ENDOGENOUS SOURCES OF VOLATILITY IN HOUSING MARKETS: THE JOINT BUYER–SELLER PROBLEM

This article presents new empirical evidence that internal movement—selling one home and buying another—by existing homeowners within a metropolitan housing market is especially volatile and a substantial driver of fluctuations in transaction volume over the housing market cycle. We develop a search model that shows that the strong procyclicality of internal movement is driven by the cost of simultaneously holding two homes, which varies endogenously over the cycle. The estimated model shows that frictions related to this joint buyer–seller problem substantially amplify cyclical price volatility in housing markets.     

Multinational companies and human resource management in Ireland during recession: A retrospective from a highly globalized economy

This article provides a retrospective investigation of the impact of the recent “great recession” on human resource management (HRM) in multinational companies (MNCs) in Ireland. Ireland represents a particularly fitting location within which to address this topic given its standing as one of the world's most economically globalized and MNC‐dependent economies and also because the country was very severely impacted by the global financial crisis. Using both primary and secondary data from a variety of sources, our analysis considers the impact of recession on HRM in MNCs, with particular focus on employment, pay and benefits, industrial relations, and the role of the human resource (HR) function. The findings suggest that HR practitioners played a central role in implementing a series of initiatives, many of which were operational in nature, to improve business performance. In so doing, we argue that practitioners in MNCs in Ireland behaved as archetypical “conformist innovators” during the recent recession, delivering operational HR responses to improve their organization's bottom line.     

Can public slow charging accelerate plug-in electric vehicle sales? A simulation of charging infrastructure usage and its impact on plug-in electric vehicle sales for Germany

Alternative fuel vehicles face the lack of refueling infrastructure as one obstacle to market diffusion and potential operators of refueling stations await significant market shares before constructing a dense refueling network. The resulting lock-in effect or chicken-egg-problem has scarcely been analyzed for plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) up to now. The research question of this article is How much public charging infrastructure for PEVs is needed and is there mutual interaction in the diffusion of public charging infrastructure and electric vehicles?

Here, we present an agent-based market diffusion model for PEVs and their charging infrastructure that is based on a large number of individual driving profiles for private and commercial car holders in Germany. Our results demonstrate the possibility of a market diffusion in Germany without any slow public charging infrastructure until 2030. Although a charging point at home is obligatory for early adopters, the second-best option for an infrastructure set-up is at work where the majority of vehicles is parked for a long time during the day, the installation is not costly and users profit more than from public facilities. Public slow charging facilities do not increase PEV market shares and they need to be subsidized for a long time.     

减速亚洲能否继续支撑全球经济？

亚洲经济增长的放缓比很多人预计的更为严重，这削弱了该地区帮助世界其他地区免于陷入衰退的能力。亚洲仍是世界上增长最快的地区，其对大宗商品、汽车和其他消费品的巨大需求继续推动着世界其他地区的经济增长，尤其是拉美．和非洲的新兴市场以及美国以制造业为主的地区。     

Technology shocks around the world

This article investigates the effects of a permanent technology shock on labor input in the major seven developed countries. The recent empirical literature which uses Structural Vector Autoregressions (SVAR) with long-run restrictions has argued that technology shocks lead to a persistent and significant decline in employment in most of the G7 countries. We claim that the international transmission of shocks prevents the use of existing SVAR models, but also suggests alternative specifications to properly uncover their effects. We show in a quantitative two-country model that a measure of labor productivity aggregated across countries is more immune to persistent, if not permanent, shocks and allows to accurately identify the responses of the labor input to a technology shock. Using labor productivity at the G7 aggregate level, we find that the response of employment changes critically in most of the major seven developed countries.     

The Impact of Financing Surpluses and Large Financing Deficits on Tests of the Pecking Order Theory

This paper extends the basic pecking order model of Shyam-Sunder and Myers by separating the effects of financing surpluses, normal deficits, and large deficits. Using a panel of US firms over the period 1971-2005, we find that the estimated pecking order coefficient is highest for surpluses (0.90), lower for normal deficits (0.74), and lowest when firms have large financing deficits (0.09). These findings shed light on two empirical puzzles: 1) small firms, although having the highest potential for asymmetric information, do not behave according to the pecking order theory, and 2) the pecking order theory has lost explanatory power over time. We provide a solution to these puzzles by demonstrating that the frequency of large deficits is higher in smaller firms and increasing over time. We argue that our results are consistent with the debt capacity in the pecking order model.     

Between the Ivory Tower and the Academic Assembly Line*

This paper considers the impact of managerialism and the reactions it has engendered in university life. It examines the degree to which institutions of higher education in the UK have in recent years been subjected to what some commentators have seen as a managerial assault, alongside economic pressures to restructure and reform, and explores the reactions of academic and administrative staff in middle and junior levels through a case study of two universities. Consideration is given to attempts to introduce managerial controls, including the setting of targets, appraisals and peer review, as well as to the resistances which followed. It is argued that the notion of resistance to domination and control has been underplayed in the literature of organization and management. In exploring its various manifestations it is shown that managerialism is not fully embedded in university life and that matters are far from settled. It is contended that those engaged in academe in middle and junior levels of the organizational hierarchy are actively seeking to keep alive the craft of scholarship by mediating and moderating the harsher effects of the changes through supportive or transformational styles of working.     

’E’ entrepreneurial SMEs: An Irish study of micro and macro influences

Internet-based technologies are strategically guiding the organisation of tradeable services through the development of flexible organisational structures at national and international level. Specifically for knowledge intensive business services, tasks can be mediated via technology rather than by direct physical engagement, providing enterprises with the opportunity for extensive market coverage. Many academic and political ideals thus assume that entrepreneurs have the ability to intuitively recognise technologically innovative opportunities and have the confidence to act on them. The main aim of the paper is to present the findings of a recent empirical study of Irish (Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland) knowledge-intensive service sector firms and shed some light on recent thinking in relation to ‘e’ entrepreneurial micro and macro-level influences. The micro-level findings reveal a relatively high level of ‘e’ entrepreneurial orientation and motivation. However, from a macro-level perspective, the overall conclusion is that firms in both regions of Ireland could benefit from a system that cultivates a more inclusive, networked and balanced regional innovation system, to foster technology-innovation led enterprise.     

Personnel Policies and Practices in British Trade Unions: An Exploratory Study

Full-time trade union professional employees play a significant role in the formulation and implementation of union policy and are, therefore, an important asset of any labour organisation. In recent years, researchers have begun to focus on this important union resource. This study reports the results of a survey of the internal personnel policies and practices of British trade unions in an effort to gain insights into trade unions as organisations.