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on Business Economics |
| By: | Aysit Tansel (Department of Economics Middle East Technical University and Institute for the Study of labor (IZA) Bonn, Germany and Economic Research Forum (ERF) Cairo, Egypt); Saziye Gazioglu (Middle East Technical University and Department of Economics, University of Aberdeen) |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the job satisfaction in relation to managerial attitudes towards employees and firm size using the linked employer-employee survey results in Britain. We first investigate the management-employee relationships and the firm size using maximum likelihood probit estimation. Next various measures of job satisfaction are related to the management-employee relations via maximum likelihood ordered probit estimates. Four measures of job satisfaction that have not been used often are considered. They are satisfaction with influence over job; satisfaction with amount of pay; satisfaction with sense of achievement and satisfaction with respect from supervisors. Main findings indicate that management-employee relationships are less satisfactory in the large firms than in the small firms. Job satisfaction levels are lower in large firms. Less satisfactory management-employee relationships in the large firms may be a major source of the observed lower level of job satisfaction in them. These results have important policy implications from the point of view of the firm management while achieving the aims of their organizations in particular in the large firms in the area of management-employee relationships. Improving the management-employee relations in large firms will increase employee satisfaction in many respects as well as increase productivity and reduce turnover. The nature of the management-employee relations with firm size and job satisfaction has not been investigated before. |
| Keywords: | Job Satisfaction, Managerial Attitudes, Firm size, Linked Employer-Employee data, Britain. |
| JEL: | J28 J5 J21 D23 |
| Date: | 2013–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:koc:wpaper:1307&r=bec |
| By: | Viral Acharya (New York University); Marco Pagano (University of Naples "Federico II" and EIEF); Paolo Volpin (London Business School) |
| Abstract: | We present a model in which managers are risk-averse and firms compete for scarce managerial talent (“alpha”). When managers are not mobile across firms, firms provide efficient compensation, which allows for learning about managerial talent and for insurance of low-quality managers. When instead managers can move across firms, firms cannot offer co-insurance among employees. In anticipation, risk-averse managers may churn across firms or undertake aggregate risks in order to delay the revelation of their true quality. The result is excessive risk-taking with pay for short-term performance and an accumulation of long-term risks. We conclude with a discussion of policies to address the inefficiency in compensation. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eie:wpaper:1303&r=bec |
| By: | Ryoma Kitamura (Graduate School of Economics, Kwansei Gakuin University); Tetsuya Shinkai (School of Economics, Kwansei Gakuin University) |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we consider and propose a new duopoly model of cannibalization in which firms produce and sell two vertically differentiated products in the same market. We show that each firm produces the high-quality good more (less) than the low-quality good if the upper limit of taste of consumers is sufficiently high(not so high). Further, we find that the increase in the difference in quality between two goods leads to cannibalization, such that the high-quality goods keep out the low-quality goods from the market. Furthermore, we conduct a welfare analysis. |
| Keywords: | Multiproduct firm, Duopoly, Cannibalization |
| JEL: | D21 D43 L13 L15 |
| Date: | 2013–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kgu:wpaper:100&r=bec |
| By: | Michael Fritsch (School of Economics and Business Administration, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena); Alexander Kritikos (German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin), and University of Potsdam, and IZA (Bonn) and IAB (Nuremberg)); Katharina Pijnenburg (German Institute for Economic Research (DIW Berlin)) |
| Abstract: | We investigate whether people become more willingly self-employed during boom periods or in recessions and to what extent it is the business cycle or the employment status influencing entry rates into entrepreneurship. Our analysis for Germany reveals that start-up activities are positively influenced by unemployment rates and that the cyclical component of real GDP has a negative effect. This implies that new business formation is counter-cyclical. Further disentangling periods of low and high unemployment periods reveals a "low unemployment retard effect". |
| Keywords: | Self-employment, business cycle, unemployment, start-up |
| JEL: | L26 E32 |
| Date: | 2013–03–20 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:jrp:jrpwrp:2013-011&r=bec |
| By: | Max Nathan |
| Abstract: | High levels of net migration to the UK have contributed to growing cultural diversity, and researchers are turning their attention to the long-term effects of diversity on productivity. Yet little is known about these issues. This paper asks: what are the links between the composition of firms' top teams and business performance? What role do ethnic diversity and co-ethnic networks play? And do cities amplify or dampen these channels? I explore using a rich dataset of over 6,000 English firms. Owners, partners and directors set firms' strategic direction. Top team demography might generate production externalities through diversity (a wider range of ideas/ experiences, helping problem solving) and/or 'sameness' (via specialist knowledge or better access to international markets). These channels may be balanced by internal downsides (lower trust) and external barriers (discrimination), so that overall effects on business performance are unclear. In addition, urban locations (particularly big cities) may amplify any demographics-performance effects. I create a repeat cross-section of firms from the RDA National Business Survey. I construct measures of diversity and sameness across ethnicity and gender 'bases', alongside information on revenues, product and process innovation. I then regress these measures of business performance on top team demographics, plus firm level controls, area, year and detailed industry fixed effects. My results suggest a non-linear link between diversity and business performance, which is net positive for process innovation and net negative for turnover. Further tests on diverse and minority/female-headed firms find positive links for diverse top teams, negative for minority and female-only top teams. This implies that while diversity has internal and external benefits, penalties from being 'too diverse' probably result from external constraints. Further tests for intervening effects of capital cities, metropolitan hierarchies and urban form find some evidence of amplifying and dampening effects - which are generally stronger in London and larger cities. |
| Keywords: | Cities, innovation, entrepreneurship, cultural diversity, migration, gender |
| JEL: | J61 L21 M13 O11 O31 R23 |
| Date: | 2013–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cep:sercdp:0129&r=bec |
| By: | Lionel Fontagné; Gianluca Orefice; Roberta Piermartini; Nadia Rocha |
| Abstract: | This paper analyses the trade effects of restrictive product standards on the margins of trade for a large panel of French firms. To focus on restrictive product standards only, we use a new database compiling the list of measures that have been raised as concerns in dedicated committees of the WTO. We restrict our analysis to the subset of Sanitary and Phyto-Sanitary (SPS) regulatory measures and analyse the effects of product standards on three variables: (i) probability to export and to exit the export market (firm-product extensive margins), (ii) value exported (firm-product intensive margin) and (iii) export prices. In particular we study whether firms size, market shares and export orientation modify the effect of SPS measures. We find that SPS measures discourage exports. We also find a negative effect of SPS imposition on the intensive margins of trade. Finally, the negative effects of SPS measures on the extensive and intensive margins of trade are attenuated for big firms. |
| Keywords: | International trade;firm heterogeneity;multi-product exporters;non-tariff barriers |
| JEL: | F12 F15 |
| Date: | 2013–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cii:cepidt:2013-06&r=bec |
| By: | Shirokova Galina; Knatko Dmitri; Vega Gina |
| Abstract: | Recent research emphasizes the importance of the separation of ownership and control for growing threshold firms. Demand for specialized management knowledge by growing owner-run SMEs is usually resolved through the separation of ownership and control, using top management labor market and agency contracts. Under certain environmental institutional conditions, owners of SMEs from emerging markets face difficulties separating ownership and control. For example, the majority of Russian companies are run by their primary owners. In rare situations when separation of ownership and control formally occurs, high risk of economic fraud and owner’s fear often revert management succession to a default owner-control scenario. These conditions pose a threat for a growing threshold firm needing professional management knowledge assets. Using a dataset of 500 entrepreneurial companies from fast growing industries in St. Petersburg and Moscow, this study defines and studies threshold firms and also analyzes how various perceived characteristics of the institutional environment are influencing the probability of separation of ownership and control in threshold firms. According to the estimation results institutional factors such as poor security of ownership rights and misfit of company with formal regulatory norms have a negative impact on the probability of separation of ownership and control in threshold firms. As a result, threshold firms limit their growth possibilities since their access to specialized knowledge is limited to the knowledge base of the owner. |
| Date: | 2013–04–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:eer:wpalle:13/01e&r=bec |