towards an attention based view of the firm the central argument is that firm behavior is the result of how firms channel and distribute the attention of their decision makers what decision makers do depends on what issues and answers they focus their attention on what issues and answers they focus on depends on the specific situation and on how the firm s rules resources and relationships distribute various issues answers and decision makers into specific communications and procedures the paper develops these theoretical principles into a model of firm behavior and presents its implications for explaining firm behavior and adaptation 1997 by john wiley sons ltd

labor unemployment risk and corporate financing decisions this paper examines the impact of labor unemployment risk on corporate financing decisions theory suggests that firms choose conservative financial policies partly as a means of mitigating worker exposure to unemployment risk using changes in state unemployment insurance benefit laws as a source of variation in the costs borne by workers during layoff spells we explore the connection between unemployment risk and the corporate financing decisions of public firms in the united states we find that increases in legally mandated unemployment benefits lead to increases in corporate leverage the impact of reduced unemployment risk on financial policy is especially strong for firms that have greater layoff separation rates labor intensity and financing constraints the estimated premium required to compensate workers for unemployment risk due to financial distress is about 57 basis points of firm value for a bbb rated firm these findings suggest that labor market frictions have a significant impact on corporate financing decisions

control and coordination in multinational corporations the integration of french and british subsidiaries into u s based multinationals is examined a theory linking the use of control and coordination mechanisms to the need for predictability flexibility and the cost of achieving them is investigated by relating organizational structure technology foreign commitment financial performance and nationality to the use of coordination and control

nowcasting the real time informational content of macroeconomic data abstract a formal method is developed for evaluating the marginal impact that intra monthly data releases have on current quarter forecasts nowcasts of real gross domestic product gdp growth the method can track the real time flow of the type of information monitored by central banks because it can handle large data sets with staggered data release dates each time new data are released the nowcasts are updated on the basis of progressively larger data sets that reflecting the unsynchronized data release dates have a jagged edge across the most recent months

cultural influence on the development of accounting systems internationally a test of gray s 1988 theory this paper attempts to test the theory developed by gray 1988 linking accounting values and systems with hofstede s 1980 cultural constructs based on data from twenty nine countries it finds that while gray s 1988 model has statistically significant explanatory power it is best at explaining actual financial reporting practices and is relatively weak in explaining extant professional and regulatory structures from a cultural base this paper further finds that both the development of financial markets and levels of taxation enhance the explanations offered by gray 1988

forecasting the gdp of a small open developing economy an application of favar models gdp forecasting remains a challenge for a small open developing economy faced with insufficient and low frequency data central bank forecasters cannot project gdp reliably for the purpose of mone

gdp nowcasting application and constraints in a small open developing economy despite data limitations an attempt is made to find out if a gdp nowcasting model can provide reliable forecasts for a small open economy two competing bayesian vector autoregressive models are tested rigorously to obtain the optimal model by minimizing in sample forecasting errors the main finding of this study is that gdp nowcasting can produce reliable results for a small open economy despite the unavailability of sufficient data sets and the lack of high frequency indicators

the multifaceted role of language in international business unpacking the forms functions and features of a critical challenge to mnc theory and performance language lies at the heart of international business ib activities yet language as a key construct in the field of ib has not been sufficiently articulated or theorized language presents itself in forms such as national corporate technical or electronic in functions in terms of defining hierarchies exercising power or facilitating integration and in features such as the use of mixed syntax or gender marking understanding the complex interplay between the multiple facets of language and how they affect day to day operations is becoming increasingly critical to global business effectiveness the purpose of this special issue is therefore to catalyze and set a course for the development of a new domain in ib scholarship originating from an explicit focus on language

shareholder value stakeholder management and social issues what s the bottom line we test the relationship between shareholder value stakeholder management and social issue participation building better relations with primary stakeholders like employees customers suppliers and communities could lead to increased shareholder wealth by helping firms develop intangible valuable assets which can be sources of competitive advantage on the other hand using corporate resources for social issues not related to primary stakeholders may not create value for shareholders we test these propositions with data from s p 500 firms and find evidence that stakeholder management leads to improved shareholder value while social issue participation is negatively associated with shareholder value copyright 2001 john wiley sons ltd

multinationals and corporate social responsibility in host countries does distance matter prior studies have found that foreign affiliates of multinational enterprises mnes suffer from liability of foreignness lof foreign affiliates may be able to improve their social legitimacy and overcome lof by demonstrating social commitment to host country constituents through corporate social responsibility csr if lof is positively related to the distance between the home and host countries and csr activities confer social legitimacy benefits on foreign affiliates we should expect csr activities and distance to be positively related however we argue that despite this potential motivation foreign affiliates from more distant home countries are in fact less likely to engage in host country csr our argument focuses on the ways in which distance affects the mne s willingness and ability to engage in csr abroad we also predict that host country csr reputation negatively moderates this relationship using community reinvestment act data for foreign bank affiliates from 32 countries in the united states over 1990 2007 we find strong support for our hypotheses the paper enriches our understanding of csr practices in mnes and of when and how mnes try to overcome legitimacy issues in host countries

corporate social responsibility theories mapping the territory the corporate social responsibility csr field presents not only a landscape of theories but also a proliferation of approaches which are controversial complex and unclear this article tries to clarify the sit uation mapping the territory by classifying the main csr theories and related approaches in four groups 1 instrumental theories in which the corporation is seen as only an instrument for wealth creation and its social activities are only a means to achieve economic results 2 political theories which concern themselves with the power of corporations in society and a responsible use of this power in the political arena 3 integrative theories in which the corporation is focused on the satisfaction of social demands and 4 ethical theories based on ethical responsibilities of corporations to society in practice each csr theory presents four dimensions related to profits political performance social demands and ethical values the findings suggest the necessity to develop a new theory on the business and society relationship which should integrate these four dimensions

understanding the words of relationships language as an essential tool to manage csr in communities of place multinational enterprises mnes encounter relentless stakeholder pressures when operating across linguistic cultural and institutional boundaries our aims are to examine whether and how acquisition of language resources may help mnes to bridge these boundaries and reduce pressures on mne legitimacy by improving their corporate social responsibility csr outcomes we propose an mne model of language resource acquisition policy based on three language orientations language as problem language as resource and language as right using sociolinguistic tools an ecological analysis of how language affects mne stakeholder relationships and surveying 15 mining mnes from australia canada china south africa switzerland and the united kingdom operating in east africa our research found some mnes employ regional lingua francas like swahili and local leadership practices to build sustainable relationships with local stakeholders these local stakeholders are members of communities of place cofp who steward the land their ancestors have inhabited for centuries and their voices have grown as to how that land is used as their voices have grown mnes should improve csr outcomes with cofp through better communications a well designed language acquisition policy may improve such communication and so fend off threats to mne legitimacy

right to work laws and the extent of unionization it is a well known fact that the extent of unionization is less in states with right to work rtw laws a framework is developed for determining whether rtw laws actually cause a decrease in the extent of unionization or whether they simply mirror preexisting tastes of workers against unions a set of empirical tests is proposed that can distinguish between these explanations based on differences between rtw and non rtw states in the demand for union representation the supply of union jobs relative to that demand and the observed union nonunion wage differential these tests are implemented using disaggregated data from the quality of employment survey and the current population survey and a pattern is found that is consistent with the hypothesis that rtw laws simply mirror preexisting preferences against union representation

re considering language within a cosmopolitan understanding toward a multilingual franca approach in international business studies much of the literature on language in international business ib has sought either to lay out the advantages of a common language or lingua franca that crosses the linguistic boundaries of a multinational company mnc harzing koster magner 2011 luo shenkar 2006 or to identify the imperialistic and hegemonic effects of using such lingua franca which mostly turns out to be english on actors in local subsidiaries piekkari vaara tienari santti 2005 tietze 2008 in our view looking into the relationship between globalization and language s is more complex than simply pointing at the proliferation of english and the effects of its linguistic imperialism within one global market place actually there is within every process of globalization simultaneously a genuine concern about issues of localization and contextualization appadurai 1996 bauman 1998 also increased mobility has provided people access to very fragmented and incomplete language repertoires often consisting of spoken vernacular and accented varieties of different languages in which they have differentially developed literacy skills blommaert dong 2010 such complexities between globalization processes and linguistic repertoires raise the question of how until now studies on language in ib tend to approach the notion of language itself and how they often implicitly think about the relationship between universality and particularity when studying language within globalization processes

union rent seeking intangible capital and market value of the firm abstract this study considers the effect of unions on intangi ble capital investment and profitability within the context of a market value rather than a more traditional accounting based approach theory is provided suggesting unions are able to affect profitability by sharing in the economic returns to firm specific intangible capital in support of this hypothesis we find unionization reduces the returns to r d and produces a corresponding limiting influence on r d investment at the firm level i introduction a n extensive literature in economics has ex amined the determinants of profitability with much of the focus centering on the role of market structure only recently however have the effects of labor unions on profitability been analyzed ths is surprising since labor economists long have emphasized union influences on wages and productivity that in turn may affect profitabil ity in recent studies freeman 1983 and karier 1985 report a significant limiting influence of unions on price cost margins in high concentra tion manufacturing industries using firm level data and the market based tobin s

right to work laws do matter recent economic literature has ascribed a benign influence to right to work rtw laws the apparent consensus is that rtw laws do not reduce union membership because organized labor must have already been weak at the time right to work laws were enacted this time series observation i e union membership is not significantly lower after rtw laws have been enacted than what it was before has been misapplied to argue that right to work laws are not associated with economic differences between right to work states and union shop states a closer look at this nonsequitur is in order this paper contends that right to work laws do matter the consensus to the contrary rests on a shakey econometric foundation proponents of the proposition that rtw laws are harmless have never subjected that hypothesis to empirical scrutiny instead they have tested weak models of the right to work laws do matter hypothesis by rebutting a characterature of a proposition they set out to refute these analysts make their own hypothesis the null hypothesis it is not hard to support a precept which is proved merely by showing that the probability that it is false is less than 95 percent such procedures generate impressive polemics they do not further the interests of positive economics

do unions affect innovation we examine the effect of unionization on firm innovation using a regression discontinuity design that relies on locally exogenous variation generated by elections that pass or fail by a small margin of votes passing a union election results in an 8 7 12 5 decline in patent quantity quality three years after the election a reduction in r d expenditures reduced productivity of inventors and departures of innovative inventors appear to be plausible underlying mechanisms through which unionization impedes firm innovation in response to unionization firms move their innovation activities away from states where union elections win our paper provides new insights into the real effects of unionization this paper was accepted by gustavo manso finance

political aspects of mne theory political behavior by mnes has usually been ignored downplayed or passively treated in dominant economic models of the multinational enterprise in order to remedy this lacuna dunning s eclectic paradigm is expanded to integrate political dimensions in the analysis of ownership internalization and location advantages

monetary policy in a data rich environment abstract most empirical analyses of monetary policy have been confined to frameworks in which the federal reserve is implicitly assumed to exploit only a limited amount of information despite the fact that the fed actively monitors literally thousands of economic time series this article explores the feasibility of incorporating richer information sets into the analysis both positive and normative of fed policymaking we employ a factor model approach developed by stock j h watson m w diffusion indices journal of business economic statistics 2002 20 2 147 forecasting inflation 1999 journal of monetary economics 44 2 293 that permits the systematic information in large data sets to be summarized by relatively few estimated factors with this framework we reconfirm stock and watson s result that the use of large data sets can improve forecast accuracy and we show that this result does not seem to depend on the use of finally revised as opposed to real time data we estimate policy reaction functions for the fed that take into account its data rich environment and provide a test of the hypothesis that fed actions are explained solely by its forecasts of inflation and real activity finally we explore the possibility of developing an expert system that could aggregate diverse information and provide benchmark policy settings

labor protection and leverage this paper exploits inter temporal variations in employment protection across countries and finds that rigidities in labor markets are an important determinant of firms capital structure decisions over the 1985 2007 period we find that reforms increasing employment protection are associated with a 187 basis point reduction in leverage we interpret this finding to suggest that employment protection increases operating leverage crowding out financial leverage this result is robust across measures of employment protection and leverage and does not appear to be due to pre treatment differences between treated and control firms omitted variables unobserved changes in regional economic conditions and reverse causality heterogeneous treatment effects are consistent with our economic intuition we find that the negative effect is more pronounced in firms that are subject to frequent hiring and firing

an institutional logics approach to liability of foreignness the case of mining mnes in sub saharan africa prior research on firms liability of foreignness lof has emphasized the role of isomorphic behavior in overcoming lof however the literature has not adequately considered how firms can overcome lof under conditions of institutional complexity when fundamental differences in firms home and host country values beliefs and rules may make isomorphic behaviors impossible or undesirable in this article we use the emerging research on institutional logics and institutional entrepreneurship to address this important issue by examining case studies of eight foreign mining mnes experiencing lof in sub saharan africa based upon our qualitative analysis we find that mnes can overcome lof by co creating new institutional logics rather than conforming to existing ones yet our data show that this is a difficult process one that may not be capable of being done unilaterally by the mne instead we find that local employees embedded in both sets of competing institutional logics acted as key intermediaries who facilitated institutional entrepreneurship moreover we found that firms implementation strategy matters as well in some cases institutional entrepreneurship mitigated lof in others friction returned to varying degrees

developed country mnes investing in developing economies progress and prospect this study reviews research from 1970 through 2016 on developed country multinational enterprises dmnes entering and competing in developing economies to identify the current state of knowledge of this research and push it further we review the literature using bibliometric and qualitative content analyses covering leading journals and books we articulate frontier issues that are understudied yet critical to both theorization and practice of dmnes in developing economies we discuss the findings and conclusions from prior research along five key areas 1 entering developing economies 2 organizing local activities 3 managing alliances and joint ventures 4 competing in dynamic environments and 5 dealing with institutions governments and society we offer prospective insights into future agenda that have important implications for mne strategies and decisions and propose frontier directions that encompass strategic localization reverse transfer and adaptation co evolution with local business ecosystems reorganizing and restructuring and strategic responses to institutional and market complexity

unionization incomplete contracting and capital investment this article examines empirically the hypothesis that incomplete contracts and resulting opportunistic behavior over the return to sunk assets reduces investment union firm contracts are incomplete because they 1 do not prevent all actions aimed at changing the existing contract 2 cover a relatively short time period and 3 do not extend to union members yet to be hired the primary response of firms is to reduce investment in specific durable assets and also to reduce employment growth and increase debt the authors find fairly strong evidence of these effects in a sample of large publicly traded firms using firm specific measures of unionization copyright 1993 by university of chicago press

language policies and practices in wholly owned foreign subsidiaries a recontextualization perspective this study adopts a recontextualization perspective on language policies and practices in wholly owned foreign subsidiaries drawing on a field study of 101 subsidiaries in japan we develop a contingency model that distinguishes between four different types of recontextualization with characteristic language policies and practices developing locally adaptive developing globally integrated established locally adaptive and established globally integrated our analysis shows how each of these four types is accompanied by specific problems and challenges in particular it elucidates five important aspects of language implementation 1 the emergence of language praxis from the interplay of headquarters strategies and local responses 2 the hybridization of language practices 3 the central role of key actors such as subsidiary presidents in recontextualization 4 the pervasive power implications of language policies and practices and 5 the multifaceted implications for strategic human resource management by so doing our analysis opens up new avenues for context specific and practice oriented studies of language in multinational companies

the multinational corporation as a multilingual community language and organization in a global context this paper develops a framework for analyzing the multinational corporation mnc as a multilingual community in which parent functional language and subunit functional languages are concurrently used and recursively linked through an intra corporate communication network the unit breadth and intensity of an mnc s language system are designed to apply global strategies within the context of evolving environmental and organizational realities to the extent that language design is the product of deliberate choice we suggest that headquarters functional language is determined by the mnc s international strategy organizational structure and transnationality while subunit functional language is designed in accordance with organizational form strategic role and expatriate deployment aligning language systems with organizational strategy and dynamics improves mnc communication coordination and knowledge sharing

macroeconomic forecasting using diffusion indexes this article studies forecasting a macroeconomic time series variable using a large number of predictors the predictors are summarized using a small number of indexes constructed by principal component analysis an approximate dynamic factor model serves as the statistical framework for the estimation of the indexes and construction of the forecasts the method is used to construct 6 12 and 24 monthahead forecasts for eight monthly u s macroeconomic time series using 215 predictors in simulated real time from 1970 through 1998 during this sample period these new forecasts outperformed univariate autoregressions small vector autoregressions and leading indicator models

industry migration and growth in the south for at least the last two decades the south and southwest have been the fastest growing regions in the united states during this period we have witnessed considerable shifts in the location of economic activity and overall the movement has been decidedly toward the south since the early sixties when this southern migration began to accelerate an increasing amount of public attention has been directed to this topic so much so that it is now popularly referred to as the sunbelt phenomenon numerous explanations have been advanced to account for this rapid growth in the south but three explanations have persistently evoked an impressive level of debate first many have argued that a significant portion of this regional redistribution can be attributed to differentials in state and local taxing policies in particular the state corporate income tax these rates vary considerably across states but even more important is the observation that there have been significant changes in the structure of corporate taxes over the last few decades beginning in the early 1950s the relative tax rate for several southern states particularly those in the east south central and west south central divisions began to decline sharply on the other hand relative tax rates for three divisions new england the east north central and the midatlantic rose in the early sixties by 1970 the relative tax rate ranged from 0 60 in the west south central down from 1 20 in 1950 to 1 37 in the mid atlantic up from 1 15 in 1950 notwithstanding these stylized facts the consensus from previous empirical work on industry location suggests that state taxes have not influenced the direction or magnitude of industry migration however there are reasons to believe that acceptance of this conclusion may be premature for example in the early body of work results were based on simple correlations of tax levels and changes in either value added or employment 2 more recent attempts to empirically model corporate tax effects have arrived at somewhat ambiguous results carlton 1977 examining three 4 digit industries found that corporate tax differentials failed to explain any of the variation in new births of firms across smsas hodge 1979 while confirming carlton s results for the same industries discovered that taxes have significantly affected regional investment patterns in another industry not covered in carlton s study 3 why taxes mattered in one industry and not in the other three remained a matter of ad hoc speculation a second explanation alleges that states in the south have begun to exhibit a more favorable business climate although it is difficult to measure directly a state s business climate one important manifestation of that climate is its position with respect to the division of power between union and management in the collective bargaining process legal obstacles to union organization and bargaining power will be viewed by firms as a positive signal of a pro business environment the creation of legislative obstareceived for publication october 29 1981 revision accepted for publication april 16 1982 miami university the author is especially indebted to michael ward at the rand corporation for numerouls helpful discussions throughout the preparation of this study also the author benefited from the advice and comments of john antel robert cotterman lee lillard john lunn william j moore james smith finis welch and two referees of this review financial suppoi t was provided by the foundation for research in economics and education at ucla and the university of british columbia humanities and social sciences committee i the relative tax is defined as a state s tax rate divided by the average for all states as in most economic discussions it is relative price that matters 2 for a review of earlier work see due 1961 some of the studies reviewed include bloom 1955 campbell 1958 floyd 1952 and larson 1957 see also garwood 1952 3 most of the other empirical work focused exclusively on intt urban location decisions and hence had no reason to examine state corporate taxes however they found local tax differentials inter zonal were unimportant in determining intra urban movement for example see moses and williamson 1967 and schmenner 1978

the economic impact of right to work laws evidence from collective bargaining agreements and corporate policies abstract we analyze the economic and financial impact of right to work rtw laws in the us using data from collective bargaining agreements we show that there is a decrease in wages for unionized workers after rtw laws firms increase investment and employment but reduce financial leverage labor intensive firms experience higher profits and labor to asset ratios dividends and executive compensation also increase post rtw our results are consistent with a canonical theory of the firm augmented with an exogenous bargaining power of labor and suggest that rtw laws impact corporate policies by decreasing that bargaining power