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Census of manufacturing data is gathered by statistical agency around the world and can be used to benchmark performance within industries or summarize production behavior within industries. In this talk, I present results our laboratory have found for data from the U.S., Japan and Chile. I present some of the modeling challenges and limitations of the data. I focus on the use of nonparametric shape constrained production function estimators and[...]

Production function estimation using nonparametric shape constrained methods can be computationally challenging. For the standard additive error model, y = f(x) + ε, with monotonicity and concavity constraints imposed at each observation, the associated programming problem has a quadratic objective function and linear inequality constraints and thus is easy from a computational complexity point of view. However, the number of constraints grows at the rate n2. Thus, estimation on a[...]

Assumptions motivated by either logical or existing theory can be imposed during model estimation to restrict the feasible region of the parameters. The restrictions, implemented as shape constraints, may not provide any benefits in an asymptotic analysis, but will improve the estimator’s finite sample performance. This paper briefly reviews an illustrative set of research on shape[...]

We develop a new approach to estimate a production function based on the economic axioms of the Regular Ultra Passum law and convex non-homothetic input isoquants. Central to the development of our estimator is stating the axioms as shape constraints and using shape constrained nonparametric regression methods. We implement this approach using data from the Japanese corrugated cardboard industry from 1997-2007. Using this new approach, we find most productive scale size[...]

The annual general research conference on the Japanese economy will be held July 30, 2018 in Tokyo. This years conference will be highlighted by papers by Kevin Hassett and Shuhei Kitamura with outstanding discussants such as Takeo Hoshi and Chad Syverson. Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) will hold their annual research conference on July 31, 2018 following the NBER Japan project meeting. The Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) was founded[...]

The North American Productivity Workshop (NAPW) is a major biennial conference on the topics of productivity, efficiency and performance analysis. We expect a very large number of participants to attend, from a wide international community. Presentations are invited on the theory and application of economics, econometrics, statistics, management science and operational research to various problems in the areas of productivity and efficiency. All popular techniques and methodologies will be represented,[...]

We examine a novel way of imposing shape constraints on a local polynomial kernel estimator. The proposed approach is referred to as Shape Constrained Kernel-weighted Least Squares (SCKLS). We prove uniform consistency of the SCKLS estimator with monotonicity and convexity/concavity constraints and establish its convergence rate. In addition, we propose a test to validate whether shape constraints are correctly specified. The competitiveness of SCKLS is shown in a comprehensive simulation study.[...]

We examine a novel way of imposing shape constraints on a local polynomial kernel estimator. The proposed approach is referred to as Shape Constrained Kernel-weighted Least Squares (SCKLS). We prove uniform consistency of the SCKLS estimator with monotonicity and convexity/concavity constraints and establish its convergence rate. In addition, we propose a test to validate whether shape constraints are correctly specified. The competitiveness of SCKLS is shown in a comprehensive simulation study.[...]

Welcoming environment that offers opportunities to meet and network with scholars, researchers, practitioners present and receive feedback on your research and teaching innovations and explore new ideas. Plenary/keynote sessions and panels by leading POM researchers/practitioners. College Mini-Conferences that bring together scholars with similar research interests. High quality invited research sessions featuring leading researchers, educators and practitioners. [...]

We examine a novel way of imposing shape constraints on a local polynomial kernel estimator. The proposed approach is referred to as Shape Constrained Kernel-weighted Least Squares (SCKLS). We prove uniform consistency of the SCKLS estimator with monotonicity and convexity/concavity constraints and establish its convergence rate. In addition, we propose a test to validate whether shape constraints are correctly specified. The competitiveness of SCKLS is shown in a comprehensive simulation study.[...]

We develop a new approach to estimate a production function based on the economic axioms of the Regular Ultra Passum law and convex non-homothetic input isoquants. Central to the development of our estimator is stating the axioms as shape constraints and using shape constrained nonparametric regression methods. We implement this approach using data from the Japanese corrugated cardboard industry from 1997-2007. Using this new approach, we find most productive scale[...]

Nonparametric estimation methods avoid functional form misspecification. However, the flexibility of nonparametric methods often cause difficulties in interpreting production function estimates. However, microeconomic theory provides additional structure for modeling a production or cost function which can be interpreted as shape constraints. Several nonparametric shape constrained estimators have been proposed that combine the advantage of avoiding functional misspecification with improving the interpretability of estimation results. We will review the recent work[...]

Adaptations done by Andrew L. Johnson ajohnson@tamu.edu Daisuke Yagi d.yagi@tamu.edu Function to compute the SCKLS estimator of the response y on the data matrix X Function NEEDS the quadprog function in Optimization Toolbox  in the computer To run the example files, you NEED the MATLAB code for the Local Polynomial Estimator we developed. y: the response variable — a column vector of length n X: the data matrix of the predictors (of size n*d); For more details, please refer to the[...]

Adaptations done by Andrew L. Johnson ajohnson@tamu.edu Daisuke Yagi d.yagi@tamu.edu Function to compute the (unconstrained) local polynomial regression of the response y on the data matrix X Function NEEDS the quadprog function in Optimization Toolbox  in the computer y: the response variable — a column vector of length n X: the data matrix of the predictors (of size n*d); For more details about Local Polynomial, please refer to the following book: Shape constrained kernel-weighted least squares: Application to production function estimation for[...]

Estimation in shape-constrained statistical models dates back at least as far as Hildreth [(1954); J. Amer. Statist. Assoc., 49, 598--619], who considered the maximum likelihood estimation of production functions under the natural assumption of non-increasing returns (which implies that the production function is concave and nondecreasing). Around the same time, Grenander [(1956); Skand. Aktuarietidskr., 39, 125--153], motivated by the theory of mortality measurement, studied the nonparametric maximum likelihood estimator of[...]

The Finnish electricity market has a competitive energy generation market and a monopolistic distribution system. To regulate the local monopoly power of network operators, the government regulator uses frontier estimation methods to identify excessive distribution costs, taking into account outputs and the operating environment. We describe the new regulatory system developed for the Finnish regulator, which is based on shape constrained nonparametric functional estimation and utilizes panel data to detect[...]

More details to come.[...]

The Finnish electricity market has a competitive energy generation market and a monopolistic distribution system. To regulate the local monopoly power of network operators, the government regulator uses frontier estimation methods to identify excessive distribution costs, taking into account outputs and the operating environment. We describe the new regulatory system developed for the Finnish regulator, which is based on shape constrained nonparametric functional estimation and utilizes panel data to detect[...]

The Finnish electricity market has a competitive energy generation market and a monopolistic distribution system. To regulate the local monopoly power of network operators, the government regulator uses frontier estimation methods to identify excessive distribution costs, taking into account outputs and the operating environment. We describe the new regulatory system developed for the Finnish regulator, which is based on shape constrained nonparametric functional estimation and utilizes panel data to detect[...]

The annual general research conference on the Japanese economy will be held July 31, 2017 in Tokyo. The conference will be jointly sponsored by the NBER, Australia-Japan Research Centre, Center for Advanced Research in Finance, and the Center for Japanese Economy and Business. Last years conference was highlighted by papers by Robert Delke and Hajime Tomura with outstanding discussants such as Nobuhiro Kiyotaki and Stephen Redding. Economic and Social Research[...]

EWEPA is a major biennial conference on the topics of productivity, efficiency and performance analysis. We expect a very large number of participants to attend, from a wide international community. Presentations are invited on the theory and application of economics, econometrics, statistics, management science and operational research to various problems in the areas of productivity and efficiency. All popular techniques and methodologies will be represented, including stochastic frontier analysis, data[...]

I have presented this paper at several conferences recently. Abstract: In this paper we propose selecting an estimator based on a weighting of its in-sample and predictive performance on actual application datasets. For simulated data, we find that our proposed estimator has the lowest weighted errors. For actual data, specifically the 2010 Chilean Annual National Industrial Survey, a Cobb-Douglas specification describes at least 90% as much variance as the best[...]

The INFORMS 2016 Annual Meeting will take place in the Music City Center, the state-of-the-art convention center recently built, and the adjacent Omni Nashville Hotel. The conference will feature plenaries and keynotes; panel discussions; tutorials; and thousands of oral and poster presentations from leading academics, industry experts, students, and representatives of government agencies. This Annual Meeting will provide the attendees numerous opportunities to share expertise and experiences; find prospective employers[...]

The College-Industry Council on Material Handling Education (CICMHE) held its bi-annual business meeting October 15th and 16th in Tucson, Arizona. CICHME is an academic/industry council of the Material Handling Industry (MHI) that promotes increased awareness of material handling and logistics through a variety of educational and research activities. The council is organized into two working committees: Events and Projects. [...]

The Conference on Advances in Big Data Modeling, Computation and Analytics was held at Texas A&M University on September 23 and 24 featuring a variety of academic and industry talks. A highlight of the event was a keynote talk by Michael Jordan, the abstract is included below. On Computational Thinking, Inferential Thinking and Data Science Michael I. Jordan, University of California, Berkeley ABSTRACT The rapid growth in the size and scope of datasets[...]

The Texas Research Data Center (RDC) hostied the 2016 FSRDC Research Conference on September 15, 2016. The Texas RDC is supported by a multi-university consortium involving Texas A&M University, Texas A&M University System, Baylor University, Rice University, The University of Texas at Austin and The University of Texas at San Antonio. The conference was a day of concurrent paper and poster sessions and a keynote presentation. Sessions were based on[...]

The Doctoral dissertation of M.Sc. Xiaofeng Dai in the field of Quantitative Methods of Economics and Management Science “Adapting image processing and clustering methods to productive efficiency analysis and benchmarking: A cross disciplinary approach” was publicly examined at the Aalto University School of Business on Friday, 26 August 2016. The defense of dissertation will be held in Chydenia building (address: Runeberginkatu 22-24, Helsinki, Finland), Stora Enso Hall (3rd floor) starting[...]

The 7th Helsinki Workshop on Efficiency and Productivity Analysis, Helsinki, Finland, August 2016.[...]

Abstract: In this paper we propose selecting an estimator based on a weighting of its in-sample and predictive performance on actual application datasets. For simulated data, we find that our proposed estimator has the lowest weighted errors. For actual data, specifically the 2010 Chilean Annual National Industrial Survey, a Cobb-Douglas specification describes at least 90% as much variance as the best alternative estimators in practically all cases considered.[...]

The summer workshop of Operations Research and Supply Chain Management (OR/SCM) is regularly held annually in Taiwan. This year was the 8th workshop since 2009. Typically three or four invited guest speakers will give us a 3 or 6-hour lecture about the cutting-edge research topics in OR or SCM. This year Andrew Johnson was one of the speakers and talked about, Production Function Estimation: An application of shape constrained functional[...]

Hitotsubashi Presentation[...]

The 2nd Annual Hitotsubashi Summer Institute will take place at Hitotsubashi University. The conference aims to present and discuss research in four general themes: International Trade and FDI, Economic Development, Macroeconomics and Econometrics, and The Economics of Service: Microfoundations, Measurement, and Productivity Policy. August 3 and 4 will focus on The Economics of Service: Microfoundations, Measurement, and Productivity Policy and will be held jointly with The Third Asia KLEMS Database[...]

Japan Project Meeting is jointly sponsored by the NBER, the Center for Advanced Research in Finance, the Center on Japanese Economy and Business, and the Australia-Japan Research Centre. The meeting, organized by Shiro Armstrong, Charles Horioka, Takeo Hoshi, Tsutomu Watanabe, and David Weinstein, will be held at the Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI), Kasumigaseki Building 8F, 3-2-5, Kasumigaseki, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 100-6008, Japan. Program[...]

Students in operations research and industrial engineering typically study linear and non-linear programming. Whereas regression is more commonly used in the fields of statistics and econometrics. This lecture will describe the relationship between the two methodologies.[...]

Seminars organized by the Scheduling Society of Japan featuring Pitu Mirchandani and Stefan Voss Program[...]

Abstract: In this paper we propose selecting an estimator based on a weighting of its in-sample and predictive performance on actual application datasets. For simulated data, we find that our proposed estimator has the lowest weighted errors. For actual data, specifically the 2010 Chilean Annual National Industrial Survey, a Cobb-Douglas specification describes at least 90% as much variance as the best alternative estimators in practically all cases considered. Conference Website[...]

Abstract: In this paper we propose selecting an estimator based on a weighting of its in-sample and predictive performance on actual application datasets. For simulated data, we find that our proposed estimator has the lowest weighted errors. For actual data, specifically the 2010 Chilean Annual National Industrial Survey, a Cobb-Douglas specification describes at least 90% as much variance as the best alternative estimators in practically all cases considered. Presentation Slides http://www.napw2016.com/index.html[...]

Production functions are economic models to characterize the relationship between resources consumed and output produced for production processes. Economic theories of production rarely provides guidance for a particular functional form; however, many economic theories provide shape restrictions on the production function. The specific shape restrictions vary across production processes. This talk will provide an overview of the most common shape restrictions and motivation for their use.[...]

Establishment level manufacturing data are gathered from several countries around the world. These datasets are gathered by the Census Bureau of the respective countries and is an exhaustive Census of all establishments in some years. For example the U.S. Census Bureau performs a full Census of all manufacturing establishments in years ending in 2 and 7 and performs a survey sampling only 15 percent of establishments in other years. This[...]

Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) has been widely used for performance evaluation. In July 2016, Nanjing Audit University will host The DEA International Conference in Nanjing, China. The keynote speakers are Chiang Kao, Jesus Pastor, and David Sherman.[...]

The North American Productivity Workshop (NAPW) is a Biennial workshp that brings together academic scholars and practitioners in the field of productivity and efficiency analysis. The 9th North American Productivity Workshop (NAPW) will be held in Quebec City, Canada, on June 15 - 18, 2016, at the Hotel Le Concorde-Quebec City.[...]

This workshop brings together thought-leaders from the Civil, Mechanical and Industrial Engineering academic research communities to define a roadmap for Broader Impact innovations for CMMI. This 1.5-day workshop will include academic researcher leaders who have demonstrated innovation in Broader Impact activities, creating measurable economic, human capital, and societal value through their research. People in positions who can advance and promulgate the vision from this workshop will also be invited[...]

Nonparametric shape constraints, such as monotonicity, convexity or log-concavity, offer statisticians the potential of freedom from restrictive parametric assumptions, while still permitting fully automatic procedures. In this sense, they combine the best of both the parametric and nonparametric worlds. Fundamental statistical problems such as density estimation and regression problems will be treated, along with more exotic questions related to, for example, semiparametric inference. Inference under shape constraints is a core[...]

The College-Industry Council on Material Handling Education (CICMHE) will holds its bi-annual business meeting May 14th and 15th in Atlanta, Georgia. CICHME is an academic/industry council of the Material Handling Industry (MHI) that promotes increased awareness of material handling and logistics through a variety of educational and research activities. The council is organized into two working committees: Events and Projects. At this meeting we will be welcoming 5 new members.[...]

Workshop organized by James Long and Tanya Garcia and feature speakers such as Aurore Delaigle, Ray Carroll, and Ying Wei. Talks emphasize nonparametric methods and measurement error with several interesting applications. http://www.stat.tamu.edu/measurement-error-workshop/[...]

MODEX is the greatest supply chain show on earth feature 850 leading manufacturing and supply chain providers gathered to showcase their latest and greatest solutions hosted by the Material Handling Industry (MHI). This is the 3rd Modex show which have all been held in Atlanta Georgia. Modex is held in even years while ProMat is held in odd years in Chicago. The College-Industry Council on Material Handling Education (CICMHE)[...]

Bodhi Sen is an Associate Professor in the Statistics Department at Columbia University. One of his research interests is nonparametric functional estimation with shape restrictions. He introduces his work by saying, "Nonparametric function estimation is mostly concerned with understanding the structure (trend/pattern) in the data without making strong parametric assumptions on its form. Most estimation procedures for a nonparametric function (e.g., kernel smoothing), be it a regression function or a probability[...]

Healthcare costs are higher in the U.S. then anywhere else in the world. A significant portion of the costs are generated in hospitals. We investigate both the efficiency and the effectiveness of U.S. community hospitals using the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality’s Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project 2009-2011 Nationwide Inpatient Sample, a data set which contains all discharges from an approximate 20% sample of hospitals. Here efficiency is the[...]

This paper proposes a unifying model and estimator we call Shape Constrained Kernel-weighted Least Squares (SCKLS). We show the relationship between the SCKLS estimator and both the Convex Nonparametric Least Squares (CNLS) and Du’s estimators. Specifically, the SCKLS estimator converges to the CNLS estimator as the bandwidth goes to zero. We compare the performance of the three estimators (SCKLS, CNLS, and Du’s estimator) via Monte Carlo simulations.[...]

The Workshop 2015 -Advances in DEA Theory and Applications was held in Roppongi (Tokyo) Japan on December 1st and 2nd and hosted by Kaoru Tone and the Graduate Research Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS - 政策研究大学院大学). This two-day workshop included 13 paper on Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) will provide the basis for Professor Tone's new book "Advances in DEA Theory and Applications: with Examples in Forecasting Models". It featured presentation by[...]

The Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) is an international society for practitioners in the fields of operations research (OR) and management science. Informs held their annual meeting November 1-4 in Philadelphia, PA. The conference had more than 5,000 attendees and 1,000 sessions.[...]

The Finnish electricity market has a competitive energy generation market and a monopolistic transmission system. To regulate the local monopoly power of network operators, the government regulator uses frontier estimation methods. We describe the new regulatory system developed for the Finnish regulator, which is based on the method Stochastic semi-Nonparametric Envelopment of Data (StoNED) and utilizes panel data to detect the excessive costs from random noise.[...]

The College Industry Council on Material Handling Education (CICMHE) is a group of 16 academic and 8 industry members that work to increase awareness, understanding, exploration, and development of material handling and logistics through projects and events. CICMHE meet in Jacksonville as part of the MHI's annual conference. The two-day event resulted in a set of projects MHI will fund to promote material handling and logistics education along with allowing considering[...]

  ADBI hosted the annual National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) Japan Project conference, featuring cutting edge economic research on Japan. This year’s papers very much focused on microeconomics, with a number of studies using a “natural experiment” approach to analyze diverse phenomena, including firms’ decisions to use American-style or Japanese-style import procurement, women’s childbirth and employment decisions, and changes in risk assessment and the location of firms after the Great[...]

This presentation describes the graduate and undergraduate material handling course taught at Texas A&M. Particular emphasis is given to the content description and the case study project that pairs 2 undergraduate and 2 graduate students in teams to participate in MHI's case study competition.   Presentation[...]

This presentation describes some common research topics in industrial engineering and operations research. It focuses on the Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at Texas A&M University and my laboratory. Its purposes is to further the understanding between Osaka University and Texas A&M.   Presentation[...]

The largest conference in the field of efficiency and productivity analysis is the European Workshop on Efficiency and Productivity Analysis (EWEPA) XIV. This conference is held in odd years and the North American Productivity Workshop (NAPW) is held in even years. This years conference was help from June 16-18 in Helsinki, Finland. I was invited to give a plenary talk with Chris Parmeter. The topic was  Nonparametric smoothing and shape constraints. Slides[...]

Informs Annual Meeting will be held Nov 1-4 in Philadelphia Pennsylvania. The DEA cluster will have 7 session. We look forward to seeing all of you at Informs.[...]

Chia-Yen Lee (2012 graduate of the lab) published the fifth paper from his dissertation. In a previous paper, Lee and Johnson (2014), we define effectiveness as a way to distinguish between production performance and sales performance. In this paper we extend the concept to a panel data setting and analyze how efficiency and effectiveness evolve. Abstract Sales fluctuations lead to variations in the output levels affecting technical efficiency measures of operations when[...]

This presentation was given at the European Workshop for Efficiency and Productivity Analysis (EWEPA XIV) as the plenary talk, June 16, 2015 in Helsinki Finland. I focus on the benefits of shape constraints to improve the finite sample performance of nonparametric estimators. Existing estimators and new estimators are presented that combine kernel smoothing techniques with axiomatic functional estimation.   EWEPAPlenary5[...]

  This file contains the set of GAMS codes that was developed for a GAMS tutorial at EWEPA XIV held in June 2015 in Helsinki Finland. Please see the codes inside the zip file.   Tutorial (files)[...]

  This is the code for Constrained Weighted Bootstrap with y-space objective function written by Daisuke Yagi (d.yagi@tamu.edu). Constrained Weighted Bootstrap is developed by Hall & Huang (2001) and Du et al. (2013). ExperimentSettings.m file is the summary of the setting of Monte Carlo Simulation. You can run this file after you set every parameters for the experiments. If you want to use the real data, then you can use LLKwSCtest.m directly, which is the main code for[...]

  This is the code for Kernel Weighted Convex Regression written by Daisuke Yagi (d.yagi@tamu.edu). We have two versions of KWCR: fixed bandwidth and variable bandwidth (KNN). ExperimentSettings.m file is the summary of the setting of Monte Carlo Simulation. You can run this file after you set every parameters for the experiments. If you want to use the real data, then you can use LLKwSCtest.m directly, which is the main code for the whole[...]

The first version of this code was created by Bodhisattva Sen at Columbia University. What is presented here is a slightly adapted version to aid in the estimation of CNLS. Adaptations done by Andrew L. Johnson ajohnson@tamu.edu Jose Luis Preciado jpreciado@tamu.edu Daisuke Yagi d.yagi@tamu.edu Function to compute the CONVEX Regression of the response y on the data matrix x Function NEEDS the quadprog function in Optimization Toolbox  in the computer y: the response variable — a column vector of length[...]

  Soondo Hong (a 2010 graduate of the lab) continues to develop extension to his dissertation work which modeled and qualified picker blocking in narrow aisle order picking systems. He has now extend this work to consider bucket brigade operations. This paper addresses some of the unique challenges of the bucket brigade setting. Abstract This paper we model and quantify picker blocking in bucket brigade order picking systems (OPSs). Bucket brigades improves throughput and[...]

  This file contains the set of GAMS codes for DEA that was developed for a GAMS tutorial at EWEPA XIII held in June 2013 in Helsinki Finland. Please see the introduction of codes inside the zip file.   Download  [...]

    This file contains the set of GAMS codes for CNLS that was developed for a GAMS tutorial at EWEPA XIII held in June 2013 in Helsinki Finland. Please see the introduction of codes inside the zip file.   Download[...]

Brandon Pope's (2011 graduate of the lab) dissertation is about modeling incentives in healthcare systems. This paper is a critical component where he explores the dependencies in health behaviors (diet, exercise and smoking) modeling as binary decisions and explores modeling the dependence through either joint attraction functions or probabilistic dependence. We find some evidence of superior performance of the joint attraction function approach for our data. Abstract The prediction and control of[...]

The first version of this code was created by Bodhisattva Sen at Columbia University. What is presented here is a slightly adapted version to aid in the estimation of CNLS. Adaptations done by Andrew L. Johnson ajohnson@tamu.edu Function to compute the CONVEX Regression of the response y on the data matrix x Function NEEDS the PACKAGE cvx (see http://cvxr.com/cvx/) to be installed in the computer y: the response variable -- a column vector of length n x:[...]

To run BDMCMC with the Tarlac rice dataset Place all contents of this package on the same folder and make it the active folder in Matlab. BDMCMC_Dummy_Trend_Mono runs the monotonicity-constrained dummy time trend model. BDMCMC_Linear_Trend_Mono runs the monotonicity-constrained linear time trend model. RiceIM contains the dataset scaled to input means (used on the estimation process). Rice contains the dataset in its original units of measurement. This is a subset of the dataset used in Villano,[...]

This presentation discusses a method that incorporates the latest advances in the Bayesian constrained regression literature offering an alternative to the current Least Squares-based and Kernel Regression-based Stochastic frontier constrained estimation methods, both in terms of runtime and of data capacity. Although monotonicity constraints can be applied in a simple manner by the specification of sign constraints on the regression coefficients in both parametric and nonparametric settings, estimation of concavity-constrained[...]

Informs held its Annual meeting in San Francisco this year from November 9-12. The DEA track had 8 invited session and 4 contributed sessions, with more than 40 papers presented. This is largest the track has been in the past 4 years. The Informs meeting will be held in Philadelphia from November 1-4. I hope everyone will be able to join again. If you are interested in presenting in the DEA[...]

After many years in development, the DEA Journal published its first issue which was available at the NOW Publishing booth at Informs. This provides another field specific outlet for efficiency and productivity papers. The mission of the new journal is to publish the best and most insightful papers on the theory and practice of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA). The DEA Journal is the official journal of the International Data Envelopment Analysis[...]

The College Industry Council on Material Handling Education (CICMHE) is a group of 15 academic and 8 industry members that work to increase awareness, understanding, exploration, and development of material handling and logistics through projects and events. CICMHE meet in San Diego as part of the MHI's annual conference. The two-day event resulted in a set of projects MHI will fund to promote material handling and logistics education along with allowing[...]

This paper develops a method to investigate the effects of technical change on marginal abatement costs (MAC). This was the second chapter of Maethee Mekaroonreung Ph.D. dissertation. The research was motivated by a paper by Erin Baker that suggested that technical change does not always reduce MAC. In their analysis they made parametric assumptions to investigate a variety of models relating technical change and MAC. In this paper we used[...]

This paper was written in 2010 and appeared on-line in 2011. It has taken Annals of Operations Research more than 3 years to publish the paper. This paper combines a deterministic contextual variables model with a Malmquist productivity analysis. The methods are applied to Ohio school data. See the abstract below for more details. This paper was written with John Ruggiero one of the most widely cited researchers in the area[...]

Bayesian StoNED or Multi-variate Bayesian Convex Regression with inefficiency: Two sides of the same coin. Bayesian methods allow researchers to simulate regression models to investigate the effects of prior distributional assumptions and modeling restrictions on posterior estimates of model parameters. Here we try to develop a Bayesian version of Stochastic Nonparametric Envelopment of Data (StoNED). There are strong similarities between StoNED and Multi-variate Bayesian Convex Regression (MBCR) proposed by Hannah and[...]

The International Material Handling Research Colloquium (IMHRC) purpose is to share world-class research accomplishments, projects and trends in the field of material handling, facility logistics and intralogistics. It aims to facilitate dialog and collaborative research by teams of university researchers on leading edge topics of interest to end users as well as technology and solutions providers. The Colloquium operates on an immersion philosophy of complete participation by all participants in[...]

Stochastic nonparametric approach to efficiency analysis: A Unified Framework Efficiency analysis is an essential and extensive research area that provides answers to such important questions as: Who are the best performing firms and can we learn something from their behavior? What are the sources of efficiency differences across firms? Can efficiency be improved by government policy or better managerial practices? Are there benefits to increasing the scale of operations? These are[...]

The North American Productivity Workshop (NAPW) is a biennial conference held in North America in even years and its sister conference European Workshop on Efficiency and Productivity Analysis (EWEPA) is held in odd years. It brings together researchers in economics, operations research, management science, engineering and a wide variety of application areas to discuss the latest innovations in efficiency and productivity research. The 9th NAPW was held in Ottawa Canada[...]

Affective September 1st 2014, Andrew Johnson is the department editor for facilities and production logistics at the IIE Transactions. As the flagship journal of the Institute of Industrial Engineers, IIE Transactions publishes original high-quality papers on a wide range of topics of interest to industrial engineers who want to remain current with the state-of-the-art technologies. The refereed journal aims to foster the engineering community by publishing papers with a strong[...]

10 Years of the World Management Survey: Lessons and Next Steps How Much Does Management Affect Productive Performance? New Insights from a semi-nonparametric Analysis of the World Management Survey Abstract It remains a challenge to demonstrate the effects of management for improving performance beyond simply relying on case studies and anecdotal evidence. The World Management Survey presents a unique opportunity to look more closely at the relationship between management and performance. This[...]

Department of Service and Information Economy - Helsinki, Finland Analysis and Control of Batch Order Picking Processes Considering Picker Blocking Abstract: Order picking operations play a critical role in the order fulfillment process of distribution centers (DCs). Picking a batch of orders is often favored when customers’ demands create a large number of small orders, since the traditional single order picking process results in low utilization of order pickers and significant[...]

Group for the Advancement of Revealed Preferences - Kortrijk, Belgium Orthogonality conditions for identification of joint production technologies Axiomatic nonparametric approach to the estimation of stochastic distance functions Abstract: The classic econometric approach treats productivity as a residual term of the standard microeconomic production model. Critics of this approach argue that productivity shocks correlate with the input factors that are used as explanatory variables of the regression model, which causes an[...]

I recently visited Professor Tone at National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS) in Roppongi Tokyo with my daughter Juila.[...]

Finance Research Group Seminar - Belfast, Northern Ireland Benchmarking managerial performance: a Stochastic semi-Nonparametric Envelopment of Data Approach The Finnish electricity market has a competitive energy generation market and a monopolistic transmission system. To regulate the local monopoly power of network operators, the government regulator uses frontier estimation methods (e.g., Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) and nonparametric Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA)) to identify excessive transmission costs, taking into account outputs and the[...]

The production of electricity from coal also produces SO2 and NOx. The EPA cap and trade program has been used to regulate NOx admissions.  We use a production economics approach to estimate the actual cost to producers to reduce NOx emissions. paper[...]

Finnish electricity distribution regulator has adopted Stochastic nonparametric envelopment of z -data (StoNEZD) to benchmark costs from 2012 onwards. StoNED integrates the two most popular efficiency analysis methods DEA and SFA to a unified framework. paper[...]

Department of Business and Economics Regulating Local Monopolies in Electricity Transmission: A Real-world Application of the StoNED Method Abstract: The Finnish electricity market has a competitive energy generation market and a monopolistic transmission system. To regulate the local monopoly power of network operators, the government regulator uses frontier estimation methods (e.g., Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) and nonparametric Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA)) to identify excessive transmission costs, taking into account outputs and[...]