A Bayesian Bioeconometric Model of Invasive Species Control: The Case of the Hemlock Woolly Adelgid

In this article we evaluate a US Forest Service plan to mitigate damages from an invasive insect on public, forested land. We develop a dynamic model of infestation and control to explicitly account for biological interactions, baseline conditions, and uncertainty, thus creating a more complete picture of policy impacts than a static cost benefit analysis could provide. We combine the results of the dynamic model with an empirical study of nonmarket forest benefits to create a bioeconomic model of ecosystem management. Estimating the empirical model in a Bayesian framework allows us to treat the economic coefficients of the dynamic model as random variables. We specify distributions for the biological parameters and examine the effects of both biological and economic uncertainty on the predictive distribution of net benefits. We find that the net benefits of the program are positive, and that uncertainty in the biological model contributes substantially more to the variance of our estimate than does uncertainty over the valuation of the resource.     

Moral Disengagement in Processes of Organizational Corruption

This paper explores Albert Bandura's concept of moral disengagement in the context of organizational corruption. First, the construct of moral disengagement is defined and elaborated. Moral disengagement is then hypothesized to play a role in the initiation of corruption by both easing and expediting individual unethical decision-making that advances organizational interests. It is hypothesized to be a factor in the facilitation of organizational corruption through dampening individuals’ awareness of the ethical content of the decisions they make. Finally, it is hypothesized to contribute to the perpetuation of corruption in organizations, because if individuals who have a greater propensity to morally disengage are more likely to make decisions that advance organizational interests regardless of the ethicality of those decisions, they may also be rewarded for those decisions in terms of organizational advancement. Together these studies form an argument that moral disengagement plays an important role in processes of organizational corruption.     

Incentive Travel: A View from the Top

Meetings, incentives, conventions, and exhibitions are an important segment of the hospitality and tourism industry. The extant study focuses on the incentives or incentive travel. While incentive travel has existed for decades it is a relatively under-researched sub-field of hospitality. The goal of this article is to examine the current state of incentive travel, how it has changed over the past few years, and how it is likely to change in the future. Rather than examine every aspect of incentive travel, this research only looks at “buyers” of incentive travel rather than users or recipients and obtains data only from top-level corporate executives. Thus, the results are of the highest level and highest caliber. It was found that companies have been using incentive travel for decades and find it to be an effective employee motivator and as an incentive to sell product. It also builds morale and relationships.     

An unsuitable job for a woman: a ‘native category’ approach to gender,diversity and cross-cultural management

This paper takes an ethnographic study of the recruitment of women at BMW MINI between 2003 and 2006 as the basis to explore the impact of the concepts of ‘native categories’ and ‘recontextualisation’ on diversity management and cross-cultural management. I consider how managers' and workers' subconsciously held cultural categories relating to gender and work affected efforts to increase the number of female line workers in the plant, and how these were further complicated by the recontextualisation of German native categories in a British context. In doing so, this paper will develop a better understanding of the way native categories affect management and international business, provide an addition to the literature on recontextualisation, by introducing the concept of ‘native categories’ to research exploring the effects of recontextualisation on cross-cultural knowledge transfer, international human resource management strategy and marketing, and, finally, develop some understanding of how diversity management initiatives can fail in practice.     

The Influence of Entrepreneurial Risk Assessment on Venture Launch or Growth Decisions

Entrepreneurs are thought to engage in riskier behavior than nonentrepreneurs, yet little empirical evidence supports that intuitively appealing notion. We argue instead that differences in information, not risk aversion, may explain the decision to launch or grow a venture. We separately test risk taking propensity and risk assessment. We hypothesize that entrepreneurs will not differ from nonentrepreneurs on risk taking propensity. Additionally, we propose and test a model of risk assessment. The sample size for this exploratory study is n=53 with 30 respondents declaring themselves as entrepreneurs and 23 declaring themselves as nonentrepreneurs. The study’s design is a simulation. Each respondent is provided with data on a potential acquisition that would result in either the launch of a new venture or significant growth for an existing firm. Consistent with the hypotheses, the results show no difference between entrepreneurs and nonentrepreneurs on the risk taking measure. We also find that we can predict entrepreneurial behavior based on risk assessment. We close with a discussion of limitations and directions for future research.     

The market microstructure of central bank intervention

How quickly do central bank intervention operations impact the foreign exchange market? And, do intra-daily market conditions influence the effectiveness of central bank interventions? This paper uses high-frequency intra-daily data to examine the relationship between the efficacy of intervention operations and the “state of the market” at the moment that the operation is made public. The results indicate that some traders typically know that the Fed is intervening at least 1 h prior to the public release of the information in newswire reports. Also, the evidence suggests that the timing of intervention operations matters—interventions that occur during heavy trading volume, that are closely timed to scheduled macro announcements, and that are coordinated with another central bank are the most likely to have large effects.     

Entrepreneurial Risk: Have We Been Asking the Wrong Question?

Entrepreneurs are often thought to engage in "risky" behaviors. Thus, they may be seen as more willing than average to take risks. We offer a dissenting view. Central to entrepreneurship is the alertness perspective which suggests that entrepreneurs may assess opportunities and threats differently than non-entrepreneurs. That differential assessment may be understood in terms of Bayesian probability. The Bayesian model argues that differing assessments of prospective outcomes may be attributable to differences in prior information. This perspective on risk assessment has implications for entrepreneurial decision making, whether to launch a new venture or adopt a growth strategy. The literature is reviewed, a synthesis is offered, a numerical example is developed, and a research agenda is proposed.