Business Commons^™

Measuring Transformation: Assessing And Improving The Impact Of Microcredit, Susy Cheston, Larry Reed

Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review

The question of impact assessment is one that continues to plague microcredit practitioners. Some contend that existing impact assessment studies are meaningless, while others maintain they are absolutely necessary. The authors of this paper advocate a renewed focus on the transformation of clients and their communities, as well as a new impact assessment model to support and document this focus. They outline the key principles for conducting impact audits that include measurement of transformation among clients. They also review a series of practitioner-oriented impact assessment tools and outline future challenges for practitioners, donors, and academics in improving performance through impact …

Microenterprise Development In The Heartland: Self-Employment As A Self-Sufficiency Strategy For Tanf Recipients In Iowa 1993-1998, Salome Raheim, Jason J. Friedman

Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review

There has been a significant interest in the microenterprise movement regarding its effectiveness as a welfare-to-work strategy. A decade's worth of program results, demonstration projects, and research strongly suggest that the benefits of microenterprise development for welfare recipients outweigh the costs and risks. The state of Iowa has been a leader in promoting microenterprise development as a welfare-to-work strategy. Iowa was the first state in the US to incorporate microenterprise-development training as an eligible activity in its welfare-reform program. Since 1993, the Iowa Department of Human Services (IDHS) has contracted with the Institute for Social and Economic Development (ISED), a …

Announcements, Journal Of Microfinance

Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review

No abstract provided.

Are Grameen Replications Sustainable, And Do They Reach The Poor?: The Case Of Card Rural Bank In The Philippines, Hans Dieter Seibel, Dolores Torres

Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review

The Grameen Bank in Bangladesh is known worldwide for its success in providing credit to the poor. However, subsequent replications of its methodology in other parts of the world have been less successful. Is there really an infallible solution that works everywhere, and is outreach to the poor compatible with sustainability? A Grameen replicator in the Philippines, the Center for Agriculture and Rural Development (CARD), has recently set itself firmly on the path to sustainability by becoming a formal sector, rural bank—the first credit NGO in the country to do so. During the period, from 1993 to June 1999, CARD's …

Village Banking Dynamics Study: Evidence From Seven Programs, Judith Painter, Barbara Mknelly

Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review

The primary question examined in this study is whether client loans grow or stagnate over time. Loan growth is important to financial sustainability and is also a proxy for positive impact. The relationship between loan growth and a variety of factors--program loan and savings policies, site selection, membership dynamics--are explored in the context of seven village bank programs. The study concludes that on average, loan size did not stagnant but increased steadily, although at a rate lower than the original village bank model projections. Only programs that allowed non-poverty level loans (loans above US$300) approached the original loan growth rate. …

The Impact Of Outcome-Based Assessment On Microenterprise Programs, Margaret A. Johnson, Umasundari Akella, Jule Lalande

Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review

The changing environment in the nonprofit sector has subjected microenterprise programs to a new paradigm that emphasizes rationality principles. These principles ask practitioners to increase their outcomes while minimizing costs and to demonstrate that they are doing so with outcome-assessment measurements. This paper presents a case study of what happened to 11 microenterprise programs that adopted outcome assessment. Factors affecting the adoption of outcome assessment were changing norms in the nonprofit sector, demands from state legislators for information on program outcomes, and mandates from funders. A funding formula was implemented; program responses included going along, adopting practices to fit the …

Defying The Odds: Bunking For The Poor, By Eugene Versluysen, Eugene Versluysen

Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review

No abstract provided.

Bringing Development Back, Into Microfinance, Maria Otero

Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review

No abstract provided.

The Microcredit Summit's Challenge: Working Toward Institutional Financial Self-Sufficiency While Maintaining A Commitment To Serving The Poorest Families, David S. Gibbons, Jennifer W. Meehan

Journal of Microfinance / ESR Review

Institutional financial self-sufficiency (IFS) is necessary for a microfinance institution (MFI) to obtain the large amount of funds required to reach and benefit truly large numbers of the poor and poorest households. There is no necessary trade-off between serving large numbers of the poorest households and the attainment of IFS by an MFI, as proven by the case studies in this paper. Cost-effective identification of the poor and the poorest women is essential to maximizing the effectiveness and efficiency of providing microfinance services to them. If the service is not exclusively for the poor and the poorest, it should be …

Structuring Time And Task In Electronic Brainstorming, Alan R. Dennis, Jay E. Aronson, William G. Heninger, Edward D. Walker Ii

Faculty Publications

There are many ways in which a GSS can beused to support group brainstorming. This paper reports the results of an experiment that manipulated task structure and time structure. Groups electronically brainstormed on intact tasks(where all parts of the task were presented simultaneously) or on partitioned tasks (where three subcategories of the task were presented to thegroups). The time periods in which groups worked were either one 30-minute time period or three 10-minute periods separated by two-minute breaks. Groups in the partitioned task treatment generated 40% more ideas, but there were no time effects. These differences are attributed to the …

Service-Learning And Management Education A Call To Action, Paul C. Godfrey

Faculty Publications

The private sector of United States society (private corporations) currently enjoys the moral authority to set the national agenda. Business schools, because they train future managers, can play a vital role in helping the private sector sustain that moral authority. Specifically, I argue that service-learning pedagogies offer management educators a way to incorporate citizenship skills and moral training into the traditional management curriculum. This article describes the concept of service-learning, reviews the current state of service-learning in management, and argues that service-learning can enhance both the technical capability and moral capability of students. Key issues for faculty members involved in …

Revisiting The Stock Price Impact Of Quality Awards, Gregory L. Adams, Grant Mcqueen, Kristie Seawright

Faculty Publications

In an event study, Hendricks and Singhal [Hendricks KB, Singhal VR. Quality awards and the market value of the firm: an empirical investigation. Management Sci 1996;42:415±36.] find evidence that firms that win quality awards are further rewarded with a stock price increase on the day of the award announcement. We revisit Hendricks and Singhal (1996), extend their research and find four reasons why management, owners and analysts should be cautious about expecting an abnormal return when a firm wins a quality award. First, in our sample of Baldrige Award winners, the evidence of a stock price response on the announcement …

The Delisting Bias In Crsp’S Nasdaq Data And Its Implications For The Size Effect, Tyler Shumway, Vincent A. Warther

Faculty Publications

We investigate the bias in CRSP's Nasdaq data due to missing returns for delisted stocks. We find that the missing returns are large and negative on average, and that delisted stocks experience a substantial decrease in liquidity. We estimate that using a corrected return of −55 percent for missing performance-related delisting returns corrects the bias. We revisit previous work which finds a size effect among Nasdaq stocks. After correcting for the delisting bias, there is no evidence that there ever was a size effect on Nasdaq. Our results are inconsistent with most risk-based explanations of the size effect.

Estimating Tourism's Economic Impact In Nebraska Counties, Brian J. Hill

Faculty Publications

Every community interested in developing tourism to enhance or diversify their economy wants to know how much good tourism can do for them. While tourism is not the answer to every community's economic challenges, it can provide economic benefits in many cases. These economic benefits must then be compared to the social, cultural and environmental changes that tourism might bring in order to judge its acceptability in community economic development efforts.

Politicians, planners and citizens want to know just how important tourism is to their communities. While some economic benefits and costs are very difficult to calculate, total economic impacts …

Where Do Resources Come From? A Model Of Resource Generation, Paul C. Godfrey, Hal B. Gregersen

Faculty Publications

Although the Resource-Based View of the firm (RBV) continues to gain centrality in the conversation of strategic management, several unanswered questions remain within the emerging paradigm. This article focuses on one of those questions. We propose a causal model of resource generation built around three central constructs: entrepreneurial ability, market context, and organizational context. Entrepreneurial ability generates new asset combinations that are valuable and unique, while market and organizational contexts preserve the value in these new asset combinations by providing barriers to imitation. We build a model and then consider three separate paths for generating idiosyncratic resources within a firm. …

A Rejoinder To Kenworthy-U'Ren Enlarging The Tent Of Service-Learning, Paul C. Godfrey

Faculty Publications

The Old Testament prophet/poet Isaiah speaks of the eventual redemption of the children of Abraham and uses a powerful metaphor to invite his followers to action: "Enlarge thy tent, and let them stretch forth the curtains of thy habitations: spare not, lengthen thy cords, and strengthen thy stakes" (Isaiah 54:2, King James Version). In the spirit of enlarging the tent and strengthening the stakes of the service-learning movement, Kenworthy-U'Ren's (1999, this issue) commentary to my article, "Service-Learning and Management Education: A Call to Action" (1999, this issue), proves a valuable and wonderful contribution. The strength of her commentary comes from …

Health, Health Insurance And The Labor Market, Janet Currie, Brigitte C. Madrian

Faculty Publications

This chapter provides an overview of the literature linking health, health insurance and labor market outcomes such as wages, earnings, employment, hours, occupational choice, job turnover, retirement, and the structure of employment. The ®rst part of the paper focuses on the relationship between health and labor market outcomes. The empirical literature surveyed suggests that poor health reduces the capacity to work and has substantive effects on wages, labor force participation and job choice. The exact magnitudes, however, are sensitive to both the choice of health measures and to identi®cation assumptions. The second part of the paper considers the link between …

Nebraska’S Lodging Tax, Brian J. Hill

Faculty Publications

Like many states, Nebraska charges a tax on overnight lodging accommodations. Sometimes called a bed tax or occupancy tax, this levy is available on a county by county basis as desired by county commissioners or supervisors. As of 1996, 45 Nebraska counties opted to impose a lodging tax on their guests. That same year, total government revenues from the lodging tax were over $6 million. The funds gathered in this manner provide the funding for the Nebraska Division of Travel and Tourism and for county marketing efforts.

Characteristics Of A Full Disclosure, Transaction-Based Index Of Commercial Real Estate, David H. Downs, Barrett A. Slade

Faculty Publications

This study addresses the characteristics of a transaction-based index of commercial real estate as reported in a full-disclosure market. Prior research on transaction-based indices has enumerated various shortcomings for commercial real estate markets. This study circumvents many of these problems by using a large data set of commercial property transactions obtained for the Phoenix, Arizona metropolitan statistical area. The empirical analysis demonstrates that investors stand to gain considerable insight by comparing fulldisclosure, transaction-based indices with voluntarydisclosure, appraisal-based indices. The results suggest that full-disclosure indices avoid some of the institutional biases associated with other benchmarks of commercial real estate performance. In …

Price And Non-Price Influences On Water Conservation: An Econometric Model Of Aggregate Demand Under Nonlinear Budget Constraints, Leonardo Corral, Anthony C. Fisher, Nile W. Hatch

Faculty Publications

This paper develops a model of residential water demand under a nonlinear budget constraint. The theoretical model for an individual consumer is adapted to yield an aggregate model that preserves the structure of the individual demand function, and that can be used with aggregate (water district level) data. The model is used to study the influence of pricing and non-price conservation programs on consumption and conservation behavior in three water districts in the San Francisco Bay Area, over a 10-year period that includes both drought and normal years. Empirical results show that pricing can be effective in reducing water consumption, …

Brigham Young University Independent Study On-Line Courses, Bret Alvey, Dave Boyack, Jon Macaulay, Derek Russell

Student Works

The purpose of this report is to provide information for BYU Independent Study to assist them in making management decisions in regards to the Internet courses. More specifically, the report will answer the following questions: What is the target marker for the Internet course? What previous marketing strategies were effective? What are additional ways to market the courses effectively? M.I.L.O. comprised of Bret Alvey, Dave Boyack, Jon Macaulay, Derek Russell.

Larry H. Miller Automotive Division Marketing Research Project: Prepared For Direct Manager Of Larry H. Miller Advertising, Staci Checketts, Tatum Enyart, Brooke Hardy, Marlene Lang

Student Works

The Larry H. Miller Automotive Dealerships have been in business for over ten years, and have determined the Salt Lake Valley to be the target market for its advertising campaigns. The current advertising campaign for Larry H. Miller Dealerships centers on the "After all...you know this guy" slogan. Venture Consulting conducted a study to determine the following: How effective are current Larry H. Miller dealership advertisements? How does the public perceive Larry H. Miller as an individual? How does the public perceive Larry H. Miller advertisements in relation to its competitors? Venture Consulting comprised of Staci Checketts, Tatum Enyart, Booke …

Bureaucracy In The Postmodern World: Problems And Solutions, Paul C. Godfrey, Grant C. Madsen

Faculty Publications

This paper considers the problems presented by modern bureaucratic organizations within the framework of postmodern philosophy. Bureaucracy represents the logical outcome of the rational tradition in western philosophy. Because of their efficiency properties, individuals are both the beneficiaries and victims of bureaucratic behavior. We suggest that a solution to these problems will not be found by using existing philosophical frameworks. The French philosopher Jean-Francois Lyotard presents a model of postmodern relationships based on language games. We explore the concept of language games within bureaucratic settings.

Does Medicare Eligibility Affect Retirement?, Brigitte C. Madrian, Nancy Dean Beaulieu

Faculty Publications

Concern over the lack of portability associated with employer-provided health insurance has precipitated a recent flurry of research activity on the effects of health insurance on labor market outcomes. Several estimates suggest that the costs associated with changing doctors and losing coverage for preexisting conditions are sufficient to deter individuals from changing jobs. These costs may be particularly important for older individuals contemplating retirement because a departure from the labor force may involve not only a change in doctors or lack of coverage for preexisting conditions but a complete loss of access to employer-provided group health insurance.

Economic Valuation Models For Insurers, David F. Babbel, Craig B. Merrill

Faculty Publications

Recently much attention has been given to the approaches insurers undertake in valuing their liabilities and assets. For example, in 1994 the American Academy of Actuaries created a Fair Valuation of Liabilities Task Force to address the issue [see Doll et al. (1998), Reitano (1997), Babbel (1997, 1998b), Babbel and Merrill (1996), and Merrill (1997)]. In 1997, the Academy established a Valuation Law Task Force and a Valuation Tools Working Group to investigate the various valuation approaches extant and to recommend the models best suited to the task.

Much of the literature on valuation has focused on the strengths and …

Is Sound Just Noise, Joshua D. Coval, Tyler Shumway

Faculty Publications

This paper analyzes the information content of the ambient noise level in the Chicago Board of Trade's 30-year Treasury Bond futures trading pit. Controlling for a variety of other variables, including lagged price changes, trading volumes, and news announcements, we find that the sound level conveys information which is highly economically and statistically significant. In particular, we find increases in the sound level precede periods of high price volatility and increased trading volumes. Increases in the sound level also presage the placement of block trades and relative increases in customer-driven trading. Our results add to our understanding of the market …

Labor Market Responses To Rising Health Insurance Costs: Evidence On Hours Worked, David M. Cutler, Brigitte C. Madrian

Faculty Publications

Increases in the cost of providing health insurance must have some effect on labor markets, either in lower wages, changes in the composition of employment, or both. Despite a presumption that most of this effect will be in the fonn of lower wages, we document in this paper a significant effect on work hours as well. Using data from the CPS and the SIPP, we show that rising health insurance costs over the 1980s increased the hours worked of those with health insurance by up to 3 percent. We argue that this occurs because health insurance is a fixed cost, …

Health Insurance Portability: The Consequences Of Cobra, Brigitte C. Madrian

Faculty Publications

THE RESPONSE OF THE CLINTON ADMINISTRATION and Congress to the failed attempt at fundamental health care reform in 1993 has been a series of incremental measures that expand the government’s role in the health care system. One recent initiative, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA), restricts the ability of insurers to exclude preexisting medical conditions from insurance coverage. It also requires insurance companies to issue or renew coverage for individuals who have been insured but who no longer have access to group health insurance coverage. Those provisions are intended to address the issue of health insurance …

Efficacy Of A Tr Self-Esteem Program For Emotionally Disturbed Adolescents In A Treatment Setting, Ramon B. Zabriskie

Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of a modularized therapeutic recreation self-esteem program (that included outdoor adventure based components) provided for adolescents in a residential treatment center. Data were also collected on demographic variables including age, gender, and ethnicity. Subjects consisted of 112 adolescent patients ranging from ages 12 to 17, with an average length of stay of nine months to one year.

Image Study For Bank Of American Fork: Research Report, Jennifer Holladay, Roger Kerr, Phil Upton-Rowley, Miriam Stelter

Student Works

Bank of American Fork wishes to facilitate further growth. To achieve this goal, BAF has hired Greg Soter, of Soter Associates Inc., to develop a more aggressive marketing plan. Sorter Associates has asked Stelter Marketeers to discover the community's perception by conducting a comprehensive image study of Bank of American Fork. Three market segments have been the focus of the study; personal account customers, personal account non-customers, and business account customers. The objective has been to determine the perceptions of each market segment. Stelter Marketeers comprised of Jennifer Holladay, Roger Kerr, Phil Upton-Rowley, Miriam Stelter, Dan Weber.