Responsible Marketing and Its Impact on Business Performance: A Longitudinal Study

This research article explores, analyzes, and justifies the requirement of socially responsible activities of the corporation in the light of alternative approach to marketing promotion. In fact, this research claims for more societal activity-based promotion (responsible marketing) in place of product driven advertisement-based marketing (traditional) only. Thus, this research refutes the combined impact of societal activities (donation and employee expenditure) and advertisement (Advertisement Expenditure) on business performance (Profit/Sales). This has been analyzed with longitudinal (time series) data for 15 year period of the available 9 companies in capitaline database. Appropriate methodologies in regards to time series data have been performed. The findings are thought-provoking since the evidence of combined effect is not that much visible, though its impact in comparison with marginal effect is quite more. Finally, to conclude this research refutes the utility of advertising as a means of promotion, but at the same time, it indicates the changing direction of advertisement content from product feature-based to more societal activity-based.     

Industry structure and the dynamics of price adjustment

Using annual US data for gross domestic product originating by sector between 1947 and 1997 it is shown that a negative long-run relationship between inflation and the markup is present across the sectors as well as in the aggregate data. A preliminary explanation based on industry structure is explored for the relative sizes of the impact of inflation on the markup in the long-run for the various sectors.     

The Process of Trust Formation in E-Business: Insights from Case Studies of Two Small Firms

Purpose: The purpose of this research is to investigate and theoretically explain the process of trust formation in high risk e-business.

Methodology/approach: The interpretive case-based approach has been used in this study. Inductive analysis of interview data helped to develop the process model of trust formation in the context of business-to-business e-market transactions by two small firms.

Research implications: This research explains how and why trial outcomes influence trust formation. The findings also indicate the importance of the trialing process as a legitimate means of determining trustworthiness of the other party and the e-business platform. These findings add to the existing body of knowledge on trust in e-business and have important implications for further research.

Practical implications: The practical implication is that if sponsors of business-to-business e-markets can support initial trials, it would foster trust and lead to more active usage of e-business methods.

Originality/value/contribution: This research shows that trust formation in high risk e-business is a dynamic process, influenced by changes in risk perceptions from repeated trial outcomes in initial stages, a departure from prior variance studies with assumptions of static perceptions of risk and trust.     

Is it the wage premium that targets worker turnovers?

The literature on FDI shows that there exists a wage premium that multinational enterprises (MNEs) pay to local workers and link this to a technology spillover argument. The MNEs pay higher wages to prevent worker turnovers and technology leakages. Literature relates the wage premium aspect of FDI using worker mobility data and uses worker turnovers and the technology spillover argument. We relate stock options in the FDI context of worker mobility and find in a simplified framework that the turnover of workers would depend on the relative payments of stock options.     

Optimal Organization of Surrogacy Contracts and Underinvestment

We develop a theoretical model of commercial gestational surrogacy in which a childless couple approaches a prospective surrogate, who is willing to gestate for the couple. We use a Principal-Agent framework with continuous effort to argue the following: in presence of limited liability of the surrogate, provision of optimal incentives (under non-contractible effort) is not feasible. Hence, a surrogate facing low outside option and having limited wealth is always found to put in sub-optimal care for the fetus. Put differently, the surrogate cannot be made a residual claimant (cannot be entitled with custody rights of the fetus) and therefore eliciting first best care is never optimal. But this result dramatically changes when the model is cast in discrete effort where inefficiency is likely only when the surrogate faces low outside option whereas we get multiple efficient contracts for higher outside option. Moreover, we see first-best efficient contracts may be implemented even without full transfer of custody rights to the surrogate.

     

Does Tariff Induce Intellectual Property Right Protection and Reduce Incidence of Piracy?

We consider a model with North exporting a copyrighted product to South where there is IPR violation, and South exports a basic good to North. We examine the impact of North's imposition of import tariff on South's monitoring of IPR violation and the incidence of piracy. If South values IPR compliance “lowly”, then tariff imposition do not alter the pre‐tariff no monitoring equilibrium outcome but unambiguously raises the incidence of piracy. If IPR compliance is valued “highly” then tariff either switches the equilibrium outcome from not monitoring to monitoring or increases its rate. However, the incidence of piracy may increase.     

Response of industrial customers to hourly pricing in Ontario’s deregulated electricity market

This paper uses hourly data from Ontario (Canada) between 2005 and 2008 to estimate the effects of real time wholesale electricity prices on demand by industrial customers. Nonlinear SUR estimates from Generalized Leontief (GL) specifications reveal elasticities of substitution from 0.02 to 0.07, confirming that industrial customers (connected to the transmission grid) shift consumption across peak and off-peak periods in order to reap benefits of lower prices. Estimates from FGLS and IV models suggest that this reduction in demand by industrial customers results in lower wholesale prices, which benefits all consumers. The policy lesson is that market based schemes that encourage Real Time Pricing (RTP) pricing should result in positive spillovers to all consumers.     

Teen employment, poverty, and the minimum wage: Evidence from Canada

In May 2007, the U.S. Congress enacted legislation, which increased the Federal minimum hourly wage from $5.15 to $7.25, over a two year time period. This increase to the minimum wage was the first in nearly a decade and was approved with the objective of alleviating poverty among low-income households. However, a higher minimum wage may result in more unemployment and poverty. We exploit time-series variation in minimum wages set by Canadian provinces between 1981 and 2004. OLS and IV results suggest that a 10% increase in the minimum wage is significantly correlated with a 3%-5% drop in teen employment. Further, a 10% rise in the minimum wage is also significantly associated with a 4%-6% increase in the percentage of families living under Low Income Cut Offs (LICOs). Difference-in-difference estimates from the 1993, 1995, and 1998 waves of the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF) support these findings as they suggest that income earned by teens constitutes a non-trivial portion of household income for families beneath Low Income Cut Offs. Therefore, a higher minimum wage may paradoxically result in a significant negative shock to household income among low-income families.     

Social media as a destination marketing tool: its use by national tourism organisations

India's protected areas (PAs), especially those designated tiger reserves, are popular tourist destinations, experiencing considerable and growing visitor numbers, but the principles of ecotourism are not well implemented. This paper analyses tourism practice in a sample of popular tiger reserves in India according to four principles of responsible ecotourism: minimisation of environmental impacts, generation of funds for conservation, benefits to local communities, and education of visitors. Evidence demonstrates that few criteria of ecotourism are met in most PAs: tourism imposes significant detrimental impacts, little of the generated revenue is captured, local communities get mostly menial jobs, and visitor education is virtually non-existent with tourism geared mainly towards thrill-seeking. The Indian Forest Service, which manages the PAs, is on the whole unprepared and ill-equipped to plan and implement proper ecotourism practices and faces constant pressure from other actors to increase tourism revenue. Periyar National Park stands out as an exception where innovative approaches involving local communities have brought about a significant positive change. Policy recommendations are offered based on limited, low-impact activities with high participation of local communities which is essential to build local support for conservation that has been historically lacking.