Exotic unit-linked life insurance contracts

This article integrates aspects of traditional insurance with advances in financial economics, yielding proper valuation and premium assessments of insurance benefits linked to various financial assets. Several new types of unit-linked life insurance contracts are discussed, with substantial potential for real-life applications. Compared to usual unit-linked products, these contracts offer added flexibility and/or altered exposure to financial risk for the insured and/or the insurer. The single premiums of these policies are calculated as expectations under a risk-adjusted probability measure (equivalent martingale measure), satisfying no-arbitrage conditions in financial markets.     

Housing prices and tenure choice with asymmetric taxes and progressivity

This paper studies the effects of tax schedule changes on prices and tenure choice in the housing market. It is shown that, given the present asymmetric treatment of owner-occupants vs. renters, an increase in the degree of progressivity is likely to lead to an increasein the prices of both owner-occupied and rental housing. A numerical example indicates that the effects may be quite large. Equilibrium prices are calculated based on the actual Swedish income tax schedules for 1971 and 1979. According to these simulations the tax changes that took place between these years caused the price of owner-occupied houses to increase by around 30 percent, and the rent level to increase by 2 or 3 percent.     

The Contract of Employment - Ethical Dimensions

A review of the literature indicates that faculty, students, and employers recognize the importance of professional behaviors for a successful career. These professional behaviors were defined by business school faculty to include honesty and ethical decision making, regular attendance and punctuality, professional dress and appearance, participation in professional organizations, and appropriate behavior during meetings. This paper presents the results of a survey administered to managers, faculty, and students about how business school professors can teach these professional behaviors. A hypothesis was tested that managers, professors, and students differ in their perceptions about what is appropriate professional behavior. Using a scale of strongly agree to strongly disagree to respond to critical incidents, one-way ANOVA indicated no group differences for items about cheating, plagiarism, and helping students to work projects on schedule. Group differences were found for ethics items (raising course grade for the purpose of tuition reimbursement, stopping excessive use of school printers, simplifying course work to accommodate weaker students), time management items (making accommodations for students unable to regularly attend class, refusing to admit late students), appearance items (requiring students to dress in suits for major presentations, counseling a student with facial piercing), and for items about required activities inside and outside of the classroom. Allen Hall received his Ph.D. in education from the University of Iowa. Currently he is an associate professor at the State University of New York (SUNY) Institute of Technology. His research projects center around surveys designed to measure changes in ethical awareness. His teaching area is Business & Society. He currently studies management issues in non-profit organizations. Lisa Berardino received her Ph.D. in management from Virginia Tech. Currently she is an associate professor at the State University of New York (SUNY) Institute of Technology and coordinator for the Master of Business Administration program. Her publications focus on identifying, measuring and building the critical skills that business students need in today’s workplace. Her teaching area is human resource management and compensation. Her current research projects center on how to build the competency of professional behavior and how to teach ethics.     

Revisiting a Social Constructionist Approach to Crisis Communication– Investigating Contemporary Crises in China

ABSTRACT

The current study provides a social constructionist approach to crisis communication in the Chinese context. Crisis communication is viewed as a form of strategic communication, involving multiple stakeholders in situations that are dependent on context, space and time. This approach provides a much-needed path for investigating and understanding crisis communication practices in contemporary China. The distinct Chinese context for crisis communication, with both an authoritarian government structure and a digital transformation of society, challenges theories originally developed in the Western countries. To address this issue, this study proposes a three-theme analytical framework to examine crisis communication practices in the Chinese context: (1) an audience (or stakeholder) orientation—focusing sense-making, (2) a proactive and interactive approach—focusing communication, and (3) a community—focused approach—focusing a long-range precrisis perspective.     

Government consumption smoothing in a balanced budget regime

I investigate government consumption smoothing (sensitivity) under a balanced budget rule in Swedish municipalities. In general, I find Swedish municipalities to be highly consumption sensitive. Municipalities consume 87.6 % out of predicted current revenues in the time period leading up to the implementation of the balanced budget rule, and they consume 76.3 % out of predicted current revenue in the time period following the implementation. Fiscally weak municipalities are found to be more consumption sensitive than fiscally strong municipalities. Very weak municipalities have become more consumption sensitive compared with very strong municipalities since the implementation of the balanced budget rule. Thus, I find indicative evidence that both credit market constraints and formal budget rules such as balanced budget rules increase municipal consumption sensitivity.     

Trust and Brand Recovery Campaigns in Crisis: Findus Nordic and the Horsemeat Scandal

The aim of this study is to describe and analyze a transboundary crisis, focusing on crisis communication from the perspective of an involved major corporation. More concretely, the intent is to increase understanding of how Findus Nordic in Sweden managed the crisis communication response and repair of its trust and corporate brand during and after the horsemeat scandal in 2013. The case study is based on a theoretical framework that consists of three theories or concepts: transboundary crisis, image repair strategy, and rhetorical arena. Findus Nordic followed its corporate values and applied a consistent image repair strategy: denial and blame shifting towards the supplier Comigel in an extremely multivocal arena. This strategy was supplemented with responsibility evasion. Towards the end of the public crisis, Findus Nordic used the crisis as an opportunity to recover their position and started a campaign that had a positive impact on trust and the corporate brand. The launch of the campaign was very fast and might have been dangerous. However, according to the analysis, the success of the campaign may be explained as a consequence of its sensemaking and auto-communicative approach.     

SICK PAY INSURANCE AND SICKNESS ABSENCE: SOME EUROPEAN CROSS-COUNTRY OBSERVATIONS AND A REVIEW OF PREVIOUS RESEARCH

All European countries have some form of compulsory insurance against the loss of income due to temporary disability. The insurance schemes vary widely between countries both in terms of measurable entities (such as the compensation level) as well as in unmeasurable traits concerning the actual implementation of the programs. In this paper we use European Labour Force Survey data to study how the measurable differences in the programs is associated with differences in absence rates. We also summarize the theoretical literature on insurance principles in this field. Based on the empirical literature we then discuss how different forms of incentives may affect the work absence rate.     

Children's understanding of food and meals in the foodscape at school

Children come into contact with food in different places and contexts, i.e. ‘foodscapes’. The aim of the paper was to study what knowledge children construct regarding food and meals in the foodscape at school and how they do so, focusing on the school meal context. Observations, interviews and focus group interviews were used. The children appropriated ideas and understandings from the adult world and society as a whole and used it among their peers in the school meal situation. This included the adoption of institutional commensality, the telling of stories about food, and the classification of foods in dichotomies.