Jeffery Scott Bredthauer, Brian C. Payne, Jiri Tresl and Gordon V. Karels
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the absolute and risk-adjusted stock return performance of the US health care industry conditional upon the presidential…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the absolute and risk-adjusted stock return performance of the US health care industry conditional upon the presidential administration’s political party and the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy stance. It evaluates this return behavior across the 60-year time period from 1954 to 2013, and sub-divides this entire period into the pre-Medicare period (1954-1964), Medicare period (1965-1984), and Medicare-plus-high-health-care-inflation period (1985-2013).
Design/methodology/approach
The study uses monthly returns to the health care industry and overall market, characterizing each sample month as either having a Republican or Democratic president and either a contractionary or expansionary monetary policy regime determined by whether the Federal Reserve is increasing or decreasing interest rates, respectively. It incorporates univariate and multivariate analysis to quantify the return behavior of both the health care industry and the overall market during the entire period and all three sub-periods. Additionally, it utilizes a common four-factor multivariate regression model and associated hypothesis testing to characterize risk-adjusted excess returns (i.e. α) to the health care industry during the entire period and all three sub-periods.
Findings
The health care industry has earned robust, positive risk-adjusted returns with the magnitude of the returns sensitive to the political party of the administration and the monetary policy regime. The authors find that prior to 1965 (1954-1964), when the president was a Republican, during times of monetary contraction, health care earned an excess risk-adjusted return. There was no association between Democratic administrations and excess health care returns prior to 1965. In contrast, the authors find that after 1965 this relationship changes. The authors find that returns to health care were positive for Republicans during times of monetary expansion and positive for Democrats during monetary contraction. The authors also find this relationship has become more pronounced after 1984.
Originality/value
The study extends prior literature, which has shown that the health care industry is a priced factor in the US stock market and that it provides significant risk-adjusted returns in the recent past. Uniquely, this study shows that the excess returns to health care vary considerably over the past 60 years, and that these excess returns are quite sensitive to political policy, proxied by the presidential administration party, and monetary policy, as measured using Fed discount rate changes. These findings have implications for management and shareholders of highly regulated and subsidized industries and firms.
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David C. May and Brian K. Payne
The purpose of this paper is to use exchange rate theory to compare how white-collar offenders and property offenders rank the severity of various correctional sanctions.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to use exchange rate theory to compare how white-collar offenders and property offenders rank the severity of various correctional sanctions.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors use survey data from 160 inmates incarcerated for white-collar and property crimes in a Midwestern state to compare how white-collar inmates differed from property inmates in ranking the goals of prison and the punitiveness of prison as compared to other alternatives.
Findings
White-collar offenders were no different than property offenders in terms of their assessment of the punitiveness of prison compared to the punitiveness of the four sanctions under consideration here. White-collar offenders were significantly more likely than property offenders to believe that the goal of prison is to rehabilitate rather than deter individuals from further crime.
Research limitations/implications
Because the authors defined white-collar offenders by their crime of incarceration, they may have captured offenders who are not truly white-collar offenders. Focusing on offenders who were in prison did not allow them to fully examine whether similarities between white-collar and property offenders can be attributed to adjustment to prison or some other variable.
Practical implications
Alternative sanctions may be useful in punishing white-collar offenders in a less expensive manner than prison. Results suggest white-collar offenders may be more amenable to rehabilitation than property offenders and may not experience prison much differently than other types of offenders.
Originality value
This research is important because it is the first of its kind to compare white-collar offenders’ views about the punitiveness of prison and the goals of incarceration with those of property offenders.
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In the last four years, since Volume I of this Bibliography first appeared, there has been an explosion of literature in all the main functional areas of business. This wealth of…
Abstract
In the last four years, since Volume I of this Bibliography first appeared, there has been an explosion of literature in all the main functional areas of business. This wealth of material poses problems for the researcher in management studies — and, of course, for the librarian: uncovering what has been written in any one area is not an easy task. This volume aims to help the librarian and the researcher overcome some of the immediate problems of identification of material. It is an annotated bibliography of management, drawing on the wide variety of literature produced by MCB University Press. Over the last four years, MCB University Press has produced an extensive range of books and serial publications covering most of the established and many of the developing areas of management. This volume, in conjunction with Volume I, provides a guide to all the material published so far.
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The librarian and researcher have to be able to uncover specific articles in their areas of interest. This Bibliography is designed to help. Volume IV, like Volume III, contains…
Abstract
The librarian and researcher have to be able to uncover specific articles in their areas of interest. This Bibliography is designed to help. Volume IV, like Volume III, contains features to help the reader to retrieve relevant literature from MCB University Press' considerable output. Each entry within has been indexed according to author(s) and the Fifth Edition of the SCIMP/SCAMP Thesaurus. The latter thus provides a full subject index to facilitate rapid retrieval. Each article or book is assigned its own unique number and this is used in both the subject and author index. This Volume indexes 29 journals indicating the depth, coverage and expansion of MCB's portfolio.
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Brian K. Payne, Bruce L. Berg and Jeff Toussaint
When elder abuse first surfaced as a social problem, the response to the problem was grounded in the belief that the victims would be best served with as little criminal justice…
Abstract
When elder abuse first surfaced as a social problem, the response to the problem was grounded in the belief that the victims would be best served with as little criminal justice involvement as possible. This changed in the late 1980s and early 1990s when elder abuse was criminalized by politicians, and police were expected to treat the problem as a crime problem despite the fact that very little research had considered the best law enforcement response to elder abuse. In this research, we surveyed 119 police chiefs to see how their departments handled allegations of abuse. We also address the problems they confront in elder abuse cases and the special programs and policies they have implemented to deal with the victimization of elderly persons. Results show that traditional criminal justice techniques are followed for the most part, and only about a third of the departments implemented special elder abuse programs. Also, they confront numerous problems that are common when police are expected to enforce new laws.
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A highly significant action taken by the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, reported elsewhere in this issue, could well result in important advances in surveillance and…
Abstract
A highly significant action taken by the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, reported elsewhere in this issue, could well result in important advances in surveillance and probably legislative control over enforcement of certain aspects of EEC legislation in the Member‐states. The Minister has sent an urgent request to the Commission in Brussels to dispatch inspectors to each country, including the United Kingdom, to examine and report on the standards of inspection and hygiene with detailed information on how the EEC Directive on Poultry Meat is being implemented. Information of the method of financing the cost of poultrymeat inspection in each country has ben requested. The comprehensive survey is seen as a common approach in this one field. The Minister requested that the results of the inspectors' reports should be available to him and other Member‐states.
Chris F. Wright, Kyoung-Hee Yu and Stephen Clibborn
Migrant workers are often concentrated in segments of the labour market characterised by low-paid and insecure work and which fall outside of the traditional ‘web of rules’…
Abstract
Migrant workers are often concentrated in segments of the labour market characterised by low-paid and insecure work and which fall outside of the traditional ‘web of rules’ providing workers with protections. Institutional experimentation provides an opportunity to rectify this. This chapter examines the reasons why migrant workers are often subject to exploitation and marginalisation in the labour market. It then analyses the roles of the three main actors with the capacity to protect and improve migrant workers’ labour market position: governments, trade unions and community organisations. It proposes a ‘co-regulation’ approach based on collaborative institutional experimentation between these actors as the most effective way to address the exploitation and marginalisation of migrant workers.
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Formed by Andrew Hall following interest at the Fabricators' Group Meeting in the November 1994 PCIF Senior Management Session, the Bare Board Test Working Group is the latest…
Abstract
Formed by Andrew Hall following interest at the Fabricators' Group Meeting in the November 1994 PCIF Senior Management Session, the Bare Board Test Working Group is the latest addition to the PCIF April Project.