Domestic service,gender, and wages in rural England,c.1700–18601

Domestic service was a vital occupational sector in England in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries—particularly for women. This article uses a new series of wage observations from across England, focusing on rural areas. Analysis of the dataset shows that wages paid to servants in rural England slightly increased over the period considered, but at uneven rates dependent on region and precise occupation of servant. The majority of servants, particularly maids, did not experience any significant increase in the wages they were paid. This article also shows a widening wage gap between male and female servants. When differences between regions were analysed, it was shown that the wages paid to servants did not match the model of the north becoming the high wage zone of England by the mid‐nineteenth century, although rates of growth there were the highest. For servants the south generally remained an area of higher wages even in the mid‐nineteenth century. Geography was probably not the key variable in determining wage levels. The type of household in which a servant was employed was more important than where it was located. The most important variables were the servants' gender, and their occupations in the household.     

Tax Expense Momentum

We investigate the joint hypothesis that (1) tax expense contains information about core profitability that is incremental to reported earnings and (2) that information is reflected in stock prices with a delay. We find that seasonally differenced quarterly tax expense, our proxy for tax expense surprise, is related positively to future returns. This anomaly is separate from previously documented pricing anomalies based on financial and tax variables. Additional investigation reveals that tax expense surprise is related positively to changes in future quarterly earnings and tax expense, and both those future changes are related positively to future returns. While the returns to investing in predictable future earnings changes has been documented before, these results suggest that predicting changes in future tax expense also generates incremental future returns.     

Investor Information Demand: Evidence from Google Searches Around Earnings Announcements

The objective of this study is to investigate factors that influence investor information demand around earnings announcements and to provide insights into how variation in information demand impacts the capital market response to earnings. The Internet is one channel through which public information is disseminated to investors and we propose that one way that investors express their demand for public information is via Google searches. We find that abnormal Google search increases about two weeks prior to the earnings announcement, spikes markedly at the announcement, and continues at high levels for a period after the announcement. This finding suggests that information diffusion is not instantaneous with the release of the earnings information, but rather is spread over a period surrounding the announcement. We also find that information demand is positively associated with media attention and news, and is negatively associated with investor distraction. When investors search for more information in the days just prior to the announcement, preannouncement price and volume changes reflect more of the upcoming earnings news and there is less of a price and volume response when the news is announced. This result suggests that, when investors demand more information about a firm, the information content of the earnings announcement is partially preempted.     

Large‐Scale Risks and Technological Change: What About Limited Liability?

We consider a firm under strict liability that must choose between two risky technologies, one being safer but costlier than the other one. The total potential level of damage increases with the level of activity. We show that, under limited liability, technological change is welfare‐improving and leads to full risk internalization when the firms are sufficiently capitalized. Nevertheless, the percentage of firms adopting the safer technology and full risk internalization is higher under unlimited liability than under limited liability. We show how an adequate tax policy increases this percentage. We also determine the characteristics of a second‐best tax policy.     

Markups,Tobin's q,and the Increasing Capital Share

Increasing markups have recently gained prominence as a leading explanation for the increasing share of income going to capital since the 1980s. However, the existing analysis has been limited to the United States, covers only short periods, and generally does not control for potentially important confounders. Constructing data for the share of income going to capital and markups based on Tobin's q over the period 1870–2018 for 21 advanced countries, this research examines the ability of markups to explain the movements of income shares and the tendency for factor shares to converge toward constants in the long run. We find strong support for the markup hypothesis.     

Livelihoods after Land Reform in Zimbabwe: Understanding Processes of Rural Differentiation

This paper explores the consequences of Zimbabwe's land reform for the dynamics of differentiation in Zimbabwe's countryside, reporting on the results from a 10‐year study from Masvingo province. Based on a detailed analysis of livelihoods across 400 households at 16 sites, the paper offers a detailed typology of livelihood strategies, linked to a class‐based analysis of emerging agrarian dynamics. The paper identifies a significant and successful ‘middle farmer’ group, reliant on ‘accumulation from below’ through petty commodity production, existing alongside other worker‐peasants and the semi‐peasantry, whose livelihoods remain vulnerable, with prospects for accumulation currently limited. In addition, there are others who are ‘accumulating from above’, through patronage and corruption. While small in number, this group has significant political and economic influence, and is embedded in powerful alliances that have fundamental impacts on the wider political–economic dynamics. To conclude, the economic, social and political implications of the emerging patterns of differentiation in Zimbabwe's countryside are discussed.     

Applying XBRL in an Accounting Information System Design Using the REA Approach: An Instructional Case*

The Church in Somewhere (CIS) is a small community church which uses an Excel spreadsheet to keep its financial records. The church administrator is considering moving from a spreadsheet accounting system to a relational database system that can easily be expanded to include more information in the future. In this paper we examine the transforming process in this hypothetical case by following a resource‐event‐agent (REA) modeling paradigm to create a database. We then link the REA model to financial reporting using Microsoft Access. In addition, using the financial report in the database, students prepare and validate an eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) document for CIS. Instead of applying the complex U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) Taxonomies, Release 2009 , the case uses a dedicated CIS Taxonomy to complete the mapping and tagging processes.