Does credit quality matter for homeownership?

While micro-level household data on wealth and income are available for assessing income- and wealth-based constraints to homeownership, lack of data on household credit ratings has precluded evaluation of credit quality as a potential barrier to homeownership. The study, for the first time, measures the relative importance of credit-, income-, and wealth-based constraints and estimates how the effects of these constraints have evolved over the past decade. The results show that financing constraints continue to have an important impact on potential homebuyers. The wealth constraint has the largest impact, although its importance declined substantially during the 1990s. Credit quality based constraints have become more important barriers to homeownership during the 1990s, mostly reflecting an increase in the number of households with impaired credit quality. Thus, both wealth and credit constraints persist as barriers to the attainment of homeownership.     

Asset pricing dynamics

This paper is concerned with the issue of dynamics in financial data and asset pricing models such as the CAPM. A literature review in this area is undertaken and highlights the need for a modern time series econometric approach in asset pricing. Such an approach is discussed and deals with problems related to structural breaks and microstructures, dynamics in the mean and variance process, and non-stationary regressions and cointegration. An empirical application using UK stock market data demonstrates the merit of the proposed methodology in correcting market model regressions.     

KNOWLEDGE ACCUMULATION WITHIN AN ORGANIZATION

In this article, we consider a knowledge accumulation problem within an organization that cannot prevent the worker from quitting and using the knowledge outside the organization. We show that knowledge accumulation is delayed: The fraction of working time allocated to knowledge creation is highest at the early career stage, falls gradually, then rises again, before falling finally toward zero. We determine the effect of a change in the severity of the enforcement problem (or the specificity of knowledge). We also discuss the form of the optimal life‐cycle wage profiles, the role of the initial knowledge level, and the role of discounting.     

Freedom of Expression,Internet Responsibility,and Business Ethics: The Yahoo! Saga and Its Implications

In the late 1990s, the Internet seemed a perfect medium for business: a facilitator of unlimited economical propositions to people without any regulatory limitations. Cases such as that of Yahoo! mark the beginning of the end of that illusion. They demonstrate that Internet service providers (ISPs) have to respect domestic state legislation in order to avoid legal risks. Yahoo! was wrong to ignore French national laws and the plea to remove Nazi memorabilia from its auction site. Its legal struggle proved futile and may have harmed its business. This essay argues for the adoption of standards of corporate social responsibility (CSR). CSR considerations may trump some forms of antisocial, highly offensive expression.     

Neue Medienumgebungen,andere Auswahlkriterien?

Due to the wide range of diverse media content in today’s high-choice media environment, decisions on sampling methods are mandatory for content-analytical research projects. While including some objects of study into their analysis and excluding others, researchers influence the results of their investigation. Until now, methodological contributions have rarely discussed such cases of selection bias. In this article, we focus on content-related criteria of selection and propose a framework for the systemization of various dimensions of selection. Along the distinction between a diagnostic and a prognostic epistemic goal, we differentiate between a media-centric and an audience-centric dimension. For each dimension, various criteria of selection are discussed. We argue, that future content-analytical research projects could – depending upon the study’s objective – start from this systemization in order to define the particular set of objects of study. By doing this, researchers can adequately counter a less prominent source of error in content analyses, i.?e., the error of coverage.     

Rural industrialization objectives: The income-employment conflict

This paper examines the existence of a trade-off between employment and income levels as objectives of rural industrialization. The theoretical approach suggested in order to explain conflicting views regarding the relations between these objectives treats separately static conditions, dynamic conditions and long-term projections. Some of these considerations are tested using empirical data relating to rural industrialization in Northeast Brazil.The conclusions reached refer to some indications of optimal industrialization policies for the achievement of alternative development objectives.     

Diversification strategies,business cycles and economic performance

Two major diversification strategies of firms are examined: diversification into related businesses and diversification into unrelated businesses. The first strategy attempts to exploit operating synergies. In the second, the firm attempts to gain financial benefits from its ability to increase leverage due to a greater stability of cash flows. The study utilizes a large sample affirms to assess empirically the benefits and costs of these two diversification strategies by developing a new measure of diversification across business cycles and economic sectors. This new measure is compared with Berry—Herfindahl type measures of total diversification and recent measures of diversification into related businesses. The results indicate that pure financial diversification is associated with (a) more stable cash flows, i.e. lower operating risk; (b) increased levels of leverage; and (c) lower profitability. These observations are in accord with the theory. We also reaffirm that firms which diversify into related businesses have, on the average, higher profitability than non-diversified firms, although these results are not always statistically significant.     

Strategic assets and organizational rent

We build on an emerging strategy literature that views the firm as a bundle of resources and capabilities, and examine conditions that contribute to the realization of sustainable economic rents. Because of (1) resource-market imperfections and (2) discretionary managerial decisions about resource development and deployment, we expect firms to differ (in and out of equilibrium) in the resources and capabilities they control. This asymmetry in turn can be a source of sustainable economic rent. The paper focuses on the linkages between the industry analysis framework, the resource-based view of the firm, behavioral decision biases and organizational implementation issues. It connects the concept of Strategic Industry Factors at the market level with the notion of Strategic Assets at the firm level. Organizational rent is shown to stem from imperfect and discretionary decisions to develop and deploy selected resources and capabilities, made by boundedly rational managers facing high uncertainty, complexity, and intrafirm conflict.     

Electronics-based automation technologies and the onset of systemofacture: Implications for Third World industrialization

This paper considers the implications of emergent best-practice techniques for Third World industrial strategies. These new techniques are described in historical context, and are considered to consist of two major developments. These are the adoption of systemic, electronics-based automation technologies, and the adoption of Japanese-style just-in-time production techniques. The implications for Third World industrialization are considered in four major areas, namely: policies concerning technological diffusion; networking and infrastructure; skill acquisition; and the role of design in comparative advantage.     

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