CEO's empathy and salience of socioemotional wealth in family SMEs – The moderating role of external directors

A focus on preserving socioemotional wealth may influence entrepreneurial activities in family firms. In this paper, we identify the emotion of empathy in the family CEO as an antecedent of socioemotional wealth creation. We argue that the presence of one or more external directors can have a direct as well as moderating influence on the relationship between CEO's empathy and the salience of socioemotional wealth to the family CEO. Our empirical tests confirm these hypotheses. Several areas of future research are suggested to incorporate empathy and other emotions in family business studies.     

Technological complementarities, demand, and market power

Recent technological changes in many industries have generated numerous complementary technologies. A key implication of complementary technologies is that the demand for related services has tended to change both qualitatively and quantitatively. While the economics literature has examined various aspects, the effects of technological complementarity have not been fully flushed out. Using a simple model, this paper examines the implications of technological complementarity. How have firms’ pricing abilities changed with complementary technologies? What implications do complementary technologies have for regulation? Results show that technological complementarity has the potential to increase the market power of firms, possibly increasing prices to unprecedented levels. This holds whether demand elasticity is constant or variable. Policy implications are discussed.     

PROLIFERATION OF ACADEMIC JOURNALS: EFFECTS ON RESEARCH QUANTITY AND QUALITY

There have been significant structural changes in research markets in recent years reflected in the increase in the number of academic journals. This paper uses a differential game model of authors and journal editors to examine the effects of an increase in competition among academic journals. Does an increase in the number of academic journals lead to an increase in scholarly articles published? Will an increase in publishing outlets adversely affect research quality? The results show greater competition does not affect research output and in fact enhances research quality. The number of journals and the relative discount rates of authors and editors are crucial determinants of the effects of competition.     

Identity theft in the internet age: Evidence from the U.S. states

This paper examines the determinants of identity theft, focusing especially on the influence of internet diffusion. Results, based on panel data across the U.S. states, show that a 10% in increase households with internet access would increase identity theft by about 9%, ceteris paribus. Other noteworthy findings point to states with greater corrupt activity having greater identity theft but greater police employment not having a significant deterrent impact. Dynamic panel regressions results reveal the presence of inertia in identity thefts. Some implications for policy are discussed.     

Are health care scams infectious? Empirical evidence on contagion in health care fraud

This paper examines the presence of contagion in health care fraud across jurisdictional boundaries. Using state‐level data for the United States, we find evidence of contagion in medical fraud. There are also spillovers from border corruption on medical fraud, but no evidence of spillovers from international borders. In other findings, greater urbanization, greater elderly population, and higher hospital occupancy positively contribute to medical fraud, while nursing employment has a mitigating effect. Further, it is economic inequality rather than economic prosperity that seems relevant. The main findings are robust to consideration of simultaneity, but dependent upon the prevalence of fraud across states.     

Drivers of COVID-19 vaccinations: vaccine delivery and delivery efficiency in the United States

NETNOMICS: Economic Research and Electronic Networking - This paper adds some formal research to the success of ongoing efforts to combat the COVID-19 pandemic by examining the drivers of the...     

Social identity and perceived income adequacy

Economists are increasingly interested in subjective well‐being, but the economic literature on perceptions of income adequacy, which is one of the factors that shape subjective well‐being, is little. Our paper fills this lacuna. We utilize nationally representative data on perceptions of amounts considered as remunerative earnings from self‐employment in India and examine how these are earnings shaped by social identity, namely, caste. We also investigate if institutional change such as the introduction of an employment guarantee scheme alters these perceptions. Finally, we examine the relationship between caste identity and actual earnings. We find that caste identity does shape both perceptions of income adequacy and actual earnings: lower‐ranked groups perceive lower amounts as being remunerative and also earn lower amounts. Further, the employment guarantee scheme alters self‐perceptions differentially for different caste groups, but in more nuanced ways than our ex‐ante beliefs.     

INTRANATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL KNOWLEDGE FLOWS: EFFECTS ON THE FORMAL AND INFORMAL SECTORS

This article studies the effects of international and intranational knowledge flows. Contributions include comparing the effects of knowledge flows on the formal and informal sectors and determining multilateral spatial spillovers of innovation. Results show that formal entrepreneurs respect intranational intellectual property rights, but benefit from international spillovers, especially from patents granted. In contrast, informal entrepreneurs somewhat respect intranational patents granted, but not patent applications and citations. International spillovers to the informal sector are mainly from patents granted. Spillover magnitudes are greater internationally than intranationally, and greater in the informal sector than the formal sector (except for trademarks). (JEL O33, L26, K42)     

On contracting for uncertain R&D

Using a two‐stage model, this paper studies auctions of research and development (R&D) contracts when the outcome of research is uncertain. The agent is contracted by the principal to invent a new product or a new process. The principal selects the most capable agent through an auction and writes an incentive contract with the winning agent to share risks. The main finding of the paper is that the generally superior incentive contracts might not be desirable under plausible conditions in R&D contracting. In particular, we find that the principal prefers a cost‐plus contract in cases of large R&D projects or rising innovation benefits, but would prefer a fixed‐price contract when the number of bidders increases. An alternate elasticity interpretation of results holds promise for empirical analysis. Public policy implications are finally discussed. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Foreign direct investment and entrepreneurship: gender differences across international economic freedom and taxation

Using recent cross-national data, this paper examines the impact of foreign direct investment (FDI) on entrepreneurship activity. The impact of FDI on entrepreneurship is not clear a priori, with possibilities of both a negative effect (crowding out) and a positive effect (synergy or complementarity via spillovers). Results find support for the crowding out effect; however, this effect varies across nations with different prevalence of entrepreneurship. Another focus of this work is on gender differences. The crowding out effect is stronger for the full sample rather than the subsample of female entrepreneurship. This finding stands up to a battery of robustness checks. Policy implications are discussed.