Digital Commons Network^™

Is There Deadweight Loss In Holiday Rewards?, Kevin F. Hallock

Economics Faculty Publications

An interesting and provocative study was conducted by Joel Waldfogel of the University of Minnesota some 20 years ago. He wrote "The Deadweight Loss of Christmas." Waldfogel was not only discussing Christmas but noted that the ideas could apply to other holidays with gift-giving rituals. The study noted that although gift giving is generally applauded by economists since it is a way to help the macro economy, there is another side to the story. A problem with gift giving (or non-monetary rewards) is that the gift giver often does not perfectly know the preferences of the person receiving the gift. …

Language Learning And Study Abroad: A Critical Reading Of The Research (Review), Elizabeth M. Kissling

Latin American, Latino and Iberian Studies Faculty Publications

Kinginger’s interpretation of the research represents an endorsement of the great potential of study abroad, balanced with several limitations and caveats. Kinginger argues that while study abroad generally results in increased proficiency and oral fluency, slightly superior to gains resulting from at-home formal study, one should note the design flaws of many studies such as lack of a true control group as well as reliance on monologic, situation-less tasks to measure language gains, even in the areas of discursive, pragmatic, and sociocultural competencies. Kinginger also notes that opportunities for learning language and cultural through interactions with native speakers can be …

Norms And Survival In The Heat Of War: Normative Versus Instrumental Rationalities And Survival Tactics In The Blockade Of Leningrad, Jeffrey K. Hass

Sociology and Anthropology Faculty Publications

When war challenges civilian survival, what shapes the balance between normative and instrumental rationalities in survival practices? Increasing desperation and uncertainty can lead civilians to focus on their own material interests and to violate norms in the name of survival or gain—to the detriment of the war effort and of other civilians. Do norms, boundaries against transgressions, and considerations of collective interests and identities persist, and, if so, through what mechanisms? Using diaries and recollections from the 872-day Blockade of Leningrad (1941–1944)—an extreme case of wartime desperation—this article examines how three forms of cultural embeddedness shape variation in the strength …

Postmortems On The Affordable Care Act (Book Review), Rick Mayes

Political Science Faculty Publications

Nearly two years after the Affordable Care Act became law, books are appearing by Washington insiders who detail how the legislation came about. The two reviewed here discuss and dissect topics related to the health reform law from decidedly different points of view.

The Temporal And Spatial Connectivity Of The Gambles Mill Corridor, Richmond, Va, R.M. Price, K. Billups, S. Bodner, M. Burbank, L. Cohan, S. Elliott, C. Landesberg, G. Leonard, J. Marconi, M. Mcgovern, J. Petrosino, A. Phadke, C. Phelan, A. Purdy, David S. Salisbury

Geography and the Environment Poster Presentations

The City of Richmond and the Virginia Department of Transportation proposed to rehabilitate the Gambles Mill Trail connecting the University of Richmond (UR) to the intersection of Huguenot and River Road. Planners envision this trail as a sustainable model for the reduction of nutrient and sediment flow and as a vital path in a city-wide network of bike and pedestrian trails. Meanwhile, UR also proposes to rehabilitate the corridor in their new Master Plan. Nevertheless, until now, no substantive studies exist on the trail or the corridor linking the trail to the south side of the James River through the …

The Bathsheba Syndrome: When A Leader Fails, Donelson R. Forsyth

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

Another leader—no, an entire cadre of leaders—has been found to be a moral failure. Legal authorities have charged Jerry Sandusky, who retired as the defensive coordinator for the Penn State football team in 1999, with the sexual abuse of children who he targeted through his involvement in the charitable organization The Second Mile. Additionally, a number of other administrators and leaders at Penn State University—the university’s president Graham Spanier, vice-president Gary Schultz, athletic director Tim Curley and long-time football coach Joe Paterno—face charges or have been fired from the university because of their failure to take action when Sandusky’s crimes …

Pay System Gender Neutrality, Kevin F. Hallock

Economics Faculty Publications

It was Francine Blau's "Equal Pay in the Office" (1977) that laid out some of the seminal research on gender differences in labor market outcomes. Blau and other pioneering researchers established decades ago that the gender pay gap (then around 40%) could not be ignored by academic economists. Many organizations are concerned with whether their individual pay systems are gender neutral, but it is not easy to test robustly a pay system's gender neutrality. To build such a test requires consideration of several issues, including control variables, occupational patterns, statistical specifications, and the often-overlooked difference between wage and salary income …

Molecular Systematics Of The Middle American Genus Hypopachus (Anura: Microhylidae), Eli Greenbaum, Eric N. Smith, Rafael O. De Sá

Biology Faculty Publications

We present the first phylogenetic study on the widespread Middle American microhylid frog genus Hypopachus. Partial sequences of mitochondrial (12S and 16S ribosomal RNA) and nuclear (rhodopsin) genes (1275 bp total) were analyzed from 43 samples of Hypopachus, three currently recognized species of Gastrophryne, and seven arthroleptid, brevicipitid and microhylid outgroup taxa. Maximum parsimony (PAUP), maximum likelihood (RAxML) and Bayesian inference (MrBayes) optimality criteria were used for phylogenetic analyses, and BEAST was used to estimate divergence dates of major clades. Population-level analyses were conducted with the programs NETWORK and Arlequin. Results confirm the placement of Hypopachus …

Nokia Siemens Networks: Just Doing Business – Or Supporting An Oppressive Regime?, Judith Schrempf-Stirling

Management Faculty Publications

This case study examines the relevance of taking social and political factors into consideration when a corporation is making a key business decision. In September 2009, Simon Beresford-Wylie, the outgoing CEO of Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN), was reviewing the company’s achievements — while acknowledging the latest public criticism regarding NSN’s business relationship with the Iranian government. In the summer of 2009, NSN was accused of complicity in human rights violations linked to Iran’s presidential election. The company sold network infrastructure and software solutions to the Iranian government, which then used this technology to observe, block, and control domestic communications. Should …

Say On Pay And Compensation Design, Kevin F. Hallock

Economics Faculty Publications

Say on pay is demanding far more time and energy than expected, and its full impact on the world won't be known for years. The 2011 proxy season was the first time publicly traded firms in the U.S. were required by law to solicit from their shareholders advisory yes or no votes on the pay package awarded to the CEO. In every industry, the median CEO received a raise (positive year-on-year change) in total CEO compensation. The mix of pay shifted some. For example, in the communications industry, the average share of total compensation paid in salary fell by 6.53 …

Sell Unipolarity? The Future Of An Overvalued Concept, Jeffrey W. Legro

Political Science Faculty Publications

For at least the past thirty years, scholarship on international relations has been bewitched by a simple proposition: the polarity of the international system is a central cause of great power strategies and politics. The number of "poles" (dominant countries) in the system is like an invisible fence that shapes states as if they were dogs with electronic collars or a Skinner box that conditions national "rats." States can choose to ignore the fence or box, but if they do, they must pay the consequences. The polarity of the international system as defined by the number of great powers - …

Coca And Conservation: Cultivation, Eradication, And Trafficking In The Amazon Borderlands, David S. Salisbury, C. Fagan

Geography and the Environment Faculty Publications

The cultivation and traffic of coca, Erythrolxylum coca, and coca derivatives remain understudied threats to the conservation of the Amazon rainforest. Currently the crop is transforming land use and livelihoods in the ecologically and culturally rich borderlands of Amazonian Peru. The isolated nature of this region characterized by indigenous populations (both settled and uncontacted), conservation units, resource concessions, and a lack of state presence provides fertile ground for the boom and bust cycle of coca production and facilitates the international transport of the product to neighboring Brazil. This paper explores the social and environmental impacts of coca production, eradication, and …

Will Specialization Continue Forever? A Case Study Of Interactions Between Industry Specialization And Diversity, Xiaobing Shuai

School of Professional and Continuing Studies Faculty Publications

This paper studies the interactions between industry specialization and diversity. Several studies have shown that competitive industries in a region grew faster, thus expanding their shares in overall employment. The implication is that a region will become more specialized in its competitive industries and the process will continue forever barring external intervention. Utilizing an econometric model on county level employment growth in Virginia, this study confirms that competitive industries experience faster employment growth, reinforcing specialization. However, as specialization proceeds, it reduces economic diversity. That will hurt job creation, as economic diversity also stimulates employment growth. The interactions between specialization and …

Linking Compensation And Job Losses During A Recession, Kevin F. Hallock

Economics Faculty Publications

For more than 60 years, no permanent Lincoln Electric employee has been laid off for lack of work. 2010 marked the 10th consecutive year year that the company increased its dividend and stock price gains have fairly consistently outperformed the S&P 500 during the past five years. For most organizations, when costs need to be cut, shedding some workers is part of the solution. Work Sharing Unemployment Insurance tries to mitigate the negative repercussions of layoffs. Under WSUI, workers are eligible for a prorated fraction of unemployment insurance benefits. Proponents of WSUI contend that hiring, firing, and retraining costs are …

The Principle Of Fairness And States’ Duty To Obey International Law, David Lefkowitz

Philosophy Faculty Publications

Philosophers and political theorists have developed a number of different justifications for the duty to obey domestic law. The possibility of using one (or more) of these justifications to demonstrate that states have a duty to obey international law seems a natural starting point for an analysis of international political obligation. Amongst the accounts of the duty to obey domestic law, one that appears to have a great deal of intuitive appeal, and that has attracted a significant number of philosophical defenders, is the principle of fairness (or fair play). In this paper, I examine the possibility of using the …

Group Processes And The Chilean Mine Disaster, Donelson R. Forsyth

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

We are used to hearing about groups and problems they can cause, but the rescue of the Chilean miners is a story of everyday individuals who, by banding together, can do great good.

From The President: A Heart-Felt Thank You, Joyce Manna Janto

Law Faculty Publications

In her final From the President column, Ms. Janto reviews her terms and thanks those who assisted her.

Does That Pay Practice Really Have Any Impact?, Kevin F. Hallock

Economics Faculty Publications

Few organizations take the time to credibly study whether some pay, benefits, work-life balance or other total rewards practices have any impact on the organizations' bottom line or employee outcomes like productivity or turnover. It's too difficult to do well, organizations don't actually want to know the answer, and/or organizations don't have the know-how or time. One successfully executed, evidence-based study of a new compensation practice is Safelite AutoGlass. Edward Lazear compared the productivity change worker by worker, for only those employees present under both pay arrangements. Lazear found that not only did productivity increase after the change from hourly …

Dr Pepper Snapple Group: Fighting To Prosper In A Highly Competitive Market, Joseph S. Harrison

Robins Case Network

Since its separation from the food giant Cadbury Schweppes, Dr Pepper Snapple Group has experienced successes such as the turnaround of the Snapple brand and growth in demand for some of its popular brands. However, the company is still a distant third in an incredibly competitive industry. How can the company achieve continued success in the shadows of Coca Cola and PepsiCo?

The Rollercoaster Ride Of Redistricting, Thomas J. Shields

School of Professional and Continuing Studies Faculty Publications

At Kings Dominion they have rollercoaster rides called the Intimidator, the Dominator, the Grizzly and - my favorite - the Hurler. I think they should add one called the Redistricting Rollercoaster Ride, which would be equally as thrilling and nauseating. I hopped on this ride thinking I was to be a viable candidate in Senate District 8, a new district to include portions of Henrico and Chesterfield counties and part of the city of Richmond. I turned out to be a theoretical candidate for a theoretical district, as Senate District 8 was eliminated from the redistricting bill. I walk away, …

No Exit: Yemen's Existential Crisis, Sheila Carapico

Political Science Faculty Publications

A venal dictatorship three decades old, mutinous army officers, dissident tribal sheikhs, a parliamentary opposition coalition, youthful pro-democracy activists, gray-haired Socialists, gun-toting cowboys, veiled women protesters, northern carpetbaggers, Shi‘i insurgents, tear gas canisters, leaked State Department cables, foreign-born jihadis -- Yemen’s demi-revolutionary spring has it all. The mass uprising in southern Arabia blends features of the peaceful popular revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia with elements of the state repression in Libya and Syria in a gaudy, fast-paced, multi-layered theater of revolt verging on the absurd.

Pay Ratios And Pay Inequality, Kevin F. Hallock

Economics Faculty Publications

Some argue that reporting the ratio of CEO pay to that of the median-compensated worker in the organization is useful since it highlights the sometimes large discrepancy between the pay of an average worker and that of corporate executives. One argument against reporting the ratio of CEO pay to median worker pay is that this is much more difficult to calculate in practice than in theory. The hourly earnings of workers at the bottom have been incredibly flat for the last generation. Only the top 5% have seen large gains over time. For CEOs, the gains are substantial. the multiple …

Mixed Agendas And Government Regulation Of Business: Can We Clean Up The Mess?, Tom Arnold, Jerry L. Stevens

Finance Faculty Publications

The history of regulation in the U.S. economy shows a cumulative growth of government involvement in private enterprise that has helped business at times and has been at odds with business at other times. The wavering views on how much regulation is warranted change over time and cut across political and philosophical ideologies. For example, in the first two years of President Barack Obama's administration there was a push for new and large increases in regulation of healthcare and financial markets along with intervention into public markets with massive spending to bailout automakers and financial institutions.

Now, in the second …

From The President: Beginnings And Endings, Joyce Manna Janto

Law Faculty Publications

In her "From the President" column, Ms. Janto discusses the upcoming AALL Annual Meeting.

Invisible Occupation: Indigenous Natural Resource Management In The Peruvian Amazon, Aleah Goldin, David S. Salisbury, James Águila Soria, Raquel Espinosa Linares, Enzo Pinedo Ramírez, Luís Rosero Flores, Miguel Núnez Sánchez, Gerardo Cavero Oroche, Jorge Vela Alvarado, Oscar Barreto Vásquez, Giraldo Almeida Villanueva, Carlos Pérez Alván

Geography and the Environment Poster Presentations

On June 5th 2009, an estimated thirty people died in a clash between governmental authorities and indigenous people near Bagua, Peru. Termed the "Bagua Massacre," this event underscores the marginalized role of Indigenous Amazonians when confronting multinational commercial interests supported by the state (Shepard, 2009). The indigenous people were protesting the “Law of the Jungle,” Decree 1090, a 2009 decree assuming heavily-forested indigenous lands idle and unproductive, and providing the legal basis to privatize comunally-held forests to facilitate petroleum, biofuel, hydroelectric and logging projects. Since contact, the assumption of indigenous people unproductively managing their forested homelands has fueled colonization, deforestation, …

Gestión Invisible: Manejo De Recursos Naturales En Dos Comunidades Indígenas Peruanas, Aleah Goldin, Yazmin Nunez, David S. Salisbury, James Águila Soria, Raquel Espinosa Linares, Enzo Pinedo Ramírez, Luís Rosero Flores, Miguel Nuñez Sánchez, Gerardo Cavero Oroche, Jorge Vela Alvarado, Oscar Barreto Vásquez, Giraldo Almeida Villanueva, Carlos Pérez Alván

Geography and the Environment Poster Presentations

El 5 de junio de 2009, unas treinta personas murieron en Bagua, Perú en un enfrentamiento entre las autoridades gubernamentales y los pueblos indígenas. El evento denominado el "Baguazo", destaca el papel marginalizado de los indígenas amazónicos cuando se enfrentan a los intereses comerciales multinacionales respaldados por el Estado (Shepard, 2009). Los pueblos indígenas estaban protestando la "Ley de la Selva", el Decreto 1090, un decreto de 2009 asumiendo las tierras indígenas boscosas como improductivas, y que proporciona la base legal para privatizar los bosques comunales para facilitar la extracción de petróleo, los proyectos de biocombustibles, los proyectos hidroeléctricos y …

Monopsony And Salary Suppression: The Case Of Major League Soccer In The United States, John Twomey, James Monks

Economics Faculty Publications

Top tier professional soccer in the United States is operated by Major League Soccer (MLS). The MLS was established and operates under a single entity structure, such that all players negotiate and sign contracts with the league rather than with individual teams. This monopsonistic structure was designed to eliminate competition for players across teams within the league and thus allow the league to suppress player salaries. This paper investigates how effective the MLS has been in achieving this goal and finds that the MLS devotes only about 25 percent of its revenues to player salaries, compared to 50 to 60 …

Pay Secrecy And Relative Pay, Kevin F. Hallock

Economics Faculty Publications

In March 2008, the Sacramento Bee began publishing the salaries of all California state workers, including public universities. UC Berkeley professors took this information and used it to learn about pay secrecy, relative income, and how people feel and react to knowing what their co-workers earn. It turns out that there is a dramatic difference in the response to new information about wages of co-workers, depending on whether an individual has wage and salary pay above or below the median for his or her workgroup. For those who earn below the middle of their group, the new information about the …

Jean Hampton’S Theory Of Punishment: A Critical Appreciation, Richard Dagger

Political Science Faculty Publications

Jean Hampton’s work first came to my attention in 1984, when the summer issue of Philosophy & Public Affairs appeared in my mailbox. Hampton’s essay in that issue, “The Moral Education Theory of Punishment,” did not persuade me—or many others, I suspect—that “punishment should not be justified as a deserved evil, but rather as an attempt, by someone who cares, to improve a wayward person” (Hampton 1984, 237). The essay did persuade me, though, that moral education is a plausible aim of punishment, even if it is not the “full and complete justification” Hampton claimed it to be (Hampton 1984, …

Introduction: Navigating The Unknown, Melvyn P. Leffler, Jeffrey W. Legro

Political Science Faculty Publications

On November 9, 1989, the Berlin Wall came down. Hardly anyone had foreseen this event. When President Ronald Reagan had challenged Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in June 1987 “to tear down this wall,” he never anticipated that Berliners themselves would have the opportunity and courage to bring about such dramatic change. We now know that the Wall came down as a result of accidental circumstances, a series of mistaken statements and understandings among officials of the German Democratic Republic. No one had planned for this to happen, and no one had plans to deal with a new landscape that might …