Exploratory assessment of the Macao casino dealers’ job perceptions

Quality is the cornerstone of success in any business and is perceived to be a key factor in acquiring and sustaining competitive advantage. Good service quality can be enhanced by managing the performance of employees, especially front-line personnel, by first understanding their attitudes and job perceptions. The exploratory study reported herein investigates the job perceptions of casino dealers in Macao via in-depth face-to-face interviews with 51 such dealers. The perceived barriers prohibiting them from delivering quality service are identified, and they include the lack of a fair and transparent reward and promotion system, serious communication difficulties and conflicts due to cultural differences, the language barriers amongst local dealers and foreign supervisors, feelings of job insecurity attributed to the economic downturn and the influx of imported labour, and poor internal communication. The implications for the development of quality casino services are also discussed in this paper.     

Perceptions of casino dealers toward organizational justice: Are there any gender differences?

The emphasis on equity and diversity is vital for businesses to flourish. Promoting workplace equality, essential to enhance employees' satisfaction in delivering excellent service quality, requires understanding of the perception of employees as well as the problems they face. This study examines whether gender equality exists among frontline casino employees, the degree to which inequality is experienced and the consequence of such perceptions, through face-to-face, in-depth interviews with the dealers in Macao. The theory of organizational justice is adopted. Results revealed that perceived inequality and injustices were stronger among the male dealers. Male dealers perceived stronger distributive and procedural injustices than females, while female dealers perceived stronger interactional injustice than males. The perceived injustices resulted in various negative work attitudes among employees. Recommendations to improve work attitudes and counterbalance the inequities are proposed.     

Residents’ Perceptions of the Role of Leisure Satisfaction and Quality of Life in Overall Tourism Development: Case of a Fast-Growing Tourism Destination – Macao

The previous literature has examined leisure satisfaction and quality of life but majority of studies were conducted in Western countries. Policy makers worldwide have struggled to balance residents’ leisure satisfaction and tourism development. This study is conducted in Macao, China, a fast-growing tourism destination in Asia. Results indicated that local residents’ leisure satisfaction is positively related to their perceived quality of life while local residents’ perceived quality of life is positively associated with their evaluation of the perceived benefits of tourism. The results generated from that evaluation positively lead to residents’ support of tourism development. Results indicated that it is worthwhile for the policy makers to invest resources in local residents’ leisure satisfaction and quality of life since this will eventually help to support tourism development. The results of this study provide significant implications for policy makers.     

Trends and Forecasts for Inbound Tourism to China

Summary

The development of tourism in China over the last two decades is reviewed. It is argued that the success of the economic reforms in China which has resulted in fast economic growth has also been the main cause of rapid tourism growth in China. Forecasts of international tourist arrivals by source country market and destination region within China are generated over the period 2001-05. An integrative approach is used which combines both time-series and econometric methodologies, termed structural integrated time-series econometric analysis (SITEA).     

剖析内地旅客在澳门只作短暂停留的原因与对策

旅游(及博彩)业长期都是澳门经济的重要产业.在2003年内地"个人游"政策实施后,来澳者过半为内地旅客,可是他们平均在澳停留天数偏低.本文通过深度调查访问、问卷调查和统计分析探究及检验内地旅客决定在澳停留天数的因素.结果发现来澳目的、来澳次数、可支配收入、出入境交通工具、出入境便利性等都是重要因素.故本文提出以下对策:鼓励以商业为目的的旅客,举办季节性转变的主题活动,在内地高档场所加强宣传和推广,开拓更多的航班和航线,提高边检部门的效率等.     

澳门博彩旅游业的多维效应——一个5年的历时性对比研究

居民对博彩旅游业在环境和青少年价值观方面的负面效应有着强烈的感知,在国际化和地方形象方面,有强烈的正面认同,在传统文化方面有较强烈的正面感知.在经济方面,相对于就业和增加家庭收入方面较高的正面效应,居民对提高生活成本压力的负面效应感知更为强烈.与5年前的历时性对比发现,居民的感知中变化最大的是环境和社会以及生活成本指标,其次是文化方面的指标,前者出现消极趋势,后者则是积极趋势.结合同期澳门社会现实数据分析,作者认为,5年间居民的博彩旅游的多维效应感知显著差异的关键因素很可能与赌权开放后博彩旅游业的规模效应密切相关,这种显著变化暗示居民对社会和环境方面的影响比以往更关切,或者澳门已处于一个比较敏感的社会环境临界点,因此,研究澳门博彩旅游业的社会环境容量和门槛成为迫切的课题.     

The search for World Heritage brand awareness beyond the iconic heritage: a case study of the Historic Centre of Macao

The Historic Centre of Macao was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site (WHS) in 2005. The question arises regarding the value of the designation ‘WHS’ and what it means to tourists who visit. The researchers used intercept surveys and participant observation to determine brand awareness among visitors. Regardless of how much the tourism industry and UNESCO promote the ‘brand’, if visitors are unaware of it and do not respond, the economic and cultural values may be negatively affected.

The results showed the average visitor had only a vague understanding of WHS and it was not a major motivator for their visit. However, the general theme of culture was of high interest, as was a visit to the must-see icon attraction of St Paul's Ruins (the highlight of the Historic Centre of Macao). That is, there appears to be a good level of cultural and heritage awareness but minimal WHS awareness.     

The impacts of international tourism demand on economic growth of small economies dependent on tourism

This paper studies the impacts on economic growth of a small tourism-driven economy caused by an increase in the growth rate of international tourism demand. We present a formal model and empirical evidence. The ingredients of the dynamic model are a large population of intertemporally optimizing agents and an AK technology representing tourism production. The model shows that an increase in the growth of tourism demand leads to transitional dynamics with gradually increasing economic growth and increasing terms of trade. In our empirical application, an econometric methodology is applied to annual data of Antigua and Barbuda from 1970 to 2008. We perform a cointegration analysis to look for the existence of a long-run relationship among variables of economic growth, international tourism earnings and the real exchange rate. The exercise confirms the theoretical findings.     

Can tourism be a key sector in reducing income inequality? An empirical investigation for Turkey

The aim of the study is to investigate the nexus between tourism and income inequality by employing the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) test cover the period 1974–2015 in Turkey. Findings indicated that the variables are cointegrated and an increase in tourism has a positive effect on income inequality, while economic growth and trade openness have a negative effect both in the long-run and short-run. Results also denote that tourism will decrease income inequality with the expansion of tourism activities and the spread of tourism throughout society. In other words, the tourism-related Kuznets Curve hypothesis is valid for Turkey.