Management Accounting Education In Australian Universities: A Review Of The Current State

The teaching of management accounting at tertiary institutions drew criticism in the mid-to-late 1980s on the grounds that course content and teaching methods were not keeping pace with changes in manufacturing technologies and the business environment. A study of management accounting programs in 30 Australian universities shows that the criticisms are largely being addressed, with most programs being well up-to-date in their coverage of many of the new topics and practices that have emerged in management accounting in recent years. Nonetheless, management accounting educators continue to see a number of constraints on effective teaching in this area.     

The UK and European Monetary Union: Why we should not stand aside

Ahead of next year's IGC David Currie considers the case for European monetary Union. He argues overall that EMU is desirable, though political arguments dominate the economic ones, which are finely balanced. he also argues that the UK should participate if other member states proceed to EMU, because of the dangers of marginalisation in Europe and of reduced attractiveness as a location for inward investment.     

The Impact of the Crisis on Internal Population Movement in Indonesia

One of the ways in which Indonesians have adapted to economic change over recent decades is through permanent and temporary movement within and outside the country. This paper focuses on the effects which the crisis that started in 1997 has had upon population mobility among different groups and in different areas within the country. It begins by summarising the employment effects of the crisis, as indicated by the 1997 and 1998 National Labour Force Surveys. It then uses results from a number of surveys to identify the changes that have occurred in population mobility in Indonesia during the crisis. In particular it looks at the extent and nature of urban to rural movement, and at patterns of movement between Java and the Outer Islands. Although comprehensive data are lacking, it is argued that population mobility has become an important coping mechanism for confronting the crisis.     

Quantifying spatial gaps in public transport supply based on social needs

This paper concerns a research project to identify spatial gaps in public transport provision for people who are socially disadvantaged. The paper outlines the research context for measurement of public transport supply and needs, and then describes the methodology developed for an application in Melbourne, Australia. Results of the application are described including key findings on spatial gaps in services relative to social needs. The research identifies significant gaps between services supplied and social needs for transport services. Consistency of these findings with research in other Australian cities are noted. Implications for policy development are suggested.     

A value premium without operating leverage

The existing real options literature explains the value premium as a consequence of either operating leverage raising risk in low-demand states or industry-wide investment lowering risk in high-demand states. This paper presents a simple model in which a value premium arises solely from capacity constraints. Profit is more sensitive to demand shocks when there is excess capacity, and the book-to-market ratio is high, than when capacity constraints bind, and the book-to-market ratio is low. The option to adjust capacity weakens the value premium arising from assets in place, but does not eliminate it for a wide range of parameters.     

Corporate Groups in Australia: State of Play

While a number of studies and reports (for example, CASAC 2000 ; Clarke and Dean 2007 ; Ramsay and Stapledon 1998; 2001 ) have identified the importance of corporate groups on the commercial landscape, both in Australia and internationally, little is known about the nature, incidence, composition or rationale for commercial enterprises to adopt specific types of group structures. Understanding the differences in the accounting for each separate company within a group and the process of consolidated group enterprise data used in most empirical works is a prius for researchers undertaking large‐scale empirical work. It underpins the ability to generalise about findings based on samples of publicly listed companies, arguably randomly selected from the population of listed corporate groups. This paper reports findings of an extensive empirical study using 2007 data in order to illuminate the current situation in relation to the nature, incidence and composition of corporate groups in Australia. It adopts a similar structure to that used by Ramsay and Stapledon (1998; 2001) . The current data will allow tests of stability regarding the way corporate groups are structured.     

Sensation seeking and the prediction of attitudes and behaviours of wine tourists

Although socio-economic variables are commonly used for market segmentation and are widely applied in describing winery visitors, increasing awareness is evident in the literature that personality might also be useful for that purpose. The present study examined whether, compared with socio-economic variables (age, gender, education level, personal income, and household income), the personality variable sensation seeking adds to the ability to predict differences in various attitudes and behaviours of wine tourists. With the effects of the former controlled, sensation seeking was observed to be significantly related to spending on wine, and wine drinking, as well as to the frequency of visits to wineries and the number of activities engaged in at wineries, the use of the internet as a source of information about wineries, venturing off the beaten track during a visit to a wine region, and the strength of opportunity for learning, stimulation, or indulgence as incentives to visit a wine region. Sensation seeking was also observed to be significantly related to all but one of those variables when the effects of another variable which is receiving increasing attention as a means by which to characterize wine tourists, “involvement”, were controlled. The practical significance of the results for winery and wine region marketing and management is discussed, and several requirements for further research are identified.