Publications

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30 Dec 2014
Working Paper Summaries

Return on Political Investment in the American Jobs Creation Act of 2004

Keywords: by Hui Chen, Katherine Gunny & Karthik Ramanna

2025
Working Paper

Who Values Democracy?

By: Max Miller

This paper examines the conventional view that redistribution is central to the democratization process using data from stock markets. Consistent with this view, democratizations have a large, negative impact on asset valuations driven by a rise in redistribution risk.... View Details

Keywords: Government and Politics; Risk and Uncertainty; Financial Crisis; Macroeconomics; Financial Markets; Valuation

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July – August 2009
Article

The Descent of Finance

What if the current recession turns out to be like the Great Depression of 1929-1933? Four years from now, the United States might find itself with a still-shrinking economy, half as many banks as in 2009, a third as many hedge funds, and retail banking resembling a... View Details

Keywords: Forecasting and Prediction; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation; International Finance; Globalized Economies and Regions; Business and Government Relations; Financial Services Industry

01 Dec 2020
What Do You Think?

How Can We Get Companies to Invest More in Low-Wage Workers?

economic equality fosters economic growth, primarily by encouraging consumption among people who spend a lot and invest modestly. For example, the study concludes that the US pays handsomely for the low growth that comes with income and... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

31 Aug 2020
Research & Ideas

State and Local Governments Peer Into the Pandemic Abyss

data-id=_/ryQnayeNjTevj53FSE60][/div] In past recessions, especially the 2008 financial crisis, it was lost income taxes that caused state and local governments to feel the pinch, but only after annual View Details

Keywords: by Kristen Senz

13 May 2014
First Look

First Look: May 13

compliance. We first create an income and taxation environment in a laboratory setting to test for compliance with a "lab tax." Allowing a treatment group to express non-binding preferences over View Details

Keywords: Sean Silverthorne

18 Jun 2007
Op-Ed

Leveling the Executive Options Playing Field

taxes. Similarly, tax authorities can rely on the use of the 1040 for other purposes to limit the degree of income understatement given your need for capital. The uniformity with which you are forced to... View Details

Keywords: by Mihir Desai

October 2016 (Revised October 2020)
Case

Essent: From a State-Owned Utility to a Commercial Company

By: Ananth Raman and Elena Corsi

Patrick Lammers, Chief Commercial Officer (CCO) for the Dutch energy company Essent NV, once a state-owned company, was pleased with the progress Essent’s consumer (“B2C”) business had made: Earnings Before Income Tax (EBIT) for B2C had gone from a loss of €18 million... View Details

Keywords: Lean Management; Operation Management; Service Management; Commercialization; Operations; Management; Energy; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Service Operations; Performance; Energy Industry; Europe

10 Apr 2008
Working Paper Summaries

Where Does it Go? Spending by the Financially Constrained

Keywords: by Shawn A. Cole, John Thompson & Peter Tufano; Financial Services

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

Find at Harvard

July 2004 (Revised January 2007)
Case

H&R Block and "Everyday Financial Services"

By: Peter Tufano and Daniel Schneider

H&R Block, the U.S. market leader in tax preparation services, must decide whether to offer financial services to its low-income clients. H&R Block is facing increased competition from branded and nonbranded tax preparers, and the number of returns prepared by the... View Details

Keywords: Financial Management; Income; Taxation; Product Development; Financial Services Industry; United States

Regina E. Herzlinger is the Nancy R. McPherson Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. She was the first woman to be tenured and chaired at Harvard Business School and serve on many established and start-up corporate health care/medical... View Details

Keywords: health care; insurance industry; medical devices; retailing; digital health

25 Sep 2018
First Look

New Research and Ideas, September 25, 2018

inventors who patent since 1920; a dataset of the employment, location, and patents of firms active in R&D since 1921; and a historical state-level corporate tax database since 1900, which we link to an existing database on... View Details

Keywords: Dina Gerdeman

20 Mar 2000
Research & Ideas

No Place Like Home: America’s Housing Crisis and Its Impact on Business

does not exceed 30 percent of the median family income in a given area. In one typically hard-pressed neighborhood, Boston's South End, the average two-bedroom apartment rents for $1,400, considerably more than 30 percent of an average... View Details

Keywords: by Garry Emmons; Construction; Real Estate

September 2022
Case

BancoSol: Financial Inclusion in the Perfect Storm

By: Michael Chu and Carla Larangeira

In the pandemic, financial inclusion icon BancoSol faces a government-mandated year-long deferral of all loan payments, followed by the sudden Covid death of its CEO. In a Bolivia mired in political turmoil following a failed presidential election, with clients not... View Details

Keywords: Decision Making; Crisis Management; Management Succession; Business Strategy; Innovation Leadership; Risk and Uncertainty; Financing and Loans; Restructuring; Financial Services Industry; Latin America; Bolivia

Jerry R. Green

David A. Wells Professor of Political Economy

John Leverett Professor in the University

Harvard University

Jerry Green is the John Leverett Professor in the University and the David A. Wells... View Details

Keywords: aerospace; education industry; insurance industry; professional services

March 2009 (Revised July 2010)
Case

State Street Corporation

By: William E. Fruhan

To maximize their effectiveness, color cases should be printed in color. State Street Corp. reports a 13% gain in EPS in 2008 amidst a global financial crisis. The stock price declines 59% on the day of the earnings report. This one day decline was exceeded in the... View Details

Keywords: Fair Value Accounting; Financial Reporting; Financial Crisis; Financial Liquidity; Financial Markets; Crisis Management; Financial Services Industry