Crowding-out or crowding-in? Direct voice,performance-related pay,and organizational innovation in European firms

Building on motivation crowding theory (MCT), this article contributes to the human resources management (HRM)-innovation debate by examining the potential trade-offs between HRM practices targeted to increase employees' intrinsic motivation, such as direct employee voice (EV), and the presence of extrinsic incentives in the form of individual and collective performance-related pay (PRP). The results of the analysis on more than 22,000 European establishments show support for the positive relationship between EV and a firm's organizational innovation, and that this relationship is weaker in companies that adopted individual PRP schemes (piece-rate plans). Moreover, while we found that collective PRP (profit-sharing) does not moderate the relationship between EV and organizational innovation, a positive and significant moderation effect emerged when the combined presence of individual and collective PRP was considered. By advocating that the coexistence of multiple forms of PRP could overcome the crowding-out effect of individual PRP on EV, the study contributes to the HRM debate by also calling for a better understanding of the potential contingencies between different HRM practices when innovation is focus of the analysis.     

Free trade zones,tariffs and the real exchange rate

This article examines the consequences of changes in final and intermediate good tariffs on structural adjustment, urban unemployment, and the real exchange rate in the presence of a free trade zone (FTZ) and foreign capital in the host country. The location of the FTZ and the disaggregation of the economy allows us to examine the consequences of a tariff change on regional incomes. It is shown that as a consequence of a tariff change the urban and rural incomes need not necessarily move in the same direction (hence the potential for rural and urban conflict in policy making). It is also shown that an increase in the tariff on an immediate good may result in both export promotion and an increase in welfare. Such expansion is a nonconventional result, since raising barriers to trade normally leads to a contradiction in the volume of the trade. The interconnection between the real exchange rate and intermediate good tariff is also explored in this article. It is shown that a policy of imposing tariffs on these goods may result in the appreciation of the real exchange rate.     

A DYNAMICAL ANALYSIS OF ALTERNATIVE FORMS OF AGRICULTURAL LAND TENURE

This paper explores a dynamic model of an agricultural sector in which farms are leased to cultivators on fixed rent contracts or on sharecropping contracts and in which cultivators are subject to credit rationing by banks. The model, which can exhibit complex dynamics, is used to compare the two pure forms of land tenure and to explore some implications of the coexistence of both types of tenure. The central conclusion from the dynamic simulations is that, contrary to the conventional proposition based on static analysis, both landowners and cultivators may be better‐off under sharecropping.     

Environmental control,wage inequality and national welfare in a tourism economy

This paper examines the effects of stricter environmental regulation on income distribution and welfare for an open economy with inbound tourism. The pollution input is considered as a mobile factor between sectors, and a decrease in it lowers wages of skilled labor in the traded sector but can increase the wages of unskilled labor in the non-traded sector. A stricter policy on environmental controls can narrow wage inequality and increase welfare if the tourism terms-of-trade effect dominates. These results are confirmed by simulations.     

Consumer behavior: Some thoughts on Sheth’s evaluation of the discipline

A paper by Sheth in the Fall 1979 issue of this journal assessed the status of the consumer behavior discipline. Various recommendations on future directions were also presented with that evaluation. The purpose of this paper is to comment on a number of issues raised by Sheth's review. Additional thoughts on the future of the discipline are also offered. The author gratefully acknowledges the many helpful comments of Steven Lysonski, Ph.D.     

Trainees' reactions to training: shaping groups and courses for happier trainees

The extensive use of training demands more extensive evaluations of its real effects. Human resource scholars attempt to develop multi-dimensional training evaluation models, often ignored by practitioners, whereas training managers tend to evaluate only reaction evaluations, the first dimension in several models. To provide more practically relevant research, this study includes five training parameters in a model that assesses trainees' overall satisfaction with training (OST), which results from perceived usefulness of training, perceived trainer performance and perceived training efficiency. Structured survey data from a sample of 13,753 trainees, grouped in 1230 courses, involving 3047 companies, and financed by an Italian inter-professional fund, confirm the role of all three antecedents of OST. Moreover, of the five course- and participant-related variables, participation of female workers (which is also a moderator variable), the length of the course and the type of target audience influence trainees' OST. These results provide useful implications for practitioners in shaping their courses and audiences to maximise the trainees' reactions.     

Cost Channel of Monetary Policy: Financial Frictions and External Shocks

This paper deepens our understanding of the importance of the cost channel of monetary policy, where inflation adjusts with a firm's marginal cost of working capital. A model extended for a small, open economy with financial frictions is proposed and examined with data from Taiwan. The cost channel effect on inflation adjustment is substantiated by simultaneous generalized method of moments estimations and appears to be strengthened by financial frictions but mitigated by external shocks. Greater caution is hence required in the conduct of monetary policy for a bank-dependent emerging economy such as Taiwan because of the relative complexity in its supply-side interest rate pass-through.     

The spatial distribution of innovation: evidence on the role of academic quality for seven European countries

The quality of academic research and research undertaken at public laboratories is an important determinant of successful technology transfer. Corporate innovativeness may benefit considerably from scientific discoveries at universities or public laboratories and from the availability of locally well-trained scientists and graduates. The extent to which quality matters is investigated for 86 European regions in seven countries between 1997 and 2007. We find that regions hosting research departments at the forefront of science produce significantly more inventions and more innovations, whereas the mere presence of R&D personnel in universities has no significant impact. The production of patents in high-technology domains instead does benefit from the presence of R&D personnel in public laboratories. These results complement the existing evidence on the relationship between public research and spatial distribution of innovation.     

A partial analysis of sharetenancy relationships in Northeast Brazil

In order to explicitly examine the implications of sharecroppers and landowners having different objective functions, and to handle a multiple-output complication, a mathematical programming structure is employed to analyze sharetenancy relationships. For a typical sharecropped plot in northeast Brazil, simulations are obtained when the landowner and sharecropper respectively are the decision-makers, and for policies involving abolition of share contracts, land reform, and variations in share of the cash crop accruing to the landowner. The observed shares permit agreement by the two agents on the farm plan, and this agreed-upon solution is Pareto-optimal. Beyond a narrow range around the observed share, the desired farm plans diverge, Pareto-optimality does not hold, and enforcement costs would be required.