Strengthening “Giving Voice to Values” in Business Schools by Reconsidering the “Invisible Hand” Metaphor

The main contention of this paper is that our ability to embed a consideration of values into business school curricula is hampered by certain normative parameters that our students have when entering the classroom. If we don’t understand the processes of valuation that underpin our students’ reasoning, our ethics teaching will inevitably miss its mark. In this paper, we analyze one of the most prevalent metaphors that underpin moral arguments about business, and reveal the beliefs and assumptions that underpin it. By revisiting the content of Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” metaphor, we show that the moral content of the metaphor has been significantly misconstrued through its subsequent reception in economic theory. The “Giving Voice to Values” (GVV) pedagogy aims to enable students to act on their tacit values and address the rationalizations that they may encounter for not acting on these values (Gentile in Giving voice to values. How to speak your mind when you know what’s right, Yale University Press, Yale, 2010a; Discussions about ethics in the accounting classroom: student assumptions and faculty paradigms, Darden Business Publishing,2010b. http://store.darden.virginia.edu/Syllabus%20Copy/Discussions-about-Ethics-in-Accounting_S.pdf; Educating for values-driven leadership across the curriculum: giving voice to values, Business Expert Press, New York, 2013). We believe our analysis can strengthen the employment of GVV in three ways: (1) understanding tacit blockages to moral action, i.e., how students’ belief in the moral efficacy of the invisible hand could undermine their own sense of moral duty; (2) addressing common rationalizations that may emerge from different assumptions about morally appropriate courses of action in the workplace; and (3) resolving values conflicts on how to act.     

Finance,Investment and Growth: Evidence for Italy

This paper investigates the finance–growth nexus in Italy over a period of more than forty years (1965–2009). After a review of the theoretical and empirical literature, the paper provides evidence that the aggregate indicators of financial depth, constructed by Beck et al. ( 2000a ) and widely used in the literature, played no significant role in spurring economic growth, after controlling for the main determinants of growth and corrected for endogeneity biases. The indicator of private credit to GDP—considered the most important measure of financial development—adversely affected growth in the period studied. By contrast, financial development indicators have a positive impact when are associated directly with the real investment rate. The results are robust to the inclusion of various controls and changes in the conditioning set.     

Innovation,complementarity, and exporting. Evidence from German manufacturing firms

This paper assesses whether there might be complementarities between different types of innovation activities (product, process and organizational) and how these effects may be linked to the likelihood that a firm will export. Complementarity is addressed through the properties of supermodular functions, and firm heterogeneity by export destination is explored. A new econometric strategy to test for pairwise complementarity in a function with three independent variables and a binary dependent variable is proposed. Exogenous and endogenous innovation variables are considered by using bootstrapping for hypothesis testing, propensity score matching and treatment effects models. The empirical analysis shows that complementarity relationships between innovation strategies are more likely to exist when firms export to multiple foreign markets.     

Budesonide with multi-matrix technology as second-line treatment for ulcerative colitis: evaluation of long-term cost-effectiveness in the Netherlands

Aims: Budesonide with multi-matrix technology (MMX) is an oral corticosteroid, shown to have high topical activity against ulcerative colitis (UC) while maintaining low systemic bioavailability with few adverse events. The aim of this study was to evaluate the cost-effectiveness of budesonide MMX versus commonly used corticosteroids, in the second-line treatment of active mild-to-moderate UC in the Netherlands.

Materials and methods: An eight-state Markov model with an 8 week cycle length captured remission, four distinct therapy stages, hospitalization, possible colectomy and mortality. Remission probability for budesonide MMX was based on the CORE-II study. Population characteristics were derived from the Dutch Inflammatory Bowel Disease South Limburg cohort (n?=?598) and included patients with proctitis (39%), left-sided (42%) and extensive disease (19%). Comparators (topical budesonide foam and enema, oral budesonide and prednisolone) were selected based on current Dutch clinical practice. Treatment effects were evaluated by network meta-analysis using a Bayesian framework. Cost-effectiveness analysis was performed over a 5 year time horizon from a societal perspective, with costs, health-state and adverse event utilities derived from published sources. Outcomes were weighted by disease extent distribution and corresponding comparators.

Results: Budesonide MMX was associated with comparable quality-adjusted life year (QALY) gain versus foam and oral formulations (+0.01 QALYs) in the total UC population, whilst being cost-saving (EUR 366 per patient). Probabilistic sensitivity analysis evaluated an 86.6% probability of budesonide MMX being dominant (cost-saving with QALY gain) versus these comparators. Exploratory analysis showed similar findings versus prednisolone.

Limitations: Differing definitions of trial end-points and remission across trials meant indirect comparison was not ideal. However, in the absence of head-to-head clinical data, these comparisons are reasonable alternatives and currently offer the only comparison of second-line UC treatments.

Conclusions: In the present analysis, budesonide MMX was shown to be cost-effective versus comparators in the total UC population, for the second-line treatment of active mild-to-moderate UC in the Netherlands.     

Advantage Amnesia

The dot-com crash exposed a business phenomenon - "advantage amnesia", the state of becoming entangled in the Internet stampede at the expense of the basics of competitive advantage. It led many managers to lose sight of how to leverage their traditional competitive advantages in order to gain new-economy success. But now we can refresh our memories.     

Power, satisfaction, and relationship commitment in Chinese store-tenant relationship and their impact on performance

Managing the distribution channel is a key concern to firms operating in the world's largest developing economy. This study examines channel exchange relationships in China using data on department stores’ relationship with their tenants. The power-satisfaction-commitment-performance framework was used as a basis for the study. Department stores’ contingent use of coercive power was found to have little or no effect on their tenants’ economic and social satisfaction, which suggests that coercive power is perceived as ‘legitimate’ by small and medium-sized retailers in China. Tenants’ behavior towards power also reflects a subtle difference in channel member behavior, which reflects the differences between China's collectivistic culture and the individualistic culture in many Western countries. This study adds to the existing knowledge on channel behavior in Chinese cultural setting. In addition, it tests the degree of cross-cultural generalization of established channel constructs. It also provides managerial insights on channel relationship management in China's market.     

Apparel catalog patronage: Demographic,lifestyle and motivational factors

This study was designed to profile catalog shoppers of apparel and to examine their frequency of shopping. Specifically, it focused on the relative importance of consumers' lifestyle, demographic, and motivational factors in catalog shopping patronage. Data from 680 respondents were analyzed. The data indicated a relationship between consumers who shop for apparel from catalogs and some of the variables included in the study. A multiple regression model indicated that when several variables were considered, the frequent catalog shoppers tended to be older and better educated than infrequent catalog shoppers. They were also more likely to engage in inactive pursuits rather than sports activities and were more likely to perceive convenience as an important factor in their decisions to shop from catalogs than were infrequent catalog shoppers.     

Taxation and Economic Growth

A bstract The effects of vorious tax policies on economic growth are recx amined on the basis of the recently developed endogenous growth therory The assertion of Henry George that the structure of taxation is more important than the level of taxation in explaining economic growth is elaborated and verified Annual data for Taiwan from 1954 to 1986 shows that the aggregate tax rate does not have significant effect on the long run growth rates of private ouptup, consumption and production factor inputs This result is due to the poostivie effect of consumption taxation offsetting the negative effect of factor taxation on economic growth     

Bounding quantile demand functions using revealed preference inequalities

This paper develops a new approach to the estimation of consumer demand models with unobserved heterogeneity subject to revealed preference inequality restrictions. Particular attention is given to nonseparable heterogeneity. The inequality restrictions are used to identify bounds on counterfactual demand. A nonparametric estimator for these bounds is developed and asymptotic properties are derived. An empirical application using data from the UK Family Expenditure Survey illustrates the usefulness of the methods.     

Call Warrant Listing and the Behavior of its Underlying Spot Market: Some Evidence from Bursa Malaysia

This study investigates the call warrant listing impact on its underlying stock based on Malaysian stock market. The study indicates that call warrant listing has no significant impact on the return, volatility, and bid-ask spread of its underlying stock. However, its trading volume tends to be higher in the post event period. The results suggest that (1) the diversion of trade from spot to warrant market is nonexistent, (2) call warrant does not expand the opportunity set for investors, (3) it is fair to use historical data in volatility estimation for the purpose of asset pricing based on Malaysian context.