The impact of information technology on emergency health care outcomes

We analyze the productivity of information technology in emergency response systems. "Enhanced 911" (E911) is information technology that links caller identification to a location database and so speeds up emergency response. We assess the impact of E911 on health outcomes using Pennsylvania ambulance and hospital records between 1994 and 1996, a period of substantial adoption. We find that as a result of E911 adoption, patient health measured at the time of ambulance arrival improves, suggesting that E911 speeds up emergency response. Further analysis using hospital discharge data shows that E911 reduces mortality and hospital costs.     

Modelling Loss of Resilience in Agroecosystems: Rangelands in Botswana

Economists have recently begun to consider the questions raised by the ecological concept of resilience – a measure of the degree to which a system can be perturbed before it switches from one stability domain to another. At a theoretical level, it has been argued that the loss of resilience in an ecological-economic system involves a change in its long-run productive potential, but no consideration has yet been given to the empirical investigation of this. This paper discusses an econometric approach to the problem, using the example of semi-arid rangelands. The long-run productive potential of the system is regarded as an unobserved state variable, change in which is irreversible or at least only slowly reversible. It is estimated by applying the extended (nonlinear) Kalman filter. The paper illustrates the approach using data from Botswana for the period 1965–1993. The maximum likelihood estimates of the parameters associated with the loss of resilience mechanism are non-zero. They indicate a small loss of resilience event at the end of the long drought in the 1980s. However, these parameters are very imprecisely estimated and are therefore statistically insignificant. We find that the sensitivity of the system to exogenous shocks varies with fluctuations in both economic and non-economic parameters. Contrary to what is usually thought to be the case, the sensitivity of the system to exogenous shocks is only weakly affected by variations in offtake prices, but is very strongly affected by variations in the cost of herd maintenance. This suggests that offtake prices may be a weak tool for controlling the size of cattle stocks and preventing a loss of resilience. On the other hand, taxes on cattle stocks or grazing fees may be very effective.     

A Look Back at the Beginnings of EVA and Value‐Based Management

One of the pioneers of value‐based management discusses his life's work in converting principles of modern finance theory into performance evaluation and incentive compensation plans that have been adopted by many of the world's largest and most successful companies, including Coca‐Cola in the U.S., SABMiller in London, Siemens in Germany, and the Godrej Group in India. The issues covered include the significance of dividend payouts (are dividends really necessary to support a company's stock price and, if so, why?) as well as the question of optimal capital structure (whether and why debt might not be cheaper than equity). But the most important focus of the interview is corporate performance measurement and the use of executive pay to strengthen management incentives to increase efficiency and value. According to Stern, the widespread tendency of public companies to manage “for earnings”—or in accordance with what he refers to as “the accounting model of the firm”—often leads to value‐destroying decisions. As one example, the GAAP accounting principle that requires intangible investments like R&D and training to be written off in the year the expenses are incurred is likely to cause underinvestment in such intangibles. At the same time, the failure of conventional income statements to reflect the cost of equity almost certainly encourages corporate overinvestment. Stern's solution to this problem is an executive incentive compensation plan in which rewards are tied to increases in a measure of economic profit called economic value added, or EVA, which research has shown to have a significance relation to changes both in share value and the premium of market value over book value. Moreover, by combining such a plan with a “bonus bank” that pays out annual awards over a multi‐year period, boards can ensure that management will be rewarded not for good luck but rather for sustainable improvements in performance.     

Unmixed signals: How reputation and status affect alliance formation

We analyze how incumbents in technology‐driven industries are influenced by founders' reputation and status when considering strategic alliances with newly emerging firms. We theorize that reputation and status represent two distinct components of perceived quality that exert independent and interdependent effects on alliance formation. Using literature on impression formation processes to derive predictions of signal congruence, we argue that the independent effects of reputation and status are amplified when the two are congruent, and that the effect of negative congruence (both reputation and status are low) is stronger than positive congruence (both are high). We find support for our arguments based on panel data on alliances between pharma and biotech firms, using data on biotech scientists' research output (reputation) and university attended (status). Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Sex-Typed Service Images: An Empirical Investigation of Self-Service Variables

This article presents a study of sex-typed service images based on gender research in marketing and service encounter theory. The purpose is to address the issues of how and why services as distinct from products acquire a sex-typed image. Two streams of research provide the variables hypothesized to influence sex- image determination: gender research provides individual variables related to the consumer him/herself, and service encounter research provides variables related to the service itself. Consumer variables include an individual's biological and psychological sex image and personal use, while service variables deal with the sex image of the firm's characteristic provider and typical customer. A study conducted to test the hypotheses that both sets of variables influence a service's sex-typed image is presented. Marketing implications for development and promotion of new services and re-positioning of extant ones are discussed.     

Literary criticism and the history of marketing thought: A new perspective on “reading” marketing theory

This paper proposes the addition of concepts drawn from literary criticism to philosophical and historical ones in order to provide insights into “reading” marketing theory. The paper sets forth three modes of literary criticism applicable to the analysis of marketing theory—psychobiographical, editorial, and structural. It offers as an illustrative example a reading of the history of Ernest Dichter's motivation research movement using these methods. The addition of literary analysis demonstrates how textual clues can enrich the historian's study of the rise and fall of marketing phenomena over time.     

What doesbrand mean? historical-analysis method and construct definition

This article addresses the meaning of the term brand means by presenting a method of historical analysis and construct definition based on information in theOxford English Dictionary. The method’s use is demonstrated in an analysis of the original meanings that underlie the term’s usage both as a single word and in compounds such as brand competition, brand personality, brand reputation, and so forth. Literal (denotative) definitions and metaphoric (connotative) associations are examined to explain the use of brand to refer to a physical entity and/or a mental representation. The method is also theoretically grounded in the disciplines of philology (the history of words), poetics, rhetoric, and the philosophy of science. The historical-analysis method is applied to the meanings of brand, starting with its original usage about 1,500 years ago and culminating with the definitions used by authors in this special issue. Barbara B. Stern (bbstern@aol.com) is Professor II of marketing at Rutgers Business School. She was awarded her Ph.D. by the City University of New York. Her articles have appeared in leading marketing journals such as theJournal of Marketing, theJournal of Consumer Research, theJournal of Advertising, theJournal of Advertising Research, theJournal of the Academy of Marketing Science, and others. In addition, she is a coeditor of the journalMarketing Theory and the author of numerous articles in the proceedings of conferences of the Association for Consumer Research, the American Marketing Association, and the American Academy of Advertising. In 1995, she was a co-chair of the American Marketing Association Summer Educators’ Conference, and in 1997, she received the Outstanding Contributions in Advertising Research Award from the American Academy of Advertising. Her primary research interest is the adaptation of literary theory and methods to the analysis of advertising, marketing, and consumer text.     

Determinants of the structure of U.S. foreign trade, 1958–1976

The Heckscher-Ohlin model with three direct-factor inputs is borne out for U.S. net exports of manufactures in annual cross-section regressions for 1958–1976. The coefficient on unskilled labor became significantly more negative over the period, and there is evidence that the negative sign on physical capital may reflect the inclusion of natural resource industries. Further analysis based upon 1960 and 1970 census years suggests the importance as well of skill and technological variables. Calculations of the total factor requirements of U.S. trade uphold the Leontief paradox for 1958 but not for 1972.     

Nonfarm diversification,poverty, economic mobility,and income inequality: a case study in village India

This article assembles data at the all‐India level and for the village of Palanpur, Uttar Pradesh, to document the growing importance, and influence, of the nonfarm sector in the rural economy between the early 1980s and late 2000s. The suggestion from the combined National Sample Survey and Palanpur data is of a slow process of nonfarm diversification, whose distributional incidence, on the margin, is increasingly pro‐poor. The village‐level analysis documents that the nonfarm sector is not only increasing incomes and reducing poverty, but appears as well to be breaking down long‐standing barriers to mobility among the poorest segments of rural society. Efforts by the government of India to accelerate the process of diversification could thus yield significant returns in terms of declining poverty and increased income mobility. The evidence from Palanpur also shows, however, that at the village‐level a significant increase in income inequality has accompanied diversification away from the farm. A growing literature argues that such a rise in inequality could affect the fabric of village society, the way in which village institutions function and evolve, and the scope for collective action at the village level. Failure to keep such inequalities in check could thus undermine the pro‐poor impacts from the process of structural transformation currently underway in rural India.