IR journal and conference literature from the 1960s to the 1990s: What can HR learn from it? Where is it headed?

The industrial relations (IR) literature has changed notably from the early 1960s until the late 1990s. Yet it has retained an externalist flavor — a sense that the key variables determining outcomes are often outside the control of firm-level actors. However, the kind of externalism found in the modern IR literature differs notably from that of the past. Externalism today is seen as labor market and personal variables — often in an econometric formulation — rather than grand social forces. Generally, the IR literature has moved toward sophisticated empiricism and toward a labor economics paradigm. To the extent that the older grand themes remain, they are more likely to be found in IR books rather than in academic journals. Human resource (HR) academics and practitioners can nonetheless benefit from the IR approach, even though the tyranny of tenure review has made journal articles in IR less readable. The IR literature emphasizes that labor–market forces, sometimes stemming from product and financial markets, matter to HR outcomes. And it regards conflict more as a source of information rather than just a cause of lost productivity.     

School completion in urban Latin America: the voices of young people from an informal settlement

Despite progress in improving secondary school completion in Latin America, a high proportion of young people from urban marginalised neighbourhoods continue to drop out. On the basis of in-depth interviews with young people in an informal settlement of the City of Buenos Aires, the paper aims to broaden the understanding of the processes that lead to school dropout in these neighbourhoods. It does so by examining what young people value being and doing, and how they interpret the value of secondary school in their own lives and contexts. The results point to the critical importance of the family in young peoples’ processes of reasoning and decision-making, the complex interaction between capabilities, and the benefits of schools that provide social and emotional support to students and families. The paper argues that listening to the voices of young people can give significant insights for the design of policies to close the gap in education outcomes in segregated urban contexts.     

Inspirational leadership,positive mood,and team innovation: A moderated mediation investigation into the pivotal role of professional salience

Multidisciplinary teams are increasingly advocated for in healthcare policy consequent to their capacity to develop innovative solutions to seemingly intractable service and care challenges. Recent arguments that inspirational leadership styles may foster innovation in multidisciplinary teams point to their potential value in this effort. However, inconsistency in the capacity of such leaders to engender innovation highlights the need to understand the mechanisms and boundary conditions that determine when such leadership generates positive effects. We argue that follower positive mood acts to mediate the path between inspirational leadership and innovation and may account for its variable effects. By increasing positive team mood, inspirational leaders can potentially bring about more flexible thinking and enhance innovation but can also increase reliance on less effortful information processing, undermining innovative potential. In an effort to address the dilemma posed by these contrasting effects, we propose that professional salience acts as an important boundary condition of this relationship such that only when profession is salient do inspirational leaders enhance multidisciplinary team innovation through positive mood. An analysis of survey data from 60 UK‐based multidisciplinary healthcare teams, investigating the inspirational leadership of practice‐based innovation, supports our moderated mediation model. Finally, the implications for HRM are considered, specifically for leader development and work team design.     

A time diversification approach to the emerging stock markets of Latin America: Argentina,Brazil, Chile,and Mexico

This article provides the analytical basis for the adoption of a longer view to portfolio diversification in Latin America. The benefits to be gained through time diversification are studied in the context of four countries: Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and Mexico. The empirical evidence of actual annualized returns indicates that risk in investment in Latin American equity returns tends to diminish over longer term investment horizons.     

The cost of telephone service: An international comparison of rates in major countries

An exhaustive analysis of all 1979 telephone calls in the US Bell System determines market baskets of telephone services consumed by residential subscribers and by business subscribers. Individual calls are classified according to duration, distance, hour and day of week, and type of service. The annual cost of purchasing these market baskets is evaluated using the complete rate structures of nine countries. Telephone service is least expensive in the US and only slightly higher in Canada. Costs in Sweden, the UK and Italy are moderately higher than the USA. The highest rates are found in Japan, the FRG, France and Australia.     

The nature of Japan's comparative advantage, 1965-80

This paper compares the dynamic factor proportions theory to the product cycle theory in explaining Japan's comparative advantage for the 1965-80 period. Three tests were used: (1) domestic Japanese relative prices of more and less competitive export commodities; (2) trends in capital-labour ratios, skill ratios, R&D intensity and product turnover for Japan's manufactured exports; (3) price elasticities over time of Japan's exports. The results suggest that: (1) the product cycle must be considered along with the factor proportions theory for the pre-oil shock period; (2) the product cycle theory is superior for the post-oil shock period.     

Enhancing risk management for an aging world

As the world confronts unprecedented global aging, academics and policymakers are growing increasingly aware of the need for better risk management tools to handle the demographic transition. It is therefore imperative to identify innovative insurance and financial market products that can enrich the range of options for households, firms, and governments facing the challenge of an aging population. After outlining thoughts on how rising longevity might shape financial markets, we discuss opportunities for the finance and insurance industries in this arena. We also highlight how policymakers could respond to improve efforts to better manage risk.