Beyond a Liberal Critique of ‘Trickle Down': Urban Planning in the City of Malmö

This article scrutinizes the much used, but less examined, concept of ‘trickle down' in an urban setting. We make a distinction between the production of and distribution in the city, and argue that trickle down in contemporary urban policy could be regarded as the liberal link between production and distribution. Based on interviews with key figures and document analyses, we look at the transformation of the Swedish city of Malmö from an industrial to a post‐industrial city, where, during the last two decades, we have found three concurrent components: the ideology of trickle down; several urban policy programs and governmental policies to ‘make' money and resources trickle down; as well as increased economic polarization and segregation. A liberal critique of trickle down would argue that market mechanisms cannot by themselves solve distribution, and that government policies therefore are needed. We argue for the need to go beyond a liberal critique of trickle down and stress how unequal distribution is built into the unequal production of the city.     

Advance selling of new products to strategic consumers on flash sale platforms*

Flash sale (FS) is a new business model that offers discounted products in limited numbers over a short period. In this paper we discuss the impact of strategic consumers on advance selling (AS) of new products on FS platforms. We first study the impact of strategic consumers on competing retailers adopting AS to sell a homogeneous new product. And find that the retailers’ AS profits and inventory quantities decrease with the strategic customers’ valuation and valuation decreasing rate. Then we analyse whether FS can mitigate the impact of strategic customers on retailers adopting AS for new products. We consider a newsvendor model involving only one retailer adopting AS to sell a new product. We derive the results by comparing this model with two counterpart models, namely the classical newsvendor model with no strategic customers and a newsvendor model with strategic customers where the retailer does not use FS under AS.     

Product Market Competition,Skill Shortages and Productivity: Evidence from Canadian Manufacturing Firms

In this paper, we estimate the impacts of product market competition and skill shortages on the productivity level performance of Canadian manufacturing firms. We use firms perceptions of their competitive environment from the Statistics Canada 1999 Survey of Innovation to measure product market competition and skill shortages. We argue in the paper that such perceptions are important for productivity level performance. After controlling for other factors, we find that product market competition has a positive impact on the performance of medium-sized and large-sized firms, and that skill shortages have a negative impact on the performance of small-sized and medium-sized firms.Jel Classification: L0, O0     

Too much of a good thing: The impact of product variety on operations and sales performance

We examine the impact of product variety decisions on an operational measure – unit fill rate – and on sales performance. Results are estimated using weekly data over three years from 108 distribution centers of a major soft drink bottler. Our results show that fill rates are negatively associated with product variety at a diminishing rate. In addition, we examine the total effect of product variety on sales including both the direct effect and the indirect effect through operations performance. The total impact of product variety on sales initially is positive, although at a diminishing rate. However, beyond a certain level, increased product variety actually results in lower sales; that is, “too much of a good thing”. Thus, the findings provide a comprehensive understanding of the impact of product variety on operations and sales performance.     

Product configuration,ambidexterity and firm performance in the context of industrial equipment manufacturing

The practice of configuring products to individual customer orders has found application in a variety of industry contexts, but little is known about the specific capabilities that firms develop to successfully compete when offering configurable products. Our research begins to fill this gap in the context of industrial equipment manufacturing. Drawing from the ambidexterity literature, we argue that firms have to balance dual goals of reducing variation and promoting variation in their product configuration activities by fostering two distinct firm-level capabilities: product configuration effectiveness (PCE) and product configuration intelligence (PCI). Specifically, we hypothesize that the simultaneous presence of PCE and PCI—that is, product configuration ambidexterity (PCA)—drives superior firm responsiveness and, indirectly firm sales and operating margin. However, we also contend that responsiveness gains through PCA can diminish with product complexity and can increase operating cost. We test these hypotheses by collecting both primary and secondary data from a sample of 108 European industrial equipment manufacturing firms. Results from our analyses indicate that PCA has an indirect effect through responsiveness on sales and operating cost but not on operating margin, with this effect diminishing with product complexity. Taken together, our results suggest that investment in developing PCA may represent a conundrum for industrial equipment manufacturing firms, because it translates into market but not financial advantages, and it is intertwined with product design decisions. We conclude this study with a discussion of the findings for theory and practice.     

THE HOUSING MARKET AND THE RECOVERY

In the run up to the key Christmas period the talk is again of renewed weakness in consumer spending. Last month saw the volume of retail sales rise by only 0.1 per cent, and the annual rate of growth has now slowed to a shade over 3 per cent, down from its peak of 4.4 per cent back in July this summer. This weakness in consumer demand is also clearly being reflected in retail prices; with retailers discounting their prices to boost sales, headline inflation fell to 1.4per cent in October, while the underlying rate dropped to its lowest level for 25 years. This forecast release looks at the wider determinants of consumer spending, especially developments in the housing market. We argue that the slowdown in high street sales is a forbear of sluggish growth to come and that lower interest rates, if they materialise, are unlikely to have much of an impact. While consumer spending has been the driving force out of recession, for the recovery to be sustained, requires that exports and investment spending now take up the running.     

Poverty and crime in 19th century Germany

We estimate the impact of poverty on crime in 19th century Bavaria, Germany. Rainfall is used as an instrumental variable for grain (rye) prices to address econometric identification problems in the existing literature. The rye price was a major determinant of living standards during this period. The rye price has a positive effect on property crime: a one standard deviation increased property crime by 8%. OLS estimates are twice as large as instrumental variable estimates, highlighting the value of our empirical approach. Higher rye prices lead to significantly less violent crime, though, and we argue that higher beer prices, caused by the higher rye prices, are a likely explanation.     

Why do firms train apprentices? The net cost puzzle reconsidered

This paper analyses the impact of increasing the share of apprentices at the cost of the share of unskilled or semi-skilled employees on establishment performance. We use representative matched employer–employee panel data and correct for estimation biases. We show that an increase of the apprentice share in trade, commercial, craft or construction occupations has a positive impact on establishment performance. Establishments that increase the apprentice share in manufacturing occupations face a negative impact on performance, however. These results shed a new light on the stylised fact that apprenticeship training always leads to net costs during the apprenticeship period in Germany: we argue that establishments only hire apprentices at a cost if their skills are relatively specific, their retention rate is high and skilled employees are hard to hire.     

Credit constraints and the persistence of unemployment

In this paper, we argue that credit market imperfections impact not only the level of unemployment, but also its persistence. For this purpose, we first develop a theoretical model based on the equilibrium matching framework of Mortensen and Pissarides (1999) and Pissarides (2000) where we introduce credit constraints. We show these credit constraints not only increase steady-state unemployment, but also slow down the transitional dynamics. We then provide an empirical illustration based on a country panel dataset of 20 OECD countries. Our results suggest that credit market imperfections significantly increase the persistence of unemployment.     

Together or separately? Direct and synergistic effects of Effectuation and Causation on innovation in technology-based SMEs

Technology-based SMEs develop their activity in changing environments with strong competitive pressures. These conditions make them much more likely to innovate but also make the innovative process more challenging due to greater complexity of decisions about resources and establishment of actions to achieve favorable innovation results. Although prior studies have analyzed diverse factors that impact the innovative dynamics of this type of firm, little advance has been made in exploring the problem from the perspective of decision-making. This study seeks to close this research gap using Effectuation Theory, one of the most-cited theories emerging in the field of entrepreneurship. More specifically, we analyze the use of causal and effectual decision-making logics to evaluate their direct and ambidextrous effects on innovation in technology-based SMEs. Our results provide evidence that not just one path, but rather a pool of alternatives, supports product and process innovation development. More specifically, when technology SMEs pursue product innovation, both effectuation and causation can be used as predominant mechanisms to achieve positive innovation results. If firms also seek to develop process innovations, however, they may obtain better results with an ambidextrous approach.

     

Markov体制转换模型与经济周期分析

根据信息选择滞后准则,将经济增长率的特点状态分为两个。本模型的特点是引入一个虚拟变量将序列在两个状态下的均值再分为改革开放前后两个情况。根据经济增长率的平滑概率发现改革开放前周期与波峰和波谷划分的周期相同,改革开放后的周期基本相同,只是经济的收缩状态比较长,尤其近几年。模型估计收缩的持续时间是3.5年,扩张的持续时间是3.1年;2005年和2006年是经济发展的扩张期,预计2007年是扩张期,2008年在北京举办奥运会,是经济发展的高峰期,预计2009年可能是经济从扩张到收缩的转折期,2010年经济有恢复的迹象。     

Has the ECB increased interest rates too soon?

Even though the Eurozone recovery is far from entrenched, the ECB decided to raise interest rates towards the end of 2005 and another hike is expected soon. Those in the ECB who have been looking for a reason to start tightening for some time can point to an inflation rate that remains stubbornly above target as a justification. In this article we find that the price rises of non‐energy industrial goods ‐ particularly those for clothing and footwear ‐ have remained very sticky when compared to the deflation seen in countries like the UK. A lack of competitive forces may be an issue ‐ the impact of China and India on goods prices does not seem to be fully feeding through to consumers. And weak productivity in the distribution sector may have prevented retailers from driving down prices to the same extent as in the UK. Does the current ECB action form the start of a prolonged tightening cycle as seen in the US? Despite worries over asset price and credit growth ‐ and here we argue that the ECB's reliance on monetary aggregates as a signal of impending inflation is misguided ‐ there is a possibility that the ECB has acted at the same time that inflation is finally set to subside. Consequently, we expect a "wait and see" approach to further moves, and unless growth comes in much stronger than the 2.2% we expect in 2006, rates should end the year at around 2½%.     

The impact of a firm's make, pseudo-make, or buy strategy on product performance

The bulk of the product architecture and make-buy choice literature deals with product architecture changes from integral to modular form. This development is often associated with a firm's tendency to change from a make to a buy strategy. However, a few studies investigate the change of product architecture in the reverse direction - from modular to integral form - and the subsequent change in the firm sourcing decision from a buy to a make strategy. These studies hold to the presumption that a firm following a make strategy will outperform firms following a buy strategy in dealing with integral product architectures. Based on the knowledge-based view, we argue for the viability of a sourcing strategy between the pure make and buy strategies - a pseudo-make strategy. We also argue that as product architecture changes from a modular to integral form, firms adopting this pseudo-make strategy are likely to show better product performance than firms following a pure make or buy strategy due to the relative knowledge advantages of the pseudo-make strategy in dealing with the integral product architecture. We examine the impact of the make/pseudo-make/buy strategies on product performance in the U.S. bicycle derailleur and freewheel market from 1980 to 1992 and provide theoretical and managerial implications of our results. Our findings highlight an important distinction between the pseudo-make and make-buy strategies that has not previously been fully appreciated in the extant literature, and as a result increases our understanding of why some firms do not switch strategies from a buy to a make strategy when product architecture changes from modular to integral form as previously expected.     

Toward a theory of competencies for the management of product complexity: Six case studies

Business units in six Fortune 500 companies were studied to develop better understanding regarding drivers of product portfolio complexity and the means to manage them. Our research focuses on identifying important competencies for managing product portfolio complexity and on the development of appropriate theoretical explanations. We found three important competencies: product/technology portfolio strategy, organization and governance regarding complexity decisions, and product design and decision support systems. We explicate these competencies using a socio-technical systems theoretical perspective. Our findings provide the basis for a model describing the impact of complexity and complexity management on business unit profitability.     

Learning by customers as co-producers in financial services: An empirical study of the effects of learning channels and customer characteristics

As customers become more involved in executing service tasks, service performance is increasingly reliant on the efficiency and effectiveness of this customer co-production. While organizational and employee learning have been extensively studied, learning by customers in their role as co-producers is largely unexplored. To explore how customers learn to be better co-producers, we examine whether learning channels and customer characteristics impact the customer learning rate. Using longitudinal panel data consisting of 954 customers who adopted and used a bank??s online banking product over a 12-month period, we find that service delivery channels can have dual effects on customer learning, acting as learning channels to accelerate customer learning and/or impeding learning through channel substitution. In addition, customers?? experiences working on related technology-mediated tasks and absorptive capacity increase their learning rate. Overall, our results suggest that customer learning can be designed into the service delivery system by encouraging the use of channels with complementary learning effects and discouraging channel substitution.     

Growing Followers: Exploring the Effects of Leader Humility on Follower Self‐Expansion,Self‐Efficacy,and Performance

Although the effectiveness of leader humility has been well documented, our understanding of how leader humility influences followers psychologically is limited. Surpassing a mere leader‐centric understanding of the leader influence process by more fully understanding how leadership behavior shapes followers psychologically has been identified as a critical need by leadership scholars. Drawing on self‐expansion theory, we argue that leader humility triggers followers’ self‐expansion and that this psychological change enhances followers’ self‐efficacy, which in turn contributes to followers’ task performance. We also argue that the relationship between leader humility and followers’ self‐expansion is strengthened when leaders and followers are similar in age and gender. Using a time‐lagged research design with responses from 256 leader–follower dyads, we found support for our proposed model. We discuss the theoretical implications for our findings and suggest areas for future research.     

Learning from R&D outsourcing vs. learning by R&D outsourcing

We analyze how research and development (R&D) outsourcing influences product innovation. We propose a separation between learning from R&D outsourcing, whereby the firm improves its ability to innovate by using outsourced R&D directly in new products, from learning by R&D outsourcing, whereby the firm indirectly uses outsourced R&D by integrating it with internal R&D to create new products. Building on the knowledge-based view, we argue that learning from R&D outsourcing is likely to have an inverse U-shaped relationship with product innovation, because the initial benefits of using outsourced component R&D knowledge to innovate products is eventually outweighed by the hollowing out of the firm's ability to innovate. In contrast, we propose that learning by R&D outsourcing is likely to have a U-shaped relationship with product innovation, because the initial challenges of integrating internal and external R&D are eventually overcome, resulting in more innovations. Finally, we distinguish between domestic and foreign R&D outsourcing and propose a liability of foreignness in R&D outsourcing as it has a lower impact on new products than domestic R&D outsourcing. The empirical analysis shows that outsourced R&D has an inverted U-shaped relationship with the number of new products, while the interaction between outsourced R&D and internal R&D has a U-shaped relationship with the number of new products. It also shows that domestic outsourced R&D has a higher positive impact on the number of new products than foreign outsourced R&D.     

‘How would you measure something like that?’: Quality in a Retail Bank

In this paper we explore a case study of total quality management (TQM) within the financial services sector. We demonstrate that a ‘conformance to requirements’ approach towards TQM is concerned with increasing management’s physical and financial control over procedures, documentation, systems and people. Such an approach only partially addresses quality because (a) there can never be a precise ‘conformance’ and (b) this approach neglects customers and employees. We illustrate that often management do not understand the flaws/problematics and underlying philosophy behind TQM. Thus they continue to adopt ‘inconsistent’ approaches, such as attempting to control costs and employees while espousing the importance of the customer and the need for a trust-based culture. Yet, whether or not they understand the rationale behind TQM and attempt to widen their focus by considering people and customers more directly, we argue that management cannot easily adopt a ‘consistent’ approach because a preoccupation with controlling costs is bound up with career-based identities and hierarchical power relations. Ultimately we argue that management cannot control ‘quality’ in any simple top down way, essentially because of the ‘indeterminacy’ of labour, the ‘intangibility’ of customer satisfaction, and the complexity of organizational power and identity relations.     

The impact of VIX on China’s financial market: A new perspective based on high-dimensional and time-varying methods

Based on the new perspective of high-dimensional and time-varying methods, this paper analyzes the contagion effects of US financial market volatility on China’s nine financial sub-markets. The results show evidence of non-linear Granger causality from the US financial volatility (VIX) to the China’s financial markets. Increased US financial volatility has a negative next-day impact on the stock, bond, fund, interest rate, foreign exchange, industrial product and agricultural product markets, and a positive next-day impact on the gold and real estate markets. US financial volatility has the greatest impact on industrial product market, following by stock, agricultural product, fund, real estate, bond, gold, foreign exchange, and interest rates. Major risk events such as the global financial crisis can cause an enhanced contagion effect of US financial volatility to China's financial markets. This paper supports the achievements of China's actions to prevent and resolve major financial risks in the period of the COVID-19 epidemic.