Tourism and economic development: Which investments produce gains for regions?

Across three decades numerous metropolitan regions have made substantial investments in different tourist amenity packages. These investments were made to either capture a portion of the growing tourism market or establish an image that attracted the human capital needed to advance economic development. This article analyzes the returns for the tourism industry and for economic development from different amenity packages and finds those related to sports and amusements generated the most significant gains for regions.     

Off‐Farm Work,Intensity of Government Payments,and Farm Exits: Evidence from a National Survey in the United States

The last three decades have witnessed the continued exit of households from primary agriculture in the United States, where the average annual gross exit rate has averaged 10% per year. Understanding exit behavior is one key to future farm structure, management of abandoned land, depopulation of rural areas, and agricultural policy, including government program payments. This study empirically estimates the determinants of exit decisions of farm households. Particular attention is given to the roles of intensity of government payments and off‐farm work decisions of farm couples in the exit decision. Using a large farm‐level survey and controlling for endogeneity, results indicate that farm households with reduced intensity of government payments are more likely to exit farming. Households where the operator spouse works off the farm are more likely to exit farming. Additionally, households with older farmers, with the farm operator and spouse raised on a farm, and households operating farms located in Northern Great Plains are more likely to exit farming.     

Using meta‐analytic structural equation modeling to advance strategic management research: Guidelines and an empirical illustration via the strategic leadership‐performance relationship

This paper demonstrates how meta‐analysis can be combined with structural equation modeling (MASEM) to address new questions in strategic management research. We review this integration, describe its implementation, and compare findings from bivariate meta‐analyses, a direct‐effect structural equations model, and two mediating frameworks using data on the strategic leadership and performance relationship. Results drawn from 208 articles that collectively included data on 495,638 observations demonstrate the new insights available from MASEM while also suggesting a revision to conventional thinking on strategic leadership. Whereas some theories posit that boards of directors influence firm performance through monitoring and disciplining the top management team, MASEM provides more support for the view that boards mediate the top management teams' decisions. Implications for applying MASEM in strategic management are offered. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Information Content of Productivity Measures: an International Comparison*

This study examines whether, and to what extent, productivity information is used by the market and whether it is useful as a predictive measure. To see if nationality has any bearing on these issues, we examine the information content of productivity measures in Japan, Korea and the United States. While correlations between security returns, productivity changes and unexpected earnings are not uniform across our sample countries, our findings suggest that productivity, as a performance metric, merits greater attention by financial managers and security analysts. The substitution of productivity in place of short-run earnings could very well be the key to enhanced performance in today's environment of global competition.     

Facilitating computer-supported meetings: A cumulative analysis in a multiple-criteria task environment

There have been many instances of the ineffective applications of new information technology. This article describes a program of enhancing the effectiveness of a new technology, Group Decision Support Systems (GDSS), through a series of studies which resulted in improvements in the technology itself as well as in how the technology is supported. Our approach emphasizes human facilitation and facilitative features embedded in the GDSS software.     

Determinants of collective intelligence quality: comparison between Wiki and Q&A services in English and Korean users

Although web-enabled collective intelligence (CI) plays a critical role in organizational innovation and collaboration, the dubious quality of CI is still a substantial problem faced by many CI services. Thus, it is important to identify determinants of CI quality and to analyze the relationship between CI quality and its usefulness. One of the most successful services of web-enabled CI is Wikipedia accessible all over the world. Another type of CI service is Naver KnowledgeiN, a typical and popular CI site offering question and answer (Q&A) services in Korea. Wikipedia is a multilingual and web-based encyclopedia. Thus, it is necessary to study the influence relationships among CI quality, its determinants, and CI usefulness according to different CI type and languages. In this paper, we propose a new research model reflecting multi-dimensional factors related to CI quality from user’s perspective. To test a total of 15 hypotheses drawn from the research model, a total of 691 responses were collected from Wikipedia and KnowledgeiN users in South Korea and US. Expertise of contributors, community size, and diversity of contributors were identified as determinants of perceived CI quality. Perceived CI quality has significantly influenced on perceived CI usefulness from user’s perspective. CI type and different language partially play a role of moderators. The expertise of contributors plays a more important role in CI quality in the case of Q&A services such as KnowledgeiN compared to Wiki services such as Wikipedia. This implies that Q&A service requires more expertise and experiences in particular areas rather than the case of Wiki service to improve service quality. The relationship between community size and perceived CI quality was different according to CI type. The community size has a greater effect on CI quality in case of Wiki service than that of Q&A service. The number of contributors in Wikipedia is important because Wiki is an encyclopedia service which is edited and revised repeatedly from many contributors while the answer given in Naver KnowledgeiN cannot be edited by others. Finally, CI quality has a greater effect on its usefulness in case of Wiki service rather than Q&A service. In this paper, we suggested implications for practitioners and theorists.     

Macroeconomic effects of family business inheritance tax reduction: Evidence from South Korea

This study examines the macroeconomic effects of family business inheritance tax reduction in South Korea using a theoretical model that addresses the problem of a family member's occupational choice decision between being a worker and being an entrepreneur. In contrast with previous studies, the model considers the distribution of firm size. The effect of the reduction in the family business inheritance tax rate on the macroeconomy is positive in this model, whereas it is negative in a model in the literature that does not consider the distribution of firm size when addressing the occupational choice decision. Calibrated results obtained using data for South Korea show that a 50% reduction in the family business inheritance tax rate increases the total labour demand, total real investment, and total sales by 0.13%, 1.88%, and 0.15%, respectively.     

Does local political support influence financial markets? A study on the impact of job approval ratings of political representatives on local stock returns

Using data on job approval ratings of governors, U.S. senators, and the president, we find that firms located in states with high approval ratings outperform firms located in states with low approval ratings by .64% per month. Furthermore, this relationship is stronger when investors are actively involved in politics, when local politicians are closer to the center of political power, for small firms that have a larger proportion of local investors, and for financially strong areas where investors are ready to execute investments in local stocks. Overall, our study shows that investors’ political sentiment is important in determining stock returns.     

A Study on the KBS TV Drama Winter Sonata and its Impact on Korea's Hallyu Tourism Development

The purpose of this paper is to examine the ties between the success of a TV drama Winter Sonata, produced by the Korean Broadcasting System (KBS), and the flow of tourism into Korea. By deconstructing the Hallyu phenomenon, started in part by Winter Sonata, the study tries to determine possibilities for Korean tourism expansion. Literature reviews, tourism data, interviews with specialists, and actual pieces of feedback from Winter Sonata's Egyptian audience are referred to draw conclusions on the subject matter. Results show promising markets far beyond just Asia, touched by Hallyu, but not the opportunity to tour Korea yet. Suggestions are then made on how to help sustain Hallyu tourism and increase access to potential new travel markets, especially those in diverse Islamic regions around the world.     

South Korea’s outward direct investment and its dyadic determinants: Foreign aid,bilateral treaty and economic diplomacy

This study investigates the factors that affect South Korean outward foreign direct investment (FDI) in developing countries. Most previous studies focus on monadic factors and do not consider how and to what extent bilateral relationships between South Korea and the host countries affect the investment decisions of Korean firms. The current study finds that interstate factors such as South Korea's international investment treaties with and official development assistance to host countries have positive effects on FDI to these countries, while presidential visits have strong and statistically significant effects on FDI only in countries located in non-Asian regions, especially the African continent. The findings suggest that the effects of bilateral relations on South Korea's FDI vary depending on the geographic location of the host country.