Congruence between technology and compensation systems: implications for strategy implementation

This paper examines the interactive relationship between the use of integrated manufacturing and compensation practices in predicting several aspects of plant performance in the concrete pipe industry. We predicted that compensation practices reinforcing collective effort, teamwork, and flexibility (team incentives and skill-based pay) enhance the effectiveness of integrated manufacturing systems (total quality management and advanced manufacturing technology), while practices inhibiting cooperation and teamwork among employees (individual incentives and seniority-based pay) impede it. Results provide moderate support for the congruence model across several measures of plant effectiveness (labor hours per ton, lost-time accidents, perceptual performance, and customer satisfaction). Implications of the research are addressed. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Biodiversity value and the optimal location of forest conservation sites in Southern Finland

Safeguarding biodiversity has been one of the most important issues in environmental and forest policies since the 1990s. In Southern Finland, decisions concerning further actions for the preservation of forest biodiversity will be made in the coming years. To support policy making, we present a multi-regional model that is applicable in determining the economically optimal regional allocation of conservation sites. Three habitat quality models are evaluated to calculate habitat quality indices used as a surrogate for a biodiversity value in a forest sector model. The scenarios presented provide information about the economic impacts of conservation choices on the forest sector. The overall economic impacts of conservation depend on its scale and regional allocation. Conserving land with high biodiversity value can have less adverse impact on the forest sector than conservation of typical commercial forest sites. When optimizing conservation set-asides, we found that set-asides targeted to certain regions possessing higher/lower than average relative share of ecologically valuable land, caused lower/higher adverse economic impacts on the forest sector. Because it is expensive to search land suitable for conservation, these regions could be respectively favoured/avoided when asking forest owners to offer their land for the new conservation program in Southern Finland, which will be based on voluntariness.     

A panel study of labour supply and taxes in Denmark

The labour supply of Danish married couples is estimated on a longitudinal sample of about 3000 Danish couples observed over the period 1980–86. The influence of the progressive tax system and the effect of the unemployment insurance system are evaluated. The definition of unemployment in labour-supply functions is discussed, and two separate models are estimated where unemployment is considered either completely voluntary or completely involuntary. The wage elasticity and the supply effects of tax reduction are estimated to be positive, but numerically small for both men and women.     

The division of innovative labour: when does customer codevelopment contribute to firm innovation performance?

ABSTRACT

Innovative firms often involve customers in their product development to drive innovation outcomes. However, few have empirically examined how this division of innovative labour affects innovation performance. Drawing on prior studies and the knowledge-based theory of the firm, we theorise conditions under which customer codevelopment benefits innovation performance. By examining panel data from Swiss firms, we provide the first empirical account of the performance effects of customer codevelopment based on a large-scale survey sample. We find that a firm's absorptive capacity reinforces the relationship between customer codevelopment and innovation performance. We elaborate on the implications of these findings for the literatures on customer codevelopment and open innovation.     

Qualifications,discrimination, or assimilation? An extended framework for analysing immigrant wage gaps

In this paper, we analyze immigrant wage gaps and propose an extension of the traditional wage decomposition technique, which is a synthesis from two strains of literature on ethnic/immigrant wage differences, namely the assimilation literature and the discrimination literature. We estimate separate wage equations for natives and a number of immigrant groups using panel data sample selection models. Based on the estimations, we find that the immigrant wage gap is caused by a lack of qualifications and incomplete assimilation, and that a large fraction of that gap would disappear if only immigrants could find employment and thus accumulate work experience.First version received: June 2001 / Final version received: October 2003The project has been supported financially by the Danish Research Agency (the FREJA grant) and TSER. Furthermore, the first author received support from the Danish Social Science Research Council (SSF) while this work was undertaken. We are grateful for comments from the editor of Empirical Economics, Bernd Fitzenberger, two anonymous referees, several seminar and conference participants, and for the research assistance done by Thomas H. Jensen.     

基于公共清算所的个人账户养老基金管理模式研究

在分析个人账户基金管理的委托人职责缺失、管理效率低下、基金保值增值难等问题的基础上.通过对个人账户管理模式和投资决策模式的分析,以及结合产权理论与委托代理理论,构建一种新的个人账户基金管理模式,即公私结合管理模式——中央层面成立公共清算机构负责基金管理,在旗下成立多家个人账户基金投资公司,负责个人账户基金的投资运营.这对养老基金的保值增值以及养老金制度的可持续发展都具有深远意义.     

Currency substitution and seignorage in eastern europe

Economic and political uncertainty, high inflation and liberalization of foreign exchange restrictions have encouraged substantial currency substitution in the economies in transition. This paper presents empirical evidence on currency substitution in four Eastern European countries in transition: Poland, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. It is shown how currency substitution affects money demand and by that seignorage revenues. The empirical estimates of the money demand functions are used to calculate the seignorage maximizing rate of inflation in the economies in transition.     

UPLIFTING THE RACE THROUGH DOMESTICITY: CAPITALISM,AFRICAN-AMERICAN MIGRATION,AND THE HOUSEHOLD ECONOMY IN THE GREAT MIGRATION ERA OF 1916—1930

Abstract

The transformation of African Americans into a working-class population began during the World War I Great Migration era. In response to the rise in racial intolerance and the urgency of migrants’ needs, the Pittsburgh Urban League was formed in 1918 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Using a historical case study, this article suggests that the League attempted to promote domesticity among married migrant women for the purpose of racial uplift. This paper examines the implications of this strategy for migrant households and Pittsburgh industry. The study explores the relationship between patriarchy and capitalism in the formation of working-class families by discussing the role of racial ideologies in this process. The author argues that studies of white women’s domesticity and reproductive labor also must address the ways in which race has affected their incorporation into capitalist class systems in countries where race is a central organizing feature of the political economy.