Publications

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September 2010 (Revised October 2011)
Case

Chances Are? Course Selection at HBS and at Kellogg

By: Hanna Halaburda and Aldo Sesia

The case describes two alternative elective course assignment procedures: Harvard Business School's lottery-based system and Kellogg Graduate School of Management's bidding-based system. The case has been designed to discuss the benefits and drawbacks of each system... View Details

Keywords: Business Education; Curriculum and Courses; Higher Education; Auctions; Marketplace Matching; Groups and Teams; Strategy; Education Industry; Sports Industry; United States

2008
Working Paper

Variance-Seeking for Positive (and Variance-Aversion for Negative) Experiences: Risk-Seeking in the Domain of Gains?

By: Jolie Mae Martin, Gregory M. Barron and Michael I. Norton

In contrast to research which has conflated losses with negative experiences and gains with positive experiences, we argue that because reference points are set by memories of extremely good and bad experiences, most outcomes are seen as losses in positive domains and... View Details

Keywords: Change; Experience and Expertise; Marketing; Research; Risk and Uncertainty; Loss; Perspective

2009
Chapter

Nonlinear Pricing

By: Raghuram Iyengar and Sunil Gupta

A nonlinear pricing schedule refers to any pricing structure where the total charges payable by customers are not proportional to the quantity of their consumed services. We begin the chapter with a discussion of the broad applicability of nonlinear pricing schemes. We... View Details

Keywords: Price; Demand and Consumers; Duopoly and Oligopoly; Monopoly; Service Operations; Research

June 1999
Supplement

Conversation with Donna Dubinsky, A (Video)

Donna Dubinsky, president and CEO of Handspring, Inc. and former president of Palm Computing, speaks about her career. Topics include: early mentors, strategies for building and maintaining business and personal relationships, developing her personal style and... View Details

Keywords: Personal Development and Career

April 2001 (Revised July 2001)
Case

Verge Software (A)

By: Dorothy A. Leonard and Elizabeth Kind

Scott Rozic, CEO of start-up Verge Software, has just told his board that he is taking the company in a totally new direction, moving from enterprise knowledge management software to Internet direct marketing. This case covers the start-up of the business, and Rozic's... View Details

Keywords: Venture Capital; Investment; Corporate Entrepreneurship; Business or Company Management; Business Strategy; Technological Innovation; Applications and Software; Management Teams; Governing and Advisory Boards; Business Startups; Decision Choices and Conditions; Product Development; Information Technology Industry; United States

2020
Working Paper

Do Lenders Still Discriminate? A Robust Approach for Assessing Differences in Menus

By: David Hao Zhang and Paul Willen

We use a new methodology to assess mortgage pricing discrimination by race. We make four main contributions. First, we show that existing estimates of mortgage pricing differences by race can be confounded by a "menu problem," which is the problem associated with... View Details

Keywords: Mortgages; Financing and Loans; Prejudice and Bias; Race; Measurement and Metrics; Banking Industry; United States

February 2016 (Revised February 2018)
Case

The Battle over the Initiative and Referendum in Massachusetts (1918)

By: David Moss and Dean Grodzins

On Election Day in 1918, Massachusetts voters would have to decide not only on their preferred candidates for governor and U.S. Senator, but also whether or not to approve 19 proposed amendments to the state constitution. By far the most controversial of these would... View Details

Keywords: Political Elections; Government Legislation; Power and Influence; History; Massachusetts

Web

Publications - Faculty & Research

Economic Integration ; International Trade ; Democracy ; Political Preferences ; Institutions ; Trade ; Global Range ; Economics ; Government and Politics Citation Find at Harvard Purchase Related Tabellini, Marco, and Giacomo... View Details

2018
Working Paper

Corporate Refinancing, Covenants, and the Agency Cost of Debt

By: Daniel Green

How valuable are restrictive debt covenants in reducing the agency costs of debt? I exploit the revealed preference decision to refinance fixed-coupon bonds, which weighs observable interest rate savings against the unobservable costs of a change in restrictive... View Details

Keywords: Covenants; Refinancing; Corporate Bonds; Agency Costs; Debt Policy; Borrowing and Debt; Bonds; Interest Rates

2016
Working Paper

PathBreakers? Women's Electoral Success and Future Political Participation

By: Sonia Bhalotra, Irma Clots-Figueras and Lakshmi Iyer

We investigate whether the event of a woman being competitively elected as a state legislator encourages the subsequent political participation of women, using a regression discontinuity design on constituency level data from India. We find that female incumbents are... View Details

Keywords: Political Participation; Women; Candidates; Gender Bias; Backlash; Minority Representation; Regression Discontinuity; India; Prejudice and Bias; Political Elections; Gender; Public Administration Industry; India

SSRN

2010
Working Paper

A Behavioral Model of Demandable Deposits and Its Implications for Financial Regulation

By: Julio J. Rotemberg

A model is developed that rationalizes contracts that give depositors the right to obtain funds on demand even when depositors intend to use these funds for consumption in the future. This is explained by depositor overoptimism regarding their own ability to collect... View Details

Keywords: Banks and Banking; Insurance; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; Consumer Behavior; Financial Services Industry

June 1980 (Revised December 1992)
Case

Parker House (B)

The management of Boston's historic Parker House, owned by Dunfey Hotels, has received a request from a tour wholesaler to book a large number of rooms at the hotel during summer and fall 1980. This booking is tied to bookings at two other Dunfey hotels that need this... View Details

Keywords: Product Positioning; Segmentation; Accommodations Industry; Boston

28 Sep 2021
News

Dropbox Billionaire Predicts 40-Hour Workweek Will Become a ‘Thing of the Past’

March – April 2009
Article

Market Research and Innovation Strategy in a Duopoly

By: Dominique Lauga and Elie Ofek

We model a duopoly in which ex-ante identical firms must decide where to direct their innovation efforts. The firms face market uncertainty about consumers' preferences for innovation on two product attributes and technology uncertainty about the success of their R&D... View Details

Keywords: Profit; Innovation and Management; Demand and Consumers; Duopoly and Oligopoly; Research and Development; Competitive Strategy

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2019
Working Paper

Persuasive Propaganda During the 2015 Argentine Ballotage

By: Rafael Di Tella, Sebastian Galiani and Ernesto Schargrodsky

We study a propaganda campaign sponsored by the government against the main political challenger in the days preceding the 2015 Argentine runoff presidential election. Subjects in the treatment group watched an “ad” initially aired during soccer transmissions that was... View Details

Keywords: Propaganda; Persuasion; Voting; Political Elections; Government and Politics; Communication Strategy; Power and Influence; Public Opinion; Argentina

2018
Article

The Role of Overbilling in Hospitals' Earnings Management Decisions

By: Jonas Heese

This paper examines the role of overbilling in hospitals’ earnings management choices. Overbilling by hospitals is a form of revenue manipulation that involves misclassifying a patient into a diagnosis-related group that yields higher reimbursement. As overbilling... View Details

Keywords: Overbilling; Accrual-based Earnings Management; Real Activities Manipulation; For-profit Hospitals; Earnings Management; Health Industry

SSRN

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June 2016
Case

Macy's Reinvents Its Millennial Business

By: Boris Groysberg and Sarah L. Abbott

Molly Langenstein, Macy’s executive vice president for fashion and new business development, and members of Macy’s senior team were rethinking the company’s approach to serving millennial customers, customers born between the years of 1980 and 2000. To tackle this... View Details

Keywords: Marketing; Marketing Strategy; Age; Organizational Structure; Organizational Culture; Business Processes; Fashion Industry; Retail Industry

October 2003 (Revised January 2005)
Case

Shared Decision Making

By: Richard M.J. Bohmer, Karen Sepucha and Laura Feldman

The Foundation for Informed Medical Decision-Making has created an interactive videodisc system that provides patients with customized support regarding medical treatment or screening decisions when they face a choice between two equally effective courses of action.... View Details

Keywords: Decision Choices and Conditions; Borrowing and Debt; Health Care and Treatment; Innovation Strategy; Technological Innovation; Product Marketing; Distribution Channels; Production; Partners and Partnerships; Research and Development; Information Technology