Regional Economic Impacts of Fusarium Head Blight in Wheat and Barley

Fusarium Head Blight is a fungus affecting wheat and barley in the upper Midwest region of the United States. The purpose of this study is to estimate the direct and secondary regional economic impacts of Fusarium Head Blight infestations from 1998 to 2000. Cumulative direct production and price impacts from Fusarium Head Blight in hard red spring, soft red winter, durum wheat, and barley are estimated at $871 million over the period, with secondary economic losses of $1.8 billion. The total impacts of $2.7 billion were concentrated in North Dakota and Minnesota, which accounted for 55% of total losses over the period.     

Does trade liberalization harm the environment? A new test

Some believe that relatively lenient environmental standards give developing countries a comparative advantage in pollution–intensive goods. Thus, freer trade will harm their environment. This paper brings together the literature on openness and growth, and on the environmental Kuznet’s curve, to demonstrate that the opposite may be true. A simultaneous–equations system is derived which incorporates multiple effects of trade liberalization on the environment. Estimation using pooled provincial data on Chinese water pollution, suggests that freer trade aggravates environmental damage via the terms of trade, but mitigates it via income growth. Simulations suggest that the net effect in China was beneficial. JEL Classification: Fl3, Q28, 0l9 Est–ce que la libéralisation du commerce est nuisible pour l’environnement? Un nouveau test. Certains croient que des normes environnementales relativement peu contraignantes donnent un avantage comparatif aux pays en voie de développement dans la production de biens qui polluent intensivement. Donc, un commerce plus libre contribuera à nuire à l’environnement. Ce mémoire synthétise la littérature spécialisée sur l’ouverture des marchés et la croissance, ainsi que sur la courbe de Kuznets, pour montrer que l’inverse est vrai. On dérive un système d’équations simultanées qui incorpore les multiples effets de la libéralisation du commerce sur l’environnement. La calibration de ce système, en utilisant de manière intégrée les données provinciales de pollution de l’eau en Chine, suggère qu’un commerce plus libre aggrave l’état de l’environnement par le truchement du jeu des termes d’échange, mais que cet effet est mitigé par l’effet de croissance des revenus. Des simulations suggèrent que l’effet net en Chine est positif.     

The Surprising Duality of Jugaad: Low Firm Growth and High Inclusive Growth

Western theories on creativity emphasize the importance of access to resources and the generation of innovations as a source of sustainable competitive advantage for firms. However, perhaps the emphasis on slack resources and the firm as the level of analysis may be less appropriate for understanding the benefits of individual creative problem solving in resource-poor environments of the east; focusing solely on the firm is not sufficiently inclusive and may underestimate the benefits of creative problem solving under resource scarcity. Through an inductive interpretive case study of 12 problem solvers in the highly resource-poor environment of rural India, we identified the antecedents, dimensions and duality of outcomes for an Indian cultural source of creative problem solving called jugaad. Jugaad relies on assertive defiance, trial-and-error experiential learning and the recombination of available resources to improvise a frugal quick-fix solution. Our inductive framework provides new insights into the dual outcomes of creative problem solving from an eastern perspective; jugaad is unlikely to be a source of competitive advantage for firm growth but represents a source of enhanced wellbeing for inclusive growth.     

Local Venturing as Compassion Organizing in the Aftermath of a Natural Disaster: The Role of Localness and Community in Reducing Suffering

In contrast to models of compassion within existing organizations, this grounded theory study examines how ventures emerge relying on localness and community in direct response to ‘opportunities’ to alleviate suffering in the aftermath of a natural disaster. While a natural disaster is a surprising disruptive event devastating a local community, that local community is nested within a broader community, which can be a source of abundant resources. Ventures created in the aftermath of a natural disaster, given local knowledge and unencumbered by pre‐existing systems, procedures, and capabilities, are highly effective at connecting the broader community with the local community through customizing resources to meet victims' needs and to quickly delivering these resources to alleviate suffering.     

Harsh Evaluations of Entrepreneurs Who Fail: The Role of Sexual Orientation,Use of Environmentally Friendly Technologies,and Observers' Perspective Taking

Although there is a pervasive anti‐failure bias in society, we investigate why some entrepreneurs who fail are evaluated more harshly than others. Building on attribution theory and the literatures on prejudice, pro‐social intentions, and perspective taking, we offer an evaluation model of entrepreneurial failure and test this model on 6,784 assessments made by 212 observers. We find that variance in the harshness of failure evaluations depends on both the attributes of the entrepreneur and the attributes of the observer, and the interaction between the two. Specifically, entrepreneurs who are homosexual are evaluated more harshly by some observers and entrepreneurs who use environmentally friendly technology are evaluated less harshly. Moreover, observers high in perspective taking are more ‘lenient’ in their failure evaluations of those who use environmentally friendly technology than those low in perspective taking.     

To the Rescue!? Brokering a Rapid,Scaled and Customized Compassionate Response to Suffering after Disaster

Suffering comes in many forms that significantly impact organizations’ operations and performance. As a result, recent research on compassion organizing seeks to explain how efforts to notice, feel, and respond to suffering create organizational (and societal) benefits. Widespread suffering can be generated by natural disasters, which in turn can trigger compassionate organizational responses. In this paper, we build on social capital theory to theorize about how compassionate ventures leverage network relationships to identify and mobilize resources. We also explore how differences in these approaches influence the magnitude, speed, and customization of the response, all of which are theorized indicators of the effectiveness of compassion organizing in alleviating suffering. We use structural equation modelling to test our model and find that compassionate ventures with stronger ties to the local community are more likely to bundle (i.e., stretch) resources, which facilitates a speedy, customized, and large magnitude response. In contrast, those with stronger ties outside the local community are more likely to pursue (i.e., chase) new resources, which results in a large magnitude response, but one that is not associated with speed or customization. We discuss the implications of our findings and make recommendations for future research.     

The Market Performance of Socially Responsible Investment during Periods of the Economic Cycle – Illustrated Using the Case of FTSE

The debate about socially responsible investment (SRI) portfolio performance compared with its non‐SRI counterparts remains inconclusive. This paper contributes to the debate by adding a new approach, examining the issue of a full economic circle through economic boom, recession and recovery. We compare stock performance of two value‐weighted investment portfolios: FTSE4Good (SRI portfolios) and FTSE 350 (conventional portfolios) from 2004 to 2011 including 2007 to 2009 financial crash. The results indicate the SRI portfolio performed better and recovered its value quicker in post‐crisis than the non‐SRI portfolio, indicating that SRI portfolios are more resilient to economic turmoil and market shocks. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Decomposing China–Japan–U.S. trade: Vertical specialization,ownership, and organizational form

We use the US International Trade Commission's uniquely detailed 1995–2007 Chinese Customs data to better understand the pattern of trade between China and its two largest trading partners, Japan and the United States. Our review finds that only a small share of these flows can be characterized as arm's length, one-way trade in final goods. Instead, we find extensive two-way trade, deep vertical specialization, concentration of trade in computer and communication devices, and a prominent role for foreign-invested enterprises. While these characteristics define both bilateral relationships, important differences between the two pairs do emerge, suggesting that trade costs influence the method by which multinationals choose to integrate their production with China. Consequently, we argue that dialogue on East Asian trade liberalization should include the possibility of significant production gains for the US from its inclusion in any regional agreements.     

Estimating an origin–destination table for US imports of waterborne containerized freight

Containerized freight imports into the US are growing at an average of 10% per year. This traffic is concentrated at a small number of US seaports. It is therefore important to have an accurate understanding of the flow of containers from their origin country through these seaports to their final destination. This paper develops an optimization model to estimate route flows and a corresponding multi-modal origin–destination table for containers by synthesizing data on international trade and railcar movements with a gravity model for the demand of container traffic. This analysis provides insights into the balance of rail and truck inland transportation from each port.