Mind the context gap: a critical review of engagement within the public sector and an agenda for future research

Abstract

In this review paper, we critically examine the evidence base relating to engagement within the public sector given a wide range of public services have faced acute human resource challenges over recent years. Our review of 188 empirical studies reveals that much of the evidence focuses attention on individual and job level factors, such that specific public sector contextual contingencies have rarely been considered. Through identifying significant ‘context gaps’, we present a future research agenda addressing the following key areas: i) clarifying the relationship between engagement and public service motivation, ii) further contextualizing general engagement models, iii) exploring cultural, socio-political, and institutional factors in more depth, iv) encouraging a more critical perspective on engagement, v) understanding the variation in the experience of engagement across different public services/delivery models, and vi) connecting more strongly with practical concerns and initiatives within public organizations. In presenting this agenda, we highlight how engagement and HRM scholars can more strongly embed their research within a sectoral context.     

Social Affiliation and the Demand for Health Services: Caste and Child Health in South India

This paper assesses the role of social affiliation, measured by caste, in shaping investments in child health. The special setting that we have chosen for the analysis - tea estates in the South Indian High Range - allows us to control nonparametrically for differences in income, access to health services, and patterns of morbidity across low caste and high caste households. In this controlled setting, low caste households spend more on their children's health than high caste households, reversing the pattern we would expect to find elsewhere in India. Moreover, health expenditures do not vary by gender within either caste group, in contrast once again with the male preference documented throughout the country. A simple explanation, based on differences in the returns to human capital across castes in the tea estates is proposed to explain these striking results.     

Is international trust performance predictable over time? A note

We examine whether past return measures have any significant predictive ability for future returns of UK unit trusts with international equity objectives. We find significant positive persistence between the past return performance of the trust relative to its investment sector and future trust returns relative to its sector. This result holds at short‐run and long‐run return horizons. The persistence is stronger in trusts that perform well relative to their sector. Our findings suggest that the past return performance of the trust relative to their sector provides a useful guide to future return performance relative to their sector.     

Author’s Reply: Market Value Of Insurance Liabilities: Reconciling the Actuarial Appraisal and Option Pricing Methods - Discussion by Thomas S. Y. Ho; Joe Koltisko; Thomas J. Merfeld; Marsha Wallace

Adverse selection death spirals in health insurance are dramatic and, so far, exotic economic events. The possibility of death spirals has garnered recent policy and popular attention because the pricing regulations in the Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010 make health plans more vulnerable to them (though some other aspects of the ACA limit them). Most death spirals tracked in the literature have involved selection against a group health plan that was dropped quickly by the employer. In this article, we empirically document a death spiral in individual health insurance that was apparently triggered by a block closure in 1981 and developed slowly because the insurer partially subsidized the block. We show that premiums rose dramatically from around the time of the block closure to at least 2009 (the last year of available data). By 2009, some, but very few, policyholders remained in the block, and premiums were roughly seven times that of a yardstick we developed. The history of this slow-moving event is directly relevant to current policy discussions because of both adverse selection in general and the particular problems induced by closing a block.     

Can mergers increase output? Evidence from the lodging industry

We find that hotel mergers increase occupancy. In some specifications, price also rises. Because these effects occur only in markets with high capacity utilization and high uncertainty, we reject simple models of price or quantity competition in favor of models of “revenue management,” where firms price to fill available capacity in the face of uncertain demand.