Publications

28 Feb 2011
News

Rebooting the Human Condition

engineered cells, biological tissue, and robots. This perfect storm of innovation will allow humans to shape their own evolution (as well as that of other species) and create solutions to energy, health, and economic problems. Enriquez... View Details

Keywords: Health, Social Assistance; Management, Scientific, and Technical Consulting Services; Professional Services

2021
Article

Cluster Presence and Economic Performance: A New Look Based on European Data

By: Christian H.M. Ketels and Sergiy Protsiv

This paper takes a fresh empirical look at how cluster presence matters for economic performance. It analyses a new data set developed for the European Cluster Observatory to assess the impact of clusters on industry-level wages and regional prosperity. It is found... View Details

Keywords: Cluster; Economic Geography; Prosperity; Economic Performance; Wages; Economy; Europe

Forthcoming
Article

Transaction Cost Economics in the Digital Economy: A Research Agenda

By: Frank Nagle, Robert Seamans and Steve Tadelis

Transaction cost economics theory explains when it is more efficient for a transaction between two parties to occur across the market or within an organization. How does transaction cost economics apply in the digital economy, which relies on digital transactions? In... View Details

Keywords: Transaction Cost Economics; Digital Economy; Economics; Cost; Markets; Research; Digital Transformation

February 2022
Module Note

Behavioral Economics and Choice Architecture

By: John Beshears

This module note for instructors describes a module on the design of choice architecture solutions to organizational problems. View Details

Keywords: Behavioral Economics; Choice Architecture; Organizations; Problems and Challenges; Decision Choices and Conditions; Economics

2020
Working Paper

Transaction Cost Economics in the Digital Economy: A Research Agenda

By: Frank Nagle, Robert Seamans and Steve Tadelis

Transaction Cost Economics (TCE) theory has played an important role in understanding when it is more efficient for a transaction between two parties to occur within the market or within an organization. However, as more transactions occur in a digitally-mediated... View Details

Keywords: Transaction Cost Economics; Digital Economy; Economics; Cost; Markets; Research; Digital Transformation

SSRN

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October 2020
Case

Fiscal Responses to COVID-19

By: Rawi Abdelal, Rafael Di Tella, Vincent Pons and Galit Goldstein

For the first half of 2020, the COVID-19 crisis seemed on the verge of spiraling out of control. The business world struggled to figure out what COVID meant for macroeconomics. Extended restrictions limiting human interaction meant an end to normal economic production,... View Details

Keywords: Fiscal Policy; COVID; COVID-19; Economic Analysis; Economic Downturn; Economic Conditions; Economic Governance; Economic Systems; Economy; Health Pandemics; Finance; Policy; United States; Germany; France; European Union

Research Summary

Foreign Direct Investment, Finance, and Economic Development

Research has sought to understand how foreign direct investment affects host economies. This paper reviews the empirical literature, specifically addressing the question: How does FDI affect economic development of host countries and what is the role of local financial... View Details

Keywords: Foreign Direct Investment; Economic Development; Multinational Corporation; Finance

November 2021 (Revised January 2024)
Case

The Global Great Depression, 1929-1939

By: Alberto Cavallo, Sophus A. Reinert and Federica Gabrieli

The Great Depression was, by far, the worst economic contraction of the twentieth century, and some of the most important ideas about both fiscal and monetary policy in the second half of the century were developed in response to it. The economic collapse, which... View Details

Keywords: Great Depression; Economic Conditions; Unemployment; Homelessness; Financial Crisis; History; Economy; Policy; Poverty; Social Issues; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation

May–June 2015
Article

Dead Weight: How Greece Wound up Trapped in the European Union

By: Debora L. Spar

In the early 1990s, Greece fell far afield of the economic criteria laid out by the Maastricht Treaty, the EU's founding document. In 1999, when the European monetary union was launched, Greece failed to meet the criteria again, but managed to squeeze into the body two... View Details

Keywords: EU; Geopolitics; Economic Conditions; Economy; Financial Crisis; Greece; European Union

21 Jul 2017
Working Paper Summaries

Organizational Structures and the Improvement of Working Conditions in Global Supply Chains: Legalization, Participation, and Economic Incentives

Keywords: by Yanhua Z. Bird, Jodi L. Short, and Michael W. Toffel

July–August 2019
Article

Coupling Labor Codes of Conduct and Supplier Labor Practices: The Role of Internal Structural Conditions

By: Yanhua Bird, Jodi L. Short and Michael W. Toffel

Exploitive working conditions have spurred companies to pressure their suppliers to adopt labor codes of conduct and to conform their labor practices to the standards set forth in those codes. Yet little is known about whether organizational structures such as codes... View Details

Keywords: Organization Theory; Economic Sociology; Social Responsibility; Sustainability; Auditing; Process Improvement; Organizational Structure; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Supply Chain; Labor; Working Conditions

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July–August 2021
Article

Lowering the Bar? External Conditions, Opportunity Costs, and High-Tech Startup Outcomes

By: Annamaria Conti and Maria P. Roche

We assess the heterogeneous impact of economic downturns on individuals’ decisions to bring high-technology ideas to the market in the form of new ventures. We thereby examine how worsening labor market conditions influence individuals’ opportunity costs of starting... View Details

Keywords: Necessity Entrepreneurship; Economic Conditions; Recessions; High-tech Startups; Opportunity Costs; Entrepreneurship; Economic Slowdown and Stagnation; Business Startups; Information Technology; Performance; Labor

March 2019 (Revised June 2019)
Case

Global Sourcing at Nike

By: Nien-hê Hsieh, Michael W. Toffel and Olivia Hull

This case explores the evolution of Nike’s global product sourcing strategy, in particular ongoing efforts to improve working conditions at its suppliers’ factories. When the case opens in July 2018, Vice President of Sourcing Amanda Tucker and her colleagues in Nike’s... View Details

August 2008
Article

From Clusters to Cluster-Based Economic Development

By: Christian H.M. Ketels and Olga Memedovic

Over the last decades, changes in the global economy and the emergence of Global Value Chains (GVCs) have raised the interest in understanding the specific conditions and cross-company interactions within and across locations. For companies, the need to choose the... View Details

Keywords: Development Economics; Economy; Value; Business Strategy; Competition; Performance Productivity; Cost; Natural Environment; Policy; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Framework; Industry Clusters

04 Aug 2006
What Do You Think?

What Happens When the Economics of Scarcity Meets the Economics of Abundance?

Summing Up There's no need to rethink important economic constructs just because of the growth of the Long Tail phenomenon and its impact on demand and supply. Or is there? That was part of the debate that occupied respondents to this... View Details

Keywords: by James Heskett

1968
Mimeo

Restrictions on Rational Option Pricing: A Set of Arbitrage Conditions

By: Robert C. Merton

Keywords: Stock Options; Valuation; Trade