Cost of Recycling Municipal Solid Waste With and Without a Concurrent Beverage Container Deposit Law

The purpose of this article is to contribute to the literature on the effect of beverage container deposit legislation (BCDL) on the cost and amount of the household portion of municipal solid waste recycled. A U.S. General Accounting Office report concluded that dual systems cost more than either alone and that the combination diverts a greater amount of solid waste from landfills, which is supported by this analysis. However, the report's conclusion that a dual system becomes more cost-effective as landfill disposal costs increase cannot be supported over reasonable ranges of the marginal savings from not having to dispose of recycled materials. The cost of recycling is higher in communities with dual systems. Recycling programs without BCDL divert as much or more waste from disposal than with BCDL.     

Whistle-Blowing for Profit: An Ethical Analysis of the Federal False Claims Act

This paper focuses on the 1986 Amendments to the False Claims Act of 1863, which offers whistle-blowers financial rewards for disclosing fraud committed against the U.S. government. This law provides an opportunity to examine underlying assumptions about the morality of whistle-blowing and to consider the merits of increased reliance on whistle-blowing to protect the public interest. The law seems open to a number of moral objections, most notably that it exerts a morally corrupting influence on whistle-blowers. We answer these objections and argue that the law is not objectionable on these grounds. Since there are no compelling moral objections to the law, it is appropriate and acceptable to judge the law in terms of its economic costs and benefits. We assess the most salient of these and conclude that the benefits outweigh the costs. We suggest that a mechanism similar to the Act should be considered for protecting stockholders’ interests in the private sector. We conclude by making several proposals for improving the existing legislation. The authors' names are listed in alphabetical order. An earlier version of this paper was presented to the Society for Business Ethics August 2004.     

我国循环经济立法问题的几点探讨

我国循环经济立法经历了长期的发展过程,取得了可喜的成绩,但从总体上看,我国循环经济立法还处于初步阶段,立法质量不高,法律修改工作滞后等问题。我国循环经济立法应以科学发展观为指导,确定循环经济立法的基本思路;抓紧制定《清洁生产促进法》的配套法规及资源回收利用的规定,抓紧修改有关的法律,建立循环经济发展的规则制度、科技支撑制度、激励制度、公众参与制度和政府责任制度。     

The New Zealand Fair Trading Act of 1986: Deceptive Advertising

In 1986, New Zealand introduced the Fair Trading Act, legislation aimed at consumer protection. This act was modeled after similar Australian legislation, while taking into account the legislation and precedents of other countries including the United States, England, and Canada. Although wording of different nations' legislation is often similar, unique national conditions may give rise to different interpretations. The emergence of the Act may indicate a movement toward minimal international standards in consumer protection legislation among common law countries and to a lesser extent, a large number of Western nations. This paper examines the content and performance of the Act concerning deceptive advertising. Available evidence suggests that the frequency and severity of deceptive advertising has declined. Knowledge of the New Zealand experience provides insight into the evolution of consumer protection legislation and insight for American firms planning commerce there.     

The Export Trading Company Act:

The Export Trading Company Act (ETCA) was signed into law in 1982 by then President Ronald Reagan. The goal of this legislation was to promote U.S. exports by allowing U.S. banks to hold an equity U.S. exports by allowing U.S. banks to hold an equity position in Export Trading Companies (ETCs) and by exempting the overseas activities of these organiziations from U.S. antitrust laws. The writers of this legislation hoped that the American ETCs would eventually grow to rival the Japanese General Export Trading Cmopanies known as sogo shosha's. This paper focuses on the history of the ETCA, its problems, and the current state of Export Trading Companies (ETCs) in the U.S. When the ETCA was established, the dollar was on an upward trend and was relatively high compared to other major currencies, such as the Deutsche mark, Japanese yen, and pound sterling. The legislation had a somewhat minor effect of exports, as few companies came together to form ETCs. With the fall of the dollar, an important question to ask is: Has the drop of the dollar contributed to a rise in interest in forming ETCs?     

萨班斯法案与我国上市公司治理结构研究

为了保护投资者的利益,美国于2002年颁布了萨班斯法案。该法案要求加强对在美国上市公司的监管,完善上市公司的内部控制机制,但其高昂的实施成本也引起了人们对该法案作用的争议。尽管如此,萨班斯法案对我国上市公司治理方面仍具有借鉴意义。本文通过对萨班斯法案的分析,探讨我国证券市场应如何借鉴该法案来完善我国上市公司内部治理机制和外部治理环境,从而实现我国证券市场快速、健康而有序的发展,以保护国内广大投资者的利益。     

Reward redemption effects in a loyalty program when customers choose how much and when to redeem

The redemption of loyalty program (LP) rewards has an important impact on LP members' behavior, particularly on purchase behavior before and after redeeming a reward. However, little is known about the interplay between members' purchase and redemption behavior when members are not pressured with point expiration and they choose for themselves when and how much to redeem. In this context, the effects of redemption are not straightforward, as little additional effort is required from an LP member to obtain the reward. Analyzing the behavior of 3094 members in such an LP, we find that the mere decision to redeem a reward significantly enhances purchase behavior before and after the redemption event, even when members redeem just a fraction of their accumulated points. Conceptually, we refer to this enhancement as the redemption momentum, which is an alternative and novel explanation of the existence of pre-reward effects that do not depend on points-pressure. In addition to the overall impact of redemption on purchases, prior purchase behavior also enhances redemption decisions. Finally, we find a number of moderating effects on purchase and redemption behavior that derive from the length of LP membership, age, income and direct mailings. Our study's most important managerial implication is that firms should avoid imposing point expiry and/or binding thresholds in order to enhance members' purchase behavior.     

Genetic Screening in the Workplace: Legislative and Ethical Implications

This paper discusses legal and ethical issues related to genetic screening. It is argued that persons identified with actual or perceived deleterious genetic markers are protected by the American with Disabilities Act of 1990 and the Civil Rights Act of 1991, if members of a protected group, regardless of whether or not they are currently ill. However, legislation may not protect all employees in all scenarios, in which case, ethical principles should guide decision-making. In doing so a model of preventive ethics is proposed to better understand the multiple levels on which this issue resides.     

Saying Nothing With Words

Good legislation depends on clearly articulated policy objectives. This paper argues that a significant threat to effective consumer protection is posed by fuzzy thinking at the policy-making stage. Three major Australian law reform initiatives are examined: the Contracts Review Act 1980 (New South Wales); new uniform truth in lending laws; and product liability legislation. In each case, effective policy choices were left unresolved, either because the choice was politically too difficult or simply because of a failure by the policy makers to perceive that there was a choice needing to be made. In each case, the problem has been disguised by resort to drafting at a high level of abstraction, and this serves to make rhetorical claims in support of the legislation seem plausible. The truth, however, is that legislation drafted this way is bound to be indeterminate and it is left to the courts to invent policy as part of the interpretation process. This is not a legitimate judicial function.     

旅游餐饮市场信用缺失与政府监管

文章在分析我国旅游餐饮市场信用缺失的特点、危害的基础上,运用博弈矩阵模型对旅游餐饮市场信用缺失与政府监管的关系进行了剖析,认为在政府缺位的情况下,旅游餐饮商家为了经济利益将始终采取欺客宰客行为。所以,政府对旅游餐饮市场的干预和监管是必须的。政府应不断完善法规和管理制度、提升监管技术水平并加大对欺诈行为的制裁力度。     

信息交易呼唤新的法律规则

计算机信息交易是直接电子商务的重要组成部分 ,美国《统一计算机信息交易法》是世界上第一部全面调整计算机信息交易的法律。在我国 ,电子商务飞速发展 ,其中信息交易的数量也与日俱增 ,立法不足将日益凸显 ,因此 ,制订我国的《计算机信息交易法》应尽早提上议事日程。     

受捐赠人特定型网络募捐的法律认可与合理规制——兼论与证券公开发行行为的比较分析

受捐赠人特定型网络募捐是社会主体通过网络向不特定社会公众募集资金，且将所募集资金用于特定受捐赠人的新型募捐模式。《慈善法》目前未将此类募捐行为纳入其调整与规范范围。通过对与受捐赠人特定型网络募捐有较多类比因素的证券公开发行行为进行比较分析可见，在各国立法长期认可后者的基础上，我国法律认可前者也具有较强的合理性。事实上，网络募捐的市场理性和市场调节能力的自发规制、网络募捐整体社会收益远大于募捐成本以及立法对慈善组织的良好假设经不起实践检验等因素的存在，都是我国立法认可受捐赠人特定型网络募捐行为的具体原因。我国立法可通过各种制度措施对受捐赠人特定型网络募捐行为进行合理适度的有效规制。     

Legislated Ethics: From Enron to Sarbanes-Oxley,the Impact on Corporate America

This paper explores the financial reporting scandals of the past decade and the resulting U.S. legislative attempts to impose ethical behavior and control the incidence of new reporting problems via the Sarbanes-Oxley legislation. We begin with a brief historical perspective followed by assertions of ethical consequences of legislation with discussions of key recent corporate scandals, the motives for the frauds, and the consequences. Ethics related provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act are discussed with the potential impact of the legislation on the likelihood of similar future frauds and accompanying prognosis for future corporate ethical behavior.     

Transforming Australian business attitudes to competition: Responses to the Trade Practices Act 1965

When the Australian Trade Practices Act 1965 came into force on 1 September 1967 it was vehemently opposed by business as it threatened to reveal the extent of their anti-competitive arrangements. Yet by the time the Act was replaced by stronger legislation in 1974, most firms had accepted that collusion and price fixing were undesirable and that they had to compete. Using newspapers, parliamentary debates, archival records, and the Secret Register of trade agreements introduced by the 1965 Act, this paper examines the transformation of attitudes to competition in the Australian business community.     

国学思想在市场营销中的应用

国学思想是中国几千年来治理国家事物、整顿吏治、管理家庭事务、提高自身修养的思想体系和方法论体系,在长期的社会实践中起到了积极的作用。在当代,企业管理者要善于运用国学思想,在吸收国学的经典思想过程中要活学活用,用科学和理性的态度将"仁义礼智信、温良恭俭让"的思想运用到企业的日常管理和营销实践中,在继承中发展,以不断提高企业的经济效益。     

Advocacy on the Internet: Lessons Learned from the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act of 2005

After the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act (AETA) was introduced to Congress in 2005, animal rights organizations joined efforts to advocate against the legislation. Their efforts failed even though more than 250 groups across the nation joined together to lobby against the act. To evaluate the communication strategies and media relations efforts of these organizations, a content analysis of randomly sampled advocacy group Web sites was conducted. Of the 122 “Stop AETA” organizations in the sample, 82% had a Web site though only 36% of those organizations with Web sites had organized online press rooms to promote their causes. This paper examines the implications of advocacy communication in a virtual environment and recommends strategies for improving the media relations efforts.     

逆向物流在我国发展的障碍分析

本文认为,目前我国逆向物流发展存在很多障碍,诸如国家缺乏立法和经济管制及相应的支持性经济政策,技术落后,宣传不够,认识不足等等。文章提出,一要加快立法,依法管理,将再生资源回收利用逐步纳入法制化管理的轨道;二要采用经济手段促进逆向物流的发展,如由环保部门收取环境保护税;三要加大公共财政对再生资源回收利用的支持力度,在信贷等方面给予必要的支持;四要加大对逆向物流的科技投入,最大限度地回收废弃物中的价值;五要广泛宣传,使之深入人心,从我做起。     

An exploratory investigation into how socioeconomic attributes influence coupons redeeming intentions

In this study, we examine the effects that opportunity cost, income effect, coupon proneness and devaluation effect have on coupon redemption intention. Overall, the results of a survey received from approximately 2250 respondents suggest that prospect of savings and coupon proneness are positively associated, while opportunity cost is inversely associated with coupon redemption intention. The results are consistent across several sub-samples of grocery stores, which further underline the robustness of our hypotheses. Our analyses are more exhaustive than and therefore, contribute to, extant literature on promotions using coupons, because we base our study on behavioral, social and economic factors that influence coupon redemption intentions.     

Rebate redemption requirements – Can they discourage redeeming?

Mail-in rebates are a popular price promotion that receive substantial negative criticism due to high consumer resentment and mistrust. There is little research examining rebate redemption requirements and it seems no attempt has been made to develop a measure of what constitutes a reasonable and, perhaps more importantly, an unreasonable set of compliance requirements. This paper reports on a study of rebate promotion redemption requirements and the differences in their perceived onerousness. Furthermore, we test the effect of rebate requirement onerousness on consumers’ intention to redeem. Results show that consumers do perceive difference in the relative onerousness of rebate requirements. Furthermore, through the use of Best-Worst Scaling it was possible to rank the onerousness of requirements and demonstrate that the most onerous were up to 50 times more likely to deter consumers from redeeming than the least onerous. These results will help marketers better understand how to promote products using rebate promotions that do not foster consumer angst. Findings offer implications for retailers, product marketers, policy makers, and regulators.