Tree farms: Driving forces and regional patterns in the global expansion of forest plantations

People have planted trees in rural places with increasing frequency during the past two decades, but the circumstances in which they plant and the social forces inducing them to plant remain unclear. While forests that produce wood for industrial uses comprise an increasing number of the plantations, most of the growth has occurred in Asia where plantations that produce wood for local consumption remain important. Explanations for these trends take economic, political, and human ecological forms. Growth in urban and global markets for forest products, coupled with rural to urban migration, may spur the conversion of fields into tree farms. Government programs also stimulate tree planting. These programs occur frequently in nations with high population densities. Quantitative, cross-national analyses suggest that these forces combine in regionally distinctive ways to promote the expansion of forest plantations. In Africa and Asia plantations have expanded most rapidly in nations with densely populated rural districts, rural to urban migration, and government policies that promote tree planting. In the Americas and Oceania plantations have expanded rapidly in countries with relatively stable rural populations, low densities, and extensive tracts of land in pasture. If, as anticipated, the growing concern with global warming spurs further expansion in forest plantations in an effort to sequester carbon, questions about their social and ecological effects should become more pressing.     

Minimum nurse staffing ratios for nursing homes

The authors explored minimum nurse staffing ratios for nursing homes using production function simulations. Minimum levels of registered nurse hours per resident day were 0.31, 1.83, and 3.3 at 50%, 75%, and 90% levels of quality respectively. These results suggest that efficiency-oriented minimum nurse staffing points exist, and could be used to inform policymakers and nursing home administrators on better resource allocation and health care delivery.     

The sales recovery audit: Learning to walk the talk

Little research attention has been devoted to the impact of salesperson failure and recovery management on customer relationship development. This paper develops a theoretically anchored and externally validated sales recovery audit for the purpose of assessing sales organization performance in these matters. Results based on a survey of 177 sales managers indicate that practice of sales recovery efforts lags behind their perceived importance as they relate to organizational success. The sales recovery audit presented here can be a useful tool to continuously evaluate and enhance sales recovery efforts for the purpose of building a stronger relationship selling organization.     

Assessing supply chain risks with the analytic hierarchy process: Providing decision support for the offshoring decision by a US manufacturing company

This paper reports the process used by a US manufacturing company to assess supply chain risks within the context of an offshore sourcing decision. The case study company was faced with the objective of finding a new supplier for two of its major product lines. Five alternatives were considered: (1) sourcing finished goods from Mexico; (2) sourcing finished goods from China; (3) sourcing parts from China and assembly in the US; (4) sourcing parts from China, assembly in a Maquiladora in Mexico with investment; and (5) sourcing parts from China, assembly in a Maquiladora in Mexico with no investment in the venture. To find the best solution, action research methodology was combined with the application of the analytic hierarchy process (AHP). Through iterative and structured discussions, 17 risk factors were identified, which were subsequently grouped into main and sub objectives. AHP was then used to evaluate the importance of each risk factor, and to determine the best alternative. This study makes several contributions to the field of purchasing and supply management. First, it provides a comprehensive framework of empirically derived risk factors to be considered in an international sourcing context. Second, it shows how AHP can be used to assess these risk factors and alternatives as part of the framework to facilitate and support the final offshoring decision. And third, it illustrates the successful application of the approach by a US manufacturing company. As such, this paper contributes to the research streams of offshoring and risk management in purchasing and supply, as well as to decision-making under uncertainty and AHP. In addition, it serves as a practical methodology for firms in similar situations.     

Promise and peril in implementing pay‐for‐performance

Why would managers abandon pay‐for‐performance plans they initiated with great hopes? Why would employees celebrate this decision? This article explores why managers made their decisions in 12 of 13 pay‐for‐performance “experiments” at Hewlett‐Packard in the mid‐1990s. We find that managers thought the costs of these programs to be higher than the benefits. Alternative managerial practices such as effective leadership, clear objectives, coaching, or training were thought a better investment. Despite the undisputed instrumentality of pay‐for‐performance to motivate, little attention has been given to whether the benefits outweigh the costs or the “fit” of these programs with high‐commitment cultures like Hewlett‐Packard was at the time. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Residential Asking Rents and Time on the Market

Landlords offering a house in the rental market face a difficult strategic pricing decision. The revenue maximizing decision for the landlord involves a tradeoff between the rental rate and time on the market. Because the turnover of renters is higher than owners, and because the landlord must bear some carrying costs on a vacant house, pricing the rent too high may decrease revenue due to a higher vacancy period and pricing it too low may reduce the revenue when occupied. While there is substantial research on the relationship between listed prices and time on the market for freehold interests, this is the first study to provide empirical evidence on the relationship between asking rent, contract rent and time on the market for single family residential rental (leasehold) property interests. We present two models; a rental price model and a duration model for time-on-the market. Using data from the Dallas–Fort Worth area we find that landlords who set a lower asking rent relative to predicted rent can expect a shorter marketing period for their properties. The results also indicate that overpricing the asking rent and then lowering it at a later date leads to a longer marketing time (after the reset) and often a lower rent. These finding are reasonably robust for low-, mid-, and higher-valued rental properties.

MAINTAINING MARKET POSITION: TEAM PERFORMANCE,REVENUE AND WAGE EXPENDITURE IN THE ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE

This paper investigates the relationship between playing success and commercial success in team sports. Utilizing a data set relating to the English Premier League that combines both financial measures and indicators of playing skills and performances, our empirical analysis is based on three behavioural equations. Our analysis indicates that on‐field success can be directly related to players’ skills and abilities and that revenue is positively related to on‐field success. Wage expenditure is also shown to systematically reflect player skills and performances. One interpretation of this evidence is that investment in players’ skills and ability buys on‐field success, with richer teams becoming ever richer and able to maintain or even build upon success by spending more on players than less successful clubs. To the extent that richer clubs are successful in their objective there is a causal link between revenue earned and competitive imbalance via investments in players. The implications of this tendency within a league are discussed in our conclusion, which also considers the potentially wider implications of our study as they relate to the evolution of firm size and issues of market share.     

Directional heterogeneity of environmental disamenities: the impact of crematory operations on adjacent residential values

A hedonic study of residential house sales in Rawlins, Wyoming, was conducted to estimate the impact of an environmental shock from a new point source upon adjacent residential property values. We use a unique data base of house sale prices and associated house attributes, including structural and neighbourhood characteristics and geographic distances and directions from the source of the shock, atmospheric emissions from a new crematory. Our data spans 27 months of house sales: 7 months before, and 20 months after the startup of crematory operations. Results indicate that proximity, measured both in terms of direction and distance from the crematory, imparts a statistically significant negative impact on average house sale prices–an increase of 0.3 to 3.6% of average sale price for every one-tenth mile increase up to one-half mile in distance away from the crematory, but depending on direction from the crematory. This distance benefit increases somewhat with calendar time only for houses located west of the crematory.     

The nature of Austrian macroeconomic time series unit root tests

It is still an open question in economic and econometric modelling whether the non-stationarity in a time series is captured by detrending or by differencing. We test thirrteen Austrian macroenconomic time series for difference versus trend stationarity using informal methods and formal procedures developed by Dickey-Fuller and Phillips-Perron. To eliminate the effects of seasonal adjustment on the tests we apply a third procedure to the unadjusted data, recently developed by Hylleberg-Engle-Granger-Yoo. Independent of the seasonal adjustment the empirical results indicate that these series are integrated of order 1.