House prices, non-fundamental components and interstate spillovers: The Australian experience

Using Australian capital city data from 1984Q3--2008Q2, this paper utilizes a dynamic present value model within a VAR framework to construct time series of house prices depicting what aggregate house prices should be given expectations of future real disposable income - the “fundamental price” - and continues by comparing capital city fundamental prices with actual prices. The extent to which revealed capital city “non-fundamental” components spillover from state to state, as well as their long-term impact is also investigated. Results provide evidence of periods of sustained deviations of house prices from values warranted by income for all state capitals with the greatest deviations arising in the NSW market and starting around 2000. In general NSW is relatively more susceptible to spillovers transmitted from other states while ACT and WA are most isolated from the rest of the country.     

Engineering,a civilising influence?

The global environment is increasingly under threat and we face a challenge with little time to respond. Are we prepared to change the actions and attitudes that have led to this parlous situation, and if we are, how do we do it? Is the world ready for a more ecologically benign, less economically driven, peaceful and spiritually oriented way of living? My challenge lies in higher education. How do you encourage such values in a tertiary education system which has spent many years applying and rewarding a ‘respond to the market’ discourse? My responses are grounded in transformative education research with large diverse cohorts of first year engineering students. This paper also uses a critical futures methodology, Causal Layered Analysis, to update my concerns about Australian engineering education and the profession, using two recent reports. The aim is to offer constructive insights that may be transferable to educators in other contexts.     

Engineers and management: The challenge of the challenger incident

The Challenger incident was a result of at least four kinds of difficulties: differing perceptions and priorities of the engineers and management at Thiokol and at NASA, a preoccupation with roles and role responsibilities on the part of engineers and managers, contrasting corporate cultures at Thiokol and its parent, Morton, and a failure both by engineers and by managers to exercise individual moral responsibility. I shall argue that in the Challenger case organizational structure, corporate culture, engineering and managerial habits, and role responsibilites precipitated events contributing to the Challenger disaster. At the same time, a number of individuals at Morton Thiokol and NASA were responsible for the launch failure. Differing world views, conflicting priorities of the engineers and managers on this project, and the failure of either engineers or management to take personal moral responsibility for decision-making contributed significantly to the event. Patricia H. Werhane is the Wirtenberger Professor of Business Ethics at Loyola University of Chicago. She is one of the founding members and past president of the Society for Business Ethics and editor-in-chief of Business Ethics Quarterly. Her publications include Ethical Issues in Business, coedited with Tom Donaldson, Persons, Rights, and Corporations, and Adam Smith and His Legacy for Modern Capitalism forthcoming with Oxford University Press.     

Onboarding: delivering on the promise

The nursing workforce continues to age and exit the workplace. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics studies indicate as many as 40% will retire or are considering retirement. Fewer qualified graduates are in place to replace aging baby boomers, leading to a knowledge and skills gap as well as a numbers gap. Globalization of the nursing workforce has increased competition for all employers to find, hire, and retain good employees.     

Unemployment,wages and pensions

Empirical evidence has shown the existence of a negative relationship between the rates of unemployment and real wages. If pensions are computed according to the wages that workers have contributed, then the unemployment rates during working life may also influence the pensions to which they are entitled. Using data from 2005 to 2012 for the Spanish social security system, we estimate that the unemployment elasticity of real pension is ?0.135. A 1% increase in unemployment rate is associated with a reduction in pension equal to 0.135%. In ‘normal times’, this value could be considered modest, but the Great Recession has increased dramatically the rate of unemployment. In 2012, the rate of unemployment in Spain had increased to 25.7% and in 2015, it had diminished to 20.9%. It is estimated that unemployment rate will not be returned to figures existing before the crisis until middle of the next decade. Moreover, the current reforms in social security systems could interact with the future effects of the current rates of unemployment and cause future pensions to be significantly lower than those estimated by individuals. The economic welfare of the future cohorts of retirees would then be significantly worsened.     

Do overweight and obesity prevalence rates converge in Europe?

We exploit recently published data to evaluate the long-run evolution of overweight and obesity rates among European economies between 1975 and 2016. We find that overweight rates for both females and males converge in Europe. In particular, the convergence is driven by the nations in the EU. This fact is consistent with food patterns as well as trade, agricultural, and health policies that are common among EU members. Across our model specifications, the steady-state average overweight rate ranges between 60% and 77% for European female individuals and lies above 82% for their male counterparts. Confidence intervals suggest that such gender differences are statistically significant. In the EU, the point estimates of these rates are 62% and 91%, respectively. Obesity prevalence in Europe would reach long-term rates of 39% and 45% for females and males respectively, whereas these rates would be similar in the EU (approximately 28%).     

Clusters,knowledge spillovers and new venture performance: An empirical examination

Firms in geographic regions with industry clustering have been hypothesized to possess performance advantages due to superior access to knowledge spillovers. Yet, no prior studies have directly examined the relationship between a firm's location within a cluster, knowledge spillovers and firm performance. In this study, we examine whether technological spillovers explain the performance of new ventures in cluster regions. We find that ventures located within geographic clusters absorb more knowledge from the local environment and have higher growth and innovation performance, but contrary to conventional wisdom, technological spillovers are not the contributing cause of higher performance observed for these firms.     

Knowledge Synthesis and Innovative Logistics Processes: Enhancing Operational Flexibility and Performance

Research results are presented providing an empirical examination of the impact of knowledge synthesis and innovative logistics processes on operational flexibility. The research is theoretically grounded in the resource‐based view of the firm, augmented with the knowledge‐based view. Knowledge synthesis and innovative logistics processes are proposed as key resources in the development of an important logistics capability: operational flexibility. A structural model analysis of survey data collected from logistics executives supports the proposed relationships and indicates that innovative logistics processes can lead to greater operational flexibility. Operational flexibility is also shown to lead to higher levels of logistics performance.