The empirical link between export dispersion and export performance: A contingency-based approach

Practitioners and scholars point out that firms are increasingly dispersing their capabilities across organizational functions. However, it is not clear whether all forms of dispersion, of any function, result in the same consequences. This study initiates investigation into the link between the cross-functional dispersion of influence on export marketing decisions (export dispersion) and export performance. Drawing on data from a sample of 225 UK exporters, the findings support the argument that active participation of non-export functions in export-marketing decisions affects export success. However, those performance consequences are dependent on internal and external contingencies. Export dispersion is beneficial for export performance when the export customer environment is more turbulent and, simultaneously, the export technological environment is more stable and the firm has lower levels of export information sharing. In all other scenarios examined in this study, greater levels of concentration of export decision-making (i.e. lower levels of export dispersion) appear to be more beneficial for export performance. Our findings imply that the management of the firm’s level of export dispersion is a complex task, whereby the degree of export dispersion pursued needs to match external environmental and internal firm factors.     

High Leverage and Willingness to Pay: Evidence from the Residential Housing Market

I document a strong correlation between paying the full listing price on homes and borrowing 100% loan‐to‐value. Homebuyers who do both overpay by 2.8% to 3.9% ($4,800 to $6,700) and are 22.7% more likely to have their properties foreclosed within one year. The correlation is not mechanical: there is a discontinuity in the average leverage around the full listing price. The correlation is stronger in areas with a high fraction of financially constrained and unsophisticated residents, and in areas of high past price growth (potentially indicative of buyer optimism).     

The actual impact of comprehensive land-use plans: Insights from high resolution observations

Like most EU and US planning systems, planning in Israel aims to promote certainty regarding future development by employing statutory land-use plans for stabilizing and binding the development of land use. In Israel, district planning from the 1980s onwards took place in the form of long-term land-use plans. However, in practice, Israeli planning witnessed a movement toward discretionary-oriented decision-making, providing for revisions of the land-use plans and subsequently diminishing its efficacy. A pending reform suggests eliminating district land-use plans and absorbing them into national and local plans. Concerning the debate on the future of the Israeli planning system, this research aims to assess the gap between certainty-oriented regulation and actual development, often occurring on a case-by-case basis. Our aim is to evaluate the actual performance of a district land-use plan, focusing particularly on aspects of land-use. Remote Sensing and GIS-based Plan Implementation Evaluation (PIE) analysis was used to test the impact of a comprehensive outline plan for Israel's Central District on the actual development of the built environment. The results show fundamental gaps between the original land-use assignments of the district plan and actual development. The limited effectiveness of regulatory land-use planning for complex, densely populated districts is then discussed in line with the certainty–flexibility dilemma in land-use planning and the structure of planning decision-making in Israel.     

Bank acquisition of mortgage firms and stockholders' wealth: An empirical analysis

This paper examines the behavior of the returns on the securities of bank holding companies (BHCs) acquiring mortgage firms after the announcement of such an acquisition and the release of the Federal Reserve Board's decision. The stockholders of acquiring BHCs do not realize abnormal returns following the announcement of the acquisition of a mortgage firm. This reconfirms previous findings in unregulated industries and is consisten with the hypothesis that any economic rent which is generated by such an acquisition is captured by the acquired mortgage firm: This implies that there exist BHCs — other than the acquiring one — that could also affect a profitable merger with the mortgage firm. Another finding is that stockholders of BHCs that were 3enied permission to acquire mortgage firms sustained significant losses during the five weeks following the Board's decision.     

PARTIAL EXERCISE OF LOAN COMMITMENTS UNDER ADAPTIVE PRICING

The partial takedown phenomenon associated with bank loan commitments is examined in a dynamic context in which banks adjust commitment prices to client takedown behavior. The optimal takedown is an increasing function of client riskiness and a decreasing function of the time the client plans to remain with its present bank and the cost of switching to a new bank. Since the bank's learning is cumulative, the longer a client remains with its bank the smaller is the commitment price adjustment resulting from an aberrant takedown. The enhanced commitment price certainty, obtained with longevity of the client relationship, helps to explain client reluctance to switch banks. Since the optimal takedown is an increasing function of client riskiness under adaptive pricing, such pricing may serve the added purpose of providing information on client risk.     

Three methods for calculating the statistical properties of elasticities: A comparison

We acknowledge the support of NSERC and the Arts Research Board at McMaster.     

Beyond workaholism: Towards a general model of heavy work investment

Although the term workaholism is widely used, little consensus exists about its meaning, and there is a great need for further theoretical and methodological advancement. We attempt to address this need by introducing the concept of Heavy Work Investment (HWI), and viewing workaholism as only one of its subtypes. Furthermore, we propose a model consisting of four main components: HWI, its possible predictors, its types, and its outcomes.In this model, using Weiner's (1985) attributional framework, we differentiate between situational and dispositional types of HWI, each with its own subtypes, as based on the predictors of such an investment. For example, financial-needs-based and employer-directed are situational subtypes, whereas workaholism and work-devotion are dispositional subtypes. Based on the proposed HWI model, we compare dispositional investors with situational investors.Finally, the measurement of HWI, as well as future research directions (study of situational investors, research across time and cultures, and exploration of inter-generational similarity/difference) is also discussed.     

Optimal steady-state in stationary consumption-loan type models

We consider a stationary overlapping generations economy, and prove that an optimal steady state exists. We show that if a government intervention is needed in order to implement the optimal steady state as a competitive equilibrium, it is necessary only in a finite number of periods. If the interest rate associated with the optimal steady state equals the population rate of growth, some outside money may be required in order to make the competitive equilibrium follow the optimal steady state. We show that our existence result enables us to construct Pareto optimal competitive equilibria in some important cases.