Diversity management and the business case

Managing for diversity is a management strategy that intends to make productive use of (ethnic and other) differences between individuals. It is based on the premise that - at least if they are well managed - diverse teams will produce better results and diverse companies will gain market advantage. In contrast to other employment equity policies, diversity management is primarily driven by the business case, i.e. by the argument that diversity and/or its management will increase organizational efficiency and profitability. With diversity management as a business practice becoming more and more popular in Europe, the question of whether this policy actually delivers the business benefits its advocates promise, becomes increasingly relevant to anyone involved in the discussion and implementation of employment policies relating to ethnic and other minorities. An examination of the literature, however, shows that there is no unanimous answer regarding the business benefits of diversity and its management. While for many advocates of diversity management the business case seems to be rather self-evident, academic research on the effects of diversity provides mixed and inconclusive results and has led critics to see a mismatch between research results and diversity rhetoric (Kochan et al 2003: 5). --

Lower bounds for operators on graded Lie groups

In this note we present a symbolic pseudo-differential calculus on graded nilpotent Lie groups and, as an application, a version of the sharp Garding inequality. As a corollary, we obtain lower bounds for positive Rockland operators with variable coefficients as well as their Schwartz-hypoellipticity

A pseudo-differential calculus on the Heisenberg group

In this note we present a symbolic pseudo-differential calculus on the Heisenberg group. We particularise to this group our general construction [4,3,2] of pseudo-differential calculi on graded groups. The relation between the Weyl quantization and the representations of the Heisenberg group enables us to consider here scalar-valued symbols. We find that the conditions defining the symbol classes are similar but different to the ones in [1]. Applications are given to Schwartz hypoellipticity and to subelliptic estimates on the Heisenberg group.Comment: 9 page

Seigniorage, Operating Rules and the High Inflation Trap

A given amount of seigniorage revenue can be collected at either a high or a low rate of inflation. Thus there ray be two equilibria when a government finances its deficit by printing money--implying that an economy may be stuck in a high inflation equilibrium when, with the same fiscal policy, it could be at a lower inflation rate. We show that under rational expectations the high inflation equilibrium is stable and the low inflation equilibrium unstable; under adaptive expectations or lagged adjustment of money balances with rational expectations, it may be the low inflation equilibrium that is stable. Extending the model to allow for bond as well as money financing of deficits, we show that one of the equilibria disappears if the government sets a nominal anchor for the economy, for instance by fixing the growth rate of money. The dual equilibria and their stability.

The Inflationary Process in Israel: Shocks and Accommodation

The rate of inflation in Israel increased from 8 percent in 1965 to 300-400 percent in the first half of 1984. The inflationary process until 1977 was not qualitatively different from that in the OECD countries, but after the financial liberalization of 1977 the economy appeared to move into a new era in which the inflation rate seemed capable only of rising. Our explanation of the inflationary process is that because of institutional adaptations, and as a result of accommodating monetary and fiscal policies, the stabilizing forces in the economy are so weak that the inflation rate is in a meta-stable equilibrium. We ascribe the apparent asymmetry of the inflation to the expansionary underlying thrust of monetary and fiscal policy. We develop an analytical framework that assigns roles to indexation, to the financial structure, and to the exchange rate system in determining the dynamics of the economy. We place very little blame for the inflation on wage indexation, which has been incomplete, but we regard the extensive indexation of the returns on financial assets, and the steady shift out of nominal assets, as major contributing factors, for the economy is now left with virtually no nominal anchor. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of alternative stabilization plans, arguing that a successful stabilization program will have to be comprehensive and rapid.

The Mechanics of a successful Exchange-Rate Peg: Lessons from Emerging Markets

To the surprise of many market watchers, Thailand's exchange-rate peg to the dollar collapsed in July 1997, leading to similar rounds of currency devaluations in other East Asian countries. This study seeks to determine if there were identifiable contrasts in implementation between Thailand's peg and a perennially successful peg- Austria's to the Deutsche Mark- that would have hinted at problems for Thailand prior to July 1997. the comparison suggests that Thailand was not sufficently vigilant about keeping its inflation rate low in the early 1990s. By 1995, Thailand faced a situation where a tight monetary policy involving high domestic interet rates would not always have created disinflationary pressure, as high interest rates also tended to attract greater capital inflow to Thailand. In this environment, Thailand's monetary policy became erratic and failed to maintain the exchange-rate peg.

Fixing Swiss Potholes: The Importance and Cyclical Nature of Improvements

This note sheds new light on the dynamic properties of maintenance and repair and examines the behavior of an additional form of capital spending- that of improvements. The analysis examines a unique long-run data set on Swiss road spending.