Let the evidence speak again! Financial incentives are more effective than we thought

In this essay, the authors rejoin the debate about financial incentive effectiveness. They (a) briefly review the state of the literature in 1998, (b) highlight new meta‐analytic findings and update conclusions regarding the financial incentives–performance relationship, (c) address the myth that financial incentives erode intrinsic motivation, (d) provide explanations for the presumed failure of financial incentives and (e) offer some concluding thoughts and suggestions for future research.     

Short Selling Pressure,Stock Price Behavior,and Management Forecast Precision: Evidence from a Natural Experiment

Using a natural experiment (Regulation SHO), we show that short selling pressure and consequent stock price behavior have a causal effect on managers’ voluntary disclosure choices. Specifically, we find that managers respond to a positive exogenous shock to short selling pressure and price sensitivity to bad news by reducing the precision of bad news forecasts. This finding on management forecasts appears to be generalizable to other corporate disclosures. In particular, we find that, in response to increased short selling pressure, managers also reduce the readability (or increase the fuzziness) of bad news annual reports. Overall, our results suggest that maintaining the current level of stock prices is an important consideration in managers’ strategic disclosure decisions.     

Contracting Under Endogenous Risk

Agents make decisions by trading off cost, return and risk. The literature, however, does not consider the impact of risk on action choice. We show that this tradeoff has important implications for the firm. First, the firm may provide no insurance in the salary. Since the agents action choice will determine her risk, the salary cannot compensate her for it. Second, the firm may not be able to design an incentive scheme to implement particularly risky actions. Finally, the firm may not be able to design a scheme in which the agent splits her effort across multiple tasks. This is particularly problematic for tasks that are technological substitutes.     

绿色供应链研究述评

绿色供应链是改变传统环境治理与企业发展关系的一种方法,它的发展对于促进企业和社会的可持续发展有着重要的影响。需要指出的是,绿色供应链的研究从其概念的提出到现在仅仅只有10多年,还有很多领域等待开发。不仅需要新的理论研究来支撑,还需要研究者多进行实证定量研究,来解决实际中存在的问题。     

Internal Marketing at Continental Airlines: Convincing Employees that Management Knows Best

Maintaining a high level of customer service quality is necessary for success, particularly for firms in service industries, but employees need to be motivated to provide it. Management can provide the motivation through the use of compensation schemes and internal marketing. In this paper we examine profit sharing compensation schemes that reward employees for achieving customer service objectives. We discuss how such schemes should be implemented, and explain why management needs to convince employees through internal marketing programs about the benefits of its scheme. We obtain the optimal amount of profit that the firm should share with employees, and the optimal effort it should spend on internal marketing. Finally, we relate the analysis to a successful scheme implemented by Continental Airlines.     

The Propensity To Sue: Why Do People Seek Legal Actions?

Tort costs as a fraction of U.S. GDP have increased over three-fold in the past 50 years, now hovering slightly above two percent. Although there has been much ink spilled blaming the plaintiffs’ bar and so-called hellhole jurisdictions, less has been written about the behavior and attitudes of individual plaintiffs. Using a unique survey from the RAND Corporation, this paper empirically analyzes the perceptual and economic factors that affect the decision of an injured party to seek legal action. We find that, independent of economic incentives, perception of fault is the most important factor in the decision to make a claim. On average, a person who blames another person or firm for his or her injury is four times more likely to claim regardless of the type of injury involved. Unsurprisingly, the severity of injury—either as perceived by the claimant or as measured by actual injury during the accident—is another key factor in explaining the claiming rate. Also, as expected, there is a negative relation between age and claiming behavior. Somewhat unexpectedly, whether the person has had experience with filing before has no independent effect on the decision to claim. JEL Classification K41     

Business Ethics versus Economic Incentives:<Emphasis Type="Italic">Contemporary Issues and Dilemmas</Emphasis>

Contemporary economic thought presumes that individuals in a society always act according to their self-interest or private economic incentives, while important ethical motivations for action, such as a concern for others and public interest, are largely ignored. This paper is based on my experience of teaching an undergraduate course that highlighted the divergence between economic incentives and ethical motives for action in present-day life and business. Teaching tools such as lectures, case and group discussions were employed to address important ethical dilemmas of individuals and managers in contemporary societies. Readings underscored the evolving relationship of business ethics and economic incentives, and the relevance of ancient ethical principles (e.g., Ethics of Interdependence, and Ethics of Prudence and Self-Development) to present-day business ethics. The course emphasized the imminent need in contemporary societies to reduce the divergence between economic incentives and ethical motives for action, and called for a greater understanding of business ethics today, given the complex ethical concerns that managers confront in the current global environment.     

基于区块链技术的旅游地低碳发展模式构建

旅游地是推进旅游业低碳化发展的重要实践主体,但长期面临旅游企业、旅游者低碳生产与消费内在动力不足,低碳发展长效落实机制缺乏,监督管理成本过高等问题。提升旅游地低碳发展系统协同效率,推动低碳发展措施高效实施是实现旅游业高质量发展的迫切议题。本研究以区块链技术为支撑,以低碳信息共享为基础,基于供需协同、低碳优先、共同参与、可持续性、系统性5项原则,尝试构建以旅游企业、旅游者、第三方评估机构、政府部门、社区居民五大利益相关者为主体,以低碳信息共享、低碳发展激励、低碳发展规制、低碳发展补偿4项区块链平台运行机制为支持的旅游地低碳发展模式,通过正向激励机制、反向规制机制、补偿机制推动低碳"信息互联网"向"价值互联网"转变,为旅游地低碳发展提供技术支撑。同时,本研究意图突破传统低碳旅游研究局限,拓展可持续旅游分析视角。     

税收优惠对企业创新的影响——基于先进制造业企业的实证分析

正确评价税收政策对先进制造业企业创新的影响具有重要意义。以2010—2019年中国A股先进制造业上市公司为研究样本,实证考察税收优惠与先进制造业企业创新的关系。研究发现：税收优惠对于先进制造业企业的创新具有激励效应,与所得税优惠相比,增值税优惠激励作用更为明显;区域异质性分析发现增值税优惠激励先进制造业企业创新呈现中、东、西部递减的状态,所得税优惠激励创新呈现东、西、中递减的状态。为提高税收优惠政策对于先进制造业企业创新的激励效应,提出完善税收优惠政策的建议。     

创新驱动发展与企业劳动收入份额

选取2012—2020年沪深A股上市公司为样本,实证检验创新驱动发展与企业劳动收入份额之间的关系,以及高管股权激励和员工持股对上述关系的调节效应。研究发现：企业创新驱动发展能够有效提高企业劳动收入份额;实施高管股权激励和员工持股计划均能显著增强上述关系。进一步研究发现,盈利水平发挥了部分中介效应,且当企业处于成长期和衰退期、市场化程度较高的地区以及为非国有企业时,上述关系更显著。研究结论表明,特别是处于成长期与衰退期、市场化程度较高地区的企业,以及非国有企业,大力推动创新驱动发展,并辅之以高管股权激励和员工持股计划,可以提高企业劳动收入份额,实现和谐发展,推进共同富裕目标实现。