Income Level and the Value of Non-Wage Employee Benefits

With continuing increases in the cost of medical insurance and other “fringe” benefits, payroll cost for monetary and non-monetary aspects of compensation is a significant factor for most organizations. While this is not a new phenomenon, relatively few studies in the empirical literature have examined the role of fringe benefits in employee compensation plans. Especially in under researched areas, it is imperative that researchers utilize ideas and theories from other disciplines to further our knowledge. Accordingly, this paper borrows the concept of elasticity from the economic literature to help explain and understand employee perceptions of two of the most common, costly, and important benefits—medical insurance and retirement plans. Specifically, the relationship between the current income of employees is analyzed in relation to employee perceptions of the value and importance of benefits. Results suggest that employees do not value medical insurance and retirement plans in the same manner. This result is interpreted in terms of the change in the marginal utility of the specific benefit.     

A comparative study of the determinants of future plans and expectations of business students

Current university juniors and seniors have plans and expectations for after they graduate. In an effort to better understand these plans and expectations, the authors assessed a sample of 334 university students enrolled in business classes. The study examined the impact of three categories of independent variables—family influences, demographic influences, and academic influences—on the dependent variables of student degree aspirations, career aspirations, and expected salaries. Determinant variables with the most consistent influences on these dependent variables include birth order and parents' income (family influences); age and ethnicity (demographic influences); and grade point average, college entrance exam scores, and academic major (academic influences).     

Financial implications of outdoor recreation planning practices: A case study from Virginia

Abstract

A financial analysis of Virginia's outdoor recreation program is presented. The conclusions of the paper may be applicable to many state recreation programs. First, state recreation planning procedures are not realistic; that is, projected requirements for recreational facility development cannot be satisfied within expected budget constraints. Second, increases in user fees and/or increases in general funds allocated to recreation will be necessary to support only modest recreation development for the future.     

Determinants of a restaurant average meal price: An application of the hedonic pricing model

This study applies the hedonic pricing model to examine important attributes influencing average customer meal prices in restaurants in Seoul, Korea. Data from 185 restaurants were collected via Internet, phone interviews, site inspections, and ZAGAT Survey, and analyzed using OLS regression. The log-linear model was found to be most suitable for the data, and the proposed hedonic model accounted for as much as 73.7% of the variation in meal prices. The results indicate that food quality and décor were important determinants of restaurants’ average meal prices while service was not. Furthermore, the study found that a restaurant's location within the building (1st floor), the types of cuisine served (Japanese and Italian), parking facilities, private dining settings, franchising, and the number of blogger reviews (e-WOM) have significant effects on restaurants’ average meal prices. The model will provide useful information for restaurateurs in deciding effective menu pricing strategies.     

中国企业海外并购中的风险控制

随着海外业务的拓展和直接投资规模的扩大,中国企业海外并购的风险也逐渐暴露出来,应引起足够的重视。在海外并购中,前期的战略选择阶段、中期的评估实施阶段和后期的并购整合阶段都存在着相应的风险,控制各个阶段的风险应制定明确的海外并购战略规划,深入评估并购目标的真实价值,选择有利的并购方式和并购方案,重视并购后的文化整合,加强国际化管理人才的培养和使用以及加强政府的作用。通过对风险的控制和化解,达到促进我国企业积极拓展海外业务、提高我国企业国际知名度的目的。     

Nutrition knowledge of caterers and constraints to offering more healthy meals

The study determined whether school and workplace caterers in the South East of England have the necessary knowledge to provide more healthy meals, and the constraints preventing them offering them. Results indicated that most caterers knew about current nutritional guidelines and sources of nutrients, and thus should be able to produce healthy meal choices. Most caterers believed that certain foods could be prepared successfully using alternative ingredients or cooking methods. The main constraints to offering more healthy options were taste, cost and what customers wanted. The main changes that had been made were the use of reduced-fat ingredients and cooking practices aimed at reducing the fat content of dishes.     

Who uses robo-advising and how?

Using propriety data from a large Indian robo-advisory firm, we show that users of robo-advisory services are relatively young, predominantly male, married, small investors, and professionals. We show that the majority of small retail investors utilize a systematic investment plan (SIP). Additionally, we document that there are differences in demographic characteristics, occupation, and geographic location of investors in utilizing SIP versus one-time lump sum investments. Furthermore, we find that daily user account creation increases during periods of high market volatility.     

Combining management plans and payment schemes for targeted grassland conservation within the Habitats Directive in Saxony,Eastern Germany

As central policies for biodiversity conservation in agricultural landscapes in the European Union (EU), the Habitats Directive and Agri-environmental programmes (AEP) have largely failed to halt biodiversity loss. In response, the German federal state of Saxony combined the instrument of management plans with AEPs to support the implementation of the Habitat Directive. In this study, we investigate the determinants of a farmers’ decisions to adjust their farming practices. Our data set consists of a quantitative survey with 131 farmers conducted between 2004 and 2011, complemented by implementation data from 333 grassland-plots. Determinants of farmers’ decisions to conserve grassland were estimated using a multinomial logit model. Our results show that a combination of management plans and AEPs can increase farmers’ disposition to adopt nature conservation measures. As central determinants, structural and location factors as well as the complementary provisiion of specifically designed AEPs increase farmers’ willingness to adopt conservation practices for grassland management. It can be concluded that additional costs are a major barrier to farmers’ adoption, particularly to those farms directing their farm management towards the optimisation of productivity and profitability . The findings highlight the complementary potential of integrated policy packages to incentivise specific measures of nature conservation within the framework of the Habitats Directive.     

Mutual fund selection and performance persistence in 401(k) Plans

We examine how plan sponsors/providers select mutual funds for 401(k) plans and whether performance persistence exists for mutual funds listed in 401(k) plans. Using a hand-collected data set of 401(k) investment options, we find that plan sponsors are likely to choose actively managed growth funds, including aggressive growth funds and long-term growth funds. Furthermore, more than 50% of the mutual funds in our sample of 401(k) plans are selected from the top 10 fund families in terms of total net assets. On average, plan sponsors select funds that outperform the funds with the same investment objective and that have low expense ratios. The performance of mutual funds in 401(k) plans only persists in a short horizon. Our analysis indicates that the menus of 401(k) investment options do not exhibit a signaling effect, indicating that investment options in 401(k) plans do not supply useful information about the future performance of mutual funds for investors in selecting mutual funds.     

Contribution of suppression difficulty and lessons learned in forecasting fire suppression operations productivity: A methodological approach

We propose an economic analysis using utility and productivity, and efficiency theories to provide fire managers a decision support tool to determine the most efficient fire management programs levels. By incorporating managers’ accumulated fire suppression experiences (capitalized experience) in the analysis we help fire managers determine fire suppression productivity and efficient budget allocation. Furthermore, monitoring of the management index (MI) helps identify operational deficiencies in the different districts where the analysis is applied. This is so because internally the area contraction factor (ACF) provides information regarding the effectiveness of fire suppression operations by including a comparison ratio between the area affected and the potential fire area without suppression actions. We used the Almonaster fire that occurred in 2008 in the Huelva Province, Spain as a case study to test the applicability of the methodology. Our evaluation showed that the combinations of firefighting resources assigned to the Almonaster fire resulted in a fire suppression efficiency of only 33%, measured as the ratio between damages avoided and suppression costs involved.