BOOK REVIEW

Tourism Planning and Development. By Charles Kaiser, Jr., and Larry E. Helber. Boston, CBI Publishing Co., 1978. Pp. x + 238, indexed. Hardcover, $13.50.

Essentials of Recreational Services. By Jay S. Shivers. Lea &; Febiger, Philadelphia, 1978. Pp. x + 348. Hardcover, $15.75.

The Process of Recreation Programming. By Patricia Farrell and Herberta M. Lundegren. New York, John Wiley and Sons, 1978. Pp. xii + 313, index. Hardcover, $12.95.

YV88: An Eco‐Fiction of Tomorrow. By Christopher Swan and Chet Roaman. San Francisco, Sierra Club Books, 1977. 248 + viii, illustrated. Paperbound, $7.95.

Tourism Multipliers: The State of the Art. By Brian H. Archer. Bangor Occasional Papers in Economics (General Editor: Jack Revell), No. 11. Bangor: University of Wales Press, 1977. Pp. ix + 85.

A Good Age. By Alex Comfort. New York City, Simon and Schuster (Fireside Books), 1978. Pp. 224, indexed and illustrated. Paperbound, $5.95.     

Cutting out the middle-man: The case for direct business involvement in environmental justice

In recent years, environmental concerns have become the first priority for socially-conscious corporations. This article describes the history of the environmental justice movement and its philosophical differences with the mainstream environmental movement. Environmental justice activists allege that the mainstream environmental movement marginalizes the environmental interests of the poor and people of color. Herein, we provide guidance for environmentally-conscious corporations that wish to avoid repeating the same ethical errors.     

Catching Growth Determinants with the Adaptive Lasso

Abstract. This paper uses the adaptive Lasso estimator to determine variables important for economic growth. The adaptive Lasso estimator is a computationally very efficient procedure that simultaneously performs model selection and parameter estimation. The computational cost of this method is negligibly small compared with standard approaches in the growth regressions literature. We apply this method for a regional dataset for the European Union covering the 255 NUTS2 regions in the 27 member states over the period 1995–2005. The results suggest that initial GDP per capita (with an implied convergence speed of about 1.5% per annum), human capital (proxied by the shares of highly and medium educated in the working age population), structural labor market characteristics (the initial unemployment rate and the initial activity rate of the low educated) as well as being a capital region are important for economic growth.     

Does Private Label Quality Influence Consumers’ Decision on Where to Shop?

When consumers decide where to shop, they take several criteria into account. It is not yet clear whether private label (PL) quality is one of these criteria. It is the intention of this study to shed light on this issue because many retailers have invested heavily into the quality of their PLs. They assume that PLs differentiate a store's assortment and image, which should attract customers to the store. This study examines this assumption by use of a simultaneous equation model that links PL‐specific quality evaluations to perceptions of the image of the associated store as well as to the category‐specific share of store visits. Empirical results for 10 product categories show that PL quality positively affects store image perception, and influences consumers in the decision of where to shop.     

Complexity and contradiction in NHS computing

The National Health Service (NHS) has entered a new world of managed competition, where the purchasing and provision of services are formally separated. Accompanying the changes are major investments in computer systems, which will continue for at least the first half of the 1990s. However, the performance of the NHS in implementing computer systems has been variable, so that now is an appropriate time to review the current status of NHS computing, and to consider the key issues for computing in the new environment.     

Top executive dismissal,ownership and corporate performance

This paper evaluates the empirical relationship between top executive turnover and firm performance. Based on a sample of the 460 largest UK listed companies during the period 1990–1998, we establish an inverse and robust statistical relation between the probability of a management change and a firm's performance: top executives are fired for poor performance. This can result from internal monitoring of management by the board or block share holders. Second, the data indicate that only very poor levels of performance affect significantly the turnover likelihood: corporate performance must fall dramatically to force a senior executive job separation. Third, the likelihood of managerial turnover for poor performance has not changed over time: today's senior managers face the same disciplining effects as those senior managers in earlier years. Finally, there seems to be no evidence that managerial stock ownership, measured as the proportion of ordinary shares owned by top managers, enables them to become entrenched.     

Who trades water allocations? Evidence of the characteristics of early adopters in the Goulburn–Murray Irrigation District,Australia 1998–1999**

This article applies a model of innovation to analyze the characteristics of irrigators within the Goulburn–Murray Irrigation District in Australia and examines the efficiency of the early water market in the late 1990s. Using multinominal and binary logit analyses we identify the factors associated with irrigators who sold or bought water allocations during 1998–1999 and irrigators who at that time had never participated in any kind of water trading. Contrary to expectations we find that early adopters of water trading were older farmers with low farm productivity, but that in line with theory they had higher levels of education, had spent less time farming, had larger irrigated area, farm operating surplus and farm assets, owned farms that were more intensively farmed, and were more progressive in their planning. There was only weak evidence to suggest that water moved from lower value uses to higher value uses, suggesting the water allocation market had limited efficiency in its’ initial years.