Understanding the Social Licence of Carbon Farming in the Australian Rangelands

Carbon farming has expanded in Australia’s rangelands over recent years, incentivised under the Australian Government’s Emissions Reduction Fund. While this has largely been driven by economic benefits for landholders, the long-term viability of the carbon farming industry depends on its ability to obtain and maintain a social licence to operate in affected communities. Using a combination of survey, interview and focus group methods, involving key stakeholders in far-western New South Wales (NSW), this study reveals that the greatest threat to the social licence of carbon farming is the lack of confidence in governance related to policy complexity and uncertainty. Procedural fairness is a relative strength because of the involvement of trusted community members, and the trust-building strategies employed by the aggregators who recruit landholders to carbon farming. Perceptions of distributional fairness are strengthened by the benefits beginning to flow through rangeland communities, but are weakened by concerns around the equity of eligibility and the land management rules. A focus on participatory policy development, aligning rules with local values and local-scale trust building, is required in order to enhance the social licence for carbon farming in the NSW rangelands.

THE NORMS OF ALGORITHMIC CREDIT SCORING

This article examines the growth of algorithmic credit scoring and its implications for the regulation of consumer credit markets in the UK. It constructs a frame of analysis for the regulation of algorithmic credit scoring, bound by the core norms underpinning UK consumer credit and data protection regulation: allocative efficiency, distributional fairness and consumer privacy (as autonomy). Examining the normative trade-offs that arise within this frame, the article argues that existing data protection and consumer credit frameworks do not achieve an appropriate normative balance in the regulation of algorithmic credit scoring. In particular, the growing reliance on consumers’ personal data by lenders due to algorithmic credit scoring, coupled with the ineffectiveness of existing data protection remedies has created a data protection gap in consumer credit markets that presents a significant threat to consumer privacy and autonomy. The article makes recommendations for filling this gap through institutional and substantive regulatory reforms.

Fairness views and political preferences: evidence from a large and heterogeneous sample

We elicit distributional fairness ideals of impartial spectators using an incentivized experiment in a large and heterogeneous sample of the German population. We document several empirical facts: (i) egalitarianism is more popular than efficiency- and maxi-min ideals; (ii) females are more egalitarian than men; (iii) men are relatively more efficiency minded; (iv) left-leaning voters are more likely to be egalitarians, whereas right-leaning voters are more likely to be efficiency-minded; and (v) young and high-educated participants hold different fairness ideals than the rest of the population. Moreover, we show that fairness ideals predict preferences for redistribution and intervention by the government, as well as actual charitable giving, even after controlling for a range of covariates. This paper thus contributes to our understanding of the underpinnings of voting behavior and ideological preferences and to the literature that links laboratory measures and field behavior.

Assessment on Distributional Fairness of Physical Rehabilitation Resource Allocation: Geographic Accessibility Analysis Integrating Google Rating Mechanism

Identifying and treating co-existing diseases are essential in healthcare for the elderly, while physical rehabilitation care teams can provide interdisciplinary geriatric care for the elderly. To evaluate the appropriateness of demand and supply between the population at demand and physical rehabilitation resources, a comparative analysis was carried out in this study. Our study applied seven statistical indices to assess five proposed methods those considered different factors for geographic accessibility analysis. Google ratings were included in the study as a crucial factor of choice probability in the equation for calculating the geographic accessibility scores, because people’s behavioral decisions are increasingly dependent on online rating information. The results showed that methods considering distances, the capacity of hospitals, and Google ratings’ integrally generated scores, are in better accordance with people’s decision-making behavior when they determine which resources of physical rehabilitation to use. It implies that concurrent considerations of non-spatial factors (online ratings and sizes of resource) are important. Our study proposed an integrated assessment method of geographical accessibility scores, which includes the spatial distribution, capacity of resources and online ratings in the mechanism. This research caters to countries that provide citizens with a higher degree of freedom in their medical choices and allows these countries to improve the fairness of resource allocation, raise the geographic accessibilities of physical rehabilitation resources, and promote aging in place.

Coordination of Supply Chains with Competing Manufacturers considering Fairness Concerns

In this study, we examined the contract coordination between manufacturers with peer-induced and distributional fairness concerns. A revenue sharing contract was introduced to coordinate a competitive supply chain, in which the manufacturers have different fairness concerns based on centralized decision-making in terms of fairness neutrality. Then, we constructed two game models—the manufacturer’s peer-induced fairness concern model and the manufacturer’s distributional fairness concern model and analyzed the influence of a revenue sharing contract on the pricing decisions and profit distribution of a competitive supply chain considering fairness concerns. The results show that there is a revenue-sharing contract parameter in both the peer-induced and distributional fairness concerns of manufacturers, which can effectively realize Pareto improvements in a supply chain. Meanwhile, the retail and wholesale prices both decreased with the increase in the revenue-sharing ratio between retailers and manufacturers, and the profits of retailers decreased accordingly, but the overall utility of manufacturers and supply chains improved markedly. Moreover, the coordination condition is closely related to the level of fairness concerns of the manufacturers and the competition intensity between two manufacturers. The sharing contract designed in this study can not only effectively improve the utility of retailers and manufacturers but also enhance the total utility of the channel to ensure that node enterprises have long-term, stable, and cooperative relationships and to strengthen the overall competitiveness of the supply chain.

Pricing Decisions in Closed-Loop Supply Chains with Peer-Induced Fairness Concerns

The importance of behavioral factors in the process of decision making is widely recognized in literature and practice. The aim of this paper is to examine the influence of collectors’ multiple fairness concerns on pricing decisions in a closed-loop supply chain (CLSC), which consists of one manufacturer, one retailer, and two collectors. Specifically, the collectors are concerned with both distributional fairness and peer-induced fairness. By considering fairness concerns and selecting Nash bargain solution as the reference point of fairness distribution, this paper studies the equilibrium solution of Stackelberg game models in the CLSC with symmetrical and asymmetrical information of fairness concerns, respectively. The results show that in the former case, distributional fairness is always at the cost of sacrificing the manufacturer’s profits, which is a means of gaining more benefits for the collectors. In the latter case, the profits of both the manufacturer and the collectors turn into a loss. No matter in which case, the collector who is concerned with both distributional and peer-induced fairness is always in a passive position. Generally speaking, whether the decision maker concerns fairness and whether it can be perceived by the CLSC members both impact the members’ decision making. Additionally, the utilities of both the manufacturer and the collectors receive Pareto improvement under the proposed incentive contract.

How can the spatial equity of health services be defined and measured? A systematic review of spatial equity definitions and methods

Background Spatial equity analysis has been carried out in a variety of contexts and on a range of health services. However, there is no clear consensus on spatial equity definitions or measures. This review seeks to summarize spatial equity definitions and methods of analysis. Methods We systematically searched two electronic databases and six journals for papers providing a definition of spatial equity or performing a spatial equity analysis on health services. Studies were classified according to four definition themes: (1) distributional fairness; (2) needs-based distribution; (3) focus on outcomes or causes and (4) none provided. Results Seventy-five studies met our inclusion criteria. Sixty-one papers provided a definition of spatial equity, while a further 14 papers analysed the spatial equity of health services without providing a definition. Most authors used a needs-based definition of spatial equity, while the Gini coefficient was the most commonly used equity measure. However, analysis approaches varied according to the definition provided by each paper. Among the needs-based definitions, spatial autocorrelation was the most common spatial equity measure. Conclusions To our knowledge, this is the first systematic review summarizing spatial equity definitions and analysis methods. A lack of consensus on definitions and measures persists. The classification of measures according to definition themes makes this review a useful tool for planning and interpreting spatial equity investigations. Future research should examine the impact different measures of accessibility and need have on the results of spatial equity research.

Patents on Pharmaceutical Products in Fair International Economic Relations

Intellectual property right (IPR) negotiations during the Uruguay Round (UR) negotiations were characterized by significant disagreement between developed and developing countries. For developing countries, the WTO system might have gone too far on patents. It is particularly true for essential medicines critical to human life and health. The Agreement on Trade-related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) of the WTO includes a few provisions on special and differential treatment (SDT) of developing countries. However, these do not specifically mention pharmaceutical products. Patentability of pharmaceutical products may be analysed in light of fairness. From the viewpoint of distributional fairness, this article derives several policy suggestions for pharmaceutical products in fair international economic relations.

Redesigning the Welfare State

Since the beginnings of the welfare state, Aotearoa New Zealand has lacked a principled, comprehensive and consistent system for indexing social assistance to movements in consumer prices and/or wages. This deficiency applies not only to cash transfers but also to in-kind benefits. The absence of a robust and durable indexation regime is no accident. It reflects, among other things, an unwillingness of governments to determine an acceptable minimum standard of living for citizens and then protect, if not enhance, this standard over time. No doubt, the fiscal implications of a more consistent approach to indexation have loomed large in the political calculus. Yet if the current and future governments are to meet ambitious child poverty reduction targets and ensure greater distributional fairness, a new framework for indexation is essential. This article discusses the nature and purpose of indexation, the principles and other considerations that should inform the design of an indexation regime, the policy options available, and how a durable and defensible policy framework might be secured.