Gentrification Trends in New Transit-Oriented Communities: Evidence from 14 Cities That Expanded and Built Rail Transit Systems

Over 25 billion dollars were spent between 1970 and 2000 in 14 major cities in the United States on the construction of new rail transit lines. This massive investment in rail transit construction and expansion allows me to study the consequences of local public goods improvements for communities nearby new stations. This article uses a 14-city census tract–level panel data set covering the years 1970 to 2000 to document significant heterogeneity in the effects of rail transit expansions across the 14 cities. Communities receiving increased access to new "Walk and Ride" stations experience greater gentrification than communities that are now close to new "Park and Ride" stations.     

Delineating Design Factors that Influence the Global Product Launch Process*

Preparing for and managing the global product launch process offers unique challenges as each targeted country can pose unique differences across the design categories of channel parameters, country mores, language and colloquialisms, and technology infrastructure. Though not an exhaustive list, these have a predominant influence on the global product launch process on a per‐global‐region basis. Using a case‐study methodology, this article draws on the global product launch experiences of two firms, showing that such influences preclude use of a mass‐marketing, standardization approach. Though it appears that certain elements of global product launch may be standardized for purposes of efficiencies, a global product launch appears to require at least some degree of customization. Such thinking parallels a design perspective, which mandates a tailoring of product and marketing mix to encourage early acceptance within the intended global market. To suggest when customization should be employed, four design categories of channel parameters—country mores, language and colloquialisms, and technology infrastructure—appear to have strong propensity to dictate customized design requirements for a worldwide launch, where greater differences across these design categories would mandate more customization toward each respective global region. Post hoc comments by managers in the focal case studies support this and further delineate that these four design factors necessitate keen consideration in the course of planning and enacting activities during the global product launch process. The two cases studies especially show that customized design decisions will likely pertain to launch schedule due to local retailers' calendars, product aesthetics due to local consumer preferences, point‐of‐sale and other marketing communications due to language requirements, and technology enhancements in light of local market acceptability and both social and regulatory expectations. Managers involved in planning a global product launch should therefore heed channel owners—brand owners, retailers, and distributors—so that they give preference to, promote, and sell the respective company's product relative to competitors' products. To assist toward securing such preference status, channel owners should have a role in advising the timing of launch and design considerations (e.g., color and form). Logistic issues, such as delivery and after‐sales support via this channel, are keen considerations as well. Logistics has to be thought through to ensure that demand can be met across all regions for a new product. And with the growing prevalence of Internet worldwide, managers must pay keen attention to cultural references and language used on any Internet site to ensure that the product is properly represented and promoted during its global launch. The process of a global product launch is therefore more than the company's ability to gain access to a particular market; it is the company's ability to understand key design issues per each global region respectively and to respond to pressing global region differences by customizing the total product offering to meet the needs of that global region.     

MONEY IS PRIVACY*

An extensive literature in monetary theory has emphasized the role of money as a record‐keeping device. Money assumes this role in situations where using credit would be too costly, and some might argue that this role will diminish as the cost of information and thus the cost of credit‐based transactions continues to fall. In this article we investigate another use for money, the provision of privacy. That is, a money purchase does not identify the purchaser, whereas a credit purchase does. In a simple trading economy with moral hazard, we compare the efficiency of money and credit, and find that money may be useful even when information is free.     

Department Status: An Exploratory Investigation of Direct and Indirect Effects on Product Development Performance

To date only a limited number of product development studies have examined the construct of department status. These studies mostly report that departments can reflect different levels of status among themselves during product development activities and that often the marketing department reflects greater status. These studies do not clarify the role that department status may pose for product development performance and product management performance. Some research would suggest that department status has a direct effect on performance, while other research would suggest that department status has an indirect effect on performance. The present study investigates whether the bestowing of department status is important to product development performance and product management performance, and, if so, how? Based on empirical results from a cross‐industry study involving 668 marketing, manufacturing, and R&D managers, department status is found to have a significant indirect effect on product development and product management performance. Results further show that equal status among the three departments of marketing, manufacturing, and R&D correlates with higher levels of interdepartmental collaboration, which in turn manifests the benefits of higher levels of performance. Interdepartmental collaboration is therefore shown to be a mediating variable between department status and performance. The empirical results of this study suggest that no one department should dominate the product development effort and/or product management effort. While study data tend to correspond with prior studies in that the marketing department tends to reflect higher status compared to R&D and manufacturing, simply bestowing more status to marketing (or to another department for that matter) does not appear to be a proper course for facilitating interdepartmental collaboration nor for manifesting higher product development performance. Rather, equal status across marketing, manufacturing, and R&D departments appears to represent the proper course of action to establish collaboration between these three departments and subsequently to reap the benefits of higher performance. Given the exploratory nature of this study, subsequent study is warranted. Avenues for future research along with tentative managerial implications are discussed.     

Measuring the consequences of promoting inner city homeownership

This paper examines low- and moderate-income households in the City of Philadelphia who are becoming homeowners for the first time. We examine two Nehemiah developments subsidized by the City of Philadelphia that offer newly constructed homes at well-below cost. This paper uses a unique survey of these new owners to measure what Nehemiah residents gain in terms of structure and community attributes as they make the transition from renting to owning. The new owners in the Nehemiah complexes significantly improve their housing structures while raising their exposure to crime and weak local public schools. As part of the City’s community development strategy, these developments were expected to increase economic activity near these sites. We document that there is no evidence of local benefit spillovers for census tracts where the Nehemiah developments were built. Our survey results suggest that the new housing developments represent an “oasis” where there are few interactions between the new homeowners and the incumbent residents of the greater community.     

Non-existence and inefficiency of equilibria with American options

Summary We analyze two examples of economies with incomplete financial markets. In the first model we consider a stock and an American put option on the stock. Although there is only one commodity and asset payoffs therefore do not depend on spot prices, we derive robust non-existence of equilibria. In the second model we consider an economy where a stock is the only asset available for trade. We show that it is impossible to complete the market by introducing American put options and that equilibria are inefficient. This example is also robust.We wish to thank Jonathan Berk, Virginia France, Flavio Menezes and a referee of this journal for useful comments. This research was partially funded by the National Science Foundation (SES-8821723).