Publications

Article

The Not-So-Common-Wealth of Australia: Evidence for a Cross-Cultural Desire for a More Equal Distribution of Wealth.

By: Michael I. Norton, David T. Neal, Cassandra L. Govan, Dan Ariely and Elise Holland

Recent evidence suggests that Americans underestimate wealth inequality in the United States and favor a more equal wealth distribution (Norton & Ariely, 2011). Does this pattern reflect ideological dynamics unique to the United States, or is the phenomenon evident in... View Details

Keywords: Wealth; Equality and Inequality; Australia; United States

2011
Working Paper

'Last-place Aversion': Evidence and Redistributive Implications

By: Ilyana Kuziemko, Ryan W. Buell, Taly Reich and Michael I. Norton

Why do low-income individuals often oppose redistribution? We hypothesize that an aversion to being in "last place" undercuts support for redistribution, with low-income individuals punishing those slightly below themselves to keep someone "beneath" them. In laboratory... View Details

Keywords: Wages; Surveys; Wealth and Poverty; Behavior; Income; Research; Rank and Position; Attitudes; Personal Characteristics; Economics

2008
Chapter

Public Action for Public Goods: Theory and Evidence

By: Abhijit Banerjee, Lakshmi Iyer and Rohini Somanathan

This chapter focuses on the relationship between public action and access to public goods. It begins by developing a simple model of collective action which is intended to capture the various mechanisms that are discussed in the theoretical literature on collective... View Details

Keywords: Policy; Quality; Groups and Teams; Human Needs; Poverty; Welfare or Wellbeing; Public Administration Industry

October 2011 (Revised March 2015)
Case

SKS and the AP Microfinance Crisis

By: Shawn Cole and Yannick Saleman

SKS, India's leading microfinance firm, is challenged when politicians declaim microfinance as exploitation of the poor and severely restrict business practices. View Details

Keywords: Microfinance; Government Administration; Policy; Capital Markets; Crisis Management; Poverty; Financial Services Industry; India

Educators

2010
Article

Hospital Performance, the Local Economy, and the Local Workforce: Findings from a U.S. National Longitudinal Study

Background: Pay-for-performance is an increasingly popular approach to improving health care quality, and the US government will soon implement pay-for-performance in hospitals nationwide. Yet hospital capacity to perform (and improve performance) likely depends on... View Details

Keywords: Health Care and Treatment; Performance; Health Industry; United States

March 2017
Supplement

Microfinance in India 2010-2016: Crisis and Recovery

By: Shawn Cole, Vikram Gandhi, Caitlin Reimers and Yannick Saleman

SKS, India's leading microfinance firm, is challenged when politicians declaim microfinance as exploitation of the poor and severely restrict business practices. View Details

Keywords: Microfinance; Government Administration; Policy; Capital Markets; Crisis Management; Poverty; Financial Services Industry; India

04 Jun 2001
Research & Ideas

RealNetworks, CNET, and Judo Strategy

Bonnie (MBA '90), CEO of CNET, whose Web sites—not to mention a radio station and several print magazines—provide a wealth of information to technology buffs and buyers alike.... View Details

Keywords: by Jim Aisner

2021
Chapter

The Economic and Political Effects of Immigration: Evidence from the Age of Mass Migration

By: Marco Tabellini

Between 1850 and 1920, during the Age of Mass Migration, more than 30 million Europeans moved to the United States. European immigrants provided ample supply of cheap labor as well as specific skills and know-how, contributing to American economic growth. These... View Details

Keywords: Age Of Mass Migration; Political Ideology; Political Economy; Assimilation; Immigration; Economics; History; United States

Register to Read

09 May 2017
First Look

New Research and Ideas, May 9

toward lower-uncertainty periods. We document that the resulting opportunistic earnings management is concentrated in CEOs, firms, and periods where such incentives are likely to be strongest: (1) where CEO View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

Comment

Comment to Martin Weitzman's 'Stochastic Income and Wealth'

By: Diego Comin

Keywords: Wealth; Compensation and Benefits

04 Apr 2012
Research & Ideas

When Founders Recruit Friends and Family as Investors

risk-averse than they might otherwise have been, which can result in a lower exit value. An experienced investor explained, "When an entrepreneur has all of their own personal wealth or their family's View Details

Keywords: by Noam Wasserman

21 Aug 2018
First Look

New Research and Ideas, August 21, 2018

Latin America during the globalization waves between the 19th century and the present day. It argues that although global capitalism created much wealth for the region, this was at the cost of massive... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

2024
Book

The Fading Light of Democratic Capitalism: How Pervasive Cronyism and Restricted Suffrage Are Destroying Democratic Capitalism as a National Ideal ... And What to Do About It

By: Malcolm S. Salter

What are we to do about declining public trust and confidence in democratic capitalism, which many citizens consider a cornerstone of our national ideology and identity? In this book, I address how we can rekindle the fading light of democratic capitalism as an... View Details

Keywords: Government and Politics; Power and Influence; Economic Systems; Culture

15 Jan 2019
First Look

New Research and Ideas, January 15, 2019

minimize the impact of taxes on their investors’ returns. The assignment was complicated as KSW had different categories of investors (a sovereign wealth fund, pension funds, and high net worth individuals)... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

04 Dec 2018
First Look

New Research and Ideas, December 4, 2018

forthcoming Entrepreneurship and Collaboration Inter-Organizational Collaboration and Start-Up Innovation By: Aggarwal, Vikas A., and Andy Wu Abstract—This chapter presents an... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

February 2009 (Revised December 2009)
Case

Merck: Global Health and Access to Medicines

By: V. Kasturi Rangan and Katharine Lee

The case describes the effort of Merck, a global leader in pharmaceuticals, in making available its medicines to the poor. The challenge for the company (or for that matter, any pharmaceutical company) is how to integrate its business strategy with its corporate social... View Details

Keywords: Globalized Firms and Management; Health Care and Treatment; Emerging Markets; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Poverty; Business Strategy; Pharmaceutical Industry

Educators

January 2007 (Revised April 2011)
Case

Farmacias Similares: Private and Public Health Care for the Base of the Pyramid in Mexico

By: Michael Chu and Regina Garcia-Cuellar

Farmacias Similares, serving Mexico's low-income sector, grew to $600 million sales and 3,400 drugstores while deep reforms to help the poor swept the public health system. Adjacent to each store, for $2 per visit, medical clinics provided access to doctors for 2.3... View Details

Keywords: Private Sector; Public Sector; Health Care and Treatment; Growth and Development Strategy; Poverty; Pharmaceutical Industry; Retail Industry; Mexico

Educators

July 2009 (Revised June 2012)
Teaching Note

Denmark: Globalization and the Welfare State (TN)

By: Arthur A. Daemmrich

Teaching Note for [709015]. View Details

Keywords: Globalization; Government and Politics; Poverty; Denmark

June 2023
Teaching Note

Connecting Students in Chattanooga (A) and (B)

By: Jan W. Rivkin

Teaching Note for HBS Case Nos. 722-449 and 722-451. As this case opens, it is the spring of 2020 in Chattanooga. COVID-19 has hit, public schools have closed their buildings, remote learning has begun, and more than 28,000 schoolkids lack the high-quality Internet... View Details

Keywords: K-12 Education; Pandemic; COVID-19; Accessibility; Education; Urban Development; Wealth and Poverty; Internet and the Web; Information Infrastructure; Education Industry; Tennessee