The financial crisis in Norway: effects on financial markets and measures taken

This article guides through the measures implemented in Norway in order to dampen negative effects stemming from the financial crisis. We also discuss some features of the Norwegian money market and the liquidity system in Norway. From the point of view of central banks, the widening gap between money market rates and the key policy rate has been one disturbing element of the financial crises. We develop a simple model, which illustrates how developments in forward exchange premiums can provide insight as to why money market premiums differ across currencies. The model shows that the excess supply of term liquidity in dollar relative to the excess supply of term liquidity in other currencies has an impact on the domestic money market premium relative to that on USD.     

Knowledge creation for practice in public sector management accounting by consultants and academics: Preliminary findings and directions for future research

This study is about knowledge creation for practice in public sector management accounting by consultants and academics. It shows that researchers emphasize the importance of practice, but worry about the prospects of a successful cross-fertilization between practice and research, because of the pressure they feel to publish in international research journals. Their contacts with consultants are limited. Consultants have limited access to academic research, because of pressures from their daily work. Knowledge created by consultants is initiated by problems coming from practice; it has to be ready-made for application in practice, and is often a combination of explicit and tacit knowledge. However, our interviews with researchers show a more diffuse picture; the knowledge created by some of them is disciplinary-driven and fundamental, whereas the research of others is more problem-driven and applied. Our study hints at two intermediary groups, i.e. consultant-researchers and consultants working in the expertise centres of their firms, both of which can potentially overcome hindrances in the communication between consultancy and research.     

Principles of Advertising & IMC, 2nd edn.

Community involvement is recognized as part of an organization's attempts to build good will in the local community and as such can be thought of as part of corporate social responsibility. The argument has been made that there is a need for more examination of the content of CSR activities, in particular for firms operating in diverse domestic and foreign contexts (Gardberg and Fombrun, 2004, Academy of Management Review, 31(2), pp. 329–346). This paper explores some of these issues by presenting an in‐depth look at McDonald's community involvement initiative in Norway, where the attempts to build a Ronald McDonald House met much resistance and many barriers, many of them from political parties, doctors and academics.     

When Polypropylene Fiber Can Be Dyed

What if polypropylene fiber can be dyed someday?That means fiber offers immense production possibilities, means manufacturers will benefit from increasing their operational effectiveness, reducing the inventory of colored yarns,means streamline production process, means……     

Changing the Rules of the Game

Abstract

This article examines the impact of privatization on the relative bargaining strength of management and trade unions. Findings are based on a study of Ireland's largest telecoms provider, Eircom, which has been privatized since 1999. The privatization of Eircom adopted a stakeholder approach, under which employee share-ownership and management–union partnership played an important role in firm restructuring. Findings show that despite this approach privatization has resulted in a significant decrease in the perceived bargaining strength of unions and an increase in the perceived bargaining strength of management.     

A statistical review of the risk associated with offshore support vessel/platform encounters in UK waters

Safety performance on the UK Continental Shelf is normally considered to be of a high standard, although there are still many incidents and accidents. This paper discusses some of the initial findings in an offshore support vessel safety research project. Following a brief review study of the uses of various types of existing offshore support vessels, a comprehensive statistical failure data analysis of the vessels is carried out mainly based on a Ship/Platform Incident Database drawn from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). The variation of incident frequency with time for different types of offshore oil and gas installations, and for different vessel types has been established. A total of 394 records within the period 1980 to 1997 are investigated in this study. The variation of incident frequency with time and seasons, causation factors, incident with respect to geographical distribution, and sea conditions are discussed. The relationship between vessel types, sizes and operations is analysed; operating circumstances, reported primary failure cause, and impart orientation for different vessel types are also described. The statistical analysis reveals that safety culture in terms of good seamanship by vessel masters is probably responsible for mitigating the magnitude of many of the impacts that do occur and also that there is a need for improvement in safety performance. Issues pertaining to human element, the availability and reliability of data, risk criteria, and safety culture in the context of marine and offshore risk assessment are also discussed.     

Concert for Solo Italian Fabric

Known as the biggest national pavilion,in INTERTEXTILE 2008 held in Shanghai New International Expo Center in October,Italian Trade Commission-I.C.E. and their knighthoods came again.     

SOCIAL STATUS IN ECONOMIC THEORY

Abstract.  Social distinction or status is an important motivation of human behaviour. This paper provides a selective survey of recent advances in the economic analysis of the origins and consequences of social status concerns. First, a selection of empirical research from a variety of scientific disciplines is discussed to underpin the further theoretical analysis. I then consider the origins and determinants of tastes for status, discuss the endogenous derivation of such preferences for relative standing and assess the different formalizations of these preferences. Subsequently, the consequences of preferences for status are studied for a variety of problems and settings. The last section discusses a number of implications of status concerns for normative economics and public policy.