Publications

February 2011
Supplement

Carbon Trading Simulation: Black Cement Inc.

By: Peter A. Coles

This simulation presents students the opportunity to experience firsthand the economics of carbon markets and permit trading. Each student has private role information about a company he or she manages. The student must make decisions about pollution-reducing... View Details

Keywords: Market Design; Pollutants; Investment; Price; Profit; Agreements and Arrangements; Decisions; Service Industry; Energy Industry

06 Mar 2018
First Look

First Look at Research and Ideas, March 6, 2018

versus Posted Prices in Online Markets By: Einav, Liran, Chiara Farronato, Jonathan Levin, and Neel Sundaresan Abstract—Auctions were very popular in the early days of internet commerce, but today online sellers mostly use posted prices.... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

20 Mar 2018
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, March 20, 2018

administer the exercise in class. The goals of the exercise are to examine how asking questions during conversation influences interpersonal perception, information exchange, decision making, productivity, as well as relationships View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

February 2011
Supplement

Carbon Trading Simulation: Brown Cement Inc.

By: Peter A. Coles

This simulation presents students the opportunity to experience firsthand the economics of carbon markets and permit trading. Each student has private role information about a company he or she manages. The student must make decisions about pollution-reducing... View Details

Keywords: Decisions; Economics; Investment; Business or Company Management; Market Design; Pollutants

January 2005 (Revised October 2005)
Case

Private Capital and Public Policy: Standard & Poor's Sovereign Credit Ratings

By: Rawi E. Abdelal and Christopher Bruner

Describes Standard & Poor's sovereign credit ratings business. Provides background on the history of credit ratings agencies, the meaning of credit ratings, the expansion of the sovereign ratings business over recent decades, and the market for credit ratings. Also,... View Details

Keywords: Sovereign Finance; History; Policy; Business and Government Relations; International Finance; Country; Globalized Economies and Regions; Decision Choices and Conditions; Capital Markets; Debates; Financial Services Industry; United States

Educators

21 Nov 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, November 21, 2017

their boundaries and in their domestic economies only a subset of their production stages. A key decision facing firms worldwide is the extent of control to exert over the different segments of their... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

06 Feb 2018
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas: February 6, 2018

strategic choices for retailers. With respect to pricing, an important decision is whether to offer a “self-matching policy,” which allows a multichannel retailer to offer the lowest of its online View Details

Article

De Gustibus non est Taxandum: Heterogeneity in Preferences and Optimal Redistribution

By: Benjamin B Lockwood and Matthew Weinzierl

The prominent but unproven intuition that preference heterogeneity reduces redistribution in a standard optimal tax model is shown to hold under the plausible condition that the distribution of preferences for consumption relative to leisure rises, in terms of... View Details

Keywords: Motivation and Incentives; Income; Decision Choices and Conditions; Consumer Behavior; Taxation; Microeconomics; Macroeconomics

Web

Institutions, Macroeconomics, and the Global Economy - Course Catalog

and economic institutions are able to coordinate private decisions on stable and productive paths. Where institutional development is weak - as seems to be the case in much of... View Details

March 1997
Article

Transactions Costs and Capital Structure Choice: Evidence from Financially Distressed Firms

By: S. C. Gilson

This study provides evidence that transactions costs discourage debt reductions by financially distressed firms when they restructure their debt out of court. As a result, these firms remain highly leveraged and one-in-three subsequently experience financial distress.... View Details

Keywords: Cost; Capital Structure; Decision Choices and Conditions; Information; Finance; Business Ventures

Read Now

Web

Leadership, Ethics, and Corporate Accountability Course | HBS Online

Download our guide to learn more about this limited-time offer. Leadership, Ethics, and Corporate Accountability $1,850 Next 6-week session starts August 13th Enroll Now Develop a toolkit for making tough leadership View Details

October 2003 (Revised December 2003)
Case

Managing a 401(k) Fund

By: Richard S. Ruback and Kathleen Luchs

Focuses on an individual's decision to participate in his firm's 401(k) plan and how to invest his contributions. Plan participants have a choice of 10 mutual funds with different investment strategies. Includes data from Morningstar on the composition and performance... View Details

Keywords: Investment Funds; Investment; Saving; Asset Management; Financial Management; Decision Making; Personal Finance; Financial Services Industry

Educators

October 2019 (Revised January 2020)
Supplement

Dulcie Madden (C)—A Final Chance?

By: Shikhar Ghosh and Shweta Bagai

This is part of a three-case series that follows Dulcie Madden's journey as a founder over five years. Case (A) is about managing growth and cash flow; Case (B) is about the exit decision and conditions on a sale; Case (C) shows Madden dealing with adversity and the... View Details

Keywords: Entrepreneurship; Growth Management; Cash Flow; Success; Failure; Acquisition; Business Model; Technology

24 Oct 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, October 24, 2017

their decision rights within firms, but managers can seek permission from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to dismiss proposals. We find that managers seek to exclude 39% of all proposals they... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

September–October 2013
Article

The Role of Organizational Scope and Governance in Strengthening Private Monitoring

By: Lamar Pierce and Michael W. Toffel

Governments and other organizations often outsource activities to achieve cost savings from market competition. Yet such benefits are often accompanied by poor quality resulting from moral hazard, which can be particularly onerous when outsourcing the monitoring and... View Details

Read Now

05 Dec 2017
First Look

First Look at New Research and Ideas, December 5, 2017

R&D Failures By: Krieger, Joshua Lev Abstract— I analyze project continuation decisions where firms may resolve uncertainty through news about competitors' failures as well as through their own results.... View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

28 Oct 2024
Op-Ed

Latino Voters Have Grown More Politically Divided. That’s Not Surprising.

Like: Election 2024: Why Demographics Won't Predict the Next President Election 2024: What's at Stake for Business and the Workplace? How Politics Drives Business Decisions in a Polarized Nation Feedback or... View Details

Keywords: by Richard Calvo, Vincent Pons, and Jesse M. Shapiro

09 Sep 2024
HBS Case

McDonald’s and the Post #MeToo Rules of Sex in the Workplace

was an isolated incident. The board then weighed an important decision that turned on their view of the CEO’s role and the company’s compensation policies: Would a sanction be enough, or should the board... View Details

Keywords: by Avery Forman; Food & Beverage

April 2013
Article

Setting Health Priorities: Strategy versus Tactics

By: Michael Chu, David E. Bloom and Elizabeth Cafiero

Health decision makers throughout the world are faced with a multiplicity of challenges. As resource limitations are a fundamental fact of life, choices necessarily have to be made about which challenges to address, and the best way to tackle them. In this piece, we... View Details

Keywords: Strategy; Decision Making; Health Care and Treatment; Problems and Challenges; Health Industry