Continued decline for ethnic minorities in the transition?

Using three Bulgarian cross‐sectional household surveys from 1986, 1993 and 1997, this essay shows that the mean log wage differential between ethnic Bulgarians and Turks increased from 0.1615 in 1986 to 0.2874 in 1993 and again to 0.4075 by 1997. Bulgarian gains over ethnic Turks in the early transition are related to both changes in the relative returns to skill and changes in the composition of demand for goods and services as the country moved toward a market economy. The Turks began the transition with fewer years of education than the Bulgarians, and began to close the education gap over this time. The Bulgarians, however, were more likely to have obtained more general secondary and university degrees than the ethnic Turks – degrees that, in contrast to technical or vocational degrees, are experiencing increased remuneration in the transition. With more of an asset that has become more valuable, the ethnic Bulgarians improved their relative position.     

Growth with or without Equity? The distributional impact of Indonesian development

This paper surveys articles that have examined and sought to explain the distributional change experienced in Indonesia during the past 30 years of rapid economic development. The literature is critically evaluated, and methodological difficulties and current data limitations are highlighted and point the way for advances in future research.     

State dependency in youth unemployment: A lost generation?

Utilizing a job search framework and survey data on both completed and uncompleted spells of unemployment we present in this paper maximum likelihood estimates of the determinants of re-employment probabilities of young workers in Britain. The model used allows us to examine the importance of state dependency in youth unemployment as well as ethnicity, educational qualifications, and unemployment income. Results suggest that there is strong evidence of negative duration dependence in the transition from unemployment to employment for young workers in Britain.     

Roles, role performance, and radical innovation competences

Despite the importance of radical innovations (RI), few firms have the capability to develop such innovations internally; success is increasingly linked with relationships and networks. However, the way(s) in which relationships and networks support RI is less clear. Successfully launching RIs requires the development of four distinctive competences; discovery, incubation, acceleration and commercialization. This paper examines how networks support the development of RIs, focusing on when and how network partners become involved and how their role performances support the development of the four competences. The study context is the automotive industry, which is heavily dependent upon RI and complex interrelationships. Data were collected through in-depth interviews with network participants involved in developing several RIs. Five task-oriented and three network-oriented roles are uncovered and the performance of these roles supports the development of different competences, with some roles being exclusively connected with particular competences and others supporting several competences. Focusing on role performance offers a useful means for distinguishing between acontextual actors, and the activities and resources they bring. In doing so, the paper enhances understanding of the links between network participants, role performances and the development of RI competences, and identifies a number of important implications for theory and practice.     

The heterogenous relationship of food stamp participation with body mass: Quantile regression model

This study explores the heterogenous relationship between Food Stamp Program (FSP) participation and body mass index (BMI) for low income individuals whose per capita family income falls in the bottom two quintiles. We estimate changes in the dispersion of the entire distribution of BMI following FSP participation using a quantile regression model in both cross-sectional and longitudinal analyses. For women, we find that the mean OLS estimate of FSP participation underestimates the extent of the positive association with BMI at the top quantiles in both cross-sectional and longitudinal individual fixed effects models. Controlling for individual fixed effects in the quantile regression model reduces the estimated magnitude of the association by a factor of three to four, although the estimates remain statistically significant for women. For men, a marginally statistically significant positive association of FSP participation with BMI is found at the top quantiles compared to no statistically significant mean estimate although the association is no longer statistically significant when time-constant individual heterogeneity is adjusted for in the individual fixed effect models.     

Maternal Depression and the Production of Infant Health

Depression is most prevalent among women of childbearing age and among low-income women, and the medical literature shows it to have adverse effects on infant health. Yet maternal depression has been overlooked in economic studies of infant health production. This research incorporates maternal depressive symptoms into a standard infant health production model and estimates both structural and reduced-form birth weight equations using samples of non-Hispanic white and black women from the National Maternal and Infant Health Survey. A byproduct of this research is an empirical investigation into factors associated with maternal depressive symptoms. All results show that depressive symptoms have a negative effect on birth weight and that they may operate through several channels such as smoking and prenatal care.     

Punishment in a Regulatory Setting: Experimental Evidence from the VCM

To analyze the effectiveness of punishment in inducing regulatory compliance, we modify a standard public goods experiment to include a financial penalty for free riding. The design allows us to vary both punishment probability and severity. We introduce the punishment mechanism in both a one-time and a repeated treatment and find that compliance (contributing to the public good) is increasing in expected punishment cost in both treatments. We also find that punishment severity has a larger effect on behavior than punishment probability. In the repeated treatment, we find that past punishment has a negative rather than positive effect on compliance.     

The viability of alternative call centre production models

In this article we outline three alternative production models and discuss their applicability to call centre management. These include the classic mass production model, the professional service model and the mass customisation model. We then develop a theoretical framework that identifies potential causal links between management practices, workers? affective and cognitive reactions, and performance outcomes. We use this framework to review literature on service workplaces in organisational behaviour and HR studies and to assess the empirical evidence regarding these causal explanations. Finally, we present two recent quantitative studies of call centre performance – one that examines affective explanations and one that explores cognitive explanations for the HRperformance link. We conclude with directions for future research.     

Executive Stock Ownership After the Acquisition

How does a company, buying another company, replace the acquired company's executive stock options? This article details what companies are doing and examines the advantages and disadvantages of replacing these options. The authors propose that the success or failure of an acquisition can hinge on the resolution of these issues.