Humiliation at Work and Union Interest: An Empirical Analysis of Community Union Satisfaction as Related to Status Enhancement

How noneconomic benefits claimed by labor unions relate to union interest is not well articulated. Based on Torres and Bergner’s (Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 38, 195–204, 2010; Psychotherapy, 49, 492–501, 2012) analysis of severe public humiliation, in which status enhancement underlies recovery, we examined an augmented relationship between humiliation at work (the underside of dignity at work) and willingness to join a union. As hypothesized, nonunion employees who were less detached from work showed more willingness to join when presented with evidence that members of a union were satisfied with community aspects of membership related to status enhancement above and beyond their satisfaction with economic aspects. Implications for union interest research and applications are discussed.     

Customer retention when the customer's future usage is uncertain

Consumers are often uncertain about how much they will use a service in the future (e.g., health clubs, credit cards, cell phones), yet the effects of this uncertainty on customer retention have not been studied. This research investigates factors influencing consumers' decisions about whether to retain noncontractual services for which anticipated future usage levels are uncertain. The studies show that Future Usage Uncertainty (FUU) generally reduces the likelihood that a customer will continue in a service relationship. However, when consumers consider the flexibility they have to delay the keep/drop decision (i.e., drop flexibility), or the anticipated regret associated with making the wrong decision, the effects of FUU are essentially eliminated, and consumers are more likely to continue in the relationship. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

ATM surcharge bans and bank market structure: The case of Iowa and its neighbors

It is frequently claimed that high ATM surcharges actually attract customers to the banks that impose them, particularly if they operate large ATM networks. By exploiting as “natural experiments” two events associated with the lifting of surcharge bans in Iowa and in the states that neighbor Iowa, this paper seeks to test for the implications of this phenomenon as it applies to the market shares of banking institutions and to several aspects of market structure. Consistent with predictions, results of “difference-in-difference” analyses suggest that the retail account shares of larger market participants increased relative to those of smaller competitors, market concentration increased, and the number of market competitors decreased after the lifting of surcharge bans – all relative to what would have occurred had there been no change in authority to surcharge.     

Relational Contracting in Partnerships

When performance is not verifiable, firms in a long-term relationship may rely on incentive contracts that are self-enforced or "relational." This paper studies the optimal design and performance of relational contracts in partnerships such as joint ventures or buyer-seller alliances. Optimal contracts look the same in each period as long as the relationship continues, but may require termination of the relationship after bad outcomes. Payments between the partners depend on their relative performance. In the special case of bilateral trade with specific investments, optimal relational contracting results in a price that varies with cost and demand conditions but is more stable than under spot market bargaining. Parallels are drawn with "Japanese style" subcontracting.     

Just-in-time inventory systems innovation and the predictability of earnings

Firms that adopt just-in-time (JIT) inventory practices do so in order to realize cost savings and improve product quality, but an unexpected benefit to such firms could be a more predictable earnings stream. We examine the relationship between implementation of just-in-time inventory practices and the predictability of future quarterly earnings for a matched-pair sample of 82 firms, half of which have publicly announced that they have adopted JIT inventory practices. We find that one- and four-step-ahead forecasts of quarterly earnings, using either a Brown–Rozeff [Journal of Accounting Research (1979) 179–189] ARIMA or a seasonal random walk expectation model, are more accurate for the firms that have adopted JIT.     

A re-examination of socially responsible consumption and its measurement

Socially responsible consumption is increasing and many companies are responding to the desires and, in some cases, demands of socially and environmentally responsible consumers. Theoretically, the domain of socially responsible consumption has changed over the years, as have socially responsible corporate programs in the marketplace. The Socially Responsible Purchase and Disposal (SRPD) scale is developed to reflect recent developments that have occurred in theory and practice. Three dimensions of socially responsible consumption emerge: (1) purchasing based on firms' corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance; (2) recycling; and (3) avoidance and use reduction of products based on their environmental impact. The SRPD provides a tool for academicians and practitioners in the development of theory and marketing strategy.     

Agriculture and climate change in global scenarios: why don't the models agree

Agriculture is unique among economic sectors in the nature of impacts from climate change. The production activity that transforms inputs into agricultural outputs involves direct use of weather inputs (temperature, solar radiation available to the plant, and precipitation). Previous studies of the impacts of climate change on agriculture have reported substantial differences in outcomes such as prices, production, and trade arising from differences in model inputs and model specification. This article presents climate change results and underlying determinants from a model comparison exercise with 10 of the leading global economic models that include significant representation of agriculture. By harmonizing key drivers that include climate change effects, differences in model outcomes were reduced. The particular choice of climate change drivers for this comparison activity results in large and negative productivity effects. All models respond with higher prices. Producer behavior differs by model with some emphasizing area response and others yield response. Demand response is least important. The differences reflect both differences in model specification and perspectives on the future. The results from this study highlight the need to more fully compare the deep model parameters, to generate a call for a combination of econometric and validation studies to narrow the degree of uncertainty and variability in these parameters and to move to Monte Carlo type simulations to better map the contours of economic uncertainty.