Publications

Robert Simons is a Baker Foundation Professor at Harvard Business School. For over 35 years, Simons has taught accounting, management control, and strategy execution courses in both the Harvard MBA and Executive Education Programs. For 2024/25, he is teaching a... View Details

2010
Working Paper

Investment Taxation and Portfolio Performance

By: Daniel B. Bergstresser and Jeffrey Pontiff

Taxes have a first-order impact on portfolio returns. Most research mistakenly assumes that portfolios command similar tax burdens, or that tax burdens are proportional to dividend yields. Portfolio strategies differ in the pace of capital gains realization. We use the... View Details

Keywords: Financial Strategy; Investment Return; Investment Portfolio; Taxation; Performance Evaluation

Forthcoming
Article

Black Empowerment and White Mobilization: The Effects of the Voting Rights Act

By: Andrea Bernini, Giovanni Facchini, Marco Tabellini and Cecilia Testa

How did southern whites respond to the 1965 Voting Rights Act (VRA)? Leveraging newly digitized data on county-level voter registration by race between 1956 and 1980, and exploiting pre-determined variation in exposure to the federal intervention, we document that... View Details

Keywords: Government Legislation; Race; Behavior; Voting; Prejudice and Bias

December 2022 (Revised January 2023)
Case

Cann: High Hopes for Cannabis Infused Beverages

By: Ayelet Israeli and Anne V. Wilson

Founded in 2018 by Jake Bullock and Luke Anderson, Cann sold “social tonics,” or cannabis-infused beverages. By 2022, the company had several notable celebrity investors and talent partners, had sold over 10 million beverages to consumers, was distributing in six... View Details

18 Oct 2010
Lessons from the Classroom

Venture Capital’s Disconnect with Clean Tech

MBA students often fall into one of two categories—those hungry to rush into careers as venture capitalists, and those eager to found a venture-funded start-up. For all of them, Harvard Business School professor Joseph Lassiter has some intriguing advice: Spend a few... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Energy; Utilities; Financial Services

July 2005 (Revised September 2020)
Case

The U.S. Current Account Deficit

By: Laura Alfaro, Rafael Di Tella, Ingrid Vogel, Renee Kim, Sarah Jeong, Matthew Johnson and Jonathan Schlefer

Investors and policymakers throughout the world were confronted with the risk of painful economic consequences arising from the large U.S. current account deficit. In 2007, the U.S. current account deficit was $731 billion, equivalent to 5.3% of GDP. The implications... View Details

Keywords: World Economy; Macroeconomics; Borrowing and Debt; Currency; Foreign Direct Investment; Business and Government Relations; United States

2022
White Paper

The Options Multiplier: Decoding the CareerWise Youth Apprentice Journey

By: Joseph B. Fuller, Rachel Lipson, Farah Mallah, Girish Pendse and Rachel Snyder

As more Americans question the appeal of costly higher education programs, earn-and-learn models, like apprenticeship, are attracting increasing attention from policymakers and employers alike. While apprenticeship is widespread in many parts of Europe,... View Details

Keywords: Apprenticeship; Higher Education; Training; Personal Development and Career; Cost vs Benefits; Success; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms

11 Feb 2008
Research & Ideas

Does Democracy Need a Marketing Manager?

from ready for online voting. We can't even manage to cast and count votes accurately with the new electronic technologies. Q: In the United States it seems the public has a very low opinion of the federal government. Can View Details

Keywords: by Sean Silverthorne

July 2024
Case

“In That Crucible, You Find Innovation”: Public Safety Transformation in Albuquerque

By: Hise O. Gibson and Antonio Manuel Oftelie

“In That Crucible, You Find Innovation”: Public Safety Transformation in Albuquerque" centers on Mayor Tim Keller’s leadership during the social justice protests in 2020 and his efforts to reinvent Albuquerque’s public safety model. Faced with both a federal consent... View Details

Keywords: Change Management; Government Administration; Leading Change; Safety; Social Issues; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Ethics; Public Administration Industry; New Mexico

03 Feb 2003
Research & Ideas

Homeland Security: A Ready-made Market

consensus. There's an enormous chokepoint when it comes to getting the job done." It's about providing IT solutions to a complex, evolving environment.— Murray Mazer,Lumigent Technologies Even so, the federal View Details

Keywords: by Julia Hanna; Service

November 2023
Case

Gabon Special Economic Zone

By: John Macomber and Wale Lawal

Tropical rain forest covers about 80% of the West African nation of Gabon, part of the Congo Basin and the "lungs of the world." Gabon is one of the first nations to earn revenue from carbon sequestration...as long as the rain forest remains intact. There are... View Details

Keywords: Economic Development; Forestry; Wood; Carbon Credits; Supply Chain; Economic Growth; Developing Countries and Economies; Climate Change; Environmental Sustainability; Government Administration; Business and Government Relations; Strategy; Forest Products Industry; Africa; Gabon

19 Nov 2012
Research & Ideas

LEED-ing by Example

In the debate over whether to increase or decrease the stringency of environmental regulations, the possibility that government agencies might use purchasing to stimulate market demand for "green" products and services is often... View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel; Construction; Real Estate; Energy; Utilities

07 Sep 2019
Op-Ed

Even for Non-Believers, These Are the Next Steps on Climate Change

trillion-dollar plans to attempt to mitigate carbon. Businesses, homeowners, and local governments must focus on what can be done today to address these direct threats to people and property. There are three major tools in the “what to do... View Details

Keywords: by John Macomber

08 Nov 2013
HBS Seminar

Laura Diaz Anadon, Harvard Kennedy School

2011
Book

Accelerating Energy Innovation: Insights from Multiple Sectors

By: Rebecca Henderson and Richard G. Newell

Accelerating energy innovation could be an important part of an effective response to the threat of climate change. Written by a stellar group of experts in the field, this book complements existing research on the subject with an exploration of the role that public... View Details

Keywords: Energy Sources; Innovation and Invention; Climate Change; Policy; Competition; Demand and Consumers; Finance; Energy Industry

March 2010 (Revised October 2017)
Case

Russia: Revolution and Reform

By: Rawi E. Abdelal and Sogomon Tarontsi

The collapse of central authority in the Soviet Union in 1991 ushered in a period of revolutionary transformations for the states that emerged in its wake. The leaders of Russia, the USSR's successor, since then have struggled to reestablish central authority while... View Details

Keywords: Development Economics; Economic Systems; Government Administration; Business and Government Relations; Public Administration Industry; Russia

January–February 2022
Article

Mobilizing the U.S. Military’s TRICARE Program for Value-Based Care: A Report From the Defense Health Board

By: Robert S. Kaplan, Paul R. Schaettle, Vivian S. Lee, Michael D. Parkinson, Gregory H. Gorman and Michael-Anne Browne

The U.S. Military Health System spends about $50 billion annually through its TRICARE health plans to provide care to 9.6 million active duty service members, retirees, and their families. TRICARE, historically, has used the predominant U.S. fee-for-service payment... View Details

Keywords: Military Health System; Value-based Healthcare; Health Care and Treatment; United States

2018
Chapter

Between Economic Planning and Market Competition: International Law and Economics in the U.S.

By: Laura Phillips Sawyer

The impact of institutional economics in shaping the American regulatory tradition has largely been dismissed as an incoherent attack on the neoclassical economic paradigm. This essay briefly reconstructs the interwar institutionalist movement, exploring the... View Details

Keywords: Economics; History; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Business and Government Relations; United States