Publications

24 Sep 2008
News

Harvard Business School Examines Crisis on Wall Street

December 1983 (Revised March 1999)
Case

The United States Financial Crisis of 1931

The behavior of the Federal Reserve System during the early years of the Great Depression has been a topic of considerable controversy. The Fed, it has been argued, pursued a contracting policy, thereby helping to turn what might have been only a brief recession into... View Details

Keywords: Government and Politics; Financial Crisis; United States

29 Jun 2016
Research & Ideas

The $1 Trillion Link Between Mental Health and Economic Productivity

In April, the World Health Organization released a groundbreaking study that established a definitive link between mental health and economic productivity. The findings were both depressing and hopeful. On the downside, View Details

Keywords: by Carmen Nobel

01 Jan 2010
News

Best Practices: Leading in Crisis

06 Dec 2021
News

The Popular Stock Metric That Can Lead Investors Astray

June 2010 (Revised January 2019)
Case

The Guggenheims and Chilean Nitrates

By: Geoffrey Jones and Felipe Tamega Fernandes

The case describes the growth of Guggenheim Brothers as one of the largest mining companies in the world in the early twentieth century. Global expansion led the firm to Chile, first in copper and later in natural nitrates. Chile's economic growth was driven by the... View Details

Keywords: History; Venture Capital; Business History; Entrepreneurship; Globalization; Foreign Direct Investment; Financial Crisis; Mining Industry; Chile

02 Jul 2013
First Look

First Look: July 2

Publisher's link: http://hbr.org/2013/05/how-to-negotiate-with-vcs/ar/1 2006 pub Real Estate Prices During the Roaring Twenties and the Great Depression By: Nicholas, Tom, and Anna Scherbina Abstract—Using... View Details

Keywords: Anna Secino

October 2018 (Revised January 2019)
Case

The Financial Crisis: Hank Paulson in 2008

By: Adi Sunderam, Robin Greenwood, Sam Hanson and David Scharfstein

On the afternoon of Monday October 13, 2008, Hank Paulson Jr., the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States, walked into the large conference room across the hall from his office in the Treasury Department. Joining him were Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke,... View Details

Keywords: Bailout; Regulation; Financial Crisis; History; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Decision Making; Banking Industry; Financial Services Industry; Real Estate Industry; United States

2015
Working Paper

The U.S. Experiment with Fair Trade Laws: State Police Powers, Federal Antitrust, and the Politics of 'Fairness,' 1890-1938

By: Laura Phillips Sawyer

Prior to the Great Depression and President Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal programs, considerable pressure for antitrust revision came from trade associations of independent proprietors. A perhaps unlikely leader, Edna Gleason, organized California's retail pharmacists... View Details

Keywords: Competition; Fairness; Laws and Statutes; Supply and Industry; Business and Government Relations

Read Now

15 Oct 2013
First Look

First Look: October 15

(iii) the effects of supply are stronger for longer maturities, and (iv) following periods when arbitrageurs have lost money, both supply and the term spread are stronger predictors of excess returns. August 2013 Journal of Financial Economics Did Bank Distress Stifle... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

12 Jun 2012
First Look

First Look: June 12

distress during the Great Depression had a significant negative impact on the level, quality, and trajectory of firm-level innovation, particularly for R&D firms operating in capital intensive... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

October 2012 (Revised July 2014)
Background Note

The Role of the Government in the Early Development of American Venture Capital

By: Josh Lerner and Tom Nicholas

Whether the government or markets, or a mixture of both, can provide efficient and effective incentives for encouraging entrepreneurial activity and new venture financing is an age-old question. Public promotion efforts are controversial and in most cases they tend to... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Business and Government Relations; United States

2007
Working Paper

The Seer of Wellesley Hills: Roger Babson and the Babson Statistical Organization

By: Walter A. Friedman

Roger Babson was a pioneer of the business-forecasting industry in the United States in the early twentieth century. He built the largest private economic forecasting agency in the period and published a great range of economic statistics in his weekly newsletters. As... View Details

Keywords: Forecasting and Prediction; Economics; Business History; Newsletters; Personal Development and Career; United States