé et les liens entre les contrôles compris dans chaque cycle d'opération important. L'obtention du niveau de compréhension requis peut s'avérer une tâche énorme lorsque le praticien étudie des systèmes à interrelations complexes, des systèmes comptables informatisés ou des systèmes où la collusion est soupçonnée. Cette étude décrit un modèle de simulation en vérification destiné à aider les vérificateurs dans l'évaluation et la documentation de la fiabilité de systèmes de contrôle interne complexes. La simulation proposée constitue un prolongement de simulations précédentes sous deux aspects primordiaux. En premier lieu, les dépendances entre les processus d'erreur et de contrôle peuvent être modelées, ce qui permet au vérificateur d'examiner les effets de la collusion sur la fiabilité des systèmes et les montants des erreurs dans les soldes finals. En deuxième lieu, la simulation est un modèle informatisé interactif qui peut être adapté aux diverses applications d'une entreprise sans avoir à posséder des connaissances en programmation. Un exemple d'application de cette approche de simulation, dans le contexte d'un cycle de paye, est présenté.

This paper provides evidence of security analyst (SA) superiority relative to univariate time-series (TS) models in predicting firms' quarterly earnings numbers and shows that SA forecast superiority in our sample is attributable to: (1) better utilization of information existing on the date that TS model forecasts can be initiated, a contemporaneous advantage; and (2) use of information acquired between the date of initiation of TS model forecasts and the date when SA forecasts are published, a timing advantage.

This study examines the association between abnormal returns and five alternative proxies for the market's assessment of unexpected quarterly earnings. We examine the role that measurement error potentially has in multiple regression tests of abnormal returns (occuring around the time of earnings announcements) on an unexpected earnings proxy and other non-earnings variables. The results indicate a potential measurement error interpretation of such multiple regression tests. We examine three procedures which reduce, to an unknown degree, the measurement error problem. Our procedures appear to be more (less) effective at reducing measurement error for small (large) firms and recent (non-recent) forecasts.

Jack L. Knetsch, J. A. Sinden; The Persistence of Evaluation Disparities*, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Volume 102, Issue 3, 1 August 1987, Pages 69