bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
‘Don't try this at home’: health policy lessons for the NHS from the United States
Authors: Walshe Kieran
Published: March 2003

The US healthcare system is fragmented, chaotic and wasteful, and prevailing American social values and attitudes to health and healthcare are profoundly different from those found in the United Kingdom. Even so, there are many useful ideas and important lessons to be drawn from the US experience. The transfer of policy ideas and innovations needs, however, to take account of the differences in culture and context.
The Origins and Early Impact of the Minimum Wage in Agriculture
Authors: Gowers Robin , Hatton Timothy J.
Published: March 2003

This article examines the effects on wages and employment of the minimum wage in agriculture during the interwar period. It finds that the impact of regulation was to raise the wage for agricultural labourers by 13 per cent when it was (re)introduced in 1924, by 15 per cent in the late 1920s, and by more than 20 per cent in the 1930s. The effect on farm employment was to reduce it by about 54,000 (6.5 per cent) in 1929 up to a peak of 97,000 (13.3 per cent) in 1937. The minimum wage lifted out of poverty many families of farm labourers who remained employed, but it significantly lowered the incomes of farmers, particularly during the 1930s.
Deindustrialization in Ireland to 1851: some evidence from the census
Authors: Geary Frank
Published: March 2003

abstract
Seebohm Rowntree and the postwar poverty puzzle
Authors: Hatton Timothy J. , Bailey Roy >.
Published: March 2003

In his third social survey of York carried out in 1950, Seebohm Rowntree reported a steep decline since 1936 of the percentage of households in poverty. He attributed the bulk of this decline to government welfare reforms enacted during and after the war. This article re‐examines the survivingrecords from the 1950 survey, using a revised poverty line and looking more closely at the measurement of income. It also re‐assesses the impact of welfare reforms on working‐class poverty, and finds that poverty in York was significantly higher, and the contribution of welfare reform substantially less, than was originally reported.
External economies of scale in the Lancashire cotton industry, 1900–1950
Authors: Broadberry Stephen , Marrison Andrew
Published: March 2003

This article provides three types of evidence for external economies of scale in the Lancashire cotton industry. Anglo‐American productivity differences are used to demon‐strate external economies at the industry level. Econometric evidence of dynamic (Marshall‐Arrow‐Romer) external economies of localization in spinning and weaving is provided using individual earnings data. A case study of a merchant firm demonstrates the build‐up of dynamic (Jacobs) externalities of urbanization. It is argued that the persistence of a large merchant community generating external economies of scale helped to delay Britain's loss of comparative advantage to low wage producers.
Coercion, compliance, and the collapse of the Soviet command economy
Authors: Harrison Mark
Published: March 2003

Are command systems that rest on coercion inherently unstable, and did the Soviet economy collapse for this reason? Until it collapsed, the Soviet economy did not appear unstable. Why, then, did it collapse? A game between a dictator and a producer shows that a high level of coercion may yield a stable high–output equilibrium, that stability may rest in part on the dictator's reputation, and that a collapse may be brought about by adverse trends in the dictator's costs and a loss of reputation. The facts of the Soviet case are consistent with a collapse that was triggered by the strike movement of 1989.
Dominion or Republic? Migrants to North America from the United Kingdom, 1870–1910
Authors: Green Alan G. , MacKinnon Mary , Minns Chris
Published: March 2003

Late nineteenth–century Canada attracted a large number of immigrants from the UK, despite far lower average income per head there than in the US. While urban labour markets in the northern US were much larger than those in Canada, differences in outcomes between UK immigrants in Canadian and in northern US cities were small. Average annual real earnings by occupation group were only 10 to 15 per cent lower in Canadian cities. Individual–level census data indicate that the occupational distribution of UK immigrants in Canada was quite similar to that of their peers in the US.
Innovation, Foreign Direct Investment and Growth
Authors: Walz Uwe
Published: March 2003

Direct foreign investment is incorporated in a dynamic general equilibrium model with endogenous technological change. In contrast to recent endogenous growth approaches, I allow for geographical separation of the innovation and production of newly developed goods. Firms acquire specific knowledge through R&D investment in the more developed country and use their specific asset to establish a production plant in the low‐cost country. Foreign direct investment is accompanied by interregional spillovers of knowledge from the more to the less advanced country. I derive a steady‐state equilibrium with active innovation and production activities in the high‐technology sector in both countries. Furthermore, the implications of factor flow liberalization as well as of industrial policies are investigated.
Extortion
Authors: Konrad Kai I. , Skaperdas Stergios
Published: March 2003

Extortion of productive enterprises (‘shops’) by organized crime groups (‘gangs’) takes place in virtually all economies. We develop a framework to study this activity. The main harm of extortion comes from the long‐run erosion and distortion of useful production, as well as from the destruction of property that we show can occur in equilibrium. Among other results, we also find: gangs may increase their activity in response to increased police protection; often, but not always, forward‐looking gangs induce lower resource waste than myopic gangs.
The Effects of Financial Constraints on Inventory Investment: Evidence from a Panel of UK Firms
Authors: Guariglia Alessandra
Published: March 2003

The objective of this paper is to analyse the linkage between internalfinance and inventory investment, using a large panel of UK manufacturing firms from 1968 to 1991. Firms are classified into two groups: those more and those less likely to face financial constraints. The estimates of several equations for inventory growth augmented with the coverage ratio indicate a significant effect of the latter on inventory investment for the former group, during periods of recession and tight monetary policy. This effect is particularly strong for work‐in‐process and raw material inventories which are characterized by low adjustment costs.
Spatial Search, Migration and Regional Unemployment
Authors: Molho Ian
Published: March 2003

The dominant explanation of spatial unemployment in the literature assumes that workers must live in an area in order to be able to access job offers. This gives rise to ‘compensating variations’ in local wages and unemployment. However, for many occupations search is clearly conducted over longer distances from a home base. In the model presented in this paper, migration and unemployment are analysed both when the optimal search field is local, as in the traditional model, and when search is conducted over longer distances. I compare equilibria in these two regimes, and discuss the implications for regional policy.
Consumption and the Means of Payment: An Empirical Analysis for the United Kingdom
Authors: Dutta Jayasri , Weale Martin
Published: March 2003

We estimate a model of consumption and money holdings with multiple means of payment, using data for the United Kingdom. The model describes a technology for transactions, where money and credit are imperfect substitutes. It allows us to identify shocks to the transactions technology. We evaluate the value of long‐term changes in the payments systems to the representative consumer, as well as the welfare cost of inflation from 1977 to 1998. The estimates allow us to evaluate the welfare costs of inflation of this period. The model also has implications for consumption‐smoothing in response to monetary shocks.
Identifying Welfare Effects from Subjective Questions
Authors: Ravallion Martin , Lokshin Michael
Published: March 2003

We argue that the welfare inferences drawn from answers to subjective–qualitative survey questions are clouded by concerns over the structure of measurement errors and how latent psychological factors influence observed respondent characteristics. We propose a panel data model that allows more robust tests and we estimate the model on a high‐quality survey for Russia. We find significant income effects on an individual’s subjective economic welfare. Demographic effects are weak at given income per capita. Ill‐health and becoming unemployed lower welfare at given current income, although the unemployment effect is not robust, and returning to work does not restore welfare without an income gain.
Campaign Finance Levels as Coordinating Signals in Three‐way, Experimental Elections
Authors: Reitz T. , Myerson R. , Weber R.
Published: March 2003

If (often costly) election campaigns are simply advertising, they do not increase social welfare directly. Given this, should we limit campaign expenditures? We propose that costly campaigns can inform voters about the strength of candidates. This may increase welfare indirectly by helping voters avoid coordination failures. In laboratory elections, we study campaign finance levels as coordinating signals and compare them with our earlier work on polls. Both coordinate majority voters effectively, allowing them to stop Condorcet losers from winning. Finance levels were rational in that the total benefits of coordination exceeded the costs. Further, benefits of typical incremental contributions exceeded costs ex‐post, while the next typical increment's benefits would not have.
Rational Abstention and the Congressional Vote Choice
Authors: Rothenberg L. S. , Sanders M.
Published: March 2003

Research on voting, particularly on legislative behavior, tends to focus on the choices of those casting ballots. Yet, intuitively, abstentions and vote choice should be jointly determined. As such, the relevance of participation depends upon both the extent to which it can be explained by the costs and the benefits of voting and on the nature of the interactions between participation and preferences. To this end, we provide a framework for explaining roll call behavior that simultaneously considers legislators’ decisions about whether and how to vote. Application to roll call voting in the 104th Congress finds that abstention and voting choices are integrated; our approach generates sensible and substantively important results which yield important insights into legislative behavior and public policy.
Who gets the goods? Moderate Voting Records, Diminishing Returns, and PAC Contributions
Authors: Dempster Gregory m. , Westley Christopher
Published: March 2003

Assuming that a legislator representing a moderate constituency (with respect to a variety of interests) may be expected to vote moderately in general, the authors suggest a measure of the ‘moderateness’ of a legislator's voting behavior and use it to determine whether a relationship exists between PAC contributions and the degree of moderateness. The results suggest that PACs exhibit a tendency to give more, at the margin, to legislators with moderate voting records.
On the dynamics of inequality in the transition
Authors: Aghion Philippe , Commander Simon
Published: March 2003

Inequality has increased in many of the transition economies. At the same time, spending on education has declined. In this paper we survey the factors driving these changes. We then set up a small general equilibrium model to simulate the effect of different policy choices on the path of inequality over the transition. We show that the policies selected in Central Europe engender a relatively rapid spike in inequality but with a Kuznets curve. In the simulations that broadly capture features of the policy regime dominating in Russia and the FSU, we find no Kuznets curve. We then turn to the longer run and look at the way in which both trade liberalization and technological and organizational change are likely to affect the relative demand for types of labour. We show how substantial technological and organizational change ‐ obvious features of transition ‐ can result in raising inequality. Persistence in inequality can be expected to depend critically on the pace at which the acquisition of skills takes place in the economy ‐ and, hence, on the evolution of the educational system. As such, policies aimed at raising adaptability ‐ such as quality educational systems ‐ can be expected to dampen the increase in wage inequality.
Economic transition and the distributions of income and wealth
Authors: Ferreira Francisco H. G.
Published: March 2003

This paper relies on a model of wealth distribution dynamics and occupational choice to investigate the distributional consequences of policies and developments associated with transition from central planning to a market system. The model suggests that even an efficient privatization designed to be egalitarian may lead to increases in inequality (and possibly poverty), both during transition and in the new steady‐state. Creation of new markets in services also supplied by the public sector may also contribute to an increase in inequality, as can labour market reforms that lead to a decompression of the earnings structure and to greater flexibility in employment. The results underline the importance of retaining government provision of basic public goods and services; of removing barriers that prevent the participation of the poor in the new private sector; and of ensuring that suitable safety nets are in place.
Entrepreneurs and the Ordering of Institutional Reform: Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Russia and Ukraine Compared
Authors: Johnson Simon , McMillan John , Woodruff Christopher
Published: March 2003

We use survey data to examine new firms in Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Russia and Ukraine. By measures of job growth, security of property, and market development, our countries fall into two groups: an advanced group including Poland, Romania and Slovakia, with Slovakia falling somewhat behind the other two; and a backward group of Russia and Ukraine. Macroeconomic stability is not sufficient for private‐sector growth. A lack of bank finance does not seem to prevent private‐sector growth. More inhibiting than inadequate finance are insecure property rights.
Theories of Soft Budget Constraints and the Analysis of Banking Crises
Authors: Mitchell Janet
Published: March 2003

This paper proposes a new taxonomy for classifying models of soft budget constraints which allows identification of two classes of models. Distinguishing between these classes of models is useful, as they yield SBCs in differing circumstances and have differing theoretical and policy implications. The taxonomy is used to motivate an area of economic theory in which SBC models can yield novel insights: the analysis of banking crises. A model is presented in which SBCs arising from creditor passivity have implications for the question of the appropriate policy for dealing with bad debts on troubled banks' balance sheets. The paper also compares the implications of the two classes of SBC models for the analysis of banking crises.
Is Post‐Communist Health Spending Unusual?
Authors: Kornai János , McHale John
Published: March 2003

What factors determine a country's spending on health? And what factors determine the share of spending financed by the public sector? Taking these factors into account, is post‐communist health spending unusual? For the OECD economies, we find that per capita health spending is strongly related to per capita income, with an elasticity of about 1.5. The elasticity for developing economies is close to one. Spending is also positively related to the elderly dependency rate, but the relationship is weaker than a static comparison of spending by the elderly and non‐elderly would suggest. Even though health spending as a share of GDP in the post‐communist countries of eastern and central Europe is below the OECD average, there is evidence of above normal health spending in most countries when we control for income and demographics. For Hungary, the ‘excess’ spending reached over three percentage points of GDP in 1994. For the OECD sample, four development indicators account for half the variation in the public sector share of total health spending. Political variables help explain the remainder. If the post‐communist countries converge to the market economy pattern, the share of public financing will fall, yet still remain well above half.
Benchmarking competitiveness in transition economies
Authors: Zinnes Clifford , Eilat Yair , Sachs Jeffrey
Published: March 2003

This paper constructs an indicator for the current level of international competitiveness of countries in transition. We find that Hungary is the most competitive country in the group while Turkmenistan is the least. Competitiveness measurement, in our view, is a way to use uniform criteria to gauge the extent to which a country makes use of various levers to promote sustained improvements in its well‐being. We construct our measure of competitiveness drawing upon both the popular literature on competitiveness as well as modern economic theory. The approach acknowledges the importance of synergies between firms, markets, and government and, above all, the crucial role of institutions. Our choice of variables stresses the special characteristics of transition countries. By bringing to bear all the existing data on these countries, together with new survey data collected for the purpose, we are able to go beyond the mere ranking of countries to decompose the sources of competitiveness into their constituent parts. This allows policy makers to identify areas where their countries are lagging behind relative to other countries in their region. Our indicator is also compatible with the Global Competitiveness Report series categories, thus allowing us to benchmark transition countries against the rest of the world.

JEL classification: C82, O47, O57, P27, P52.
Optimum currency areas and the European experience
Authors: McKinnon Ronald
Published: March 2003

Across nations or regions, the debate on optimum exchange rate cum monetary policies is not yet resolved on three levels. First is the optimum domain of fixed exchange rates versus keeping them flexible. Second is the subordinate debate on whether one needs full monetary union (as in continental Europe) to secure an optimum currency area's internal domain; or, whether virtually fixed exchange rates — where national currencies remain in circulation — can be sufficient. Third is whether a regional grouping of economies with close trade ties (as in East Asia) gain by collectively pegging to an outside currency such as the US dollar. Using an axiomatic approach, which limits the set of cross‐country financial claims to what is feasible, I analyse how best to both share and reduce macroeconomic risks on these three levels.

JEL classification: F31, F36.
Macroeconomic Determinants of European Stock Market Volatility
Authors: Errunza Vihang , Hogan Ked
Published: March 2003

In this paper we investigate whether macroeconomic variability can explain time variation in European stock market volatility. We find that unlike the documented case of the USA, in many cases, the time variation in stock market volatility is found to be significantly affected by the past variability of either monetary or real macroeconomic factors. Our findings have important implications for capital and portfolio allocations.
Options and earnings announcements: an empirical study of volatility, trading volume, open interest and liquidity
Authors: Donders Monique, W.M. , Kouwenberg Roy , Vorst Ton, C. F.
Published: March 2003

In this paper we study the impact of earnings announcements on implied volatility, trading volume, open interest and spreads in the stock options market. We find that implied volatility increases before announcement days and drops afterwards. Also option trading volume is higher around announcement days. During the days before the announcement open interest tends to increase, while it returns to regular levels afterwards. Changes in the quoted spread largely respond to higher trading volume and changes in implied volatility. The effective spread increases on the event day and on the first two days following the earnings announcement.
Dispersion in Analyst Forecasts and the Profitability of Earnings Momentum Strategies
Authors: Dische Andreas
Published: March 2003

This paper shows that the dispersion in analysts’ consensus forecasts contains incremental information to predict future stock returns. Consistent with prior research, stock prices in the German market underreact to news about future earnings and drift in the direction suggested by analysts’ forecasts revisions. Even higher abnormal returns can be achieved by applying such an earnings momentum strategy to stocks with a low dispersion in analyst forecasts. These results support one of the recent behavioural models in which investors underweight new evidence and conservatively update their beliefs in the right direction, but by too little in magnitude with respect to more objective information.
The Missing View of the Cathedral: The Private Law Paradigm of European Legal Integration
Authors: Caruso Daniela
Published: March 2003

The traditional partition between public and private law continues to reinforce the belief that public law is the only proper realm of political debate, where decisions having redistributional consequences are and should be taken. This allows for a seemingly minor role of private law in the debate on European integration. This article challenges such a traditional image by noticing the central role of private law in the several legal systems of the European Union, and by analysing a few instances of resistance to private law integration. The analysis suggests that, while fully engaged in debating the public law implications of integration, Member States strive to keep civil adjudication within their control and to protect the self–contained, autonomous structure of their codes (or sets of private law doctrines) from the disruptive impact of European legislation. Integrationist pressures compel national legal actors to make explicit the social and economic choices underlying private law rules. Against such pressures, States’ resistance may take the shape of formalist entrenchment.
European Law and International Regimes: The Features of Law Beyond the Nation State
Authors: Zurn Michael , Wolf Dieter
Published: March 2003

Different forms of law are perceived of as possessing differing degrees of legal quality. A quality continuum suggests itself, running from ‘high quality’ national law, through to ‘lesser quality’ European law and to ‘low quality’ international law. This article seeks to explain the perceived differences in the quality of these laws with reference to legal theoretical perceptions of what it is that constitutes the law’s quality. It argues that only a theory of law which identifies the core of the law’s integrity as lying in its ability to act as a fulcrum between spheres of social and public discourse and the exercise of power can fully explain the divergence in legal quality between national, European and international law. With specific regard to the quality of European law, it concludes by arguing that it is weakened by its relative lack of social internalisation—in comparison with a higher degree of legal and political internalisation—within the European public.
The Institutional Requirements of the WTO in an Era of Globalisation: Imperfections in the Global Economic Polity
Authors: Mortensen Jens Ladefoged
Published: March 2003

To the liberal economist, ‘globalisation’ denotes the virtuous circle of expanded trade, investment and economic growth around the globe. In the political world, ‘globalisation’ is the vaguely understood and yet powerful undercurrents of irrevocable economic changes which have generated social tensions and environmental damage, loss of domestic competitiveness and national sovereignty. Throughout the social sciences, the usage of the term ‘globalisation’ is largely inconsistent and inconclusive—but its imprecision is matched only by its popularity. This article suggests that globalisation should be understood as a reconstruction process of the market as well as the polity. It is essentially a form of global market integration which can be observed from different vantage points, including governance. The premise of the article is that global market integration is surprisingly fragile and requires an adequate institutional foundation in order to move forward. Globalisation and governance are mutually constitutive phenomena. The polity governing the global market integration process cannot be separated in any meaningful sense from the changes in the market itself. This article concerns the institutional requirements of globalisation. While globalisation has produced institutional changes, it has not necessarily produced the most effective or legitimate ones. Exactly what polity construction should underpin globalisation? Should globalisation be left ungoverned? Should existing institutions be improved? Does it require the establishment of supranational sites and the re‐construction of hierarchical legal order at global level?
Analogy retrieval and processing with distributed vector representations
Authors: Plate Tony A.
Published: March 2003

Holographic reduced representations (HRRs) are a method for encoding nested relational structures in fixed‐width vector representations. HRRs encode relational structures as vector representations in such a way that the superficial similarity of the vectors reflects both superficial and structural similarity of the relational structures. HRRs also support a number of operations that could be very useful in psychological models of human analogy processing: fast estimation of superficial and structural similarity via a vector dot‐product; finding corresponding objects in two structures; and chunking of vector representations. Although similarity assessment and discovery of corresponding objects both theoretically take exponential time to perform fully and accurately, with HRRs one can obtain approximate solutions in constant time. The accuracy of these operations with HRRs mirrors patterns of human performance on analog retrieval and processing tasks.
An Analysis of Departmental Effectiveness, Participative Budgetary Control Processes and Environmental Dimensionality Within the Competing Values Framework: A Public Sector Study
Authors: Dunk Alan S. , Lysons Arthur F.
Published: March 2003

The competing values framework (CVF) has emerged as an integrative and consolidating mechanism to facilitate an examination of those factors that contribute to effectiveness in organizations. The CVF is adopted to investigate systematically the extent to which specific dimensions of the environment impact on the effectiveness of participative managerial control processes in terms of enhancing performance. The results based on a sample of 323 section managers from a wide range of public sector organizations throughout Australia suggest that they find complexity to be the crucial environmental dimension that influences the effectiveness of participative control processes in enhancing performance. The findings suggest that public sector managers may not be subject to the same environmental constraints as their counterparts in the private sector.
Productivity Growth in UK Accountancy Departments 1989–96
Authors: Glass J. Colin , McKillop Donal G. , O'Rourke Gary
Published: March 2003

The study investigates productivity change in UK accountancy departments over the period 1989–1996, with this change being decomposed into ‘change in efficiency’ and ‘technical change’. Efficiency change is also decomposed into changes in scale efficiency, output congestion and purely technical efficiency. To empirically assess the relative efficiency of each department, in transforming its monetary budget into teaching and research outputs, DEA techniques are utilized so as to enable comparison with a ‘best practice’ frontier. In doing this, the results of the 1989, 1992 and 1996 Research Assessment Exercises are incorporated so as to take account of the quality of research output.
Project Appraisal and Capital Investment Decision Making in the Scottish Water Industry
Authors: Coleshill Paul , Sheffield James W.
Published: March 2003

Restructuring the Scottish water industry has changed the way in which both project appraisal and capital investment decisions are performed. This article examines the project appraisal and subsequent capital investment decision in the case of a reed bed sewage treatment scheme which is compared with a more traditional scheme. Although the capital profiles of the schemes are similar there are major differences in the revenue costs. In addition, there are potential public benefits to the reed bed scheme. A comparison is made of management mechanisms in the pre‐1996 water industry with that of restructured water authorities. In the pre‐1996 water industry, local authorities had a broad remit which encouraged them to value these factors, in effect an implicit social account. The creation of water authorities with narrow remits and specific performance measures, constructed a framework that does not support the integration of social accounts into the decision making process. The paper demonstrates that investment appraisal is a product of the institutional framework in which the decisions are made. As that framework changes, mechanisms and measures of accountability shift in parallel.
Budgeting and Strategy in Schools: The Elusive Link
Authors: Edwards Pamela , Ezzamel Mahmoud , McLean Christine , Robson Keith
Published: March 2003

This paper examines the effects upon management control in schools following the assumption of responsibility for delegated budgets required by the Education Reform Act (ERA) 1988. The paper examines the process of construction, approval and amendment of school budgets drawing on a neo‐institutionalist framework. Our investigation has drawn upon extensive interviews in 17 schools in three North West local authorities, supplemented by a postal questionnaire and inspection of relevant documents. We develop two main arguments. First, in order to satisfy their statutory duties LEAs supervised the introduction of internal systems of budgetary control and school development planning in schools. Thus, control procedures were largely designed by internal auditors, who sought to provide an audit trail and to ensure financial probity mainly to satisfy external legitimacy, rather than to influence internal decision‐making. Second, the specific nature of the relationship between budgeting and strategy varies between schools as the extent of formalised planning differs, but in general there is a very loose coupling between strategic objectives and budget expenditures.
Negotiating the Network: The Contracting Experiences of Community Mental Health Agencies in New Zealand
Authors: Newberry Susan , Barnett Pauline
Published: March 2003

Structural options for reforming New Zealand'spublicly funded health services included a hierarchy, a market model, or hybrid arrangements such as quasi‐markets and networks. A survey of 28 community mental health agencies, contracting with the four regional health authorities, found that three structures emerged: a quasi‐market, a coercive network and a beneficent network. Further reforms to the publicly funded health services created a single purchaser and preferred a network structure. Performance assessment of these reformed health services requires assessment of the whole network and not just individual components. The accounting profession, although closely involved in the public sector reforms, appears to have overlooked this task.
Securitization: The Transformation of Illiquid Financial Assets into Liquid Capital Market Securities Examples from the European Market
Authors: Stone Charles Austin , Zissu Anne
Published: March 2003

Since the benefits a firm can derive from securitization are universal, the discussion of a market bounded by national borders is somewhat artificial unless the focus is on constraints particular to the country which promote or inhibit the use of securitization. With the exception of the United Kingdom, regulatory constraints have been an important factor in slowing the development of a European market for asset and mortgage backed securities. In addition to the regulatory hurdles, securitization in Europe has been inhibited by segmented corporate bond markets and the relatively slow development of money market savings vehicles for households. Liquidity across credit spectrums has been enhanced since the introduction of the Euro, as has been the competition for savings. European companies are developing the ability to securitize even if the technique is not yet being widely exploited. What is the European market for mortgage and asset backed securities? Does it include the U.S. credit card banks, Citicorp, Chase, MBNA, and First USA that have refinanced U.S. credit card receivables in European currencies and in Euro? Does it include GMAC which has structured Swiss Franc and Euro ABS backed by its U.S. dealer floor plan loans? Does it include Japanese banks that have refinanced Yen denominated leases with Euro and Swiss Franc ABS? Does it include Barclays' issue of $1 billion of ABS backed by sterling credit card receivables? Of course the answer is yes. Markets are defined by both the supply and demand sides. Our analysis focuses on the supply side of the domestic European market.
The Thrift IPO as the First Stage of its Subsequent Sale
Authors: Ciccotello Conrad S. , Field Laura Casares , Bennett Rosalind L.
Published: March 2003

Over one‐third of the thrifts that had an initial public offering (IPO) of stock between 1988 and 1992 were acquired within five years of the IPO. We compare the thrifts acquired as public firms to (1) those that go public and remain independent and (2) those that sell themselves privately via merger conversion. Prior to the IPO, publicly acquired thrifts have low risk relative to independent thrifts; a reflection of differing motivations for going public—grooming the firm for sale versus continued growth. Publicly acquired thrifts are over twice the size of privately sold thrifts, suggesting that the costs of going public are a factor in deciding whether to sell the firm privately or publicly.
Banks Increase Welfare
Authors: Samartín Margarita
Published: March 2003

This paper examines the relative degrees of risk sharing provided by demand deposit contracts and equity contracts. It is shown that in a framework in which individuals have smooth preferences and there exists some type of aggregate uncertainty (interest rate risk), the allocations obtained with a financial intermediary allow in general for greater risk sharing than those achieved in an equity economy. However, the interest rate is essential in order to determine the superiority of demand deposit contracts over equity contracts. The results of the paper contradict the ones obtained by Jacklin [1987] and Hellwig [1994], where demand deposit and equity contracts are always equivalent risk sharing instruments.
A Framework for Valuing Derivative Securities
Authors: Gray Philip , Gray Stephen F.
Published: March 2003

This paper develops a general framework for valuing a wide range of derivative securities. Rather than focusing on the stochastic process of the underlying security and developing an instantaneously‐riskless hedge portfolio, we focus on the terminal distribution of the underlying security. This enables the derivative security to be valued as the weighted sum of a number of component pieces. The component pieces are simply the different payoffs that the security generates in different states of the world, and they are weighted by the probability of the particular state of the world occurring. A full set of derivations is provided. To illustrate its use, the valuation framework is applied to plain‐vanilla call and put options, as well as a range of derivatives including caps, floors, collars, supershares, and digital options.
Women’s Costume and Feminine Civic Morality in Augustan Rome
Authors: Sebesta Judith Lynn
Published: March 2003

Augustus claimed that the moral decay of the Roman Republic was especially due to Roman women who had forsaken their traditional role of custos domi (‘preserver of the house/hold’). In reforming feminine morality, Augustus created a new pictorial language that troped the feminine body as a ‘moral sign’ of civic morality and authorized a distinctive costume for women. Sebesta investigates the relationship between women’s garments, the female body and the Roman concept of feminine civic morality.
‘Ex utroque sexu fidelium tres ordines’– The Status of Women in Early Medieval Canon Law
Authors: Synek Eva M.
Published: March 2003

Canon law provides for various categorisations among Christians. In early Christian and medieval sources it is often not very clear whether a category is only for men, or for women as well. Taking as its starting point the question of lay status this article intends to clarify terminological difficulties. It touches upon the question of female members of the clergy and the greater equality of monks and nuns. The status of queens and empresses is also discussed.
Gendering Princely Dynasties: Some Notes on Family Structure, Social Networks, and Communication at the Courts of the Margraves of Brandenburg‐Ansbach around 1500
Authors: Nolte Cordula
Published: March 2003

The paper presents princely dynasties and families of the late middle ages as complex subjects of historical‐anthropological gender research. It sketches some basic characteristics of aristocratic families and their structure, of their networks of relations and communication. The dynamics of family networks in connection with life course and family life cycle are discussed with particular attention to the consequences of aging and age. The perspective on the family includes the court. Its architecture and its personnel, in particular the female entourage, are examined in relation to members of the princely families. The dynasty of the Margraves of Brandenburg‐Ansbach has been chosen as the main point of reference because their family correspondence offers rich material to exemplify these aspects.
Reflections on Gender and Status Distinctions: An Analysis of the Liturgical Textiles Recorded in Mid–Sixteenth–Century London
Authors: Hayward Maria
Published: March 2003

This paper considers the relative significance of social standing and gender in parish life within early modern London, and how this was expressed via their liturgical textiles up to 1552. The data are drawn from the 1552 parish inventories that recorded these textiles and the other appurtenances of worship. Vestments worn for communion, robes for boy choristers and the range of textiles associated with birth, christening, churching, marriage and death are evaluated to see how far they reveal distinctions between men and women, adults and children, rich and poor, laity and clergy. A range of differences can be seen, as can the way in which social and gender considerations interlink.
Fashioning the American Man: The Arrow Collar Man, 1907–1931
Authors: Turbin Carole
Published: March 2003

This essay is about the Arrow Man, one of the most successful advertising images in early twentieth–century America, and a visual representation of the New Man. The Arrow Man was created by a noted artist, J. C. Leyendecker, to sell the Arrow collar, a new version of detachable collars, a wardrobe staple for most US men and all but working–class men in Britain and Europe since the 1840s. The Arrow Man’s story is part of the transformations in masculine ideals and physical appearance, heightened by the new visual and consumer culture. He carried messages of men’s self–management of appearance and public performance from the nineteenth century into the early twentieth, where it changed from a mark of European gentility into that of the typically American white–collar man. His story is part of fundamental shifts in the US: new occupational and social class configurations and emerging American popular culture.
Women, Employment and Feminism in the Czech Republic
Authors: Crompton Rosemary
Published: March 2003

Following the collapse of state socialism in Eastern Europe, one feature of the newly emerging ‘post‐communist’ societies which disturbed many feminists was the apparent antipathy to western feminist thinking which characterized men and women alike. In attempting to explain this situation, commentators in Eastern Europe have argued that in Eastern Europe, women’s experiences have been shaped by ‘state paternalism’, rather than specifically masculine exclusionary practices. Drawing upon material from a cross‐national study, this paper examines the employment and domestic life experiences of women bankers and doctors in the Czech Republic. This evidence suggests that women in these occupations are fully conscious of, and resent, both masculine exlusionary practices within employment as well as inequalities in the domestic division of labour. These findings are supported by evidence from a national attitudinal survey which reveals that Czech women are more progressive in their attitudes to gender roles than Czech men. A number of parallels can be drawn between the contemporary experiences and attitudes of Czech women and those of British women of twenty years ago (i.e. before the impact of ‘second‐wave’ feminism). This suggests that if and when feminism develops in Eastern Europe, it will engage with these direct masculine exclusionary practices, and not just ‘state paternalism’.
Reproducing Gendered Hierarchies in Everyday Work: Contradictions in an Employment Office
Authors: Korvajärvi Päivi
Published: March 2003

This paper is concerned with the dynamics of producing gendered hierarchies in the workplace. While the focus is on the present day, developments over the past ten years are also examined. The term ‘doing gender’ is adopted as a method of outlining these dynamics within seemingly static gendered hierarchies. Within the case study organization, a Finnish employment office, the ways of doing gender have shifted from maintaining gendered hierarchic harmony towards women?s and men's separate but invisible cultures. However, men's practices are linked in a more direct way to the textual and official goals of the organization, whereas women's working methods show some implicit opposition to the organizational logic. Throughout gendered contradictions are emphasized: between inequality and equal opportunities; informal sociability and formal rules; and the invisibility and visibility of gender.
Documenting Discrimination: A Study of Recruitment Cases Brought to the Norwegian Gender Equality Ombud
Authors: Teigen Mari
Published: March 2003

This article investigates appointment cases brought to the Gender Equality Ombud over a ten‐year period (1985–94). The study presented here aims to explore gender discrimination in recruitment and why it is so hard to document. An advantage of studying appointment cases brought to the Ombud is that the three parties — the plaintiff, the hiring authority and the Ombud — are all engaged in presenting arguments directly concerning gender discrimination. The two key questions are: how do hiring authorities argue to counter assertions of discrimination? And on what grounds are arguments accepted/not accepted by the Ombud? The cases investigated are divided into three categories: cases from male‐dominated organizations, woman‐dominated organizations and gender‐balanced organizations. How the gender of the candidates has influenced the hiring process can only be read indirectly from most cases; hiring authorities usually argue that it is the concern for personal suitability that has been the decisive factor. In the analysis of the cases three main types of justifications of hiring preferences are identified: ‘continuity’, ‘renewal’ and ‘the woman is unfit’.

The decision situation of the Ombud is uncertain in most cases. In many cases the juridical expertise of hiring authorities seems to be decisive. The demarcation line is unclear concerning which arguments should be accepted as impartial and which should be rejected because of vagueness or subjectivity.
Masculinity and the Biographical Meanings of Management Theory: Lyndall Urwick and the Making of Scientific Management in Inter‐war Britain
Authors: Roper Michael
Published: March 2003

This article explores the biographical shaping of management theory. Using the British management theorist Lyndall Urwick (1891–1983) as a case study, it argues that existing understandings of the history of management studies are limited by their lack of attention to the emotional a priori of theory production. For men such as Frederick Taylor or Urwick, the work of composing management theory for a public audience was intimately connected to events and experiences in the private life. Theorizing addressed emotional dilemmas even while it strove to construct a separation between the personal and the organizational. Management theories are not only historically, socially or discursively constructed, but can be read in terms of the evidence they provide about individual subjectivity. Psychoanalytic concepts can help illuminate such relations. Theorizing can be seen as a form of play: as something which, in D.W. Winnicott's terms, takes place in the space between the psychic reality of the ‘me’ and the external world of the ‘not me’. The ‘classical’ administrative theory represented by Taylor, Fayol and Urwick sought to create organizational structures which could stand apart from, and allow the management of, individual personalities. It simultaneously insisted on the status of theory as the ‘not me’; that is, as a product which was not shaped by personal experience, but which constituted objective knowledge. The illusion of theory as a largely external, social product persists in much management and organization studies today. This article challenges that social determinism, first, by showing how Urwick's theories addressed issues of separation and intimacy, and second, by placing Urwick's work in the context of his relations with women.
Corporate Strategy and Gendered Professional Identities: Reorganization and the Struggle for Recognition and Positions
Authors: Rasmussen Bente
Published: March 2003

Will decentralization of responsibilities in services give women service workers at the lower levels of the organization better and more ‘professional’ jobs and a recognition of their importance in the organization? This article looks at the valuation of so‐called women's skills in services in reorganization processes involving dehierarchization and decentralization of responsibilities. Through four cases of reorganized private and public services in Norway it is shown that more focus on customers and decentralization of responsibilities for the services may lead to recognition of gendered skills and an improved position for women service workers at the lowest levels of the organization. When the tasks of the workers are closely linked to the core function of the organization and not dominated by the organization's ‘dirty work’, the women at the lowest levels may obtain a more ‘professional’ work role and their work be recognized as important for the organization.