Building new plants or entering by acquisition? Firm heterogeneity and entry barriers in the U.S. cement industry

I estimate a model of entry for the cement industry that considers two options of expansion: building a plant or acquiring an incumbent. The model takes into account that there is a transfer of the buyer firm‐level characteristics to the acquired plants, which affects profits from the acquisition. Estimates show that a less‐permissive Reagan–Bush administration's merger policy would decrease the number of acquired plants by 71%, greenfield entry would increase by 9.2% and consumer surplus would decrease by 23.5%. Results suggest that regulators should be concerned about policies that negatively affect the efficient reallocation of assets between incumbents and entrants.     

The Voluntary Continuation in the Obligatory System of the Social Security Law

The system of obligatory insurance, regulated by the Social Security Law, includes the design of a mixed system, which allows workers to continue contributing to the social security. This mixed system, called voluntary continuation in the obligatory system, contemplates the option for workers who have concluded a work relationship and who wish to continue accumulating weekly contributions necessary to obtain the disability and life insurance rights, such as those of dismissal in old age, and are considered in the Social Security Act of 1973.     

The impact of income redistribution on aggregate consumption

Atlantic Economic Journal -     

Analysis of compensatory financing schemes for export earnings fluctuations in developing countries

Several recent initiatives in the area of compensatory financing have pushed this issue into the forefront of discussion between developed and developing countries. This study performs simulations of various types of compensatory financing schemes assuming they had been in operation during the 1960s and early 1970s and draws some conclusions with respect to the relative costs and benefits of such schemes and with respect to their coutry and regional distribution. The results show that a compensatory financing scheme broadly defined is a flexible financial instrument which can be useful in helping developing countries with export instability problems.     

Testing a negotiation model on Canadian Anglophone and Mexican exporters

In this study, the authors test a previously developed model of negotiations. The structural equations model focuses on the antecedents of problem-solving behaviors and negotiators’ satisfaction. The replication uses two new groups of businesspeople—Canadian Anglophone and Mexican industrial exporters. Similarities and differences in model fit were discovered across the two groups of exporters. Results validated the importance of reciprocity as a social construct in cross-cultural negotiations. The problemsolving behaviors of Canadian and Mexicans were found to be a function of their perceptions of the counterparts’ strategy. Mexicans’ problem-solving behaviors subsequently influenced their expressed satisfaction with outcomes. The impact of bargainer and organizational characteristics varied across the two groups. Alma Mintu-Wimsatt (alma_wimsatt@tamu-commerce.edu), Ph.D., is a professor of marketing in the College of Business and Technology at Texas A&M University-Commerce. Her research focuses on international negotiations, cross-cultural buyer-seller relationships, and technology-mediated learning. She has published inManagement Science, theEuropean Journal of Marketing, theJournal of Personal Selling and Sales Management, andThunderbird International Business Review. She received her degree from the University of Kentucky. John L. Graham (jgraham@uci.edu), Ph.D., is a professor of marketing and international business in the Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Irvine. His primary area of research has been on international negotiations. He has published extensively in both academic and management journals including theHarvard Business Review, theColumbia Journal of World Business, theJournal of Marketing, Marketing Science, theJournal of Consumer Research, theJournal of International Business Studies, and theJournal of Higher Education. His research has also been the subject of articles published inThe Smithsonian, Chronicle of Higher Education, and theLos Angeles Times. He received his degree from the University of California, Berkeley.     

Health and welfare benefit litigation under ERISA

Denial of health benefits may result in devastating financial problems for the consumer. Given the complexities of the system, more and more employees turn to attorneys for help. Litigation and the resultant costs, in turn, further exacerbate the cost of providing benefits to employees and the burden to the employer. The law governing employer-paid health care and benefit plans is a blend of third party beneficiary contract law, trust law and administrative law. This article provides an overview of the federal litigation resulting from a third party payer's denial of coverage.     

Social comparisons in wage delegation: experimental evidence

We make two main contributions in this article. We examine whether social comparisons affects workers’ performance when a firm can choose workers’ wages or let them choose their own. Firms can delegate the wage decision to neither, one or both workers in the firm. We vary the information workers receive, finding that social comparisons concerning both wages and decision rights affect workers’ performance. Our second contribution is methodological. We find that our treatment effects are present with both stated effort and a real-effort task, which suggests that both approaches may yield similar results in labor experiments.     

Green Practices and Organizational Design as Sources of Strategic Flexibility and Performance

Green competences are dynamic capabilities based on practices (green practices), routines and structures that can be used to detect opportunities, make the most of them and use them to transform organizations. With this in mind, we explore the relationships between environmental management, organizational performance, and organizational processes and practices. We identify three key constructs related to green competences: (1) hybrid structures, (2) environmental best practices and (3) strategic flexibility, a key variable connecting structural design and green practices to organizational performance. We propose that the implementation of specific organizational structures characterized by the inclusion of market‐driven control practices within hierarchies (internal hybrids) could enhance firms' environmental responsiveness and deployment of green best practices. In addition, we suggest that green practices and structures are positively related to the development of strategic flexibility, driving above‐average returns in dynamic environments. To test these hypotheses, we use data from the European aviation industry. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment