Digital Commons Network^™

Slavery Is Bad For Business: Analyzing The Impact Of Slavery On National Economies, Monti Narayan Datta, Kevin Bales

Political Science Faculty Publications

This article, using a novel dataset, demonstrates that slavery is empirically bad for business. Building upon the work of Robert Smith, the authors analysis examines the relationship between the prevalence of slavery in a country (in terms of the proportion of the population enslaved) and several economic measures (the United Nations Human Development Index, growth domestic product in terms of purchasing power parity, access to financial services, and the Gini coefficient). In each instance, controlling for alternative explanations, greater levels of slavery are associated with a decline in economic growth and human development. The findings imply that beyond the morality …

Location And Competitive Strategy In Retail: The Case Of Gamestop In Michigan, Karl P. Schrantz

Masters Theses

The State of Michigan offers a unique retail environment that offers a diverse arena for firms to interact and compete in. The state has many cities of different size and a multitude of retail chains that operate within them. Over the past two decades this competition has become even stiffer with the rapid growth of big box retailers. In spite of this general notion there are often the less known stories of small retailers that have been able to compete and survive big box retailing. This research aims to assess how a smaller retail chain, GameStop in this case, is …

Allowing For Low-Cost Labor In Underdeveloped And Developing Countries As A Method For Initiating Economic Industrialization, Jordon A. Wolfram

Selected Honors Theses

The topic presented here closely examines the link between low-cost labor and the affect that it has on initiating industrialization in underdeveloped and developed countries. It can ultimately create a better standard of living for a country’s general population in the future, but the initial conditions for the laborers can be harsh. The low wage labor force achieves this goal by creating a competitive labor market which has the ability to stimulate economic growth. Once the initial steps of creating manufacturing and industry are achieved, then the general standard of living has robust potential to increase in the country as …

43rd Annual Wku Student Research Conference, Student Research Council, Western Kentucky University

Student Research Conference Select Presentations

No abstract provided.

Internationalisation In A Network Environment: A Conceptual Model Of How Professional Service Firms Internationalise, Deirdre Mcquillan, Vincent Mangematin, Pamela Sharkey Scott

Conference papers

Professional service firms (“PSFs”) increasingly rely on internationalisation to drive their growth strategy. Their professional reputation and networks of relationships are critical due to the high knowledge complexity of their services. Yet international business process theory (“IB”), while identifying learning as the critical tool for addressing foreign market risk, provides little insight into how PSFs build relationships and reputation for internationalisation. Our qualitative multiple case research study of the PSF internationalisation process identified five phases of interplay between learning, relationship and reputation building. These findings extend IB theory by revealing the role of reputation and relationship building during the internationalisation …

Location-Allocation Optimization Of Supply Chain Distribution Networks: A Case Study, Mark Nicholas Helberg

Theses and Dissertations

The location of distribution centers is an important strategic decision in supply chain design, particularly as it relates to service quality, productivity, and profitability of the firm. There has been extensive research performed on distribution location models which require the use of complex algorithms and assumptions that make use of these models difficult in practice for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) that have limited capital and resources. Studies have also failed to capture and quantify potential business results of using more sophisticated methods. In this study, a deterministic and static location-allocation model is designed using a prototype software tool. The …

Csr: Good Intentions And Wild Dreams Are Not Enough, Singapore Management University

Perspectives@SMU

When Mariam Al Foudery graduated over a decade ago, the people recruiting aggressively on campus were from investment banking and management consulting firms. But that’s changed, giving rise to more opportunities in corporate social responsibility and social entrepreneurship.

2013 Q1 Market Pulse Report, John K. Paglia

Pepperdine Market Pulse Report

The quarterly IBBA and M&A Source Market Pulse Survey was created to gain an accurate understanding of the market conditions for businesses being sold in Main Street (values $0-$2MM) and the lower middle market (values $2MM -$50MM). The national survey was conducted with the intent of providing a valuable resource to business owners and their advisors. The IBBA and M&A Source present the Market Pulse Survey with the support of the Pepperdine Private Capital Markets Project and the Graziado School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University.

Managing Activities At Wineries: Building And Sustaining A Place-Based Brand, Ethan Seltzer, Mark Bernard, Jp Mcneil, Lori Parks

Urban Studies and Planning Faculty Publications and Presentations

The Willamette Valley Winery Association, Oregon Winery Association, Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development, and Oregon Department of Agriculture asked the authors to develop information needed to help inform discussions regarding the replacement for the soon-to-sunset HB 3280. HB 3280, signed by the Governor in August of 2011, provided a means for defining and regulating wine-related and non-wine-related events occurring or proposed to occur at wineries and vineyards in Oregon, often in exclusive farm use zones. Our charge was to investigate the following policy issue: How have wine regions permitted and managed a range of uses and activities at …

An Investigation Of College Students’ Learning Styles In The Us And China, G. Q. Zhan, D. Moodie, Yanmin Sun, Bailing Wang

Faculty Articles

This research project explores learning styles of college students in the US and China. The Grasha-Reichmann Student Learning Style Scale, designed to measure how college students view their learning, was used as the main instrument for the current study. A total of 511 college students, 274 from the US and 237 from China, participated in this study. Results indicate that there are significant differences between the Chinese and American students in their reported learning styles, but not necessarily in the direction of conventional prediction. For example, the Chinese participants scored higher on the independent and competitive subscales than the American …

Corporate Boards’ Political Ideology Diversity And Firm Performance, Incheol Kim, Christos Pantzalis, Jung Chul Park

Finance Faculty Publications

We investigate whether diversity in points of view within corporate boards, as captured by the diversity in political ideology of board members, can affect a firm's performance. We employ personal political contributions' data to measure political ideology distance among groups of inside, outside directors and the CEO. Our empirical evidence strongly supports the notion that outside directors' monitoring effectiveness is more likely to be enhanced when their viewpoints are distinct from those of management. We find that ideologically diverse boards are associated with better firm performance, lower agency costs and less insiders' discretionary power over the firm's Political Action Committee …

Factors Affecting Students’ Decision Of Hotel Selection, Mingyang Liu, Ritong He

MBA Student Scholarship

The goal of this research is to identify the factors affecting students’ hotel choices, to examine the impact of hotel servers when a potential guest selects a hotel, and to determine how hotel servers influence a student’s preference. The target populations for this study were Johnson & Wales University students who had stayed in U.S. hotels. A print-out questionnaire survey was distributed, descriptive statistics, and z-tests were used to address the research hypothesis. The results of the study indicated a significant positive relationship between hotel services and students’ decisions on their hotel selection. Location of the hotel, online information, and …

Managing A Global Partnership Model: Lessons From The Boeing 787 'Dreamliner' Program, Suresh Kotha, Kannan Srikanth

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Little research has examined the integration challenges in globally disaggregated value chains in a complex NPD effort or the tools managers use to overcome such challenges. Drawing on Boeing's 787 program, we highlight integration challenges Boeing faced and how it addressed them through recourse to partial co-location, establishing a centralized integration support center, reintegrating some activities performed by suppliers, and using its bargaining power to facilitate changes. The integration tools Boeing employed were geared toward two primary objectives: (1) gaining increased visibility of actions and visibility of knowledge networks across partner firms; and (2) motivating partners to take actions to …

Private Governance, Public Implications And The Tightrope Of Regulatory Reform: The Isda Credit Derivatives Determinations Committees, John Biggins, Colin Scott

Transnational Business Governance Interactions Working Papers

Regulatory relationships in financial markets exemplify the importance and changing nature of transnational business governance interactions (TBGI). These interactions involve reciprocal forces of influence between private and public regulators. This paper examines one key case of private governance in financial markets: the emergence, structures and decision-making of Credit Derivatives Determinations Committees (DCs) of the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA). The paper highlights the mechanisms or 'pathways' of interaction between ISDA, governments, courts and public regulators. Interactions between state and non-state actors are shown to occur in both operational and policy spheres. ISDA is found to be a particularly resilient …

A System Of Transnational Business Interactions: The Case Of The Living Wage, David J. Doorey

Transnational Business Governance Interactions Working Papers

The subject of transnational business governance (TBG) interactions is an emerging field of study. These interactions are complex, involving multiple public and private actors crossing vast geopolitical spaces, with sometimes shared, but often conflicting interests. This complexity makes TBG interactions both an exciting new field of inquiry for scholars, but also an extremely challenging one. In these early days of theory development, it is useful to engage in a mapping exercise that will help scholars identify and test the relationships between the many inputs and outputs of TBG interactions. This new systems framework is demonstrated by reference to the complex …

2012-2013 Financial Summary, Morehead State University. Budget & Financial Planning Office.

Morehead State University Financial Summaries Archive

2012-2013 Financial Summary of Morehead State University.

Attitudes Of Students And Practitioners Regarding Ethical Acceptability Of Accounting Transactions, Mary Fischer, Treba Marsh, George L. Hunt

Faculty Publications

This study reports the findings of a study assessing the acceptability differences in decisions made by Certified Public Accounting practitioners (CPA) and students studying to become CPAs. The study responds to researchers’ call for additional research on topics related to accounting decision ethics. Modified managerial and accounting recognition scenarios were used to collect the acceptability of ethical judgments. The analysis employs factor analysis to affirm whether the scenarios are mana­gerial or accounting recognition decisions. The analyses further divides the managerial decisions into either revenue or expense related. The accounting recognition decisions are further divided into those involving an accounting manipulation …

Santa Clara Magazine, Volume 54 Number 3, Winter 2013, Santa Clara University

Santa Clara Magazine

16 - TO CATCH A THIEF by Vince Beiser. Mathematician George Mohler has helped equip police in Santa Cruz and L.A. with an algorithm that predicts where crimes might happen next. Is this the future of policing?

22 - HOW TO PREVENT A BONFIRE OF THE HUMANITIES by Michael S. Malone '75, MBA '77. A veteran chronicler of Silicon Valley looks at why the high-tech industry needs-and wants-folks who know how to tell a story.

26 - A POEM, A PRAYER, AND A MARTINI FOR THE RHINO Two conversations with Chancellor William J. Rewak, S.J.-who's just published his first collection …

Affixing The Service Mark: Reconsidering The Rise Of An Oxymoron, Peter J. Karol

Law Faculty Scholarship

This article explores the deep and to date unacknowledged contradictions underlying service marks (trademarks used in connection with services rather than goods). Namely, the Lanham Act statutorily mandates treating trademarks the “same” as service marks; yet it simultaneously loosens requirements for proving service mark “use” by allowing mere advertising to substantiate service mark rights. This shortcut is not permitted with trademarks as such. As a result of this imbalance, sophisticated trademark practitioners may now quickly secure vast service mark rights for clients in ways not available for trademarks.

To better understand current service mark practice, and the above contradictions, the …

Chinese Overseas M&A: Overcoming Cultural And Organizational Divides, Francesca Spigarelli, Attilio Mucelli, Ilan Alon

Faculty Publications

This article contributes to the existing knowledge on the difficulties and critical aspects of the post-acquisition phase of an emerging market multinational. To establish the context, a literature review on multinational companies from emerging countries, and specifically on the internationalization initiatives of Chinese companies, is provided, along with a framework to analyze cultural and management-related differences related to mergers and acquisitions (M&As). This review and framework is followed by a case study of a Chinese motorbike M&A in Italy. The case illustrates how Chinese companies use Italy to access Western markets (and strategic logistical services), as well as a wide …

Accounting Books Of The Imperial Waqfs (Charitable Endowments) In The Eastern Mediterranean (15th To 19th Centuries), Kayhan Orbay

Accounting Historians Journal

The history of accounting in the Eastern Mediterranean has not been adequately studied through its primary sources, despite the fact that the Turkish archives house an enormous amount of material for exploring accounting practices in the Ottoman Empire. Ottomanists used the account books as sources for Ottoman socioeconomic and institutional history. They analyzed, fully transliterated and published the account registers of the central treasury, the Istanbul shipyard and the waqf institutions. Nevertheless, accounting historians did not even show interest into published archival sources up until recent years. Owing to a few recent works that were based on the primary sources, …

The Czech Automotive Industry In Global Production Networks: Regional Dimensions Of Upgrading Between 1998 And 2008, Jan Ženka, Petr Pavlinek

Geography and Geology Faculty Publications

n this article, we draw on the global production networks (GPNs) and global value chains perspectives to examine the regional development effects of economic upgrading in the Czech automotive industry between 1998 and 2008. We investigate how the position of Czech-based automotive firms in GPNs affects the intensity of upgrading and the amount of value captured for the benefit of the host regions through wages, corporate taxes revenues and reinvested profits. Based on the statistical analysis of firm-level data aggregated at the micro-regional level, the intensity of economic upgrading and value capture is measured for groups of regions and for …

Momentum 2013, Jessica Canedo

Momentum

A journal of undergraduate research

Ua3/9/7 President's Office-Ransdell Correspondence, Wku Archives

WKU Archives Collection Inventories

Selected correspondence not duplicated in the Reading File. Contains incoming correspondence and responses.

Investigating Volatility Trends Of Silver Through An Analysis Of Stock Options Prices, Dylan Houston

Bridges: A Journal of Student Research

Volatility is a statistical measure that describes the amount of fluctuation in prices for a given investment; generally, the higher the volatility for an investment, the riskier it is perceived to be. Traders study volatility history so that they can make informed decisions on how to invest capital. The purpose of this article is to analyze implied volatility values, which are derived from the investment's price and are considered the market's estimate of the investment's actual volatility, for silver electronically traded fund (ETF) options in periods of both high and low price movement. In doing so, we desired to see …

Targeting The ‘Invisible’: Improving Entrepreneurship Opportunities For Informal Sector Women, Tonia Warnecke

Faculty Publications

In the wake of global economic downturn, policymakers in many developing countries are turning their gaze upon two things: private sector-led strategies for economic growth and women’s potential to contribute to this growth. As a consequence, female entrepreneurship has been an area of particular interest to policymakers, businesses, and non-governmental organizations, and many female-targeted policies and programs have been implemented, ranging from microfinance and subsidized loans to training and incubator programs. However, the focus on entrepreneurship as a development strategy conceptualizes entrepreneurship in a particular way—as opportunity entrepreneurship. Opportunity entrepreneurs can identify available opportunities and exploit them; they are often …

Associations Of Housing, Management, Milking Activity, And Standing And Lying Behavior Of Dairy Cows Milked In Automatic Systems, Justine A. Deming, Renée Bergeron, Kenneth E. Leslie, Trevor J. Devries

Farm Animal Husbandry Collection

The objective of this cross-sectional study was to describe the housing, feeding management, and characteristics (parity and stage of lactation) of cows on commercial automatic milking system (AMS) dairies and their associations with the standing and lying behavior patterns and milking activity (frequency and yield) of lactating dairy cows. Thirteen AMS herds were enrolled in the study, with an average herd size of 71 ± 30 (mean ± SD; range: 34 to 131) lactating cows. All of the herds used freestall barns, each set up for free cow traffic to the AMS. On-farm measurements were taken to determine stocking density …

Guidebook To Creating A Collaborative Environment Between Airport Operations And Maintenance, James C. Delong, Steve Wareham, John Duval, Hana Rocek, Lori Beckman, Jaime Guillen, Jane D. Parent, Rose Agnew, Steve Loper, Michael Nichols, Kenzie Rodriguez

Management Faculty Publications

ACRP Report 92: Guidebook to Creating a Collaborative Environment Between Airport Operations and Maintenance provides tools and strategies that can be used to increase and improve collaboration between operations and maintenance staffs at airports. The tools include exercises, case studies, and other resources. The report also provides methods to identify warning signs of collaboration issues between operations and maintenance staffs. This guidebook will be useful to front-line supervisors, managers, or senior leaders who wish to increase or improve collaboration between operations and maintenance departments. The tools and strategies are applicable to be applied with other departments as well.

Essays On The Digital Divide - Explorations Through Global, National And Individual Lenses, Maria Skaletsky

2013

The Digital Divide has emerged as an important research and policy issue during the past thirty years. The divide exists at different levels, such as global, regional and individual levels. While extensive research already exists on this subject, the complexity of the issue presents opportunities for further research. In particular, there is ample scope for significantly contributing to the literature by leveraging recent analytics techniques, all the more since most of the literature on the Digital Divide relies on descriptive methods or on simple or multiple regression models. Therefore, the motivation for this study is two-fold. First, the Digital Divide …

Valuing New Random Genetically Modified (Gm) Traits In Corn, Sumadhur Shakya, William W. Wilson, Bruce Dahl

College of Business Faculty Publications and Presentations

Numerous genetically modified (GM) traits are currently under development. Those currently being developed for corn include traits for drought tolerance, cold tolerance, and nitrogen use efficiency, among others. The value of these traits is random and sporadic, creating challenges in assessing its ex ante value. This study estimates the ex ante value of a GM trait in corn with random characteristics. A real option model is developed to capture risks and returns associated with the traits, and estimates are derived for drought tolerant corn. Base case results indicate a slight chance that the option value would be out-of-the-money during the …