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Given the ongoing attention surrounding public sector defined benefit pensions, the participating plan sponsors such as local units of government may be tempted to reduce their future pension liabilities, possibly at the expense of their former employees. Alternatively, public sector employees may act to withdraw their pension contributions if they have concerns related to the sustainability of their employer's pension plan. Nonvested, terminated employees have the option of leaving their contributions on account or taking them as a distribution in the form of a rollover to a qualifying retirement account, or a cash-out. Because a cash distribution carries with it the potential for retirement savings ‘leakage,’ it continues to be of public concern.

This study contributes to the literature by examining determinants of the distribution decisions of terminated employees and is first to specifically explore the association of pension funding levels as a determinant of such decision. Decisions of 46,608 employees who separated employment between 2010 and 2013 were examined. The results suggest that a decrease in the employer's pension funding is associated with increased probability that the terminated employee will take a refund of their contributions. Additionally, the data reveal that 88% of the terminating employees who took a refund requested to receive it in the form of a cash-out, totaling about $38 million of cash distributions. Lastly, about 1,000 of those employees each cashed out more than $8,000, thus suggesting the pension leakage problem warrants further research and perhaps policy changes.

This study provides new evidence on the effect of compulsory schooling laws on educational attainment and earnings. First, we re-examine the effect of compulsory schooling laws for cohorts born between 1900 and 1964 (“older cohorts”) using newly available data that match administrative earnings records with the survey data. Second, we provide among the first evidence on cohorts born between 1977 and 1996 (“younger cohorts”). Our findings suggest that compulsory schooling laws increased the educational attainment of older cohorts, but had no economically significant effect on the educational attainment of younger cohorts. We are unable to find consistent evidence that compulsory schooling laws increased the earnings of older cohorts – a finding which adds to growing evidence that compulsory schooling laws are less beneficial than earlier studies suggest.

Planning systems are only as good as their interface with the distribution function. If distribution is having an adverse effect on the overall logistics system, then we have a “systems gap”. What is then needed is the use of distribution requirements planning (DRP), a powerful method with which to integrate the logistics systems of organisations.

The use of air cargo by low-income countries and the effects of freight charges on their export flows are described. This is accomplished by illustrating the difference between export flows from developing countries of perishable products and high-tech goods. Descriptive statistics are used to highlight the importance of trade that travels by air from these countries to the United States and the European Union. Subsequently, costs of air freight are estimated. A gravity model of trade measures the effect of these costs on export flows. Major institutional and regulatory constraints that may be halting additional trade that relies on air transportation, and the implications for economic growth, are identified.

In the two seminal papers Anderson and Hsiao (1981, 1982), the linear panel regression model without cross-sectional correlation is thoroughly discussed. This uncorrelatedness assumption is now often examined in empirical work, using tests such as those by Pesaran, Ullah, and Yamagata (2008), Hsiao, Pesaran, and Pick (2012), or Pesaran (2015). All these tests in turn improve upon the so-called error-components test suggested in Breusch and Pagan (1980). In this chapter, the author revisits this error-components test and derives its asymptotic distribution under various scenarios: (a) both time-series dimension T and cross-sectional dimension N go to ∞ jointly (Phillips & Moon, 1999); (b) T → ∞ while N is fixed, and (c) N → ∞ while T is fixed. To the best of the author’s knowledge, the results under Scenarios (b) and (c) are new. Moreover, while the distributions under (a) and (b) are normal, that under (c) is not and it is even asymmetric. The critical values under (c) can be simulated. A Monte Carlo experiment is performed and it aims to throw light on the choice among the critical values suggested in the three scenarios, given a T and an N.

The objective of this research study is to investigate the impact of auditor dismissals and resignations on commercial lending decisions. The study also examines whether a reason given for a dismissal or resignation affects commercial lending decisions. Eighty-five commercial loan officers were given a scenario involving a hypothetical company loan applicant and were first asked to assess the level of risk associated with granting a line of credit. Next, they were asked to assess the probability that they would grant the line of credit. Five different questionnaire versions were created by varying information about an auditor change and the reason for the change. The study finds that risk assessments of and the probability of granting credit to the applicant company do not significantly differ due to knowledge about auditor changes. In addition, participants did not view auditor resignations differently than auditor dismissals. Finally, disclosure of a disagreement as a reason for an auditor change did not have an impact on lending decisions.

Contemporary literature reveals that, to date, the poultry livestock sector has not received sufficient research attention. This particular industry suffers from unstructured supply chain practices, lack of awareness of the implications of the sustainability concept and failure to recycle poultry wastes. The current research thus attempts to develop an integrated supply chain model in the context of poultry industry in Bangladesh. The study considers both sustainability and supply chain issues in order to incorporate them in the poultry supply chain. By placing the forward and reverse supply chains in a single framework, existing problems can be resolved to gain economic, social and environmental benefits, which will be more sustainable than the present practices.

The theoretical underpinning of this research is ‘sustainability’ and the ‘supply chain processes’ in order to examine possible improvements in the poultry production process along with waste management. The research adopts the positivist paradigm and ‘design science’ methods with the support of system dynamics (SD) and the case study methods. Initially, a mental model is developed followed by the causal loop diagram based on in-depth interviews, focus group discussions and observation techniques. The causal model helps to understand the linkages between the associated variables for each issue. Finally, the causal loop diagram is transformed into a stock and flow (quantitative) model, which is a prerequisite for SD-based simulation modelling. A decision support system (DSS) is then developed to analyse the complex decision-making process along the supply chains.

The findings reveal that integration of the supply chain can bring economic, social and environmental sustainability along with a structured production process. It is also observed that the poultry industry can apply the model outcomes in the real-life practices with minor adjustments. This present research has both theoretical and practical implications. The proposed model’s unique characteristics in mitigating the existing problems are supported by the sustainability and supply chain theories. As for practical implications, the poultry industry in Bangladesh can follow the proposed supply chain structure (as par the research model) and test various policies via simulation prior to its application. Positive outcomes of the simulation study may provide enough confidence to implement the desired changes within the industry and their supply chain networks.