External auditors’ reliance on internal audit: the impact of sourcing arrangements and consulting activities

This study examines the impact of internal audit outsourcing and involvement in consulting on external auditors’ reliance on the work of internal audit. We test whether these factors influence reliance on internal audit work already undertaken and the use of internal auditors as assistants, distinguishing between control evaluation and substantive testing. Involvement in consulting impacts reliance on work undertaken and the use of internal auditors as assistants for control evaluation. External auditors make greater use of internal auditors as assistants for substantive testing when internal audit is provided in‐house. Overall, external auditors use internal audit more for control evaluation tasks.     

Introduction to the Special Issue: Things We Do and Don’t Understand About the Household and the Environment

Environmental economics has been slow to incorporate the full and complex nature of the household into its analytical structures and to reflect empirical evidence on household decision-making. This paper provides an overview of some of the main unanswered questions.      

Employment Effects of the Affordable Care Act Medicaid Expansions

We examine whether the recent expansions in Medicaid from the Affordable Care Act reduced “employment lock” among childless adults who were previously ineligible for public coverage. We compare employment in states that chose to expand Medicaid versus those that chose not to expand, before and after implementation. We find that although the expansion increased Medicaid coverage by 3.0 percentage points among childless adults, there was no significant impact on employment.     

A Note on α‐Gini Measures

This note provides a characterization of α‐Gini inequality measures. These measures generalize the standard Gini index by including one sensitivity parameter α, which captures different value judgments. The α‐Gini measures are shown to be weakly decomposable and unit consistent. Weak decomposition provides within‐group and between‐group inequalities. Unit consistency keeps unchanged the ranking of two income distributions when the income units vary. It is shown that the α‐Gini measures are relevant with either “leftist” or“rightist” views.     

Leading for collaborative public service innovation

ABSTRACT

This article examines the critical leadership actions that support collaborative public service innovations, drawing on evidence from UK local government led partnerships. It concludes that success is more likely if leaders help the partnership to: build mutual trust; agree clear, well thought through, politically supported ambitions; invest time, resources and energy; galvanize managers and staff; make a long term commitment to achieving the objectives, learning, adapting and growing innovations together.     

Mergers & acquisitions and the acquirer-target cultural differences

Review of Quantitative Finance and Accounting - We investigate the impacts of cultural environment on mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in the U.S. To measure the cultural environment of a...     

Materiality and family consumption: the role of the television in changing mealtime rituals

This interpretivist study contributes to our understanding of how materiality mediates everyday family life by exploring the role of material objects in changing family rituals. We show how the television acts as an agent of cultural change when intermixed with family mealtimes. Our findings present a conceptual framework to explain the ways in which family life is altering across four key areas, namely: (1) mealtime settings and practices; (2) type of food consumed; (3) family structure and membership; and (4) family values and identity. This analytical framework illustrates how technologies such as the television mediate family relationships and how technologies become progressively more embedded in everyday practices. Revealing a transfer of mealtime practices from the formal environment into the informal environment, and vice versa, our study shows how mealtime rituals are altered and changed in form when mediated by the television, but not ultimately abandoned.     

Participation in sport and membership of traditional sports clubs: a case study of gymnastics in The Netherlands (with British comparisons)

In the Netherlands, gymnastics is a major participation sport. Historically a high proportion of gymnasts have been members of clubs affiliated to the national governing body, the Koninklijke Nederlandse Gymnastiek Bond (KNGB). Over recent years there has been a steady decline in the membership of the KNGB. This paper reports the results of an investigation into this decline in membership. Prior to the study it was suggested that the cause of declining membership was an increase in the rate at which people were leaving the KNGB and one part of the investigation concentrated on identifying former members and analysing their reasons for leaving. However, on the basis of our evidence, it appeared that no more people are leaving than normal. The research indicated that the problem is that less people, in particular young people, are joining gymnastics clubs. The problem is not one of exit but one of entry.

Although the empirical results relate only to gymnastics in the Netherlands, the paper broadens the discussion to the international context by comparing the situation in the Netherlands with that in Britain. The Dutch structure of sport, and the position of the sports club in it, is similar to that in other northern European countries such as Denmark and Germany but the British situation is substantially different. Weisbrod's theory of the voluntary sector is used to investigate the broader question of the role of the sports club in the changing market for sport.