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The cornerstone of Modern Portfolio Theory with implications for many aspects of corporate finance is that reduced correlation among assets and reduced standard deviation are key elements in portfolio risk reduction. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the conditional correlation and standard deviation of a broad set of indices with the S & P 500 conditioned on market performance.

The authors examined volatility and correlation for a set of indices for a 19-year period based on weekly data from July 2, 1993 to June 30, 2012. These included the NASDAQ, MSCI EAFE, Russell 1000, Russell 2000, Russell 3000, Russell 1000 Growth, Russell 1000 Value, Gold, MSCI EM and Dow Jones UBS Commodity. The data for the Wilshire US REIT, Barclays Multiverse, Multiverse 1-3, Multiverse 3-5 and Multiverse 10+ became available starting July 2, 2002. For these indices the authors used weekly data from July 1, 2002 through June 30, 2012. For the iBarclays TIPS, the authors used weekly data from the time of availability, namely, for the period December 12, 2003 through June 29, 2012.

The findings demonstrate that both the conditional correlations and standard deviations vary as a function of market performance. Moreover, the authors obtain a U-shape distribution of correlations conditioned on market performance for equity indices, such as NASDAQ, as well as for the Wilshire REIT. Namely, correlations tend to be high when market returns are at low or high extremes. For more typical market performance, correlations tend to be low. A modified U-shape is found for bond indices and the Dow Jones UBS Commodity Index. Interestingly, the correlation between gold and the S & P 500 is unrelated to the return on the S & P.

While it has been observed that asset classes move together, this paper is the first to systematically analyze the nature of these asset class correlations.

In the UK, the majority of university students specialise and study just one subject at bachelor degree level, commonly known in the UK as a single honours degree. However, nearly all British universities will permit students if they wish to study two or even three subjects, so-called joint or combined honours degrees, internationally known as a double major. The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between graduate employment, pre-university educational attainment and degree classification achieved. The study also explored student choice with respect to university prestige.

The authors analysed the complete data set provided from the Higher Education Statistics Agency Destination of Leavers from the Higher Education survey, and combined this with data from the POLAR4 quintiles, Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) tariff points and degree classification. The data were analysed to establish whether there was a difference in the choices and highly skilled graduate employment of the joint honours students, focussing particularly on Russell Group and Post-92 Universities, in order to build on previous published work.

For any UCAS tariff band, the higher the POLAR4 quintile the higher the rate of highly skilled destination. Russell Group outperform the Post-92 graduates in their rates of highly skilled destinations, for any tariff band and for both joint and single honours degrees. Higher POLAR4 quintile graduates are more likely to study at the Russell Group, with this effect increasing the higher the UCAS tariff. With the exception of first class honours graduates from Post-92 universities, joint and single honours from the Russell Group have a higher rate of highly skilled destination than Post-92 in the next higher degree classification.

Low POLAR4 quintile students with high UCAS tariffs are “under-matching” and there is an impact on their graduate employment as a result.

This study adds new insights into joint honours degrees and also reinforces the literature around educational advantage and achievement prior to university, and the impact on graduate employment. Educational disadvantage persists over the course of a university degree education, from the perspective of gaining graduate employment. Higher quintile graduates are proportionately more likely to achieve the highest degree classifications, and proportionately less likely to achieve the lowest classifications, than graduates from the lower quintiles. Joint honours graduates are less likely to achieve a first class honours degree than single honours, and this will affect their rate of highly skilled destination.

In the UK, the majority of university students specialise and study just one subject at bachelor degree level, commonly known in the UK as a single honours degree. However, nearly all British universities will permit students if they wish to study two or even three subjects, so-called joint or combined honours degrees, internationally known as a double major. The purpose of this paper is to explore whether educational advantage, measured by the “Participation of Local Areas” (POLAR) classification, correlated with rates of graduate destinations for joint and single honours graduates. This study focused particularly on Russell Group and Post-92 Universities.

The authors analysed the complete data set provided from the Higher Education Statistics Agency Destination of Leavers from the Higher Education survey, and combined this with data from the POLAR4 quintiles, which aggregate geographical regions across the UK based on the proportion of its young people that participate in higher education. The data were analysed to establish whether there was a difference in the highly skilled graduate employability of the joint honours students, focusing particularly on Russell Group and Post-92 Universities, in order to build on previous published work.

Single honours and joint honours graduates from higher participation POLAR4 quintiles were more likely to be in a highly skilled destination. However at both the Russell Group and the Post-92 universities, respectively, there was no trend towards a smaller highly skilled destinations gap between the honours types for the higher quintiles. For the highest POLAR4 quintile, the proportion of joint honours graduates was substantially higher at the Russell Group than at Post-92 universities. Furthermore, in any quintile, there were proportionately more joint honours graduates from the Russell Group, compared with single honours graduates, and increasingly so the higher the quintile.

This study focused on joint honours degrees in the UK where the two or three principal subjects fall into different Joint Academic Coding System (JACS) subject areas, i.e. the two or three subjects are necessarily diverse rather than academically cognate. This excluded the class of joint honours degrees where the principal subjects lie within the same JACS subject area, i.e. they may be closer academically, although still taught by different academic teams. However, the overall proportion of joint honours graduates identified using the classification was in line with the UCAS (2017) data on national rates of combined studies acceptances.

All Russell Group graduates, irrespective of their POLAR4 quintile, were far more likely to be in a highly skilled destination than single or joint honours graduates of Post-92 universities. Even the lowest quintile graduates of the Russell Group had greater rates of highly skilled destination than the highest quintile from Post-92 universities, for both single and joint honours graduates. This demonstrated the positive impact that graduating from the Russell Group confers on both single and joint honours graduates.

This study could not explain the much smaller gap in the highly skilled destinations between single honours and joint honours graduates found in the Russell Group, compared with the Post-92. Why do a higher proportion of joint honours graduates hail form the upper POLAR4 quintiles, the Russell Group joint honours graduates were more disproportionately from the upper POLAR4 quintiles and the joint honours upper POLAR4 quintiles represented such a larger proportion of the Russell Group overall undergraduate population? Other student characteristics such as tariff on entry, subjects studied, gender, age and ethnicity might all contribute to this finding.

This study demonstrated that, averaged across all universities in the UK, there was a trend for both single honours and joint honours graduates from higher participation POLAR4 quintiles to be more likely to be in a highly skilled destination, i.e. the more educationally advantaged, were more likely to be in a highly skilled destination, as a proportion of the total from each honours type. This accorded with HESA (2018b) data, but expanded those findings to include direct consideration of joint honours graduates.

This note presents new archival evidence about John Maynard Keynes’ attitudes toward Jews. The relevant material is composed of two letters sent by Robert G. Wertheimer to Bertrand Russell and Richard F. Kahn along with their replies. Between 1963 and 1964, Wertheimer – an Austrian-born Jewish immigrant then professor of economics at Babson College – wrote to Russell and Kahn asking for their personal reminiscences concerning Keynes’ anti-Semitic utterances. In their brief but still significant responses, both Russell and Kahn firmly denied any hint of anti-Semitism in Keynes, thereby providing significant first-hand testimonies from two of his closest acquaintances.

Purpose – This chapter explicates the categorical resources and practices used in some disputes involving two children.

Methodology – The data on which the study is based consists of a transcript of an audio recording of the naturally occurring talk-in-interaction during a family meal. This data is analyzed using the approach of membership categorization analysis (MCA).

Findings – We show that it is neither the category collection “children” nor the category collection “siblings” that is relevant for the organization of these disputes but rather a number of asymmetrical standardized relational pairs, such as “rule-enforcer” and “offender” or “offender” and “victim.” It is these pairs of categories that are demonstrably relevant for the members, providing for and making intelligible their disputes. We then consider the question of the demonstrably relevant “wider context” of the disputes to which the disputants are actually oriented. This wider context is an omnirelevant oppositional social relationship between the children. We demonstrate that the disputes reflexively constitute the character of their oppositional relationship and show how these are instantiations of an omnirelevant category collection, namely, “parties to an oppositional relationship.”

Value of chapter – This chapter contributes to the corpus of ethnomethodological studies on children's culture in action and more particularly on the categorical organization of children's (and others’) disputes. It also contributes to MCA more generally in respect to its focus on the issues of omnirelevance and the “occasionality” of category collections.

This paper seeks to examine the effectiveness of teaching and widening participation as measures to assess, compare, and benchmark the performance of English universities.

Uses data from a paired sample English universities to compare the effectiveness of teaching and widening participation in: research‐orientated “Russell Group” universities versus teaching‐orientated “post 1992” universities. All data were in the public domain and provided from reports of the Higher Education Funding Council for England, The Higher Education Statistics Agency and The Times Higher Education Supplement.

The analysis quantified the greater academic effectiveness and academic efficiencies of post‐1992 universities compared with members of the Russell Group. These results are the complete opposite of the widely accepted position of universities in published league tables and so are likely to be controversial.

The equations used for the numerical analysis could be modified to give a different weighting to different factors and/or to include the effectiveness of research activity, and could therefore result in a different interpretation of the data.

The introduction of variable top‐up fees in 2006 will probably lead to the Russell Group universities charging a higher monetary price. If all other factors remain unchanged, this will increase the academic and operational efficiencies of the Russell Group universities compared with the post‐1992 group.

This is highly original analysis of existing data in the public domain and leads to controversial but logically inescapable findings.

The purpose of this paper is to compare Swami Vivekananda’s conception and development of human being with those of Bertrand Russell. The author also discusses Vivekananda’s conception of the human being in more detail and his methods for the development of human nature so that one can attain the ultimate goal of life.

Vivekananda’s view of human development is not to be equated with richness of material possession or with knowledge about the empirical world, which are sometimes necessary for the successful performance of virtuous actions. Vivekananda has instead emphasized the apprehension of truths, not only for our intellects but also for our hearts.

The oneness of Advaita Vedanta can, according to Vivekananda, be realized in our life in this world.

Vivekananda has shown not only how to apply the Advaita Vedanta in our life for our development but also how to achieve the ultimate goal of life, which is freedom from all types of suffering, and harmony in life.

The purpose of this paper is to estimate whether job applicants who have obtained a BSc in economics from 15 UK universities face different labour market prospects. The author examines whether university entry standards and Russell Group membership affect UK economics applicants’ occupational access and entry-level annual salaries when unobserved heterogeneities, such as ability, motivation, family characteristics and networks, are minimized.

The author evaluate the research question by recording the job search processes of 90 British economics applicants from randomly selected universities. The key elements of the approach are as follows: third-year undergraduate students apply for early career jobs that are relevant to their studies. Applications are closely matched in terms of age, ethnicity, experience and other core characteristics. Differential treatment in the access to vacancies and entry-level annual salaries per university applicant are systematically measured.

By observing as much information as a firm does, the estimations suggest that both entry standards and Russell Group membership positively affect applicants’ labour market prospects. Although the firms cannot evaluate by themselves whether graduates from highly reputable universities are more or less capable and motivated than graduates from less reputable universities, it appears that the university attended affects firms’ recruitment policies. Importantly, valuable variables that capture firms’ and jobs’ heterogeneities, such as occupational variation, regions, workplace size, establishment age, and the existence of trade unions and human resources, are also considered and provide new results.

Understanding the impact of entry standards and university reputation on students’ labour market outcomes is critical to understanding the role of human capital and screening strategies. In addition, obtaining accurate estimates of the payoff of attending a university with a high entry threshold and reputation is of great importance not only to the parents of prospective students who foot tuition bills but also to the students themselves. Furthermore, universities will be interested in the patterns estimated by this study, which will allow recent UK economists to evaluate the current employment environment. In addition, universities should be keen to know how their own graduates have fared in the labour market compared with graduates of other universities.

In the current study, the author attempt to solve the problem of firms’ seeing more information than econometricians by looking at an outcome that is determined before firms see any unobservable characteristics. In the current study, ability, motivation, family characteristics and networks cannot affect applicants’ access to vacancies and entry-level salaries. The current study can estimate the effect of university enrolment on applicants’ occupational access and entry-level salaries, controlling for unobserved characteristics that would themselves affect subsequent outcomes in the labour market.

This conceptual article presents a theoretical approach to understanding the atmosphere at sports stadiums. Using the environmental psychology behavioural model proposed by Mehrabian & Russell (1974), and taking into account recent findings in consumer research, we develop a comprehensive framework for investigating this atmosphere. The framework highlights the role of emotions elicited by different stimuli in sports stadiums. We also suggest a number of direct and indirect influences on behavioural outcomes, caused by the emotional reactions and personal predispositions of spectators - influences that are of economic relevance. The proposed framework also forms a starting point for future empirical studies.

This paper shows that local mutual funds lead firms to engage in corporate social activities locally – corporate community investment (CCI).

Using an extensive US sample of 3,691 firms for the period of 2005–2018, we find that mutual funds investing in local firms tend to increase CCI. To address endogeneity concerns, we employ an instrumental variable (IV) approach with the S&P 500 Index and Russell 1000/2000 Indexes, which suggests a causal effect of local mutual funds on CCI. Our robustness tests include alternative measures of CCI and local ownership as well as different samples using sole-HQ firms, time lags and a matching sample analysis. In addition, we employ alternative approaches for causality tests.

We find that mutual funds investing in local firms tend to increase CCI. In addition, our results indicate that CCI tends to increase firm performance measured with Tobin’s Q and operating cash flow, especially in the consumer-oriented industries where customer relations are critical. The findings imply that CCI is considered as building reputational and relationship capital in communities (i.e. strategic intangibles related to stakeholders). Local mutual funds can help firms develop such strategic intangibles that promote shareholder value.

Our study is the first to investigate the role of local institutional shareholders as a driving force of a firm’s community investments.