Europe and the joint venture frenzy

As the European community draws nearer to unifying its markets by 1992, smart American companies are entering into joint ventures with European firms. For these companies, digging a foothold into what will be the world's largest market is just too crucial to put off to a later date.     

Learning teaching in the sustainability classroom

This article analyzes the experience of a particular sustainability learning classroom model, examining the classroom composition, structure, positioning, and atmosphere components in an experimental course on the topic of sustainable buildings. The course, called Angles on Green Building, offered as the second in a suite by the Learning City sustainability in higher education collaborative, experimented with content, which concerned the emerging practice and policy of green building, and with form, exploring the most appropriate pedagogical methods for the advancement of sustainability learning and action. The course took as its practical focus the green building industry in Vancouver, Canada, with an initial case study of the new Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability (CIRS), a green building and research facility planned for completion in 2009. This article uses evidence drawn from the instructors, students and visiting professionals in the course, together a diverse and interdisciplinary group from four different higher education institutions in Vancouver. Our findings contain lessons about the careful attention needed for instructors to design, run and implement courses in sustainability topics that enable students from widely different backgrounds and levels of self-directedness to engage with, take responsibility for, and transform their behaviours in favour of sustainability.     

Innovation in shipbuilding

Abstract . In certain products, such as aircraft or ships, innovation is not always easily recognizable. Major developments in components and systems can be overshadowed by the total product. Innovation is spread over many different items and timescales. The article describes an approach where innovatory activity in shipbuilding is planned and carried out by those involved in design production in several departments, rather than confined to a separate R&D department. The aims, organization, and procedures are described, including the process of project evaluation. The article concludes with a review of project success rate, and draws conclusions particularly about the key roles of marketing and individual performance.     

Industrial distributors: Can they survive in the new economy?

As e-commerce evolves and gains power in the business-to-business (B2B) marketplace, what lies ahead for the industrial distributor? The fundamental issue from the distributor's point of view is how to compete more effectively and profitably, given the changing business environment of the new economy. This paper reviews the literature on the distributor's role and relationships and introduces a conceptual model of distributor viability. The model identifies sources of value that distributors offer to manufacturers and customers, including customer relationship management (CRM), production and operations management (POM), and knowledge management (KM). The paper explores the managerial implications of distributor relationships and sources of value. This provides the foundation for better understanding of the viability of industrial distributors in the new economy.     

Quantifying tax effects under policy foresight

Studies of tax effects make the conventional information assumption that changes in period-t taxes become known at t. Legislative lags, however, imply that news arrives before tax changes take place. Under policy foreknowledge, the conventional information structure is therefore misspecified. Simulations of a standard neoclassical growth model suggest that foresight of only one quarter can distort substantially the estimates of tax effects obtained under the no-foresight assumption. Also, it is crucial to model capital and labor taxes separately: anticipated changes in these two tax policies have opposite effects on consumption, investment, labor, and output before policy realization.     

Does Allowing the Bells to Offer InterLATA Long-Distance Service Affect Entry into Local Telephony?

Following the 1984 divestiture of AT&T, local telephone service was provided by several Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOCs). The RBOCs served as monopoly providers of local telephone service in their respective territories but were prohibited from offering long-distance service to their in-region subscribers. Section 271 of the landmark Telecommunications Act of 1996 allows an RBOC to offer in-region long-distance service if it demonstrates that the local telephone exchange market is open to competitive entry. This study empirically evaluates the efficacy of this policy by considering the impact of RBOC entry into long-distance on the development of competitive entry into local telephony. The results suggest that section 271 has been successful in promoting entry into local telephony. However, aggregate price data suggest that this entry has not been realized with lower rates for residential telephone subscribers.     

Does the ADA Disable the Disabled?— More Comments

This article examines how best to identify individuals with disabilities for analysis of the impact of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990. It also explores whether amending the ADA to broaden its definition of disability can be expected to improve the employment prospects of those who seek its protections. Answering these questions requires that we learn much more about the labor force participation decisions of those with disabilities. Our aim here is to encourage further consideration and analysis of these and related questions regarding the possible effects of the ADA and of other environmental factors that affect the labor force participation of those with disabilities.