Resort cycle revisited: The retirement connection

This article reappraises the Butler model of resort evolution with the addition of a focus on retirement-tourism relationships. The model predicts retirement will emerge as a major factor in resorts as tourism goes into decline, but an examination of trends in Parksville and Qualicum Beach, British Columbia, Canada, revealed retirement has been a feature of those resorts since their early days and has grown alongside tourism. However, an analysis of content of local newspapers revealed that the two communities came to appreciate the retirement sector with their first major downturn in tourism, which in itself partially supports Butler's thesis.     

Tourists,black markets and regional development in West Africa

Currency brought into West Africa by tourists is strong support for black market operations. The positive as well as the negative effects of illicit currency exchanges are evaluated for their social and economic significance for the region. The black market is not only an index of economic conditions, but is important for individual and group survival and the maintenance of social structure in countries having long term weakened economies. Anthroplogical data provides Third World planners a broadened base for decisions dealing with the role of tourism in regional development.     

Ownership concentration,separation of voting rights from cash flow rights,and earnings management: an empirical study in Canada

Drawing from models of Jones (1991) and Kothari, Leone, and Wasley (2005), this study examines the relationship between Canadian corporate ownership structure and earnings management from 1995 to 1999. There is evidence of a nonmonotonic relationship. The concentration of voting and cash flow rights with the ultimate owner first increases earnings management, but as the level of ownership concentration increases, earnings management decreases. There is also a positive correlation between earnings management and voting and cash flow rights divergence. This is particularly evident when the gap between voting and cash flow rights is high. Copyright © 2008 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Americans' vacations

This paper explores the nature of Americans' vacations from the perspective of current trends in social and symbolic anthropology. Taking the viewpoint of the vacationers themselves, it suggests that there are two polar types of vacations that are recognized by Americans which are termed “Peasant for a Day” and “Queen (King) for a Day.” Each of these types inverts an aspect of American society, but depending on the class of the vacationer involved, the inversion takes on one of two forms: either dissolution or accentuation of the social hierarchy. Examples and variations of these two basic types of vacation are presented; both domestic and overseas holidays are discussed.     

Two-level national-regional planning and mathematical programming decomposition applied to spatial price equilibrium models2

This paper is concerned with computation strategies related with the quantitative analysis of only a sector of a global economy (e.g. agriculture or energy). Under a ceteris paribus condition on the environment of the sector, and within the hypothetical context of the neoclassical economic theory, it is well known a type of partial equilibrium model that can be cast mathematically into an optimization framework. We attempt here to a typical specification which considers spatially separated markets, that has been called spatial price equilibrium model and that has contained within it many classical transportation problems (one for each commodity). The model is specially suitable for mathematical programming decomposition, resulting regional sybsystems whose coupling variables are the transportation flows. We explore here this structure, discussing two decomposition algorithms with economic interpretations that suggest decentralized procedures for planning. The first—of the price coordination type—is a variant of the Dantzig-Wolfe's principle which is expected to have a low number of cycles of information flow between the master level and the sub-problems (at each cycle it is calculated a series of regional production-consumption responses to alternative prices generated by transhipment problems at the central planning level). The second algorithm specializes the Geoffrion's projection/feasible directions technique, so interpreting the problem solution within the context of a net-output target coordination.     

Tourism training in developing countries The social and cultural dimension

Tourism training in developing countries has narrowly focused on vocational and technical skills. Little thought has been given as to how this education fits into an existing socio-cultural environment, the problems of communication between guest and host, or to the demands and stresses placed upon those in the front lines of the industry. Part One of this paper looks at the need for the development of programs which broaden the scope of training. Such programs need to take into account the potential social and cultural risks of tourism for the industry worker, and the barriers to communication rising from different backgrounds, values, and expectations between hosts and foreign visitors. Part Two looks at some important considerations in educational development strategy, giving an example of such a program developed by the author in East Africa.     

Directors’ and Officers’ Liability Insurance and Aggressive Tax‐Reporting Activities: Evidence from Canada

This paper examines the relationship between directors’ and officers’ liability insurance (D&O insurance) and firms’ aggressive tax reporting. Using large Canadian public companies listed on the TSX300 and relying on several measures to capture aggressive tax‐reporting activities, including GAAP effective tax rates, cash effective tax rates, and the total and residual book‐tax differences, I find that D&O insurance exhibits a strong negative relationship with the GAAP effective tax rates and a strong positive relationship with both the total and residual book‐tax differences. However, there is generally no evidence showing that D&O insurance is associated with the cash effective tax rates. I interpret these results as indicating that D&O insurance reduces the tax expenses reported in the financial statements but not the actual tax paid. In other words, D&O insurance contributes to financial tax management but not to cash tax savings. Further tests in this study reveal that firms with fluctuating D&O coverage limits engage in more aggressive tax reporting than other firms, suggesting that managers may consider the level of D&O insurance that they purchase when they make aggressive tax‐reporting decisions.     

Herbal Pharma Inc.: Conducting an Effective Group Audit*

As the relative weight of global economic activity continues to shift toward non-OECD countries (OECD 2018), audit firms are more likely to encounter clients with significant business operations in foreign jurisdictions. The associated need to engage and oversee local component auditors in these jurisdictions can lead to challenges arising from different business cultures and the resulting intra-audit miscommunications. Audit deficiencies related to these challenges have been detected by regulators (PCAOB 2011, 2010; CPAB 2012, 2015). Standard setters such as the IAASB and the Auditing and Assurance Standards Board (AASB) have responded by issuing an exposure draft proposing revisions to ISA 600 (IAASB 2020) and CAS 600 (AASB 2020) to strengthen the auditor's approach and provide enhanced guidance to practitioners. In light of this evolving area of assurance, this case was developed to deepen students' understanding of both group and component audits in an international context. The case takes the perspective of the group auditor and features an audit senior in a specialized role overseeing the component audit of a client's increasingly material Chinese subsidiary. Deficiencies in the prior year component audit, along with a change in the component auditor, further underlines the importance of robust risk analysis for the upcoming engagement.     

The Role of Corporate Sustainability and Its Consistency on Firm Financial Performance: Canadian Evidence*

This paper investigates the impact of corporate sustainability and the consistency of corporate sustainability efforts on firm financial performance in Canada. Using data on 266 Canadian companies over the 2007–2017 period, we find a significantly positive association between corporate sustainability performance and firm financial performance. In addition, we find that companies that perform consistently well on sustainability (i.e., consistent performers) achieve better financial performance compared to inconsistent performers. Thus, far from their being net costs/expenses, our results indicate that corporate sustainability performance and consistency in sustainability performance both provide net benefits and significantly impact financial performance positively, implying that corporate sustainability not only helps address the needs of the current and future generations but also has a positive effect on the corporate bottom line. Taken together, our results suggest that not only does corporate sustainability have a positive effect on firm performance, but better financial performance may be achieved through a committed—rather than a “tokenism”—approach to corporate sustainability.