Human capital and earnings distribution dynamics

Earnings heterogeneity plays a crucial role in modern macroeconomics. We document that mean earnings and measures of earnings dispersion and skewness all increase in US data over most of the working life-cycle for a typical cohort as the cohort ages. We show that (i) a human capital model can replicate these properties from the right distribution of initial human capital and learning ability, (ii) differences in learning ability are essential to produce an increase in earnings dispersion over the life cycle and (iii) differences in learning ability account for the bulk of the variation in the present value of earnings across agents. These findings emphasize the need to further understand the role and origins of initial conditions.     

The Dynamics of Location in Home Price

It is well established that house prices are dynamic. It is also axiomatic that location influences such selling prices, motivating our objective of incorporating spatial information in explaining the evolution of house prices over time. In this paper, we propose a rich class of spatio-temporal models under which each property is point referenced and its associated selling price modeled through a collection of temporally indexed spatial processes. Such modeling includes and extends all house price index models currently in the literature, and furthermore permits distinction between the effects of time and location. We study single family residential sales in two distinct submarkets of a metropolitan area and further categorize the data into single- and multiple-transaction observations. We find the spatial component is very important in explaining house price. Moreover, the relative homogeneity of homes within the submarket and the frequency with which homes sell affects the pattern of variation across space and time. Differences between single and repeat sale data are evident. The methodology is applicable to more general capital asset pricing when location is anticipated to be influential.     

Employee Stock Options, Corporate Taxes, and Debt Policy

We find that employee stock option deductions lead to large aggregate tax savings for Nasdaq 100 and S&P 100 firms and also affect corporate marginal tax rates. For Nasdaq firms, including the effect of options reduces the estimated median marginal tax rate from 31% to 5%. For S&P firms, in contrast, option deductions do not affect marginal tax rates to a large degree. Our evidence suggests that option deductions are important nondebt tax shields and that option deductions substitute for interest deductions in corporate capital structure decisions, explaining in part why some firms use so little debt.     

Measuring and improving safety culture in organisations: an exploration of tools developed and used in Belgium

To support organisations in addressing their safety culture, practical tools have been developed worldwide. Based on such practical tools, it is possible to measure where an organisation is situated regarding its safety culture in order to identify priority areas, formulate appropriate improvement strategies and determine changes over time. In this paper, it is examined which practical tools to measure and improve safety culture are provided on the Belgian market. In total, 15 Belgian tools were identified, of which 8 agreed to cooperate. Amongst the included tools, there is a lot of variation regarding the methods to diagnose the safety culture and the overall procedure to improve the safety culture. The importance to adapt the tool to the specific needs and context of organisations is acknowledged in most of the tools, as well as the importance to use a multi-method approach to measure the safety culture. Also, it is recognised that all hierarchic levels should participate during the process of diagnosing the safety culture. A point of attention is this overall participation during the validation of the results of the diagnosis, and the priority setting of the recommendations, which is mainly done by the higher management. The development of the Belgian tools is based on experience with a focus on direct practical application, which leads to the fact that none of the tools are validated through scientific evidence. Another point of attention is that organisations pay too little attention at the continuity of safety culture research. And finally, the question can be raised if the safety culture tools actually address the concept ‘safety culture’, or if they address only a subset of the concept. When safety culture is addressed, a comprehensive approach should be used, where technological, organisational, human and external aspects are taken into account as interacting and interrelating elements.     

Supply chain finance schemes in the procurement of agricultural products

Product, information, and finance flows are all interrelated within the modern supply chain; thus, it is now more than ever of paramount importance for practitioners to integrate procurement and financial decisions. This challenge is exemplified in many agricultural supply chains, where operational risks are significant and access to capital differs sharply across firms. We study three management tactics that some large food/beverage manufacturers – situated downstream in these chains – have used to meet the challenge: ordinary fixed price contracts (or soft tolling) with direct suppliers, hard tolling and contract farming where the manufacturer intervenes upstream, providing capital, and coordinating procurement decisions. We place these upstream intervention schemes in the theoretical context of supply chain finance (SCF) and model their application to a three-echelon agricultural supply chain. We perform a numerical study in order to understand how the structure of capital constraints in the chain may influence the manufacturer's choice of SCF scheme. The numerical study is based on a business case that reflects the barley–malt supply chain of Heineken N.V. Despite greater coordination opportunities, we show that upstream intervention is not necessarily preferable for the manufacturer. Nevertheless, the preferred SCF scheme can be inferred on the basis of relatively simple characterization of the capital constraints in the supply chain.     

Logics,Leaders, Lab Coats: A Multi‐Level Study on How Institutional Logics are Linked to Entrepreneurial Intentions in Academia

Situated in the context of academia, this study integrates ideas from institutional theory, person‐environment fit theory and leadership research to conceptualize and examine the cross‐level link between the organizational‐level institutional logic of research commercialization and the entrepreneurial intentions of researchers. Multi‐level analyses based on a sample of 254 researchers working for 85 research group leaders in 49 German research institutes reveal that two distinct attributes of research group leaders – that is, their track records of entrepreneurial behaviour and their entrepreneurial intentions – play a significant role in transmitting the organizational‐level logic to the individual level. We also observe a complementary interaction between organizational‐level commercialization logic and the entrepreneurial track records of leaders. We discuss how these findings advance our understanding of science commercialization through academic entrepreneurship and how they inform institutional theory and theory development in other domains of entrepreneurship research.     

A cash flow approach to the statement of changes in financial position

Increased emphasis on managing and reporting the cash flows of companies has been articulated by academics, professional organizations, and business managers. However, traditional accounting textbooks and course syllabi have been slow to relinquish a working capital focus for the statement of changes in financial position (SCFP). This article presents a cash flow approach to the SCFP that is ideal for classroom instructional purposes because it is intuitively appealing, managerially oriented, and reflective of a growing number of companies' public disclosures.     

Socially Useless Jobs

Recent research suggests that many workers in modern economies think that their job is socially useless, i.e., that it makes no or a negative contribution to society. However, the evidence so far is mainly anecdotal. We use a representative dataset comprising 100,000 workers from forty‐seven countries at four points in time. We find that approximately 8 percent of workers perceive their job as socially useless, while another 17 percent are doubtful about the usefulness of their job. There are sizeable differences among countries, sectors, occupations, and age groups, but no trend over time. A vast majority of workers cares about holding a socially useful job and we find that they suffer when they consider their job useless. We also explore possible causes of socially useless jobs, including bad management, strict job protection legislation, harmful economic activities, labor hoarding, and division of labor.     

Who's pulling the strings? The influence of network structure on standard dominance

Innovative systems and infrastructures require generally accepted common compatibility standards to enable components of such systems to interoperate. In some cases, various standards are developed by competing standards organizations, often resulting in standards battles. This paper focuses on factors that affect the outcome of these standards battles, and, specifically, on the effect of the structure of the industry-wide standards networks on standard dominance. The empirical context is the consumer electronics, telecommunications, and ICT arenas. We conduct a study of 103 standards organizations from 2000 to 2011. We find support for the hypothesis that standards that are supported by standards organizations that have a central position in the industry-wide standards network have a high chance of achieving dominance.