Drivers of consumer behaviour-the economic crisis in our every day's life

Is it possible to anticipate the consumers’ behaviour in a time of radical and unexpected change? This paper intends to demonstrate that as unpredictable as the future may be, there are certain factors that have always influenced consumers behaviour, which has never been random or erratic, but driven by mental processes that operate at an unconscious level, such as: perception, attitude, motivation. These three coordinates have been constantly the drivers of human behaviour in general. Most decisions seem to be rather the result of cognitive-affective and emotional decisions than reason-based. Globalisation and Internet communications are reshaping consumers’ behaviour, causing the shift from “mega-trends” to “micro-trends” due to the intricate maze of choices.consumer behaviour, perception, motivation, and attitude, cognitive-affective decision vs. reason-based decision

Monitoring bank performance in the presence of risk

This paper proposes a managerial control tool that integrates risk in efficiency measures. Building on existing efficiency specifications, our proposal reflects the real banking technology and accurately models the relationship between desirable and undesirable outputs. Specifically, the undesirable output is defined as nonperforming loans to capture credit risk, and is linked only to the relevant dimension of the output set. We empirically illustrate how our efficiency measure functions for managerial control purposes. The application considers a unique dataset of Costa Rican banks during 1998–2012. Results’ implications are mostly discussed at bank-level, and their interpretations are enhanced by using accounting ratios. We also show the usefulness of our tool for corporate governance by examining performance changes around executive turnover. Our findings confirm that appointing CEOs from outside the bank is associated with significantly higher performance ex post executive turnover, thus suggesting the potential benefits of new organisational practices.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author’s final draft

Private renting in Romania

The paper's aim is to present an overview on the PRS in Romania, emphasizing the main characteristics and the nature of PRS evolution after 1989. The past 20 years reveal some key-changes that occurred in the socio-economic and political life of the country and we have explored them as factors that have shaped the PRS. The analysis begins with a presentation of PRS stock, and it continues with a brief assessment of the housing conditions in addition to the socio-economic and demographic profile of households in the sector. Romania has a large housing stock with an unusually high-share of private ownership. Having these findings as a starting point, our paper explores those housing policies that have had the biggest impact on the field and shaped housing market trends. We have used statistical tools to analyze the data provided by the National Institute of Statistics-Romania, and Housing Associations, and major real-estate companies who operate on the Romanian market. An exploratory research was developed using the opportunity to interview policy-makers, national housing authorities, landlords and tenants in order to describe the current role of PRS on the housing market and the future of PRS in Romania.private rental sector, housing stock, tenant, landlord, rent, housing market, housing policy

How Does the Changing Access to Resources Affect the Power and Authority of the Postsocialist Romanian State?

In the past two decades, former postsocialist countries such as Romania have experienced very radical changes in terms of government and resource policy (Swinnen, 1997; Swinnen et al., 1997; Szelenyi, 1998; Turnock, 1998). To make sense of these changes this review paper will make use of recent postsocialist literature, which links the access and control over resources to the exercise of power and authority in the postsocialist state (Berry, 1993; Lund, 2002; Verdery, 2002; Ribot and Peluso, 2003; Sikor, 2006; Sikor and Lund, 2009; Sikor, Stahl and Dorondel, 2009).The review paper aims to re-trace this line in postsocialist thinking in the relevant literature and show how the concepts of property and access to resources are connected to the crucial concepts of power and authority. It will perform a critical review of the relevant literature and also explore the aforementioned concepts of property, access, power, authority and state.It will furthermore show how these concepts feed into the formation and consolidation of the Romanian postsocialist state. Since conflicts over property are emphasised by postsocialist researchers (de Waal, 1996; Giordano and Kostova, 1996; Verdery, 1999; Rabinowicz and Swinnen, 1997; Swinnen and Mathjs, 1997; Szelenyi, 1998; Sikor, 2003; Sikor, Stahl and Dorondel, 2009; Dorondel and Sikor, 2009), these are underlined here and thought to be the main thread connecting property and access to resources with power and authority in the new state. More specifically, the paper will reveal how said conflicts force actors to seek the authorization of their property claims at the door of the state. By doing so, they grant the new state the authority to do so again in the future and thereby contribute to the consolidation of its legitimacy.Essentially this review paper argues that changes to resource access engender conflicts, which in turn lead to the formation of a new social contract between the postsocialist state and its people (Lund, 2002).

Commerce Restrictions in the Tourist Sector in Developing Countries

The transition of national economies towards macroeconomic structures, in which services dominate, constitutes one of the most important structural mutations in global economy. Global economy has begun several decades ago, but has accentuated in the last two. We encounter this process in every country but mostly in well developed ones. Services constitute the infrastructure of a national economy, whether it is well developed or in course of development. This sector is indispensable to the well functioning of an economy. On one hand, tourism represents today one of the most expansive industries in European economy because of the national and international character of tourist activities, and on the other hand because it represents the subject of many economic politics of EU. As a general tendency, it records a dynamic with a rhythm superior to the global economic growth, even in case of international, political and economic events that may affect in a negative way tourist activities. This proves a slight independence of tourism when it comes to economic and social events. Despite the absence of legal basis, the economic importance of tourism has determined the European institutions to focus upon this sector. Despite all these, Romania and other developing countries, in comparison to those well developed, often find themselves in disadvantage because of the problems they have with the systems of global distribution but mainly because of lack of technology.services,CRS, GDS, international standards, touroperators

FOREWORD

What is needed to create a more sustainable world for us and for future generations? This is a question araised more often than ten years ago, just because of the concern about humankind's future is blurry, environmental issues become an urgency due to the visible consequences: floods, bushfires without precedent like recent Australian tragedy. The population and governments can no longer ignore these signs and immediate actions are required.The United Nations Sustainable Goals (SDGs) lay out how to eradicate poverty, advance environmental sustainability and provide decent housing, clean water and health care and education to those disadvantaged ones. All UN member states committed to take appropriate measures to make SDGs achievable as soon as possible. However, all beautiful ideals need finance to become a reality. UN estimates about $6 trillion a year to properly address all 17 SDGs, but this amount far exceeds the traditional sources that can be attracted. Therefore, global finance people think that the entire global capitalist system should get involved and contribute. At the core of this idea is the understanding that when businesses apply their expertise to solve problems, create profit and progress can go together for a better society, business and environment. Companies must consider their long-term financial sustainability in light of these global challenges and maintain a healthy environment and workforce. As an example, in SUA the Environmental Business Initiative, the funds to be deployed are$445 billion between 2007 to 2030  to support the transition to a low-carbon sustainable economy. The general public is asking businesses to take sustainability always into consideration in all their decisions. In one study, 81 percent of Millenials said companies must have a major role in driving SDGs[1]. Also, growing evidence shows a correlation between sustainability practices and better financial performance, higher productivity and lower risks[2]. It seems if businesses can deliver profitability, shareholder return than they could support the SDs most relevant to their businesses. Simple as that.[1] https://www.goldstandard.org/sites/default/files/documents/sdg_report_optimized.pdf[2] https://www.spglobal.com/en/research-insights/articles/the-esg-advantage-exploring-links-to-corporate-financial-performanc

Foreword

Digital world is changing constantly and the way in which it affects our life and work seems to be dramatically and somehow unpredictable. New skills and competencies are required and more than ever our learning efforts must be equally distributed between old, traditional and new knowledge, more abundant and diverse far from what you learned before and beyond any imagination a decade ago.Performance at work is redefined in such a way that has no connection at all with what was expected from us at the beginning of our working life. We have been trained to use our knowledge to solve problems, now we need to be trained to use machine learning systems to deal with complex problems and to relay on artificial intelligence when it comes about understanding our digital world and his diverse connectivity with our real life....