Creative destruction and labor's options

New technology, the fall of Eastern European socialism, new international trade agreements, and a resurgence of classical liberalism have greatly augmented the pace of capitalism's creative destruction. The principal benefits of this process have come in the form of new, better, and less-expensive consumer goods. But this process also generates a generalized sense of insecurity that most afflicts labor. Yet, the dominant ideology that has accompanied this latest burst of creative destruction has not been terribly sympathetic to labor's plight. After analyzing the character of this most recent burst of creative destruction, this paper explores the various options available to labor within a generally hostile ideological climate. The principle focus is on how labor's most promising options may not be found primarily in restablishing constrants upon markets, but rather in gaining greater control over production in the form of greater participation in both firm decision-making and ownership.     

Land rights in postwar Liberia: The volatile part of the peace process

The end to the war in Liberia, along with quality leadership and a large UN presence has laid the foundation for a successful peace process. Now the delicate part of the process is underway—building viable, equitable, and durable social relations, institutions and legal constructs. A potentially volatile part of any postwar scenario is the inability of land rights institutions to perform in an effective, legitimate, equitable manner. Reform of land tenure via policies, laws, institutions, and capacity, needs to happen in a manner that is able to attend to both the land rights related causes of conflict, and the tangle of land problems brought on by the war itself. This article reports on the current situation in Liberia, and examines the primary set of land tenure problems in the country. The article concludes with a series of suggestions for dealing with the unique circumstances of postwar land tenure, and the Liberian case.     

Indirect Taxes on International Aviation*

There has recently been much discussion of the possible use of internationally coordinated indirect taxes, or equivalent charges, on international aviation, whether as a source of finance for development or as part of a response to heightened concerns with climate change. This paper considers the strengths and weaknesses of the leading candidate instruments of this kind. It argues that, on both policy and administration grounds, the case for increasing indirect taxes on international aviation is strong: the indirect tax burden on international aviation is very low, yet aviation contributes significantly to border-crossing environmental damage, is just as proper an object of taxation as any other commodity, and incipient tax competition is likely to result in these taxes being set at inefficiently low levels. But the form(s) in which such taxes are levied matters: a tax on aviation fuel would address the key border-crossing externalities most directly; a tax on final ticket values would have greater revenue potential, and perhaps some distributional advantage; departure/arrival taxes face the least legal obstacles, but are much blunter instruments. Optimal policy, it is shown, typically requires deploying both a fuel tax and a ticket tax, and the paper explores, both in principle and by simulation, the key considerations and trade-offs involved in designing a suitable indirect tax regime for international aviation.     

Pollution and the firm Robert E. Kohn Edward Elgar, 1998, 251 pp.

The book, Pollution and the Firm, by Robert E. Kohn, provides a detailed and nearly definitive look at the application of Pigouvian taxation applied to competitive polluting firms in a static, general equilibrium framework. The reader is offered the most thorough examination of how the firm's long-run scale of output is related to the activities of pollution abatement and avoidance of which this reviewer is aware. While the reader would be advised to treat with skepticism some of the results of the models involving uncertainty, the overall set of models offers an excellent set of derivations and conclusions. Any student of firm-generated externalities would gain by exposure to this book.     

The long and winding roads: Perceived quality of scenic tourism routes

This study aims to understand self-drive tourists’ satisfaction with and loyalty toward scenic roads. Building on previous studies in the context of tourism destinations, satisfaction is hypothesised to be influenced by leisure and holiday motorists’ motivation for driving the routes and the provision of roadside facilities. In turn, satisfaction is assumed to increase motorists’ loyalty toward the route. The study comprises data from two scenic roads in Norway that differ with respect to landscapes formations, settlements, experiences along the routes, and travel distance. Data are analysed using structural equation modelling. Results show that roadside facilities play a crucial role in achieving overall satisfaction and loyalty among motor tourists, and that route managers should improve the quality of these and related infrastructure facilities and services. Moreover, the study indicates that it is important to take into consideration the motorists’ desire to experience attractive sceneries in order to increase overall route satisfaction. Finally, satisfaction is demonstrated to significantly increase route loyalty, although this relationship appears weaker than in conventional destination studies.     

Lifecycle‐based donor performance analysis

With charities of all sizes now having the ability to collect and store very large quantities of data about their donors on in‐house database systems, detailed donor performance analyses have an increasingly essential role to play in the effective planning and management of fundraising. If, however, such activities are to support fully the work of fundraisers then it is important that they are undertaken from the perspective of the fundraiser rather than of the specialist data analyst. This paper introduces an approach to donor performance analysis that is founded on what is termed a ‘donor lifecycle model’. The aim of this is to provide a formal analysis methodology that provides end results that can be more easily interpreted by nonspecialists and so more effectively used in support of the efficient planning of fundraising programmes. Copyright © 2000 Henry Stewart Publications     

Statistics Research at Bell Labs in the Regulated Monopoly Era

Industrial research in the United States took hold and grew during much of the 20th century. Bell Labs, a corporate component of the Bell System, was perhaps the premier example. The period from 1925, when Bell Labs was formed, to 1984, when the Bell System was broken up following a government antitrust lawsuit, is of special interest because the system operated as a regulated monopoly during that period. Telephone subscribers effectively paid for research and development in their monthly phone bills, which provided an element of financial stability for the labs. Statistics research was one of many types that thrived, much to the benefit of the Bell System, its customers, and the science of statistics. The purpose of this article is to review, explain, and illustrate the circumstances that contributed to this success and to raise the question of how modern corporations, operating in fully competitive environments, might achieve some of the same benefits.