• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
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• v.7 no.6
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• pp.145-155
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• 2020

This study analyzes the degree of competition in the oil refinery market in Korea, which is considered an oligopoly market. The price of gasoline and diesel and the quantity of supply are used to identify the market competition. We also analyze whether the oil tax reduction policy has affected market competition. The competitiveness of the market was examined using monthly data from 2008 to 2019. Bresnahan-Lau method was employed to estimate the degree of competition in the oil refinery market, which is frequently used in the industrial studies. The analysis shows that the gasoline and diesel markets seem close to a perfect competitive market. Also, the tax cut has weakened market competition. In other words, the monopolistic power has increased in the market, so consumers have not benefit from the price cuts as much as tax cuts. Although the oil refinery market where four major companies are competing, the government's monitoring and price disclosure system help the market to be highly competitive as much as a perfect competition market. The tax cut, in the high oil price era, has a negative effect on the competition because of an information asymmetry about the price-setting process between suppliers and consumers.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.71 no.1
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• pp.40-44
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• 1985

This study was carried out to know the difference in growth and degree of competition between individuals of thinned and unthinned larch stands. Annual increment and total growth were obtained from the cores sampled at breast height. The correlation between adjacent individual trees was investigated. 1) The correlation between radius growth and basal area was used to estimated the degree of competition among individual trees. 2) In estimating the degree of competition the correlation between two individual trees was better method than others. 3) Up to 9 years after planting no competition between individual trees occurred and the Night positive correlation was shown. 4) High degree of competition was observed at age of 10 years after the planting, as the correlation coefficient was getting smaller. 5) The degree of competition among individual trees increased with increase of the growth of total stand.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.28 no.910
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• pp.1208-1218
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• 2004

The purposes of this study were to examine the alliance success factors (ASF) and the business environments (BE) from the textile companies' viewpoint, to examine the differences in ASF and BE by firm characteristics, and to examine the relationships between BE and ASF. BE included the degree of market competition and the firm's competitive advantage, and firm characteristics included type of business, the number of employees, and length of business operation. Data were obtained from 155 textile companies in Daegu and Gyeongbuk regions in Korea via a questionnaire survey. Four factors including relationship capital, organizational support, alliance management, and alliance performance were extracted from ASF, and resources, product development, and marketing were extracted from the firm's competitive advantage. There were differences in product development by the number of employees and in the degree of market competition by type of business. The degree of market competition had significant relationships with all of ASF while the firm's competitive advantage differed in the relationships.

• Journal of the Korean Operations Research and Management Science Society
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.61-71
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• 2012

Other-regarding preferences (such as trust, reciprocity and altruism) between companies, between consumers and retailers, and between employers and employees are integral elements in determining economic performance. Social trust which is a core element of social capital, especially, is known to reduce transaction costs, help solve collective action problems, and contribute to economic, social, and political development. Therefore, social trust has been given a great deal of attention across an array of academic disciplines for its role in promoting cooperation among individuals and groups, and for its positive influence on economic performance. Most studies describe Korea as a low-trust society than Japan or China. To identify the causes of social trust, this paper focuses on differences of social values (perception on competition and wealth accumulation) in 4 countries (Japan, China, Korea, and United States). Based on World Values Survey data, this paper analyzes effects of the social values on social trust. Social trust was measured by degree to which a respondent thinks that most people can be trusted. Perception on competition was measured by the degree to which a respondent thinks that competition is harmful, and perception on wealth accumulation was done by the degree to which a respondent thinks that wealth can grow so there is enough for everyone. The results showed that social trust was affected by perception on competition and wealth accumulation. A respondent showed higher level of social trust when he (or she) perceived positively competition and wealth accumulation. For enhancing social trust in a country, it is not easy to reduce income inequality and corruption which were reported as causes of social trust by previous studies. Compared to them, social values can be changed more easily by various concrete measures like education and mass-media. Differently from previous studies this paper stresses the concrete measures to enhance social trust in a country.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.38 no.1
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• pp.53-70
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• 2016

This paper examines market concentration and its effect on competition in the Chinese commercial banking market. This study also investigates how changes in competition have affected the financial stability of Chinese commercial banks. To test the competitive conditions, we obtained the H statistic of the Panzar-Rosse model from a revenue function equation. The degree of financial stability is estimated by the Z-score formula. The Chinese banking industry has become an increasingly less concentrated market with an increased number of banks. Along with a decreased market concentration, competition in the Chinese banking industry has improved moderately. However, its market structure is still far from a competitive market. An individual bank's ability to earn higher markup or charge a higher net interest margin contributes to its financial soundness, although a higher degree of market concentration may have negative effect on the financial stability of the entire banking system.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2022.06a
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• pp.18-24
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• 2022

State highway agencies (SHAs) typically apply a competitive procurement procedure to select contractors for their design-bid-build projects. Since the level of competition affects construction bid prices and project outcomes, the Federal Highway Agency (FHWA) suggests SHAs seek ways to improve competition among contractors continuously. However, they rarely conduct an empirical assessment of the current competition level necessary to identify room for improvement. Besides the number of bidders on a project, other factors such as winning or losing rates among the contractors in previous projects can also indicate the degree of competition; only a few contractors may have won the majority of the projects in a specific region. However, few studies have investigated such factors. This paper proposes a network analysis-based approach to evaluating contractor competition levels of highway projects using historical bid tabulation data. The proposed method provides insights into overall competition levels, the determination of competitive contractors, and winning rate distribution among contractors.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.13 no.10
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• pp.405-413
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• 2015

The purpose of this study is to measure the level of competition in the degree of Regional Public Hospital that can provide a basis for establishing an effective management strategy and analysis of the financial performance. Investigation period of the Regional Public Hospital HHI(Herfindahl-Hirschman Index) over three years from 2010, which was unknown until 2012, index and management performance evaluation criteria, a total of 31 were selected as Regional Public Hospital surveyed. In the conclusions, it showed that the most concentrated market with high financial performance, a significant correlation between the degree of local competition and financial indicators showed. The Regional Public Hospital for trends according to the degree of competitive local medical market and therefore is required to establish policies and practices to ensure competitiveness and public interest in the region. The Regional Public Hospital in order to preempt the lead for the competitiveness of other institutions will be considered in the strategy, such as improving medical services and capital investment.

• Molecules and Cells
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• v.37 no.5
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• pp.412-417
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• 2014

It has been reported that exogenously introduced micro-RNA (exo-miRNA) competes with endogenously expressed miRNAs (endo-miRNAs) in human cells, resulting in a detectable upregulation of mRNAs with endo-miRNA target sites (TSs). However, the detailed mechanisms of the competition between exo- and endo-miRNAs remain uninvestigated. In this study, using 74 microarrays that monitored the whole-transcriptome response after introducing miRNAs or siRNAs into HeLa cells, we systematically examined the derepression of mRNAs with exo- and/or endo-miRNA TSs. We quantitatively assessed the effect of the number of endo-miRNA TSs on the degree of mRNA derepression. As a result, we observed that the number of endo-miRNA TSs was significantly associated with the degree of derepression, supporting that the derepression resulted from the competition between exo- and endo-miRNAs. However, when we examined whether the site proficiency of exo-miRNA TSs could also influence mRNA derepression, to our surprise, we discovered a strong positive correlation. Our analysis indicates that site proficiencies of both exo- and endo-miRNA TSs are important determinants for the degree of mRNA derepression, implying that the derepression of mRNAs in response to exo-miRNA is more complex than that currently perceived. Our observations may lead to a more complete understanding of the detailed mechanisms of the competition between exo- and endo-miRNAs and to a more accurate prediction of miRNA targets. Our analysis also suggests an interesting hypothesis that long 3'-UTRs may function as molecular buffer against gene expression regulation by individual miRNAs.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.129-155
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• 2008

The rate of antibiotics prescription for an acute airway infection significantly varies depending upon the diagnosis type, specialty, and the location of the hospital along with many other related factors. The objective of this study is to empirically investigate the possible relationship between the antibiotics prescription rates for an acute airway infection and the degree of competition in the hospital market regions of mainly the providers of primary medical care services such as clinics, internal medicines, pediatrics and otorhinolaryngology department. Using the data from Health Insurance Review and Assessment Service (HIRA) regarding the hospitals' antibiotics prescription rates for the acute airway infection and controlling for selected variables of demand and supply sectors, this study tries to figure out that the degree of competition in the hospital market, regardless of what type of competition indexes we employed, has a statistically significant effect on the variations of antibiotics prescription rate of the clinics in local areas. This result implies that as an economic consideration itself, the change in the degree of competition in the hospital market can play a crucial role influencing the treatment behaviors of the medical doctors. More specifically, this study reveals that as the degree of competition increases the antibiotics prescription rate goes up. This result means that if the market becomes more competitive in a specific region so that it might cause a reduction in doctor's income, doctors with rational decision-making process, recognize that the benefit created from inducing patients' seemingly unnecessary demand for medical care (income effect) would be higher than the costs associated with sustaining their targeted income (substitution effect). It is because that the doctors are more likely to prescribe antibiotics which create relatively higher margins than other medical care services in order to sustain their targeted income when the hospital market competition becomes tighter. Even though this study empirically confirms that antibiotics prescription can be affected by the economic incentives, it still raises following issues as limitations of the study: first issue is about the representativeness of the hospital regions segregated for this study, which might be weak in explaining whether these regions are mutually exclusive in reality. Patients actually consider the quality of services, transportation cost, time costs, and any other related factors choosing the doctors or hospitals, and in that sense, this study rules out 'border-crossing' in using the medical care services. Second issue arises in capturing the data of antibiotics prescription rate. Since we use the average rate for each medical institution, we cannot figure out the average rate for each patient so that we are not able to control for the variation of patients' medical conditions. It is because of the unavailability of data regarding each patient's medical condition from HIRA. Thirdly, since this study mainly analyzes the medical institutions providing primary care such as clinics, internal medicines, pediatrics, and otorhinolaryngology department, it is skeptical of whether those institutions can represent the hospital market in respective regions and truly reflect the degree of competition. It needs to extend the study areas and disease types as well as any micro data for future studies.

• Korean Management Science Review
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.49-60
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• 2000

The proliferation of electronic commerce(EC) has led manufactureres to consider Internet based marketing as a salient candidate for strategic diversification of marketing channel. In this case, each manufacturer can build its own Web store or rent an existing special EC store. Such decision making of ‘build’ or ‘rent’ can be analyzed by a game model which derives the Nash solutions for price and profit considering degree of competition with other competitive manufacturers. In this paper, to overcome the drawbacks of the traditional linear demand function, we first propose a new linear demand function which incorporates not only the price difference between competitive products but the awareness of Web stores perceived by the consumers, then design the game models to analyze the characteristics of three typical types of marketing channel in duopoly market. Based on the Nash solutions of the game models, we analyzed the effect of the degree of competition and Web awareness in selecting the optimal marketing channel.