Showing papers on "Empirical research published in 1975"

Bureaucrats and Politicians

Abstract: FIVE years ago I completed the manuscript that was published as Bureaucracy and Representative Government.2 This book-an attempt to match a now conventional theory of the demand for government services in a representative government with a new theory of bureaucratic supplyprovoked a minor stir, some misunderstanding, and some useful subsequent research. This paper summarizes my reflections on this book and the findings of several empirical studies that bear on some of its conjectures. These reflections, like the perspectives of the book, are based on a combination of personal experience, the comments and contributions of others, and the available empirical studies.3 Part I of this paper outlines several suggested modifications to my earlier theory of bureaucracy and representative government. Part II summarizes a set of relevant empirical findings.

Mail Surveys and Response Rates: A Literature Review:

Abstract: A review of empirical studies concerned with increasing response rates to mail questionnaires reveals the limited evidence upon which most widely accepted techniques are based. The only techniques ...

A Strategic Posture toward Corporate Social Responsibility

Abstract: Corporate social responsibility has been a topic of wide and speculative interest to both managers and academics. Little careful and systematic empirical research, however, has been done in this area. This article presents an analysis based on the food-processing industry, as well as two supporting studies, followed by theoretical explanation and normative implications. Middle ground is demonstrated to be the place occupied by the most commercially successful firms.

The Fishbein Extended Model and Consumer Behavior

Abstract: The theoretical development and empirical research testing the Fishbein “extended” or “behavioral intentions” model are described and evaluated. Discussion of conceptual and methodological strengths and weaknesses leads to the proposal of a reconceptualized form of the model.

Guidelines for the Empirical Classification of Organizations.

Abstract: Bill McKelvey After a brief review of organization classification, multivariate approaches toward the empirical identification of such classifications are discussed. Ten guidelines for conducting future multivariate classificatory studies are presented, supported by a critique of two published largescale empirical studies. Taxonomic development is viewed as a critical element in the future health of organization science.

Individual Demand for Higher Education: A Review and Analysis of Recent Empirical Studies

Abstract: Access to higher education has increasingly become a major priority for state and federal policy-makers. Mixtures of student financial aid and low tuition have increasingly been viewed as the means for equalizing access to and choice among institutions of higher education. This paper reviews the recent empirical evidence on the impact of price changes on individual demand for higher education. The evidence suggests that both low tuition and student grants do stimulate increases in enrollment. However, the student aid induced enrollment response is relatively low and the cost per additional student attracted to higher education may be very high.

An Empirical Study of Labor Market Segmentation

Abstract: Results of an empirical test of some ideas about the segmentation of the labor force. Classification of the different jobs within the primary sector; Social status of occupations; Empirical analysis; Empirical results. (Abstract copyright EBSCO.)

A Note on the Rationality of the Livingston Price Expectations

Abstract: The use of distributed lag proxies for inflationary expectations continues to dominate most of the rapidly expanding empirical literature on the role of price expectations in models of money wage and nominal interestrate determination. The empirical results so obtained represent joint tests of (1) the role of price expectations and (2) the validity of the distributed lag proxies. Recently, several researchers (see Gibson 1972; Pyle 1972; and Turnovsky and Wachter 1972) have employed the price expectations data compiled by Joseph A. Livingston of the Philadelphia Bulletin' to conduct tests of the role of price expectations which are not dependent on the use of distributed lag proxies for inflationary expectations. The use of these directly observed expectations data thus represents a major extension of empirical research in these important policy areas. The use of the Livingston data, however, raises its own problems. In particular, their use in empirical studies assumes that these recorded expectations may be viewed as representative of those of market participants generally. This assumption may prove suspect on a priori grounds since there is no concrete evidence that these recorded expectations do influence the behavior of economic agents and hence that they may be viewed as "market" forecasts in this important sense. The purpose of this note is to provide some perspective on this issue by examining the

Determinants of the Firm's Capital Structure

Abstract: THIS paper is an empirical study attempting to ascertain those factors that influence the firm's choice of a debt-equity ratio. Baxter and Cragg (1970), have published an empirical study that is similar in nature to this one. However, this paper differs from theirs in several important respects. First, we deal explicitly with the relationship between the overall debtequity ratio of the firm and the firm's choice of new financing. Secondly, we include the notion that the risk premiums required on bonds issued may differ among firms or between years. Finally, we include as a variable the corporate tax rate for each year. In section I we present the statistical model. A description of the independent variables used in the empirical study is presented in section II. Section III contains the results of our study plus implications and conclusions.

The Concept and Measurement of Regional Industrial Diversification

Abstract: The relationship between the economic structure of subnational regions and their relative responsiveness to fluctuations in national economic activity has been a persistent vein of inquiry within regional economics for nearly thirty years. The pursuit of "diversified" local economic structures in response to potentially unstable dependence upon single industries or groups of industries is a thoroughly ensconced dimension of virtually every contemporary local development effort. The professional research upon which such planning orientation is presumably based, however, has been less than satisfying in both its theoretical and empirical dimensions. In fact, a distinct pessimism permeates the literature with respect to the relationship between diversification of industrial structure and stability of local economic activity [see Isard, 10, 276; Richardson, 15, 148]. In this paper we shall note that such pessimism may be premature. Previous attempts to define and measure industrial diversity in economically meaningful ways have suffered from significant conceptual shortcomings; and empirical attempts to relate such definitions to historical stability have, almost without exception, been such as to understate the potential of diversification efforts to reduce instability in regional economic activity. The conceptual difficulties of the four principal measures of regional industrial diversity or diversification are here demonstrated, and the limitations of empirical studies to date are noted. A new conceptual approach is offered and is shown to lead naturally to a new measure of industrial diversification which appears to alleviate several of the problems encountered in previous measures. The results of empirical analyses of the relative ability of the new measure to explain statistically the historical instability of a cross-section of 52 U.S. metropolitan regions are also reported. The results provide some evidence not only that the new measure seems to explain variation in instability considerably better than its precursors but also that it appears to do so sufficiently well in absolute terms to raise new in erest in the policy goal of intra-regional diversification.

The Importance of Temporary Layoffs: An Empirical Analysis

Abstract: EVERY GOOD theoretical or econometric study must be based on a reasonably accurate empirical foundation. If the basic magnitudes of the subject are misperceived, the theoretical model or econometric specification will lead the research astray. In recent years, research on the central macroeconomic questions of unemployment and wage inflation has been advanced by the empirical studies of Hall, Holt, Parnes, Perry, Wachter, and others. Meanwhile, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has benefited the profession by expanding the data base with detailed monthly summaries of household and establishment data and through the provision of complete data from the Current Population Survey. All of this microeconomic evidence has greatly enriched understanding of the nature of unemployment. The traditional view, based on the experience of the depression, pictured the unemployed as an inactive pool of job losers who had to wait for a general business upturn before they could find new jobs. Modern research has shown that this picture is distorted. The majority of the unemployed do not become unemployed by losing their previous jobs; they quit voluntarily or are new entrants or reentrants into

The contingency theory of managerial accounting : an empirical test of an assessment model

Abstract: t o t h e e m p i r i c a l wor l d . Henry Margenau "What i s a T h e o r y ? " in The S t r u c t u r e o f E c o n o m i c S c i e n c e S j S . R . Krupp ( e d . ) ( P r e n t i c e H a 11, 1 9 6 6 ) , pp. 2 5 — 38; Karl R. P o p p e r , The L o g i c o f S c i e n t i f i c D i s c o v e r y ( Har pe r and Row, New York: 1 9 6 8 ) , pp. 3 1 “ 4 2 . S e e a l s o Ro b e r t R. S t e r l i n g , "On Theor y C o n s t r u c t i o n and V e r i f i c a t i o n , " A c c o u n t i n g R e v i e w , J u l y 1 9 7 0 , p . 4 4 8 .

Dividend, Investment and Financing Decisions: Empirical Evidence on French Firms

Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to examine empirically the dividend, investment, and financing decisions of French firms. A basic premise of the study is that increased perspective in business finance can be gained through better understanding of the financial behavior of companies outside one's domestic economy. While the literature of finance and economics includes many significant empirical studies based on dividend, investment, and financing data on American firms, the body of evidence on continental European firms is still relatively small, owing in large part to the difficulties encountered in gathering meaningful financial data on individual firms. In order to examine for the first time the relationship of dividend and investment decisions in France, using well-known models of financial bahavior, we were able to obtain annual data on a sample of French companies over a seven-year period. Our intent is to add to the understanding of the robustness of these models by demonstrating their empirical validity in Europe and to report several differences from previous empirical findings for American firms.

Cognitive Maps of Retail Locations: An Investigation of Some Basic Issues

Abstract: Basic issues in the conceptualization and measurement of cognitive maps are discussed and explored with the aid of an empirical study. Results indicate several advantages for using cognitive measures to describe the physical separation of retail locations.

The University Professor As a Utility Maximizer and Producer of Learning, Research, and Income.

Abstract: Numerous plans have been proposed for improving the teaching quality at major universities. These schemes typically do not rest on identifiable economic models. In this paper, a professorial decision-making model is presented for the purpose of exploring alternative plans to raise teaching quality. Using a Lancaster methodology, where time is a variable input, it is demonstrated that an increase in the pecuniary return to teaching will raise teaching quality while exogenous changes in teaching and/or research technology need not. The slack academic market for Ph.D.'s, the difficulty in securing state financing, and falling undergraduate enrollments have led to many speculations and proposals for appropriate methods to improve the quality of college teaching. In the case of economics, the American Economic Association, via its Committee on Economic Education, is emphasizing the development of better alternative university teaching technologies (for example, improved course content and teaching techniques). Siegfried and White [12, p. 315], however, question the effectiveness of improved technology: " . .. we are not optimistic that instruction at these schools will be noticeably improved by a further outpouring of new teaching techniques." They state that an alternative way of improving instruction might be to devise means of capitalizing on the research orientation of the university professor and the associated research-oriented reward structure at large universities. This suggestion is not based on an identifiable economic model, but rather on the observation that contemporaneous The author is an Assistant Professor and Director of Economic Education at the University of Minnesota. * Constructive criticism of an earlier draft was provided by John Danforth, John Hause, Jack Rodgers, Jim Simler, and other members of the Fall 1973 Minnesota Human Capital Workshop. Jack Rodgers was of special assistance in rechecking algebraic manipulations and implications. [Manuscript received February 1974; accepted August 1974.] The Journal of Human Resources * X * 1 This content downloaded from 207.46.13.86 on Sun, 16 Oct 2016 04:43:39 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 108 I THE JOURNAL OF HUMAN RESOURCES teaching output is statistically less significant in salary determination than is cumulative research output. Based on a two-dimensional argument involving only professional research and teaching time considerations, Richard McKenzie [11, p. 617], on the other hand, suggests " . . . that if more research is desired, an appropriate policy may be to increase the maximum teaching [time] requirements; if more teaching [time] is desired, administrators should consider, along with other changes, raising the research [time] requirements." To follow McKenzie's argument, it is necessary to assume, in addition to "standard assumptions," that (1) a professor can be forced into spending a given maximum amount of time in teaching and research activity while his income is fixed regardless of total time assigned; (2) the professor's two-dimensional preference ordering can be summarized by a circular indifference surface; and (3) the professor is operating in the inefficient region of his indifference surface. A more direct plan to improve the quality of college teaching has been elaborated by Kenneth Eble [3, pp. 21-35]. Eble's plan rests on the speculation that an increase in the pecuniary return to teaching, given accepted evaluation instruments and procedures, will improve the quality of teaching, but not necessarily at the expense of research.' Such speculation, however, is questioned by William Arrowsmith [1, p. 58]. He advocates viewing the professor as a "Socratic teacher," and he concludes that we will not raise college teaching quality "by the meretricious device of offering prizes or bribes." As yet, no one appears to have specified in a formal manner the alternative economic determinants for improving the quality of college level teaching. All that we do have are conflicting verbal speculations as to the possible means of improving instruction. In this study, a formal comparative static model is presented for the purpose of exploring the implications of alternative plans to raise teaching quality. Based on a Lancaster [8, 9] methodology, where time is a variable input, it is demonstrated that an increase in the pecuniary return to teaching output will raise teaching quality at major universities while exogenous changes in teaching and/or research technology need not. Empirical methods of testing this model are also suggested. PROFESSORIAL DECISION-MAKING FRAMEWORK It is generally accepted that a professional not only derives utility from consumption activity, but also acquires satisfaction out of professional activities-in 1 Hansen and Kelley [6, pp. 11-12] also predict that an increase in the relative reward for teaching will increase the output of this activity. Their prediction rests on some unspecified relationships in which a change in the relative return to teaching-psychic and pecuniary-does not affect the production possibility set, but only causes a change in the marginal rate of substitution between teaching and research in the utility function. This content downloaded from 207.46.13.86 on Sun, 16 Oct 2016 04:43:39 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms

Family Purchase Decision Making and the Process of Adjustment

Abstract: Research from social psychology, sociology, and marketing suggests the importance of the process of adjustment in family purchase decision making. Further empirical support is provided by a cross-s...

Centrality, Extremity, Intensity Neglected Variables in Research on Attitude-Behavior Consistency

Abstract: This article aims to alert researchers interested in the attitudes vs. action debate to a long-standing discontinuity between research and theory. Our review of 28 recent reports of research on the attitude-behavior relationship indicates a consistent neglect of theoretical formulations specifying the relevance of object-centrality, attitude extremity, and attitude intensity for understanding attitude-behavior consistency. Yet, bits and pieces of relevant data gleaned from these reports plus the results of our secondary analysis of data gathered in 1969-70 from some 19,000 members of the 1966 cohort of U.S. college freshmen point clearly to the conclusion that these variable properties of attitude merit most careful consideration in attitude-behavior research. Indeed, they suggest that the failure of past empirical investigations to spport the assumption, central to the work of many scholars and practitioners, that attitudes are important keys to understanding behavior may be due, at least in part, to this gap between research and theory., That attitudes vary not only in direction (positive vs. negative) but also in extremity (degree of favorableness or unfavorableness) and intensity (strength of feeling), and that their objects may be more or less important, central, or egoinvolving to the individual are common themes in conceptual analyses of the attitude construct (Scott). These variable properties of attitude figure prominently in the theoretical literature dealing with the attitude-behavior relationship. (See D. Campbell; Converse; Himmelstrand; Inkso and Schopler; Katz; Katz and Stotland; Newcomb et al.; Rosenberg.) This being the case it is surprising that so little empirical research on the attitude-behavior relationship has given systematic attention to them.1 The aim of this article is to alert researchers interested in the attitudes vs.action debate to this long-standing discontinuity between theory and research and to point out how consideration of these variable properties of attitudes and their objects might help us understand why "attitude research has long indicated . . . that the person's verbal report of his attitude has a rather low correlation with his actual behavior toward the object of the attitude" (McGuire, 156). For good reason, such findings have been a matter of concern for some *Research for this article was supported in part by the American Council on Education. We are indebted to Alexander W. Astin, Director, Office of Research, ACE, and his staff for making the survey data analyzed herein available to us. We should also like to express our appreciation to the institutions and students whose cooperation made the survey possible, and to the anonymous reviewers whose careful critiques were both helpful and challenging. The conclusions, opinions, and other statements expressed are those of the writers and are not necessarily those of the persons and organizations named here.

Market Structure and Firms' R & D Behavior

Abstract: IN recent years there has been much theoretical discussion and empirical investigation of the factors underlying firms' research and development activities. The relationship between market structure and an industry's R & D activities in particular continues to be the subject of intense debate. This paper attempts to clarify and extend the state of knowledge in this area. Part II outlines the state of the debate concerning the incentive to invent under alternative market structures, emphasizing several unsatisfactory features of the controversy which reduce considerably the practical relevance of the conclusions reached by the respective contributors. Notable in this connection is the implicit assumption that invention itself is monopolized, and the failure adequately to take account of the interdependence which exists between firms' output and R & D decisions. Part III develops a comprehensive analytical framework which shows clearly the nature of the relationship between firms' output and R & D decisions, and the multidimensional nature of the expectations regarding rivals' reactions which are relevant in determining R & D behavior. Part IV interprets the results of recent empirical studies of the determinants of firms' R & D behavior in the light of this analytical framework.

Skewness and Investors' Decisions: A Reply

Abstract: cause it is the first to present empirical evidence questioning the importance of a distribution's skewness parameter in the investor's decision process. In particular, Francis claims his evidence demonstrates that stock market inves? tors do not consider skewness in choosing among alternative investments. My reply comes in three parts. First, I will summarize the empirical evidence presented in support of the hypothesis that information about an in? vestment 's skewness is important to the stock market investor. Second, some questions are raised on Francis' general methodology. And finally, I offer the conjecture that, while the nonregression empirical studies that support the importance-of-skewness notion may be taken seriously, past regression analysis on the question?including mine [1] and Francis' [7]?are not to be taken seriously. The evidence that the stock market investor is cognizant of the skewness

An empirical study of corporate stagnation and turnaround.

Abstract: Why are some firms able to break-out of stagnating or declining performance patterns? This study, only partially reported here, attempts answers to this question by using a matched-pair sample to c...

Purposive Models of Legislative Behavior

Abstract: Although political scientists have studied Congress and other legislative bodies for many years, they have been relatively unsuccessful in developing a general theory of legislative behavior Picking and choosing from the conceptual stores of sociology and psychology, political scientists have organized their research around concepts such as role, norm, integration, etc Almost without exception the resulting partial theories are quite vaguely formulated, so that one cannot determine which propositions strictly derive from the theory In other words, though we have good descriptive information about how certain legislatures work, we have a very limited set of theoretical propositions that can help to explain these workings Still, some scholars appear to have excellent intuitions about how alterations in various internal or external institutions affect the operation of legislatures and their policy output Thus, we believe there is a deeper understanding of legislative behavior than the lack of a theoretical superstructure suggests In recent years several developments have shown some promise of filling the theoretical gaps in the study of legislative behavior First, game theorists and social choice theorists have begun to formulate abstract models of simple legislatures Thus we now have a short but growing list of propositions about legislative behavior and policy making in certain highly simplified situations Second, some empirical researchers have gradually become aware that legislators are goal-seeking agents who choose from available strategic alternatives to further their ends Some recent empirical work reflects this realization Third, a number of scholars have been working to bridge the gap between highly abstract social-choice and game-theoretic models of legislatures on the one hand and detailed empirical studies of legislatures on the other In this necessarily short review we will provide a brief survey of the work underlying each of these developments The discussion which follows proceeds in stages from the abstract constructions of the game theorists to the more concrete descriptions of empirical researchers