Publications

The failure to align the incentives of self-interested groups in favor of beneficial reform is often considered a major cause of persistent underdevelopment around the world. However, much less is known about strategies that have been successful…

Consumer preferences are often influenced by the distinctiveness of the options involved, but do needs for distinctiveness display motivational reward properties? Four studies suggest that they do. Activating needs for distinctiveness impacts the…

Hewlett-Packard has faced numerous leadership and strategic changes over the last twelve years. It has also been involved in more than its fair share of controversies. Are these signs of governance failure at the board level?

Motivated by recent cartel practices, a stable collusive agreement is characterized when firms’ prices and quantities are private information. Conditions are derived whereby an equilibrium exists in which firms truthfully report their sales and…

We argue that some powerful CEOs induce boards to shift the weight on performance measures toward the better performing measures, thereby rigging incentive pay. A simple model formalizes this intuition and gives an explicit structural…

In service industries with congestion effects, two very different contractual structures are commonly observed, depending on whether or not firms choose to offer a guaranteed service level. We analyze the impact of these choices on market…

Five studies show that gift recipients are more appreciative of gifts they explicitly request than those they do not. In contrast, gift givers assume that both solicited and unsolicited gifts will be equally appreciated. At the root of this…

This paper explores the connection between three important threads of economic research offering different approaches to studying the dynamics of an industry with heterogeneous firms. Finite models of the form pioneered by Ericson and Pakes…

Recent experience suggests that many CEOs and directors of failed companies are able to obtain or retain directorships at other companies after their departure. Should this be a concern for shareholders?

In this paper, we estimate the effect of the tax preference for health insurance on health care spending using data from the Medical Expenditure Panel Surveys from 1996–2005. We use the fact that Social Security taxes are only levied on earnings…

In 2007, SCMR featured an article on Walmart’s burgeoning sustainability program, focusing on eight specific initiatives being undertaken at the company. Four years later, the author of that article, Erica Plambeck of Stanford, and colleague Lyn…

We suggest that marketers actively participate in reducing unit costs during new product development, consistent with the theme of integrated marketing and manufacturing. Most marketing managers misjudge the impact on gross profit of…

In this fictitious tale, we apply the governance provisions of Dodd-Frank to the world of college football. If they would not work in that setting, should we expect them to work in business?

The plot structure in television advertisements can enhance consumers’ brand attitudes and foster increasing consumer and industry recognition. A corpus analysis of contemporary television advertisements shows that advertisements using the…

Health care providers may vertically integrate not only to facilitate coordination of care, but also for strategic reasons that may not be in patients’ best interests. Optimal Medicare reimbursement policy depends upon the extent to which each of…

Many organizational theorists started studying complete organizational populations in the 1980s and 1990s. In attempting to document and record the initial founding periods of populations, analysts conducting these studies often found themselves…

We identify a “slope” factor in exchange rates. High interest rate currencies load more on this slope factor than low interest rate currencies. This factor accounts for most of the cross-sectional variation in average excess returns between high…

Survey from Stanford University’s Rock Center for Corporate Governance and Heidrick & Struggles has uncovered surprises…

By many measures, current CEOs should be the best candidates to serve on the board of directors. However, recent survey evidence suggests this may not be the case. Should companies reassess the importance of this criteria when looking for new…

We have devised two special modules for De Nederlandsche Bank (DNB) Household Survey to measure financial literacy and study its relationship to stock market participation. We find that the majority of respondents display basic financial…