The forgotten employees? The experiences of expatriate staff returning to the UK

This article reports on the experiences of a group of expatriate UK managers and professionals who have recently returned to the UK from foreign assignments. A brief review of the literature in this field is presented and the findings of a questionnaire survey of 124 ‘returnees’. The data show that many expatriates face difficulties upon their return in terms of their career prospects, psychological well-being and general adaptation to life back home. The paper goes on to suggest ways in which these transitions can be managed more effectively by organizations and individual employees. It concludes by proposing directions for future research.     

A South African national economic and environmental policyframework

Most contemporary economic theories upon which conventional national accounting is based regard man‐made assets as productive capital to be depreciated against the value of production. Such production, without replenishment or renewal of the asset or capital stock, is not sustainable. Natural resource assets, however, are not valued in the same way. There is no accounting mechanism to reflect the decrease in potential future pro duction as the resource diminishes or deteriorates. In 1993, the United Nations adopted its guidelines for a ‘System of Integrated Environmental and Economic Accounting’ (SEEA), which allows for the adjustment of the System of National Accounts (SNA) for natural asset stripping and degradation, providing a format for national accounting which assesses the viability and sustainability of economic growth. The concept of an SEEA for South Africa was pursued in 1994 as a pilot study. The framework to be devel oped was termed the South African National Economic Environmental Planning (SANEEP) model. The framework can be used to predict the environmental impact, in terms of natural resource use and degradation, of economic growth, both nationally and at the sectoral level. In addition, it can be used to test the sectoral economic impact, and thus the desirability of certain types of environmental economic instruments such as pol lution taxes, or the imposition of royalties on mineral extraction. Hence, the SANEEP framework has the potential to become a broad‐based, integrated environmental and economic planning tool. This article describes the SANEEP model, its information requirements and applications.     

A Hedonic Price Analysis of Farmland Option Premiums Under Urban Influences

An emerging theory, real option pricing, suggests that an important component of urban fringe farmland values may be the option value arising from nearby urban development. This new option pricing theory, as opposed to its standard conventional counterpart in finance, incorporates both the uncertainty about the future net benefits of a land conversion decision and the irreversibility of this action taken. We demonstrate that parsimonious empirical hedonic models of the errors‐in‐variables type, when corrected for heteroskedasticity, can provide adequate representations of farmland option premiums. Data for a random sample of cash rented Ohio farmland parcels are used, and the impacts of urban development on farmland option premiums are estimated. Results provide evidence that (a) both land‐use conversion probability and urban influences have been important factors affecting the option value of the state's farmland, and (b) these option premiums associated with irreversible and uncertain land development are capitalized into farmland values. Une nouvelle théorie, l'évaluation des options réelles, semble indiquer qu'un élément important de la valeur des terres agricoles périurbaines pourrait être la valeur d'option découlant du développement urbain avoisinant. Cette nouvelle théorie, contrairement aux options financières, inclut à la fois l'incertitude quant aux bénéfices nets futurs liés à la décision de convertir une terre et l'irréversibilité de cette décision. Nous avons démontré que les modèles empiriques parcimonieux et hédoniques du type erreurs sur les variables peuvent, une fois l'hétéroscédasticité corrigée, donner des présentations adéquates des prix de l'option des terres agricoles. Nous avons utilisé les données d'un échantillon aléatoire de parcelles de terres agricoles louées au comptant en Ohio et nous avons estimé l'impact du développement urbain sur le prix de l'option des terres agricoles. Les résultats ont montré: a) que la probabilité de conversion de l'utilisation des terres et les influences urbaines sont des facteurs importants qui influent sur la valeur de l'option des terres agricoles de l'État; b) que ces prix de l'option associés à un aménagement urbain irréversible et incertain sont intégrés dans la valeur des terres agricoles.     

Micro and macroeconomic adjustment processes in East Germany — Ninth report

Micro and macroeconomic adjustment processes in East Germany — Ninth report     

The Creation,Maintenance and Governance of Public Goods and Free Goods

The theory of public goods is largely irrelevant to their management and governance. It is highly normative but is unused in the policy area. It remains centred on highly idealized and dichotomized characteristics (non-rivalrousness and non-excludability) of public goods despite important theoretical progress in the last twenty years. It is suggested that public goods are as much social as technological constructions, but there is no explanation of how such goods come into existence. It is argued that they are often subject to evolution that changes the balance of their characteristics between being public or private goods. Present theory bears little relationship to the governmental budgetary processes assumed necessary to finance such goods, yet all management and maintenance costs, often high enough to deter such funding, are ignored. While there is recognition that the intensive use of a public good often imposes costs directly upon users, there is no corresponding recognition either that inappropriate and intensive usage can erode public goods as assets or that such usage is difficult to control. Free goods are described and mooted as specific and important types of public goods. Illustrative examples of public and free goods, mainly from Australia and the Pacific, are cited.     

Commonality in Codes of Ethics

We create a database of company codes of ethics from firms listed on the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index and, separately, a sample of small firms. The SEC believes that “ethics codes do, and should, vary from company to company.” Using textual analysis techniques, we measure the extent of commonality across the documents. We find substantial levels of common sentences used by the firms, including a few cases where the codes of ethics are essentially identical. We consider these results in the context of legal statements versus value statements. While legal writing often mandates duplication, we argue that value-based statements should be held to a higher standard of originality. Our evidence is consistent with isomorphic pressures on smaller firms to conform.