The effects of tax reform on labor supply, tax revenue and welfare when tax avoidance matters

We examine how tax avoidance in the form of trade in well-functioning asset markets affects the study of labor supply. We discuss the implications for tax policy analysis, and we show that a failure to account for avoidance responses may lead to huge errors when analyzing how tax reform affects labor supply, tax revenue and the welfare cost of taxation. Our model may explain a number of otherwise hard to understand dimensions of taxpayer response.     

The landlord lag – productivity on peasant farms and landlord demesnes during the agricultural revolution in Sweden 1700–1860

In a longstanding debate among economic historians about the role of the peasants and the manors in the agrarian transformation, a variety of qualitative and quantitative indicators have been used, but no one has until now been able to compare the actual production outcomes. In this paper, we investigate the land productivity development for manorial demesnes and peasant farmers, respectively, over the course of the agricultural revolution. The sources used are unique in an international perspective and consists of tithes on individual farm level for 34 parishes in Scania, covering over 2500 peasant farms, which are compared with production data for 20 manorial demesnes.

The study generates vital information on the process of agricultural transformation and its leading actors. We assess the implications of the productivity development for the total production, and the spectacular growth in this under the agricultural revolution, by calculating production and surplus among the different types of cultivators. Our results show that the landlords gained a small advantage in the middle of the 1700s, but in the century to come, they lagged behind in terms of land productivity. A large peasantry cultivating the majority of the land did not constitute an obstacle to growth, but rather the reverse.     

The impact of advanced vocational education and training on earnings in Sweden

Researchers have established a relationship between greater education and training and higher earnings but it is difficult to infer that the former causes the latter if those with higher earnings tend to engage in more education and training. The present study attempts to control for ability and family background to see if stronger inferences can be made about education and training as the independent variable. The study focuses upon advanced vocational education and training (AVET) in Sweden. This is post‐secondary school education for individuals who are 20 years of age or older. The aim of this article is to estimate the effects of AVET on earnings by controlling for selection bias. We used various approaches such as instrumental variables, Hausman–Taylor estimates, fixed effects estimates and propensity score matching to achieve this aim. A panel, or longitudinal, data set for eight different labor markets in Sweden for the period 1996–2008 was used. The results indicate that earnings from AVET are higher than the return on investment in comprehensive education. The average effect on income is estimated to be in the range of 3–8 percent.     

Evaluation of a home injury prevention program in a WHO Safe Community

The objective of this study was to evaluate the effect of a community-based injury prevention program on home injuries. Unintentional injuries occurring in private homes and during leisure time account for 70-80% of injuries treated in public health care. A quasiexperimental design was used for the study, with cross-sectional preand post-implementation measurements in the program area and in a neighboring control community. Children and the elderly were two main target groups of the intervention program, which was based on a participative strategy for community involvement. The study was based on defined total populations. The total relative risk for home injury occurrence decreased in the study area, whereas it increased in the control area. Regarding age and gender, there was a decrease for females and males in the study area and a slight increase in the control area. For males, the youngest and oldest age groups showed no decrease, whereas females showed a decrease among the youngest and those aged 60-79. No decrease was observed in the control area. The study showed that the Safe Community approach had a general effect on the incidence of home injuries.     

Book review

Although best practice transfer methodologies have become an increasingly common instrument in enterprise policy development, barriers to the exchange and dissemination of knowledge may limit their effectiveness. Using START, an EC-funded network of regional agencies, as a case this paper explores the dynamics of experience exchange in regional enterprise policy. Working closely with the START partnership, the authors developed a detailed account of how the network communicated and disseminated cases and instances of regional start-up policy and practice between themselves. Partners in START were more likely to adapt abstracted principles, concepts and ideas that informed changes to their own practices than to adopt specific initiatives from other regions. This suggests a need to re-focus best practice transfer methodologies away from the transplantation of established practices towards encouraging interactive and collaborative learning based on the sharing of experience.     

How do MNCs establish their talent pools? Influences on individuals’ likelihood of being labeled as talent

Addressing the research question of what influences the likelihood of an individual being labeled as ‘talent’ in MNCs, this paper seeks to understand the decision processes involved in the identification of MNC-internal talent. We develop a framework suggesting that the decision to include an employee in a corporate talent pool is a two-stage decision process in which mostly experience-based (on-line) performance appraisal evaluations are used as an input in largely cognition-based (off-line) managerial decision making. Consequently, talent pool inclusion is determined not only by performance appraisal evaluations, but also a number of factors that influence the decision making in the second stage of the talent identification process. Using empirical insights from an in-depth case study as illustrations, we identify three such factors—cultural and institutional distance between the locations of a potential member of the talent pool and the decision makers; homophily between the individual and the decision makers; and the network position of the person in question.     

Management regimes in science-based innovation: control and uncertainty during early phases of new drug development

The international pharmaceutical industry is facing a challenge in terms of being able to deliver new and innovative drugs at lower cost. During the last 10 years, a range of new scientific procedures and technologies has been introduced into the industry, partially derived from the advancement of genomics research. However, to date, few have resulted in new registered drugs. In addition to the new technologies, various managerial techniques and methods have been introduced with the intention of increasing the transparency of operations. This paper reports on a study of how scientists during the early phases of new drug development conceive of this present management regime emphasising quantitative output. Thinking of new drug development as an intellectual pursuit in order to understand the elementary mechanisms of the biological organisms on the molecular level, scientists call for an understanding and adjustment of the managerial techniques structuring this work, accompanied by ambiguities and uncertainty.     

An Integrative HRM Process Theorization: Beyond Signalling Effects and Mutual Gains

How and for whom HRM creates value are key questions in management research. The present study develops and tests an integrative HRM process theorization positing the existence of mutually reinforcing ability–motivation–opportunity, signalling, and identity‐based control mechanisms of the influence of HRM on both employee performance and work intensification. In addition to providing empirical support for the ‘how’ of value creation through HRM, the study contributes to the growing critique of the dominant mutual‐gains perspective, the notion that HRM outcomes are straightforwardly positive for both employers and employees. The integrative theorization also opens up interesting avenues for future research on the individual and organizational performance effects of HRM.