"Flexible" Work Practices and Occupational Safety and Health: Exploring the Relationship Between Cumulative Trauma Disorders and Workplace Transformation

This article matches establishment-level data on workplace transformation (e.g., quality circles, work teams, and just-in-time production) with measures of cumulative trauma disorders at these same establishments to explore the relationship between "flexible" workplace practices and workplace health and safety. The results reveal a positive, statistically significant, and quantitatively sizable relationship between cumulative trauma disorders and the use of quality circles and just-in-time production.     

Exact Ruin Probabilities and the Evaluation of Program Trading On Financial Markets

For a compound Poisson process with negative drift and jump distribution consisting of a mixture of exponentials on [0) and on (-, 0), an exact expression is derived for the probability of hitting the level c, c > 0. the problem is motivated by modeling the returns from trading on financial markets.     

Shadow Financial Regulatory Committee statements

Shadow Financial Regulatory Committee statements     

Do Small Banks have an Advantage in Lending? An Examination of Risk-Adjusted Yields on Business Loans at Large and Small Banks

Consolidation in the banking industry has sparked concern about the survival of small banks, particularly as it relates to the availability of credit to small businesses. However, if small banks have an advantage in processing credit information, compared to large banks, they should continue to survive in a competitive environment. We evaluate risk-adjusted commercial loan yields (gross yields less net charge-offs and the risk-free rate of return) at small and large banks for the period of 1996 through 2001. Our primary finding is that, after controlling for market concentration, cost of funds, and a variety of other factors that might influence yields, smaller banks earn greater risk-adjusted yields than larger banks. This result suggests that small banks make better choices from the available small business loans and is consistent with the notion that these banks have an information advantage in evaluating credit.     

WARRANT PRICING USING OBSERVABLE VARIABLES

The classical warrant pricing formula requires knowledge of the firm value and of the firm‐value process variance. When warrants are outstanding, the firm value itself is a function of the warrant price. Firm value and firm‐value variance are then unobservable variables. I develop an algorithm for pricing warrants using stock prices, an observable variable, and stock return variance. The method also enables estimation of firm‐value variance. A proof of existence of the solution is provided.     

Cooperative and noncooperative protection against transferable and filterable externalities

Given self-protection from an undesirable environmental externality, we examine, under several conditions, the efficiency properties of cooperative and noncooperative behavior. We demonstrate that if self-protection can transfer the externality to another agent, then noncooperative behavior will lead to overprotection. If self-protection filters or dilutes the externality, then noncooperation leads to underprotection. In addition, overprotection will worsen if an agent with more relative power is allowed a first-mover advantage or if the damage function is elastic and transferability is uncertain. Finally, a reduction in uncertainty about transferability will accentuate overprotection if the damage function is inelastic. Our results suggest that coordination of protection activities among agents will enhance the overall gains from environmental policy in the European Single Internal Market of 1992. Coordination minimizes the costs of environmental protection, thereby reducing the public credibility of its foes.     

Marketing norms: The influence of personal moral philosophies and organizational ethical culture

This study develops a scale, using the American Marketing Association’s code of ethics, to measure the marketing-related norms of marketing practitioners. The scale has five dimensions: 1) price and distribution, 2) information and contracts, 3) product and promotion, 4) obligation and disclosure, and 5) general honesty and integrity. The relative influence of personal moral philosophies and organizational ethical climate on the norms of marketers was also examined in this study. He received his Ph.D. in marketing from Texas Tech University. His work has previously appeared in theJournal of Macromarketing, Journal of Business Ethics, Research in Marketing, Business and Professional Ethics Journal, andJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science, as well as various other journals and proceedings. His research has been accepted for publication in theJournal of Pharmaceutical Marketing and Management and theJournal of Business Ethics, and has been published in various national and regional proceedings. His research interests include marketing ethics, health care marketing, international marketing, and direct marketing. He received his Ph.D. in marketing from the University of Mississippi. His work has previously appeared in theJournal of Macromarketing, Journal of Business Ethics, Business and Professional Ethics Journal, Journal of Public Policy and Marketing, andJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science, as well as other journals and proceedings.     

Empirical testing of alternative price spread models in the South African maize market

Reduced-form price spread models have been recently utilized by Wohlgenant and Mullen, and Thompson and Lyon to evaluate the economic factors affecting the marketing margins for agricultural products. Drawing on Gardner, Heien, Buse and Brandow, Waugh, Tomek and Robinson, and others they specify alternative retail-farm price spread models and attempt to determine which best fit the data in the context of underlying theoretical rationale. This paper continues in the spirit of Wohlgenant and Mullen, and Thompson and Lyon by evaluating alternative specifications of the retail-farm price spread for white maize in South Africa. However, several important differences do remain. Wohlgenant and Mullen analyzed the price spread for beef using annual data, while Thompson and Lyon modeled the price spread for oranges using weekly data. The time period under consideration can be expected to affect the choice of model because fixed markup rules that might be evident using a short-run period of analysis (e.g., Thompson and Lyon) become untenable over the long run with underlying supply and demand shifts. In this paper, monthly data, which may be interpreted as an intermediate-run period, are used along with dichotomous supply-demand shifters. In addition, Brorsen et. al. have shown that price uncertainty affects the price spread in the marketing channels of agricultural commodities. Thus, the analysis in this paper extends the framework of Wohlgenant and Mullen, and Thompson and Lyon to include measures of price risk. Finally, like Brorsen et. al. this study pertains to the grain market, while Wohlgenant and Mullen, and Thompson and Lyon studied the marketing margin for non-storable commodities.