Ethics at the workplace

Are facts the only criteria that should determine an arbitrator's decision but are there other ethical criteria that ought to be used? Arbitrators are often faced with deciding issues like whether a person discharged already by a company for arson, should be reinstated or not to his old job. The problem, however, may not be the facts but that the company has discharged him to get rid of him so that it no longer has a problem while society does with the arsonist at work elsewhere. Another problem involves the teaching of human resources management. Most of the current literature dealing with modern management reflects the belief that participatory management is good for management. Most of the evidence supporting such a claim is weak; there surely is very little evidence that such participation should include nonsupervisory employees. The discussion concerning the issue of participatory management could be raised if the participants stopped talking about the increased productivity that is supposed to result, but rather deal instead with the issue that such participation is a form of industrial democracy and therefore is good or bad depending upon a person's ethical judgments concerning such an issue.     

FOOL THE MARKETS? CREATIVE ACCOUNTING,FISCAL TRANSPARENCY AND SOVEREIGN RISK PREMIA

We investigate the effects of official fiscal data and creative accounting signals on interest rate spreads between bond yields in the European Union. We find that two different measures of creative accounting indeed both increase the spread. The increase of the risk premium is stronger, if financial markets are unsure about the true extent of creative accounting. Moreover, fiscal transparency reduces risk premia. Instrumental variable regressions confirm these results by addressing potential reverse causality problems and measurement bias.     

DETERMINANTS OF THE EXECUTION COSTS OF COMMON STOCK TRADES BY INDIVIDUAL INVESTORS

Data on a large sample of transactions in common stocks by individual investors over a nine-year period are examined to identify factors that influence the magnitude of the price concessions those investors experienced in trades executed on the New York and American Stock Exchanges. Among the factors that appear to have an influence on such “execution costs” are the exchange where the security involved is traded and the direction of the price movement in the security on the day of the trade. The size of the trade, the price of the stock, and the volatility of price, however, do not seem to have an effect. There is also little indication that execution costs have declined over time as the securities markets have become less subject to regulation.     

Shareholder Value Implications of Compliance with the German Corporate Governance Code

This study contributes to the ongoing discussion of the German Corporate Governance Code (GCGC) of the Regierungskommission Deutscher Corporate Governance Kodex (Government Commission), which should enhance the confidence of national and international investors. We apply the Feltham and Ohlson ( 1995 ) valuation model to a panel dataset of 421 German CDAX firms over the period 2002–2012 and find a positive effect of the level of compliance with the GCGC on the market value of firms. We conclude that the recommendations of the GCGC reflect corporate governance that satisfies investors' needs, as the capital markets perceive them. Our results are in favor of the efforts of the Government Commission, which have attracted criticism from both theorists and practitioners both in the past and at present. From the perspective of managerial and decision economics, the empirical results of this study suggest that executives should follow as many recommendations of the GCGC as possible. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Introduction: Organizations, Risk and Regulation

abstract    Risk, regulation and practices of organizing are interrelated in a myriad of ways. Natural disasters, technical failures, and also processes of organizing are sources of risk to which organizations must respond and for which new managerial and regulatory practices are demanded. In this introduction we highlight three salient features of risk management: the (un)intended production of risk by organizations; the complex interrelationship between risk management and regulation; and the evolving and often contested nature of risk management knowledge. Each of these three themes is evident in the different contributions to this themed section.     

A new marked point process model for the federal funds rate target: Methodology and forecast evaluation

Forecasts of key interest rates set by central banks are of paramount concern for investors and policy makers. Recently it has been shown that forecasts of the federal funds rate target, the most anticipated indicator of the Federal Reserve Bank's monetary policy stance, can be improved considerably when its evolution is modeled as a marked point process (MPP). This is due to the fact that target changes occur in discrete time with discrete increments, have an autoregressive nature and are usually in the same direction. We propose a model which is able to account for these dynamic features of the data. In particular, we combine Hamilton and Jordà's [2002. A model for the federal funds rate target. Journal of Political Economy 110(5), 1135–1167] autoregressive conditional hazard (ACH) and Russell and Engle's [2005. A discrete-state continuous-time model of financial transactions prices and times: the autoregressive conditional multinomial-autoregressive conditional duration model. Journal of Business and Economic Statistics 23(2), 166 – 180] autoregressive conditional multinomial (ACM) model. The paper also puts forth a methodology to evaluate probability function forecasts of MPP models. By improving goodness of fit and point forecasts of the target, the ACH–ACM qualifies as a sensible modeling framework. Furthermore, our results show that MPP models deliver useful probability function forecasts at short and medium term horizons.     

Wunden schmerzarm versorgen

Schmerzintensit?t ist entscheidend für die Lebensqualit?t — Schmerzen geh?ren zu den unangenehmsten Begleiterscheinung von chronischen Wunden. Sie besitzen erhebliche Auswirkungen auf das Wohlbefinden und die Selbstwahrnehmung des Patienten und auch auf seine Einstellung zur Wunde.