Research on Alliance Decision of Dual-Channel Remanufacturing Supply Chain Considering Bidirectional Free-Riding and Cost-Sharing

This study delves into the formation dynamics of alliances within a closed-loop supply chain(CLSC)that encom-passes a manufacturer,a retailer,and an e-commerce platform.It leverages Stackelberg game for this exploration,contrasting the equilibrium outcomes of a non-alliance model with those of three differentiated alliance models.The non-alliance model acts as a crucial benchmark,enabling the evaluation of the motivations for various supply chain entities to engage in alliance formations.Our analysis is centered on identifying the most effective alliance strategies and establishing a coordination within these partnerships.We thoroughly investigate the consequences of diverse alliance behaviors,bidirectional free-riding and cost-sharing,and the resultant effects on the optimal decision-making among supply chain actors.The findings underscore several pivotal insights:(1)The behavior of alliances within the supply chain exerts variable impacts on the optimal pricing and demand of its members.In comparison to the non-alliance(D)model,the manufacturer-retailer(MR)and manufacturer-e-commerce platform(ME)alliances significantly lower both offline and online resale prices for new and remanufactured goods.This adjustment leads to an enhanced demand for products via the MR alliance’s offline outlets and the ME alliance’s online platforms,thereby augmenting the profits for those within the alliance.Conversely,retailer-e-commerce platform(ER)alliance tends to increase the optimal retail price and demand across both online and offline channels.Under specific conditions,alliance behavior can also increase the profits of non-alliance members,and the profits derived through alliance channels also exceed those from non-alliance channels.(2)The prevalence of bidirectional free-riding behavior largely remains constant across different alliance configurations.Across these models,bidirectional free-riding typically elevates the equilibrium prices in offline channel while negatively affecting the equilibrium prices in other channel.(3)The effect of cost-sharing shows relative uniformity across the various alliance models.Across all configurations,cost-sharing tends to reduce the manufacturer’s profits.Nonetheless,alliances initiated by the manufacturer can counteract these negative impacts,providing a strategic pathway to bolster CLSC profitability.

Carbon Abatement Cost-Sharing Strategy for Electric Power Sector Based on Incentive and Subsidy Mechanisms

The green and low carbon transition and development of the electricity industry is the most crucial task in realizing the“dual-carbon target”,and it is urgent to explore the incentive and subsidy mechanism to promote green electricity consumption and the cost-sharing strategy of carbon reduction,to alleviate the pressure of carbon abatement cost of each subject of the electricity supply chain.Against this background,this paper takes into account the low-carbon subsidies provided by the government and the incentive subsidies for users,and studies the optimal decision-making of each subject in the electricity supply chain,so that each of them can obtain the optimal profit and achieve carbon emission reduction at the same time.Firstly,taking into account the direct power purchase mode of large users and the electricity-selling companies emerging after the reform of the power sales side,we have established a cooperative mechanism for sharing the cost of carbon emission reduction in the electricity supply chain and clarified the relationship between the supply and demand of electricity among the main parties.Subsequently,considering government low-carbon subsidies and user incentive subsidies,the optimal decisionmaking model is established under two scenarios of decentralized and centralized cooperative games in the supply chain,respectively,with the objective of maximizing profits and carbon reduction rates.Solving for the optimal proportion of carbon abatement costs shared by each participant in the electricity supply chain in achieving game equilibrium.Finally,we analyze the role of the government’s low-carbon subsidies,users’incentive subsidies,and other factors on the profit and carbon reduction effect of the electricity industry through the example analysis and further analyze the impact of carbon abatement cost-sharing measures to provide recommendations for the electricity industry to realize low-carbon abatement and make decisions.

Study of the Mode of Cost-sharing by Indi-viduals for Higher Education in China

In recent years, financial crises of higher education have become universal. The policy of cost-sharing by in- dividuals was tried out in many countries. However, empirical studies have shown that the policy has, to a certain de- gree, negative effects for the poor in accepting higher education costs. This paper points out it is the mismatch between tuition fees and the ability to pay that causes the problem. Using two dimensions of group and time to pay, a mode sys- tem, including seven modes for the individual to share the cost of higher education, was constructed. It is suggested that only three modes of pay-immediately have been carried out in China and they all have same shortcomings. To try new modes and exercise different modes synthetically will be meaningful for solving the questions that exist in the current policy.

Chinese Stylized Sterilization:The Cost-sharing Mechanism and Financial Repression

This paper attempts to explain why sterilized intervention was so successful and sustainable in China during the first decade of the 21st century. We argue that the Chinese Government established a sterilization cost-sharing mechanism among the Peoples Bank of China, commercial banks and the househoM sector. On the one hand, Chinese commercial banks have to assume some of the sterilization costs bypurchasing low yield central bank bills and maintaining high levels of required reserves. On the other hand, Chinese households assume some of the sterilization costs by bearing negative real deposit interest rates. The cost- sharing mechanism under financial repression prevents a huge quasi-fiscal loss by the Peoples Bank of China as well as high inflation. However, Chinese households have become victims of this financial repression. Faced with the pressure of changing the growth model from investment-driven to domestic consumption-driven, the interest rate will have to be liberalized eventually, which will, in turn, make sterilized intervention unsustainable.

A COST-SHARING METHOD FOR AN UNCAPACITATED FACILITY LOCATION GAME WITH PENALTIES

This paper considers a variant of the classical facility location game called the uncapacitared facility location game with penalties （UFLGWP）. Unlike the standard UFLG, each client in the UFLGWP is either assigned to an open facility or rejected by paying a penalty. The authors propose a 3-approximate cross-monotonic cost-sharing method for the UFLGWP.

Service-Cost-Sharing Contract Design for a Dual-Channel Supply Chain with Free Riding

This paper considers a dual channel supply chain,where a manufacturer sells a single product through his/her online channel and a traditional retailer,who provides consumers with pre-sale services.The manufacturer's online channel may free-ride the retailer's pre-sale service,which reduces the retailer's desired effort level,and hence may hurt the manufacturer's and the overall supply chain performance.Under both Manufacturer-and Retailer-Stackelberg settings,we study how the manufacturer designs a service-cost-sharing(SCS for brevity)contract to enhance the retailer's service effort level,and how free riding influences two members'optimal decisions.We design an algorithm for determining the two members’optimal decisions under each setting.The three main findings are found:(i)In the Manufacturer-Stackelberg setting,the SCS contract can enhance the retailer's service effort level and eliminate the negative impact incurred by free riding,but can't in the Retailer-Stackelberg setting,(ii)Under the SCS contract,the smaller the fraction of service cost the retailer is requested to share,the more detrimental to the retailer it will be under certain conditions.That is,the phenomenon called"counter-profit cost-sharing"appears,(iii)Both players like to act as a leader if the price competition between the two channels is not relatively very fierce,otherwise they both like to act as a follower.

A Cost-Sharing Scheme for the k-Level Facility Location Game with Penalties

In the k-level facility location problem with penalties,each client will be either serviced or rejected completely.And if the client is planned to be serviced,then it must be connected to a sequence of k different kinds of facilities located in k levels of hierarchy.The total cost including the facility cost,connection cost and penalty cost will be jointly paid by all the clients.In the corresponding game of the k-level facility location problem with penalties,called the k-level facility location game with penalties,the total cost should be allocated to different clients.This work set out a cost-sharing scheme for the k-level facility location game with penalties that is cross-monotonic,competitive,and the approximate cost recovery is 6.

Energy Storage Operation Modes in Typical Electricity Market and Their Implications for China

As the Chinese government proposes ambitious plans to promote low-carbon transition,energy storage will play a pivotal role in China’s future power system.However,due to the lack of a mature electricity market environment and corresponding mechanisms,current energy storage in China faces problems such as unclear operational models,insufficient cost recovery mechanisms,and a single investment entity,making it difficult to support the rapid development of the energy storage industry.In contrast,European and American countries have already embarked on certain practices in energy storage operation models.Through exploration of key issues such as investment entities,market participation forms,and cost recovery channels in both front and back markets,a wealth of mature experiences has been accumulated.Therefore,this paper first summarizes the existing practices of energy storage operation models in North America,Europe,and Australia’s electricity markets separately from front and back markets,finding that perfect market mechanisms and reasonable subsidy policies are among the main drivers for promoting the rapid development of energy storage markets.Subsequently,combined with the actual development of China’s electricity market,it explores three key issues affecting the construction of costsharing mechanisms for energy storage under market conditions:Market participation forms,investment and operation modes,and cost recovery mechanisms.Finally,in line with the development expectations of China’s future electricitymarket,suggestions are proposed fromfour aspects:Market environment construction,electricity price formation mechanism,cost sharing path,and policy subsidy mechanism,to promote the healthy and rapid development of China’s energy storage industry.

Effect of contract choice on upstream carbon emission reduction considering carbon taxation

In order to curb the manufacturer’s product carbon emission levels, the leading retailer usually offers three contracts to the manufacturer, i.e., wholesale-price contract(WC), cost-sharing contract(CC) and revenue-sharing contract(RC). The results of implementing the three contracts are discussed and compared. The results reveal that as long as the government levies carbon taxations, all the three contracts can effectively stimulate the manufacturer to invest in carbon emission reduction. Among the three contracts, RC can achieve the highest level of carbon emission reduction of products and the maximum profits for both the manufacturer and retailer in a supply chain. However, the RC fails to reach the level of the centralized supply chain(CSC), thus it cannot coordinate the supply chain. The supply chain members’ contract choices are consistent. Both members prefer RC to the other two contracts. In order to effectively reduce the manufacturer’s carbon emission levels, the government should impose the highest carbon taxation level under RC, the medium carbon taxation level under CC, the lowest carbon taxation level under WC, and the same carbon taxation level as RC under the CSC.

Value-Added Tax （VAT） on Selected Financial Transactions

This paper deals with the approach to imposing value-added tax （VAT） on financial transactions. The VAT is a highly harmonized consumption tax within the European Union （EU）. VAT operational rules have been set down by the relevant directive of the Council of the EU. Under the directive, it is possible to select either exemption or taxation of financial transactions. Only the first option is permitted in the Czech Republic. Pros and cons of both models are described, in particular, the problems with determining the difference between financial transactions and other similar performance that must always be subject to tax. Potential lower VAT revenue or tax base assessment, as appropriate, seems to be crucial in the case of the taxation of financial transactions.

Vickrey-Clark-Groves-based Method for Eradicating Deceptive Behaviors in Demand Response Transactions

Demand response transactions between electric consumers,load aggregators,and the distribution network manager based on the"combination of price and incentive"are feasible and efficient.However,the incentive payment of demand re-sponse is quantified based on private information,which gives the electric consumers and load aggregators the possibility of defrauding illegitimate interests by declaring false information.This paper proposes a method based on Vickrey-Clark-Groves(VCG)theory to prevent electric consumers and load aggregators from taking illegitimate interests through deceptive behaviors in the demand response transactions.Firstly,a demand response transaction framework with the price-and-incentive com-bined mode is established to illustrate the deceptive behaviors in the demand response transactions.Then,the idea for eradi-cating deceptive behaviors based on VCG theory is given,and a detailed VCG-based mathematical model is constructed follow-ing the demand response transaction framework.Further,the proofs of incentive compatibility,individual rationality,cost minimization,and budget balance of the proposed VCG-based method are given.Finally,a modified IEEE 33-node system and a modified IEEE 123-node system are used to illustrate and validate the proposed method.

A cross-monotonic cost sharing method for the facility location game with service installation costs

In this paper,we consider the metric uncapacitated facility location game with service installation costs. Our main result is an 11-approximate cross-monotonic cost-sharing method under the assumption that the installation cost depends only on the service type.

Smart logistics transformation collaboration between manufacturers and logistics service providers:A supply chain contracting perspective

Intelligent transformation of manufacturers requires smart logistics transformation collaboration,which improves competitiveness.In this study,we construct a Stackelberg game model based on the mutual influence and restriction in the relationship between a manufacturer and a logistics service provider(LSP)undergoing smart logistics transformation.We investigate whether cost-sharing(CS)or revenue-sharing(RS)contracts can coordinate the supply chain and suggest a hybrid CSeRS contract to improve performance.We find that,compared with decentralized options,CS and RS contracts achieve a higher level of smart logistics transformation.While the coordination and effectiveness of CS contracts are superior to those of RS contracts,neither can fully coordinate the supply chain.The proposed hybrid CSeRS contract allows the manufacturer to share the LSP’s costs before the transformation and its partial revenue after transformation,so that the LSP can reduce its service charge,thereby achieving full supply chain coordination.

Optimal batch shipment policy for an imperfect production system under price-,advertisementand green-sensitive demand

In this paper,we consider an imperfect production-inventory system which consists of a single manufacturer and a single retailer.The manufacturer delivers the order quantity to the retailer in some unequal-sized batches.To separate the defective items,the retailer performs an error-free screening process after receiving each delivery from the manufacturer.Shortage in retailer’s inventory is allowed and completely backlogged.The customer demand is influenced by the retail price,advertisement frequency and greening level of the product.The centralized model and the decentralized model based on a Stackelberg gaming approach are developed to determine optimal pricing,advertising and inventory decisions.A cost-sharing contract between the manufacturer and the retailer is implemented,which enhances the environmental performance,advertisement frequency and profitability of the supply chain significantly.The proposed model is illustrated with a numerical example.Sensitivity analysis for some key parameters is carried out and several managerial insights are also highlighted.