Competitive intelligence practices of industrial marketers

This paper explores two ideas: that the competitive inteligence-gathering efforts of industrial marketers differ in purpose from those of consumer marketers, and that the scope of those efforts can be explained by a model incorporating purpose, size, competitive environment, and strategy. Based on data provided by employees of 151 firms, support is found for both of the basic ideas explored.     

Impacts of price and exchange rate policies on pesticide use in the Philippines

Pesticide prices can influence producer decisions to apply pesticides as opposed to nonchemical means of pest control. Those prices are are turn influenced by price and exchange rate policies. The effective rate of protection for nine pesticides commonly applied to vegetables in the Philippines was calculated to determine whether government policies are creating incentives or disincentives to adopt more integrated pest management methods. Calculations found that direct price policies, primarily through an import tariff, tax pesticide use while an overvalued exchange rate subsidizes pesticide use. The net effect is a 6 to 8% pesticide subsidy. This subsidy results in economic surplus gains to vegetable producers and consumers when negative externalities associated with pesticide use are not accounted for. However, recent analysis of human health effects of pesticide use on rice in the Philippines demonstrates that these externalities can be substantial.     

Issues in Growing a Family Business: A Strategic Human Resource Model

The conceptual literature on family businesses suggests that family businesses have difficulty managing their human resources, especially when it concerns a family member or the transition from the founder to the successor. The authors empirically examined the assumptions raised in the conceptual literature regarding whether family businesses were experiencing human resource problems in growing their business and what factors enabled or constrained the ability of their businesses to grow. The authors used in-depth interviewing to collect data in order to emphasize the depth of the issue. Using content analysis with subject matter experts coding the data, the authors sought to mine the richness of data. Finally, the authors analyzed the data using Elliot Jaques' Stratified Systems Theory as a model to examine the strategic human resource issues and to draw some tentative conclusions.     

Hedonic adaptation and the role of decision and experience utility in public policy

Many economists are becoming supportive of ‘soft’ paternalistic interventions that help people to avoid common decision errors without curtailing individual autonomy. To identify when such interventions could be beneficial, and to assess their success, requires a welfare criterion. However, traditional preference or choice-based criteria cannot serve this function because they assume that whatever people choose makes them better off. An alternative criterion that bases welfare on happiness rather than choice avoids this problem but has several of its own drawbacks. Most notably, people often adapt to serious chronic health conditions, and exhibit high levels of happiness, even though both those with and those without the condition agree that it is much preferable to be healthy. After reviewing different lines of research that shed light on the pros and cons of these alternative welfare criteria, we argue that no simple criterion based on either concept can surmount these problems. Instead, evaluations of welfare will inevitably have to be informed by a combination of both approaches, patched together in a fashion that depends on the specific context.     

康涅狄格州纽海文大学商学院 “中国价格”源于补贴

很多人认为中国制造业的价格优势得益于低廉的劳动力成本。但我们对中国钢铁业的研究表明，其低价格和政府大量的能源补贴密切相关。