Increasing Charitable Giving: What Can We Learn from Economics?*

There is growing policy interest in charitable giving in the UK. As part of its Big Society agenda, the current government is keen to encourage a higher level of donations, highlighting new technologies, new social norms and tax incentives as potential mechanisms for raising giving. In the 2012 Budget, however, the Chancellor also proposed limiting tax relief on donations to £50,000, sparking an intense discussion about the effectiveness and desirability of tax incentives for major donors. This paper brings together recent evidence relevant to the ongoing policy debates.     

A Comparative Study of the Benefits of Applying Target Cost Contracts Between South Australia and Hong Kong

This article aims to identify and analyze the key benefits of adopting Guaranteed Maximum Price and Target Cost Contracts (GMP/TCC) over and above the traditional lump‐sum contractual arrangement through an empirical questionnaire survey conducted in South Australia and compared with the findings in Hong Kong. The Mann‐Whitney U Test indicated differences in perception between the two groups of respondents on the majority of the identified benefits. The study has provided an in‐depth understanding of the perceived benefits of the GMP/TCC scheme, hence leading to a wider application of those alternative integrated procurement strategies in both regions for reference by the construction community at large.     

Correlates of Drug Testing Attitudes in a Sample of Blue Collar Workers

Using responses from 1429 workers employed in the wood products industry, we examine the relationship between drug testing (DT) attitudes and several demographic, organizational, job attitude, and job outcome variables. After controlling for age and marital status, analyses revealed moderate correlations between DT attitudes and alcohol and drug variables, DT program characteristics, organizational, and work attitude variables. DT attitudes were weakly but significantly related to absences, late work arrivals, accidents, and injuries. Implications of the findings and future research suggestions are discussed.     

A Dynamic Model of Export Competition, Policy Coordination, and Simultaneous Currency Collapse

This paper shows that the "price wars during booms" logic of Rotemberg and Saloner ( American Economic Review , vol. 76, 1986, 390–407) provides an explanation of contagious currency crises. The idea is as follows. When a group of countries relies on exports to a common foreign market, pressures for competitive devaluations arise. In response, competing exporters peg their exchange rates to the currency of their export market. However, it must be in each country's self-interest to adhere to its peg, and a common adverse external shock can make an existing (implicitly) cooperative arrangement unenforceable. Maintaining the arrangement requires a collective devaluation that reduces the unilateral incentive to devalue.     

Bank generic strategies: does Porter's theory apply in an international banking center

This study examines banks' competitive strategies and their relationship with performance in a highly internationalized banking center, Hong Kong. The factor analysis results have, by and large, provided support to Porter's three strategy typology. Nevertheless, the empirical findings from the cluster analysis and the subsequent inter-group comparison of performances have cast doubt on Porter's stuck-in-the-middle proposition by demonstrating that banks adopting a multi-strategic approach did outperform other strategically monotonous rivals. While the stuck-in-the-middle proposition is grounded in the premise of inherent inconsistencies for pursuing more than one generic strategy simultaneously, the resource-based view and the present empirical findings hint at the feasibility for well-resourced banks to combine apparently incompatible value creating activities in a synergistic way to achieve integrated flexibility and consequently, a sustainable multi-strategic position. It is suggested that this feasibility very much depends on a bank's organizing and coordinating capabilities that are developed and refined through managerial commitment, learning and experience, as well as a careful assessment of various organizational activities and its inter-relationships within the entire business system.     

Nile perch and the hungry of Lake Victoria: Gender,status and food in an East African fishery

Lake Victoria supports Africa’s largest inland fishery, and its most valuable product is the Nile perch, much of which is exported. This has given rise to arguments claiming a direct linear relationship between perch exports and disturbingly high rates of malnutrition along the lake’s shores. In this paper, we argue that this argument is seriously flawed for it is unable to explain how it is that the income from the Nile perch fishery fails to translate into a well-fed riparian population. We draw on field work carried out in 2001 that (a) set out to establish exactly how much malnutrition there was on the lake’s shores; and (b) sought to identify what happened to the income the fishery generates. We argue that because men control much of the fishery, and women are held responsible for the upkeep of their families, little of this income makes its way back into the households of the region, giving rise to the levels of malnutrition we observed.     

The Relationship Between Corporate Social Performance, and Organizational Size, Financial Performance, and Environmental Performance: An Empirical Examination

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between the corporate social performance of an organization and three variables: the size of the organization, the financial performance of the organization, and the environmental performance of the organization. By empirically testing data from 1987 to 1992, the results of the study show that a firm's corporate social performance is indeed impacted by the size of the firm, the level of profitability of the firm, and the amount of pollution emissions released by the firm.     

浅论精神分析学说对沈从文创作的影响

弗洛伊德的精神分析学说在20世纪早期盛行于世。这一学说深深地影响了沈从文并成为他诠释“人性”的最好工具。在沈从文的创作及其作品中,这种影响具体地表现在主题和题材的选择、人物形象的塑造和“纪梦”三个方面。     

Recognising Uniqueness in the Technology Key Learning Area: The Search for Meaning

The purpose of this study was to investigate areas of significance which were related to the understanding of technology and technology education, identified by teachers introducing the key learning area, technology, into their primary school classrooms for the first time. Working from Australia's national document on technology education, A Statement on Technology for Australian Schools (Curriculum Corporation, 1994), two teachers wrestled with how to fit this new curriculum area into their current classroom programs, their understandings of technology as a phenomenon and with their beliefs about teaching and learning in general. The study showed that the teachers made sense of technology education as it related to, from their perspectives, ideas about and aspects of primary school classrooms with which they felt comfortable. Implications for professional development include the need to acknowledge and value the prior experiences and understandings of primary teachers. The challenge for teachers in implementing technology education is gaining a conceptualisation of the learning area, which in some respects, is very like other more familiar learning areas in the primary curriculum, but in many other respects, unique.