Personal values associated with political consumption: an exploratory study with university students in Brazil

Emerging countries have witnessed an incredible change in their societal structure in the last few years. In Brazil, the economical rise of the middle class brought more that 100 million people to the marketplace. This stimulus to consumerism (i.e. the social and economic order that encourages the purchase of goods and services in ever‐greater amounts) is accompanied by a notable growth in social movements and mobilization of citizen‐consumers, which indicates changes in the values of individuals and concerns with the direction the society is taking. Conscious and political consumption consequently arises as an alternative way. Especially among young consumers such issues are interesting to address from a theoretical and social point of view, as this new generation will shape the future of the nation. Therefore, the main objective of this study is to analyse socially conscious and political consumption in terms of consumers’ civic engagement as political citizens. We argue that the young political consumer is value‐oriented. The study relied on quantitative research, conducted through an internet‐based survey where 458 valid questionnaires were obtained. Schwartz's Portrait Values Questionnaire was used to measure personal values of the interviewees. Conscious and political consumption were measured through eight questions addressing alter‐ and anti‐consumption actions. The results indicated significant differences among the personal values of the university students that were classified as political consumers. Universalism and benevolence stood out among the core values of this group, with prominence of self‐transcendence, appreciation for equality and concerns for the well‐being of others. However, a gap was observed between the discourse and action of interviewees, once only one‐third of the sample undertook some form of political consumption. The conclusion was that most of the university students interviewed show the will to change society with individual actions, but demonstrate very little political commitment, and currently do not act politically in their purchases.     

Regulatory changes in the electric utility industry: Investigation of effects on shareholder wealth

In 1992, the regulatory environment for electric utilities changed dramatically with enactment of the Energy Policy Act, mandating increased competition in this formerly monopolistic industry. The results of our study suggest that these regulatory changes in the electric utility industry and the opening of transmission lines to outsiders had negative and significant effects on stock values for the overall sample of firms examined. The basic results indicate that the movement toward greater competition dissipates economic rents associated with the previously held monopolistic situations. Multivariate analysis indicates that firms with greater levels of nuclear assets and higher earnings per dollar of assets prior to the regulatory actions suffered greater negative abnormal returns than other firms in the sample. Additionally, firms in a more competitive environment prior to regulatory changes had less negative abnormal returns. Results also show utility firms are riskier after deregulation with an increase in market risk of 48.88% and in firm specific risk of 23.66%. Overall, it appears that, as with other deregulation of natural monopolies in the US, increased competition will benefit some producers, harm other producers and generally dissipate economic rents to consumers.     

支付途径：百花齐放

机票销售对于绝大多数航空公司而言就是圣杯，但是支付流程的重要性——特别是对于依赖于直销的低成本航空公司而言——不能低估。如果正确的票价不能进入航空公司银行账户，那么一切都是空谈。尽管这看上去只是一个简单的流程，获得旅客的信用卡信息然后获得银行授权，但是其中的各种困难并不为外人所知。     

The impact of state ownership on performance differences in privately-owned versus state-owned banks: An international comparison

This paper examines how government ownership and government involvement in a country’s banking system affect bank performance from 1989 through 2004. Our study uncovers an interesting pattern of changing performance differences between state-owned and privately-owned banks around the Asian financial crisis. We find that state-owned banks operated less profitably, held less core capital, and had greater credit risk than privately-owned banks prior to 2001, and the performance differences are more significant in those countries with greater government involvement and political corruption in the banking system. In addition, from 1997 to 2000, the 4-year period after the beginning of the Asian financial crisis, the deterioration in the cash flow returns, core capital, and credit quality of state-owned banks was significantly greater than that of privately-owned banks, especially for the countries that were hardest hit by the Asian crisis. However, state-owned banks closed the gap with privately-owned banks on cash flow returns, core capital, and nonperforming loans in the post-crisis period of 2001–2004. Our findings can best be explained by Shleifer and Vishny’s [Shleifer, A., Vishny, R.W., 1997. A survey of corporate governance. J. Finance 52, 737–783] corporate governance theory on state ownership of firms and Kane’s [Kane, E.J., 2000. Capital movement, banking insolvency, and silent runs in the Asian financial crisis. Pacific-Basin Finance J. 8, 153–175] life-cycle model of a regulation-induced banking crisis.     

The Impact of Risk-Based Premiums on FDIC-Insured Institutions

This paper examines the effect of a series of announcements leading to the approval of risk-based deposit insurance premiums on returns to stockholders of commercial banks. Utilizing risk-weighted capital ratios and measures of overall risk, we group banks according to one of the nine-tier insurance categories subsequently defined by the FDIC. During the period in which the new insurance system was considered and approved, we found that stockholders of well-capitalized, healthy banks experienced wealth changes significantly different from those experienced by less than well-capitalized, less than healthy banks. Although many argued the premium range in the initial insurance schedule was insufficient, the results show that this initial risk-basing marked an important change in the relative burdens imposed by FDIC insurance.     

The impact of institutional ownership on corporate operating performance

This paper examines the relation between institutional investor involvement in and the operating performance of large firms. We find a significant relation between a firm’s operating cash flow returns and both the percent of institutional stock ownership and the number of institutional stockholders. However, this relation is found only for a subset of institutional investors: those less likely to have a business relationship with the firm. These results suggest that institutional investors with potential business relations with the firms in which they invest are compromised as monitors of the firm.     

Finite sample properties for the semiparametric estimation of the intercept of a censored regression model

Financial support for this paper was provided by a C.A. Anderson Fellowship of the Cowles Foundation. I wish to thank Donald Andrews, Moshe Buchinsky, Oliver Linton, and Peter Robinson for helpful discussions. I also wish to thank three anonymous referees for their comments and suggestions. I am, of course, responsible for any remaining errors. A popular two-step estimator of the intercept of a censored regression model is compared with consistent asymptotically normal semiparametric alternatives. Using a root mean squared error criterion, the semiparametric estimators perform better for a range of bandwidth parameter choices for a variety of distributions of the errors and regressors. For error distributions that are close to the normal, however, the two-step parametric estimator performs better.     

The incidence of wrongdoing,whistle-blowing,and retaliation: Results of a naturally occurring field experiment

The present study examined two general research questions pertaining to the passage of a law designed to encourage whistle-blowing: (a) Has the incidence of perceived wrongdoing, whistle-blowing, anonymous whistle-blowing, or retaliation changed following the passage of the law? (b) What variables predict the comprehensiveness of retaliation that identified whistle-blowers claim to have experienced? One questionnaire was mailed to members of 15 organizations affected by the law in 1980 (n=8500) and a second was administered in 1983 (n=4700). There was some evidence that the law had beneficial effects; specifically, the incidence of perceived wrongdoing declined and whistle-blowing increased. Unfortunately, identified whistle-blowers were just as likely to experience retaliation in 1983 as they were in 1980. The predictors of the comprehensiveness of the retaliation experienced were generally the same in both years. The results tentatively suggest that more legal and organizational encouragement of whistle-blowing is needed.     

Attitudinal Barriers to Women's Career Progression in Accounting in Australia

The literature on women's career progression in the professions has suggested a number of categories of factors that may explain the observed gender differences. This study uses data from a survey of Australian accountants to show the extent of differences between male and female accountants in their attitudes towards their careers. There are some differences between the genders in their ideas about requirements for promotion (although these are generally small) and in aspects of job satisfaction. Males aged more than 30 have higher levels of ambition and place more emphasis on career planning than do females over 30.