Trading-up on unmet expectations? Evaluating consumers’ expectations in online premium grocery shopping logistics

Geography and retail store locations are inherently bound together; this study links food retail changes to systemic logistics changes in an emerging market. The later include raising income and education, access to a wide range of technologies, traffic and transport difficulties, lagging retail provision, changing family structure and roles, as well as changing food culture and taste. The study incorporates demand for premium products defined by Kapferer and Bastien [2009b. The Luxury Strategy. London: Kogan Page] as comprising a broad variety of higher quality and unique or distinctive products and brands including in grocery organic ranges, healthy options, allergy free selections, and international and gourmet/specialty products through an online grocery model (n?=?356) that integrates a novel view of home delivery in Istanbul. More importantly from a logistic perspective our model incorporates any products from any online vendors broadening the range beyond listed items found in any traditional online supermarkets. Data collected via phone survey and analysed via structural equation modelling suggest that the offer of online premium products significantly affects consumers’ delivery logistics expectations. We discuss logistics operations and business management implications, identifying the emerging geography of logistic models which respond to consumers’ unmet expectations using multiple sourcing and consolidation points.     

Tax-benefit systems and differences in aggregate labour force participation: Comparative evidence from the Czech Republic and Hungary

This paper investigates the extent to which cross-country differences in aggregate participation rates can be explained by differences in tax-benefit systems. We take the example of two countries, the Czech Republic and Hungary, which – despite a lot of similarities – differ markedly in labour force participation rates. Using comparable individual-level labour supply estimates, we simulate how the aggregate participation rate would change in one country if the other country’s tax and social welfare system were adopted. The estimation results for the two countries are quite similar, suggesting that individual preferences are essentially identical in the two countries. The simulation results show that about one-third of the difference in the participation rates of the 15–74 year-old population and more than two-thirds of the participation of the prime-age population can be explained by differences in the tax-benefit systems.     

Creation of models for calculation of coefficients of terrain passability

Quality & Quantity - The content of this article is a paper about a complex mathematical model of terrain passability which respects geographical and meteorological conditions in terrain and...     

How to measure competition in an economy in transition

This paper attempts to find a robust method of measuring competition when firms' operational activities are subject to frictions. The first part theoretically tests the indicative quality of two competition measures, the price‐cost margin (PCM) and the profit elasticity, in a model of monopolistic competition. The second part studies the empirical performance of the indices for a panel of Ukrainian manufacturing firms. This study offers a new approach to measuring profit elasticity that relies on structural estimation of a production function. The estimation methodology retrieves a productivity index that is adjusted to imperfect competition. The proposed method of measuring profit elasticity is found to be robust to frictions, but the PCM and traditional profit elasticity are biased, especially when the intensity of competition is low. Empirical findings show that competition exhibits a significantly positive correlation with aggregate productivity performance, while its impact on firm productivity is nonlinear.     

Risk attitudes and the stag-hunt game

A stag-hunt game (with the risky and safe actions) has two pure Nash equilibria that are Pareto-rankable. The risky action leads either to the Pareto-superior equilibrium (high payoff) or to out of equilibrium (low payoff) depending on the opponent’s action. Both players may want to obtain high payoff but uncertainty about the opponent’s action may prevent them to take such strategic risk. This paper investigates how information about the risk attitude of an opponent affects a player’s action choice in the stag-hunt game. I find that although a subject’s propensity to choose the risky action depends on her opponent’s risk attitude, it does not depend on her own risk attitude.     

A theory of search with deadlines and uncertain recall

We ask how the ability to recall past prices affects the dynamics of search and price formation. In the model, buyers have limited time to purchase a good and face uncertainty regarding the availability of past price quotes in the future. Sellers cannot observe a potential buyer’s remaining time until deadline nor her quote history, and hence post prices that weigh the probability of sale versus the profit once sold. We find that, in contrast to conventional wisdom, reducing the consumer’s recall ability may actually improve his expected utility because it lowers the average expected price in the market and reduces the duration of search.     

Security in a sea of insecurity: job security and intention to stay among service sector employees in Turkey

This article examines the association between job security and intention to stay for those who are employed in Turkey. There is a high level of unemployment in the country and many workers there are concerned about their job security. Job security refers to the objective dimensions of continuous contract, working full-time hours and paid and unpaid overtime. Job security also refers to the subjective dimension of perceived job security. We surveyed 407 employees in banking and related sectors' call centres, five-star hotel front-line staff and airline cabin crews. Results show that objective dimensions of job security are not associated with intention to stay. However, perceived job security is significantly and positively associated with intention to stay. We recommend that human resource managers focus on the perceived job security aspect of employment to keep valuable employees with the company.     

Islamic Economics in the Late Ottoman Empire: Menâpirzâde Nuri Bey's Mebâhis-i İlm-i Servet

The existing literature on Islamic economics suggests that Islamic economics is a twentieth-century phenomenon with its roots in medieval Islamic intellectual and theological history, thereby leaving a centuries-long gap in the history of Islamic economic thinking. This study aims at taking a first step towards filling this gap by examining a nineteenth-century example of Islamic economics in late Ottoman economic literature. Suggesting a broader definition of Islamic economics, this article investigates a prominent Ottoman intellectual's efforts to define, reveal, and revive a tradition of Islamic economics in historical and intellectual context.     

Revisiting the finance–growth nexus: the Turkish case, 1980–2010

In Turkey, the empirical results on the link between financial development and economic growth are mixed. The existing studies do not take into account the fact that Turkey has experienced endemic political and economic instabilities over extended periods. This study aims to analyse the role of macroeconomic instability and public borrowing on the finance–growth nexus in Turkey by using time series econometric techniques over the 1980–2010 period. In doing so, we attempt to extend the existing literature by taking into account the role of macroeconomic instability as well as public borrowing. Our results reveal that there are additional – albeit indirect – channels between finance and growth via the effects of macro instability and public borrowing on financial development and economic growth. After taking into account the effects of overall instability and public borrowing, we found that growth–financial development relationship is bidirectional and permanent. In other words, in Turkish case, economic growth and financial development are jointly determined. Thus, our results shed some light on the ambiguity of the evidence on the link between financial development and economic growth for Turkey.