The Causes of Impasses in Labor Disputes

Using data on teacher contract negotiations under final-offer arbitration, this paper investigates the causes of impasses in contract negotiations and finds some support for each of three perspectives: game-theoretic, psychological, and political. The large number of "consent awards" suggests that negotiators frequently wish to avoid the political costs of a compromise settlement, preferring to blame arbitrators for the outcome. The positive correlation between the probability of an impasse and the variance in comparable negotiated settlements suggests that the parties base their judgments of fairness using evidence most consistent with their own position.     

An Investigation of TBL Report Assurance Statements: Australian Evidence

This study investigates current practice relating to the provision of triple bottom line (TBL) report assurance statements. In undertaking the analysis, a database was constructed of companies that have released TBL reports accompanied by third-party assurance statements. The results of the research show that in Australia there is great variability in the contents of TBL assurance statements. Arguably, the great variation in practice raises questions about the usefulness, or "value-add", of TBL report assurance statements.     

COMMENT—ALCOHOL ADVERTISING IN MAGAZINES AND YOUTH READERSHIP: ARE YOUTHS DISPROPORTIONATELY EXPOSED?

This article investigates the relationship between alcohol advertising in magazines and youth readership, while controlling for a set of magazine and readership variables related to the demand for advertising space. It reconstructs and reanalyzes a data set including count data for alcohol ads placed in 28 magazines in 2001-2003 that was the basis for a previous study, which concluded that alcohol advertisers do not target youths. We address the problem of collinearity in that data set and add an explanatory variable to explicitly model the hypothesis that alcohol advertising is preferentially directed to a young adult audience. We find that the number of alcohol advertisements in magazines increases significantly with the proportion of youth readers, even after controlling for young adult readership. Our results indicate that youths are disproportionately exposed to alcohol advertising and that reducing youth exposure to alcohol advertising remains an important public policy concern. ( JEL L82, L66, M37)     

THE DETERMINANTS OF LAWS RESTRICTING YOUTH ACCESS TO TOBACCO

Since many smokers begin consuming tobacco products in their adolescent years, many states have adopted a variety of restrictions on youth access to tobacco, which studies show reduces the demand for tobacco among this cohort. This paper takes a different track by addressing the demand for youth access restrictions. Specifically, using a random effects Probit procedure, which controls for the endogeneity of cigarette consumption and taxation, we examine the determinants of nine methods commonly used by states to restrict youth access to tobacco . ( JEL H70, I18)     

Extended Warranties: Consumer and Manufacturer Perceptions

Extended warranties are becoming increasingly popular, both among consumers and manufacturers. In this study, consumer and manufacturer perceptions of why extended warranties are bought and sold are evaluated and compared. The results indicate that consumers seem to view extended warranties as a way of reducing perceived risk. Manufacturers reveal that they market extended warranties both to generate revenue and to provide service to customers. Marketing management and public policy implications are examined and research directions identified.     

A Statistical Paradox in Auditing

The decision rule in a standard form of hypothesis testing in auditing is to reject the null hypothesis (and thus the auditee's account balance) if the 100(1-β)% confidence interval estimate of the population average error lies even partly outside the null (immaterial) interval. The effect of this rule is to fix the minimum power of the test (i.e., the minimum probability of rejecting a materially incorrect balance) at 1-β/2 (assuming a two-sided test). An unseen theoretical deficiency of the stated decision rule is that, from a Bayesian (evidential) rather than long-run error-frequency standpoint, marginal rejection of the null hypothesis supports that hypothesis. Indeed if the sample size is large enough, an account balance which is marginally rejected by the auditor, using a conventional test, has an'objective' (independent-of-prior) posterior probability arbitrarily close to one. In these circumstances, any call by the auditor for adjustment of the stated account balance, or additional sampling, would be seen as'over-servicing' and rightfully resisted.     

Comparative Statics of Optimal Nonlinear Income Taxation with a Publicly Provided Input and a Nonlinear Production Technology

Comparative static properties of the solution to an optimal nonlinear income tax problem are provided for a model in which the government both designs a redistributive income tax schedule and provides a public input for a nonlinear production technology. These assumptions imply that wage rates are endogenous. The endogeneity of the wages necessitates taking account of general equilibrium effects of changes in the parameters of the model that are not present when the technology is linear.     

RATINGS AND REVENUES: EVIDENCE FROM MOVIE RATINGS

Ratings and report cards provide a relatively cheap way to influence consumer and producer decisions. We examine the specific case of movie ratings and find that receiving a mature rating (rated R) reduces a movie's box office revenues by 20%. We focus on the specific role of ratings by constructing a mature content index for each movie and compare movies with similar amounts of mature content, but that received different ratings. We also exploit the fact that the movie rating system places specific guidelines on the number of F‐words that are allowed at each content rating. (JEL D0, L82)