The Impact of Business Education on Moral Judgment Competence: An Empirical Study

Recent highly publicized ethical breaches including those at Enron and WorldCom have focused attention on ethical behavior within the accounting profession. At the heart of the debate is whether ethical attitudes of accountants are to blame. Using a nationally representative sample of accounting practitioners and a multidisciplinary student sample at two Southern United States universities, we compare sample responses to 25 ethically charged vignettes to test whether they differ. Overall, we find no significant difference – even for a specific “accounting tricks” vignette, which resembles the Enron and WorldCom situations. We do find, however, that the practitioners were more accepting of vignettes that involved physical harm (PH) to individuals and those that were legal (but ethically questionable). We postulate that accounting practitioners may apply a legalistic framework to their assessment of the acceptability of each vignette. Focusing on an “accounting tricks” vignette, we also find no significant difference between auditors and institutional practitioners compared to all other types of accountants in the sample. We conclude that ethical attitudes of accounting practitioners do not differ significantly by specialty area. Tisha L. N. Emerson is an Assistant Professor of Economics at Baylor University in Texas. In addition to business ethics, Professor Emerson has published articles in the areas of environmental economics and economic education. She teaches courses in environmental economics, international trade, intermediate microeconomics and microeconomic principles. Stephen J. Conroy is an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of San Diego in California. In addition to business ethics, Professor Conroy has published articles in the areas of economic development and demography, economics of education and economics of aging. He teaches courses in managerial economics at both the graduate and undergraduate level, as well as undergraduate courses in urban and regional economic development, intermediate microeconomics and principles of micro- and macroeconomics. Charles W. Stanley is an Associate Professor of Accounting at Baylor University in Texas. In addition to business ethics, Dr. Stanley has published articles in the areas of financial accounting, managerial accounting, auditing, accounting systems, tax, and professional ethics for accountants. He has also authored several on-line continuing education courses for CPAs including one that meets the Texas State Board of Accountancy requirements for continuing education by Texas CPAs. He teaches courses in auditing, ethics, financial accounting and managerial accounting in the MBA program at Baylor.     

Scale Economies In Cellular Telephony: Size Matters

Strategic positioning and potential cost savings are popular explanations for growing consolidation in the wireless telephone industry. This research estimates economies of scale for a large panel of GTE Wireless cellular market areas. Contrary to previous findings, our results indicate scale economies exist throughout the system and provide a rationale for the industry trend of consolidation.     

An Instrumentalist Critique of “Cost-Utility Analysis”

This paper seeks to explain the causes of turbulence in foreign exchange markets in selected transition economies (Albania, Belarus, Bulgaria, Croatia,Macedonia, Moldova, Romania and Ukraine) over the period 1995-2006. It uses a set of categorical regression (CATREG) models. It considers the influence of macroeconomic, social development, institutional and external variables, based on first, second or third generation previously released theoretical models, bringing a new innovative and wider approach to the field. It finds that the insights developed by second and third generation models complement rather than substitute for the explanation provided by first generation models in the case of transition economies.