Regional determinants of ICT new firm formation

The role of regional determinants in new entrepreneurs’ location decisions is analyzed in the French information and communication technologies (ICT) sector. As we focus on the emergence of this industry, our dataset includes every new ICT firm in France in the period 1993–2001. We find evidence for the positive effect of co-location with incumbent ICT firms and some effect of knowledge spillovers. The effects of agglomeration, entrepreneurial capital and human capital are mixed.     

Austerity measures in crisis countries — results and impact on mid-term development

Since the onset of the sovereign debt crisis, the crisis-stricken countries in Europe have been pushed to take drastic steps to consolidate their finances and reduce their budget deficits. Despite strong public opposition and largely damaging short-run effects, the countries have undertaken many of the internationally recommended/mandated reforms and spending cuts. In this Forum, authors from Greece, Ireland, Italy, Spain and Portugal report on the fiscal consolidation achieved in their respective countries — and the sacrifices that have made it possible. Furthermore, the authors detail what remains to be done to resolve the crisis.     

The regulation of water services in the EU

The European Commission’s proposal for a Directive on the award of concession contracts has sparked vigorous public debate and intense opposition. This Directive is controversial because of the nature of the policy it proposes and because the sectors involved are highly sensitive. This Forum examines the weaknesses of the Commission’s proposal and presents an overview of the current issues in water regulation and the provision of water services. The authors analyse the regulation of natural monopolies, water efficiency and upstream competition in the water industry.     

The influence of emotions on customer's cognitive evaluations and satisfaction in a service failure and recovery context

The aim of this paper is to explore the relationship between customers' negative emotions after a failure, their cognitive evaluations of the recovery process, and the overall or cumulative satisfaction in a service context. Two different constructs measure a customer's cognitive evaluations of the recovery process: disconfirmation of expectations and perceived justice. The proposed model is tested on a sample of financial service customers who suffered some type of failure. The results indicate that emotions have an indirect effect on overall or cumulative satisfaction through cognitive evaluations.     

Organisational citizenship behaviours and effectiveness: an empirical study in two small insurance companies

The study relates six dimensions of organisational citizenship behaviours (OCB) at the branch level with several indicators of the effectiveness of 38 branches of two insurance companies. Results suggest that the branches where employees display more OCB are the most effective. These findings are discussed in the context of a scarcity of empirical studies on the topic, despite researchers' assumption that OCB enhances team and organisational effectiveness.     

Are there nonlinear relationships between the profitability of Portuguese service SME and its specific determinants?

Using quantile regressions, this paper examines the possibility of significant nonlinear relationships between the profitability of Portuguese service small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and its specific determinants. The results lead to the conclusion that there is a significant nonlinearity between specific determinants and profitability in Portuguese service SMEs. In the lower quantiles of the distribution of profitability of Portuguese SMEs, it is found that profitability on the one hand is catalysed by size, long-term debt and managerial control, and on the other hand, it is restricted by risk and research and development intensity. In the upper quantiles of the profitability distribution of Portuguese service SMEs, liquidity and research and development intensity serve as catalysers of profitability, while long-term debt restricts the level of profitability.     

Trade liberalization and the environment: The case of intra-industry trade

Abstract

While a large body of literature examines the environmental impact of trade on the environment, this discussion focuses largely on the context of inter-industry trade. Empirical evidence has long suggested that an increasing share of international trade takes the form of intra- rather than inter-industry trade. In an attempt to fill this gap, the present paper uses a price-setting duopoly model of intra-industry trade to highlight the environmental consequences of trade liberalization when oligopolistic rivalry rather than comparative advantage drives international trade. We find that the environmental impact of trade liberalization depends mostly on two factors, namely, on the nature of pollution (i.e. whether it is local, transboundary or global) and on which country liberalizes trade (i.e. whether it is the ‘clean’ country or the ‘dirty’ country).     

The development of a stakeholder-based scale for measuring corporate social responsibility in the banking industry

Research on corporate social responsibility (CSR) has notably increased in recent years and many scales for measuring CSR image have been developed in academic literature. Due to the contextual character recognized in the implementation of CSR strategies, in this paper a new scale based on stakeholder theory is developed to evaluate customers’ perception regarding the CSR performance of their banking service providers. The proposal of reliable measurement tools for evaluating customers’ perception is especially relevant for companies because of their significant role in influencing the design and implementation of corporate strategies. Results demonstrate the reliability and validity of this new scale in two different samples. In the banking industry, CSR includes corporate responsibilities toward customers, shareholders, employees, society, and all legal and ethical requirements of banking institutions. Nevertheless, different kinds of banking institutions have specific CSR images, which reveal different strategic approaches to CSR.     

Marketing and Pricing Dynamics in the Presence of Structural Breaks: The Hungarian Pork Market

The study of marketing margins and price transmission on various commodity markets has been a popular research topic of the past decades (see Meyer & Von Cramon-Taubadel, 2004 Meyer , J. , & Von Cramon-Taubadel , S. ( 2004 ). Asymmetric price transmission: A survey . Journal of Agricultural Economics , 55 ( 3 ), 581 – 611 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], for a recent survey). However, with a few exception these studies focused on developed economies. This article examines this phenomena on the Hungarian pork market. The Johansen (maximum likelihood, 1988 Johansen , S. ( 1988 ). Statistical analysis of cointegrating vectors . Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control , 12 , 231 – 254 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) or Engle and Granger (2-step, 1987 Engle , R. F. , & Granger , C. W. J. ( 1987 ). Cointegration and error correction: Representation, estimation and testing . Econometrica , 55 , 251 – 276 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) cointegration tests do not reject the no-cointegration null hypothesis between the Hungarian pork producer and retail price series. Therefore, we applied the Gregory and Hansen (1996 Gregory , A. W. , & Hansen , B. E. ( 1996 ). Residual-based tests for cointegration in models with regime shifts . Journal of Econometrics , 70 , 99 – 126 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) procedure with recursively estimated break points and Augmented Dickey Fuller (ADF) statistics and found that the prices are cointegrated with a structural break occurring in April 1996 Gregory , A. W. , & Hansen , B. E. ( 1996 ). Residual-based tests for cointegration in models with regime shifts . Journal of Econometrics , 70 , 99 – 126 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]. Exogeneity tests reveal the causality running from producer to retail prices both in the long and short run. Homogeneity tests are rejected, suggesting a markup pricing strategy. Price transmission modeling suggests that price transmission on the Hungarian pork meat market is symmetric in the long run but asymmetric in the short run; that is, processors, wholesalers, or retailers might take temporary advantage should price changes occur.     

Relational,Functional Benefits and Customer Value in Large Retailing: A Cross-Format Comparative Analysis

ABSTRACT

Based on the existing marketing concept on relational and functional benefits and on the retailing management of customer value, the present research empirically tests the influence of these customer benefits by providing a comparative analysis for different retailing formats, such as supermarkets and hypermarkets. Using questionnaire data for a sample of customers (N = 362), the authors developed structural equation modeling. This study identifies the factors influencing customer value, as well as the key to understand the relationships of customer benefits, customer value, loyalty, and purchase intention in the retailing service context. The contribution of the present research includes empirically testing a conceptual model, by developing a comparative analysis, along with providing some meaningful insights to retailing managers on how to strategically manage customer value variables to increase and enhance customer retention and purchase intent.