Business Commons^™

The Sentencing Structure Of White-Collar Crime, Catherine Reeves

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

Corporate fraud is an all-too-common element in our society today. Unfortunately, many of those convicted of fraud end up with a seemingly light jail sentence. A possible explanation for this is that the judges could have many subconscious reasons to give lighter sentences in these cases than they do with other more violent cases. Since there are no strict guidelines for the sentencing of these “white-collar criminals,” the judge’s personal views can play a significant role. Many of the laws and guidelines for determining the sentence in fraud cases have stemmed from the corporate scandals of the early 2000’s, but …

Financial Literacy In Retirement Planning, Jennifer Potts

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

Studying finance, I have been exposed to the retirement plan options and how they work in most of my classes. But when I would talk to my family and friends about what I was learning, I quickly discovered that many people simply had no interest or understanding about the subject. I believe everyone needs to have a basic understanding of where income will come from once they retire. This realization pushed me to study the level of financial literacy about retirement and plan options of adults in the working world and determine how I could bring information about this topic …

An Analysis Of Public Education Informatics, Brandon Moss

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

Information systems and informatics technologies are employed to increase profitability and efficiency of business models. The most common mistake made by managers, when incorporating informatics into their business model, is under-utilizing the technological capacity of their resources and investing in extraneous functions. This thesis will examine the usage of information systems and informatics principles in the United States public education system. Approaching the case from a consultant’s perspective, this paper will map out the business model theory, its actual implementation, and identify key failure points and areas of improvement in informatics usage. The structure of the thesis follows the first …

Indigenous Credit Associations In Botswana: An Application Of Elinor Ostrom's Common-Pool Resource Analysis, Christopher A. Yates

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

In this paper I attempt to analyze and explain the important of certain indigenous credit agreements in Botswana. Rotating Savings and Credit Associations are agreements made by a group of people who create a communal fund which rotates around the group until each member had had access to the pooled resource. These agreements are informal and most commonly found in the poorer traditional sectors of Botswana’s economy.

Furthermore, I attempt to explain why these agreements can be best understood using Elinor Ostrom’s common-pool resource analysis. This framework explains why these agreements are so successful in creating a source of capital, …