Change or perish: Examining the role of human capital and dynamic marketing capabilities in the hospitality sector

Many researchers have endeavored to explain which factors contribute to sustainable competitive advantage. Toward this end, this study contributes to the marketing and hospitality management literature by providing empirical evidence on how human capital, dynamic marketing capabilities, and market dynamism influence competitive advantage in the hotel sector. We collected cross-sectional survey data from marketing and sales managers in 165 hotels, along with in-depth interviews in three hotels, based in four Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, namely, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. The findings reveal that human capital directly, and indirectly through dynamic marketing capabilities, plays a critical role on developing competitive advantage. To contextualize this role, our research reveals that market dynamism moderates the mediated relationship between human capital and competitive advantage via market sensing capabilities. We discuss how the findings offer theoretical and managerial implications for the development of competitive advantage in the hotel sector.     

Efficiency change and growth in productivity: the Asian growth experience

This paper focuses on identifying the sources of productivity growth in ten Asian economies including China, Japan, the NIEs and the ASEAN-4. We calculate productivity growth and its components using distance-function-based Malmquist productivity indexes following Färe, Grosskopf, Norris, and Zhang (1994a). Hong Kong and Singapore are found to have the capabilities to shift the grand frontier of the APEC economies. But the productivity divergence might have occurred since the 70’s. The FDI contributes to the Asian growth either through catching-up or through technological innovations when a sufficient learning capacity is available in the host economy.     

Auditor health and audit outcomes before COVID-19

This study examines whether influenza-like illnesses (ILIs), a potential threat to the conduct of public company audits, are associated with audit outcomes. Because the peak months of flu season overlap with audit busy season, audit offices most at risk of ILIs may be adversely affected. The demanding nature of audit busy season and the culture of audit firms may compel employees to go to work sick, a phenomenon known as presenteeism. When auditors go to work with flu-like symptoms, cognitive functioning is impaired, resulting in brain fog. This impairment may influence auditors’ ability to exercise judgment and professional skepticism, leading to adverse outcomes. Using data collected from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) we find that the filing of audit reports is delayed and audit quality suffers in audit offices most at risk of influenza-like-illnesses. The observed effects of health impairments on company outputs have broad implications for both the audit profession and workplaces as a whole.     

Shorting costs and profitability of long–short strategies

We examine how the profitability of long–short arbitrage strategies based on anomalies is affected after adjustment for two shorting costs: implicit cost due to unavailability of stocks in the short-leg to sell short and loan fees actually paid to stock lenders. The combined shorting cost amounts to almost 40 percent of long–short gross returns over the sample period from January 2006 to December 2017. After adjustment for these shorting costs, long–short arbitrage profits are thus reduced by almost 40 percent. Even after adjustment for risk, the proportion of shorting costs is also substantial. If other trade-related transaction costs are considered, long–short arbitrage profits would be reduced further. Our results provide explicit evidence that casts doubt on the profitability of long-short arbitrage strategies based on anomalies.     

The market impact of systemic risk capital surcharges

This paper tests the ‘Too-Big-to-Fail’ hypothesis that whether being designated as a global systemically important bank (G-SIB) has an impact on the credit default swap (CDS) price of the bank, thereby reducing its credit risk. We find surprising evidence that the CDS spreads of a bank increase (decrease) after the announcement of a higher (lower) capital surcharge. However, this effect is temporary, as the mean CDS spreads revert to preannouncement level, dropping sharply after the initial rise. These findings create a puzzle by implying that a higher capital surcharge requirement and more stringent regulation could outweigh the implicit subsidy advantages of being too-big-to-fail.     

Growth and Nongrowth Capital Investments and Future Performance*

Most studies on the impact of capital expenditure on future performance use the aggregate capital expenditure disclosed in the cash flow statement. In this study, however, we distinguish between growth capital investments (that increase production capacity) from nongrowth capital investments (that only maintain or reduce current capacity). For growth capital investments, we document a negative association with year-ahead performance, which becomes positive in the subsequent year. For nongrowth capital investments, we observe a non-negative association with year-ahead performance. For nongrowth capital investments, we document a positive association, suggesting that the divestment is beneficial. That is, firms are likely disposing of nonproductive assets. Our results suggest that disclosing the nature of capital investments is important to better assess the future impact of a firm's investment decisions.     

人力资本促进中部地区旅游经济的时空差异研究

人力资本创新是助力旅游经济高效发展的重要途径。以中部6省为研究单元,基于2009—2017年面板数据,综合运用变异系数、泰尔指数、σ系数及面板回归模型,探析中部地区旅游经济时空演化特征及人力资本对中部地区旅游经济的影响效应差异。结果表明：研究期内,总体来看,中部地区旅游经济发展水平呈稳步上升态势,由2009年的0.181增长到2017年的1.081,分省份来看,大致呈“山西>江西>湖北>安徽>湖南>河南”的空间分布格局;从区域发展差异来看,中部地区旅游经济发展水平的相对差异与绝对差异均不断扩大,呈不均衡、不协调的演化特征;人力资本对中部地区旅游经济发展水平的影响总体呈先抑制后促进的“U”型关系,呈现出明显的空间异质性。     

Human capital quality and the regional economic growth: Evidence from China

China's economic development has advanced from a high-speed to a high-quality growth stage in recent years. The optimization and upgrading of the economic structure require high-quality human capital to support an innovation-driven economy. In this paper, a general equilibrium model of human capital (Xiang & Yeaple, 2018) is applied to estimate the cognitive and non-cognitive productivities based on Chinese provincial-level macro-data and individual labor's micro-data from 2008 to 2017. The weighted power mean of cognitive and non-cognitive productivities helps calculate the provincial-level human capital quality index (HCQI), which provides a realistic estimate of human capital quality. We find that the improvement of the HCQI leads to convergence in economic growth in China's provinces. HCQI can help explain the differences in economic growth levels in different regions of China. Our study provides a constructive step in understanding cognitive and non-cognitive abilities and HCQI in China, which could help guide education investment policy in China and its provinces.     

Community banks' capital requirements and regional housing tenure

Bank capital requirements aim at reducing the likelihood of banks' failure. However, these policies may generate externalities on the overall economy. By investigating the pathways from capital requirements to housing tenure using structural equation modelling, we show that community banks' capital requirements increase the gap between the regional real estate loans-based and non-real estate loans-based housing purchase rate and act as driving factors of housing market imbalance. The drop in residential real estate loans caused by the increase in capital requirements has two opposite effects: the direct effect motivates residents to rent properties, while the indirect effect motivates residents to purchase them due to the fall in housing prices. When both effects exist in housing purchases with real estate loans, the former effect is more influential than the latter one. Our findings suggest that the impact of capital requirements on housing tenure will depend on residents' reliance on real estate loans. If a housing purchase requires real estate loans, capital requirements will have a negative impact on the housing purchase, and vice versa.     

Is democracy good for growth? — Development at political transition time matters

Is democracy a better political regime for economic prosperity than autocracy? This paper shows that the answer depends on the initial economic development level during the democratic transition when the foundation of institutions was laid. Democracy facilitates growth only in countries that already have adequate development at transition time. These countries are more likely to create and sustain growth-enhancing institutions than others. Without appropriate development, democracy does not improve growth; this applies to about 40% of the third-wave democratized countries. These results are based on a sample of 153 countries in 1960–2010 and robust to various specifications and endogeneity issues.