House price convergence: Evidence from US state and metropolitan area panels

We study house price convergence in panels of US states and metropolitan areas. Our analysis is centered on three issues. First, we test whether the US house prices are converging over time using log t convergence test by Phillips and Sul (2007). The test results suggest that there is little evidence of overall convergence. The second issue is to investigate the possibility of a convergence club where the cross-sectional dispersion of house prices of the club members decreases over time. We utilize a clustering algorithm and the results support that there is strong evidence of multiple convergence clubs. Finally, we examine the general characteristics of the various convergence and divergence subgroups as well as some important driving forces of convergence clubs. We find that housing supply regulation together with climate are important determinants of convergence club membership.     

When a Sinner Does a Good Deed: The Path‐Dependence of Reputation Repair

This study examines how shareholders will interpret a socially desirable action taken by firms with a damaged corporate reputation status. We first explain theoretically why shareholders’ path‐dependent judgments of a tainted firm increase the likelihood of shareholders making less favourable judgments of the firm's socially desirable actions. We then test the theoretical predictions using a sample of Chinese listed firms that were sanctioned for securities fraud and subsequently made donations to the 2008 Sichuan earthquake relief funds. We find that the shareholders evaluate the donations made by fraud‐tainted firms less favourably than those made by firms that have not been sanctioned for fraud. Furthermore, the shareholders’ evaluations of the donations made by fraud‐tainted firms is less favourable if the firms have committed more serious fraud and undertaken fewer positive remedial actions in the post‐fraud period. Overall, our evidence demonstrates that shareholders’ path‐dependent judgments of fraud‐tainted firms constitute a major obstacle that constrains the effectiveness of reputation repair.     

Reputation und Unternehmenserfolg

About 30 years ago the first scientific papers were published that address the construct of corporate reputation from the perspective of management science. This article aims at providing a comprehensive review of the state-of-the-art of corporate reputation research. First, we discuss conceptualizations and operationalizations of this intangible asset. Second, we review studies which examine the relationship between corporate reputation and stakeholder behavior respectively firm performance. We find that a superior corporate reputation influences the behavior of stakeholders favorably and thus has a positive impact on the (financial) success of the firm. Finally, we present some hints for future research.     

Platform Pricing Structure and Moral Hazard

We study pricing by a two‐sided platform when it faces moral hazard on the sellers' side. In doing so, we introduce an equilibrium notion of platform reputation in an infinite horizon model. We find that with transaction fees only, the platform cannot eliminate the loss of reputation induced by moral hazard. If registration fees can be levied, moral hazard can be overcome. The registration fee determines the participation threshold of sellers and extracts them, whereas (lower) transaction fees provide incentives for good behavior. This provides a motivation for platforms to use registration fees in addition to transaction fees.     

The relationship between gender,personal experience,and perceptions of sexual harassment in the workplace

In this study 352 working men and women responded to a questionnaire about their perceptions of what constituted sexual harassment. It was hypothesized that females, compared to males, would view ambiguous sexually oriented work behavior as more harassing. It was also hypothesized that those who had been a target of sexual harassment, compared to those who had not been a target, would view ambiguous sexually oriented work behavior as more harassing. Both hypotheses were supported. Additionally, after taking into account the effect of having been a target of sexual harassment, the effect of gender on perceptions of sexual harassment was found to be spurious. Implications for management and future research are discussed. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 1993 Southern Management Association meeting in New Orleans.     

Regulation of road accident externalities when insurance companies have market power

Accident externalities that individual drivers impose on one another via their presence on the road are among the most important external costs of road transport. We study the regulation of these externalities when insurance companies have market power. Some of the results we derive have close resemblance to the earlier literature on externality regulation with market power in aviation and private roads, but there are important differences, too. Using analytical models, we compare the first-best public welfare-maximizing outcome with a private profit-maximizing monopoly, and oligopoly. We find that insurance companies will internalize some of the externalities, depending on their degree of market power. We derive optimal insurance premiums, and regular parametric taxes as well as “manipulable” ones that make the companies set socially optimal premiums. The latter take into account that the firm tries to exploit knowledge of the tax rule applied by the government. Finally, we also study the taxation of road users rather than that of firms.     

Effort reduction of employer‐to‐employer changers: Empirical evidence from football

We investigate changes in effort investment of employees who still fulfill a contract with their current employer but already signed a follow‐up contract with a new employer (employer‐to‐employer change). Because effort and outside contract assignments are hard to measure in firms, we use running data from professional football (n = 26,577) to proxy effort decisions. Fixed effect regressions reveal a statistically significant but weak reduction in a player's effort after signing a follow‐up contract with a new club. Because we find a statistically significant effort reduction in public sports, this effect might be even larger in less transparent labor markets.     

Conformist innovation: an institutional logics perspective on how HR executives construct business school reputations

In this paper, we explore whether Legge’s classic 1970s criticism of human resource (HR) executives as ‘conformist innovators’ is still relevant. Drawing on institutional logics, we analyse HR managers’ rationales for choosing particular university business schools to provide senior executive development. Our mixed-methods study demonstrates that senior HR managers socially construct and enact business school reputations by drawing on strategic rationales. These rationales are embedded in societal, field and organizational logics, especially the extant reputational rankings of international business schools and an ‘ideal’ template of elite business schools. We find that these rationales, and the decisions they evince, tend to confirm the traditional picture of conformist innovation among HR executives. We discuss the implications for the reputation of HR as a profession, their employers and business schools.     

Adverse selection and reputation in a world of cheap talk

Internet message boards are inherently a world of cheap talk due to the anonymity of message authors. This paper investigates whether a pecuniary reputation system influences the adverse selection problem endemic to message boards. First, we find evidence that authors with high reputation scores are less likely to voluntarily offer a buy–hold–sell sentiment in a particular message. Second, we find that authors with no reputation at stake tend to be more bearish with their sentiment but, after controlling for selection, authors with more reputation at stake tend to be bullish in their sentiment. Third, we find that high-reputation authors tend to offer more accurate sentiments on the day their message was posted, which suggests day-trading behavior by authors, but that higher-reputation authors are no more accurate than others after the day of posting. Our results suggest that reputation, coupled with a small pecuniary reward system, can materially influence the adverse selection problem in a world of cheap talk.     

Why So Unhappy? The Effects of Unionization on Job Satisfaction*

Using linked employer–employee data we investigate the job satisfaction effect of union membership in Britain. We develop a model that simultaneously controls for the determinants of individual membership status and for the selection of employees into occupations according to union coverage. We find a negative association between membership and satisfaction. However, having accounted for selection effects, we find that the negative association is confined to non‐covered employees. This is consistent with ‘voice’ effects, whereby non‐covered members voice dissatisfaction to achieve union goals, and with the possibility that membership increases preferences for collective bargaining, thus lowering members’ satisfaction in non‐covered environments.     

Voting with a Hand on the Bible and Not on the Wallet: The 1996 Video Poker Referendum in Louisiana

Abstract . The 1996 gambling referendum in Louisiana provided a unique opportunity to study voters' preferences. At the time of the referendum, video poker machines legally operated in all of Louisiana's 64 parishes (counties). Video poker was voted down in 31 parishes and retained in 33 parishes. Voters also allowed the New Orleans land‐based casino and 15 riverboat casinos to continue their operations. The extant horse racing and pari‐mutuel betting were not voted on. We examine the economic, demographic, and religious factors that influenced how people voted on the issue of legalized video poker. This study is of interest because in recent years, legalized gambling has been expanding around the world. We know of no other referendum on gambling that covered an area as large as an entire U.S. state—all of Louisiana—and offered voters control over gambling in their locality. Months before the 1996 referendum, the news media suggested several factors that might determine the outcome of the vote. The media concluded that concern over jobs would be the major influence on the outcome. Other important factors included a campaign against gambling by Southern Baptist churches and the simultaneous national presidential election. We investigate whether these factors, along with demographic factors such as age and education, influenced the results of the gambling referendum. Surprisingly, we found no clear evidence that the economic health of a parish or the preexisting size of its gambling industry determined the vote. The presence of Southern Baptists in a parish increased the likelihood that gambling would be voted down. Democratic voters tended to vote for gambling, as did black voters. Age and education levels of voters did not appear to influence their votes on gambling. Voters in parishes that bordered other states were more likely to retain gambling. Overall, it appeared that personal values were more important in determining voter behavior than financial considerations. People were voting with their hearts, not their pocketbooks.     

Reputation, Honesty, and Efficiency with Insider Information: an Experiment

We conduct an experimental study of sales of insider information about an asset's future value, where the insiders cannot purchase the underlying asset. We examine whether such information is purchased, the quality of the information provided, and the subsequent accuracy of purchase decisions in the underlying asset market. Our design explores whether reputation, in a repeated game of finite (but uncertain) duration, is an effective constraint on deliberate strategic misinformation. The insiders have an immediate incentive to state that the asset value is high when its true value is low. We suggest an application to insider trading in financial information markets. With fixed matching, cooperative outcomes featuring truthful revelation are frequently achieved and sustained, even though this suggests subjects have sophisticated beliefs about the beliefs and behavior of others. As a comparison, we also conduct a control treatment with random rematching. Here, information purchase is less frequent, the rate of truthful revelation decreases, and efficiency is diminished. Our results suggest that most people anticipate that others realize the potential value of a good reputation.     

Philanthropy and social capital in Mexico

• The aim of this paper is to examine the factors underlying philanthropic behavior in Mexico. In particular, we analyze the influence of social capital on two types of behavior: giving and volunteering. This research is based upon groundbreaking national public opinion surveys conducted in 2005 and 2008, the first of their kind in Mexico to focus on donations and volunteerism. We find that membership in associations (an important component of social capital) is strongly and positively associated with secular giving and volunteering. We also tested the role of three other aspects of social capital: participation in informal personal networks, a belief in the norm of reciprocity, and interpersonal trust, and our findings show that the former two have a consistently significant effect on our dependent variables but interpersonal trust does not. We discuss the implications of this for a society where trust in others is comparatively low. Differences between Mexico and the USA, for example, highlight the importance of context in philanthropic behavior. Mexicans' religiosity also stands out as an important variable, particularly when it comes to understanding religious forms of giving and volunteering in the country. The practical significance of our findings for the promotion of philanthropy is that Mexican nonprofits must compensate for being in a low‐trust culture by encouraging membership and a sense of group belonging.

Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Embedded entrepreneurs and post-disaster community recovery

Entrepreneurs can and do play an important role in promoting community recovery after disasters. Research, however, has not adequately explored the behavior and practices of post-disaster entrepreneurs or acknowledged the role of entrepreneurs in overall disaster recovery. We attempt to fill this gap by highlighting the behavior and practices of entrepreneurs who contribute to recovery, specifically, we argue that post-disaster entrepreneurs: (a) supply needed resources to disaster victims, (b) leverage social capital to navigate extreme uncertainty, (c) are motivated by high place attachment, and (d) exhibit both commercial and social goals. They are able to successfully perform these functions because of the embedded nature of entrepreneurship. We offer evidence based on fieldwork conducted in New Orleans, Louisiana, following Hurricane Katrina and following the tornadoes in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, and Joplin, Missouri.     

Real effects of social trust on firm performance during COVID-19

This study uses a difference-in-differences estimation method to address potential endogeneity between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and firm performance using a natural experiment of COVID-19, with a cross-country sample of 80,454 firm-quarter observations across 51 countries. We find that high-CSR firms show better performance, raise more debt, and invest more during COVID-19. The positive effect of CSR on firm performance is more pronounced in countries with better governance and among non- International Financial Reporting Standards adopters. Our findings suggest that when trust in firms and markets falls during an economic crisis, the trust established between a firm and its stakeholders via socially responsible behavior pays off.     

CEOs' reputation,quality management and environmental innovation: The roles of stakeholder pressure and resource commitment

In this paper, we examine how and when chief executive officers' (CEOs') reputation enhances environmental innovation by considering quality management as a mediating mechanism of this relationship. In addition, we introduce stakeholder pressures (primary and secondary stakeholder pressures) as important contingencies of the relationship between CEOs' reputation and quality management. Moreover, we test the moderating role of resource commitment on the quality management‐environmental innovation relationship. We test our research model using data from a manufacturing industry sample of 217 firms from Ghana. We find that quality management mediates the relationship between reputation and environmental innovation. Moreover, the relationship between CEOs' reputation and quality management is amplified when levels of both primary and secondary stakeholder pressures are greater. Finally, our findings show that the effect of quality management on environmental innovation is enhanced when resource commitment is greater. Implications for theory and practice are discussed.     

企业声誉与内部控制缺陷隐藏：抑制还是庇护

基于声誉视角,探讨了非正式制度对微观企业行为的影响,通过选取2012年至2019年我国沪深A股上市公司数据,就企业声誉与内部控制缺陷隐藏行为的关系展开分析。研究表明：企业声誉抑制而非庇护了管理层的内部控制缺陷隐藏行为,即企业声誉越高,内部控制缺陷隐藏行为越少,隐藏程度越低。进一步研究发现,相对于国有企业、管理层未持股企业以及东部地区的企业,企业声誉对内部控制缺陷隐藏行为的抑制作用在非国有企业、管理层持股企业以及中西部地区的企业中更为明显。把企业声誉和内部控制缺陷隐藏纳入同一研究框架,既证实了企业声誉具有治理的功能,又拓宽了内部控制缺陷披露的研究视野,具有重要的理论价值与现实意义。     

Has the CSR engagement of electrical companies had an effect on their performance? A closer look at the environment

Even though electrical companies attain a top ranking in the publication of CSR reports, they are often accused of 'green‐washing' due to their bad environmental reputation. The current economic crisis is testing their real CSR commitment more than ever, especially when this goes beyond its economic consequences. Based on a worldwide sample of electrical companies, we are going to study why companies are being socially responsible. We wish to know if it is due to the impact on the firms' performance or whether there are other motives (legitimation, improving their reputation) that lead companies to carry out these practices. We will also consider if it changes across the kind of CSR action considered. The results show that there is an economic justification beyond the socially responsible behaviour of the electrical companies. Additionally, most kinds of CSR action (community, diversity, corporate governance, product responsibility) are also carried out looking for economic rewards. However, the CSR actions oriented to the environment are mainly motivated by their need to improve their image and reverse their negative impact. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment     

An Examination of Differences Between Organizational Legitimacy and Organizational Reputation*

abstract Organizational legitimacy and organizational reputation have similar antecedents, social construction processes and consequences. Nonetheless, an improved understanding of relationships between legitimacy and reputation requires that differences between the two be specified and clarified. Our examination of past research indicates that legitimacy emphasizes the social acceptance resulting from adherence to social norms and expectations whereas reputation emphasizes comparisons among organizations. We empirically examine two antecedents of the financial, regulatory, and public dimensions of legitimacy and reputation in a population of US commercial banks. We find that isomorphism improves legitimacy, but its effects on reputation depend on the bank's reputation. Moreover, higher financial performance increases reputation, but does not increase the legitimacy of high performing banks.     

Is there convergence amongst shadow economies? International evidence

This paper examines convergence among cross-country shadow economies. Using the Phillips-Sul (2007, 2009) club convergence approach and data for over 150 countries from 1991 to 2017, the results show evidence against absolute convergence for all shadow economies; however, we find evidence of multiple convergence clubs. In particular, we find evidence for seven distinct convergence clubs and six divergent shadow economies. Each club is characterised by an increasingly larger shadow economy with the countries in club 1 having the largest shadow economy and those in club 7 having the smallest shadow economy. Using a two-way fixed effects approach, we also find that the determinants of the shadow economy are somewhat conditional on the convergence club. The existence of multiple equilibria suggests that policy makers in their attempt to combat the shadow economy would benefit by considering the different transitional paths associated with the different convergence clubs.