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This paper explores whether the spread of air conditioning in the United States from 1960 to 1990 affected quality of life in warmer areas enough to influence decisions about where to live, or to change North-South wage and rent differentials. Using measures designed to identify climates in which air conditioning would have made the biggest difference, I found little evidence that the flow of elderly migrants to MSAs with such climates increased over the period. Following Roback (1982), I analyzed data on MSA wages, rents, and climates from 1960 to 1990, and find that the implicit price of these hot summer climates did not change significantly from 1960 to 1980, then became significantly negative in 1990. This contrary to what one would expect if air conditioning made hot summers more bearable. I presented evidence that hot summers are an inferior good, which would explain part of the negative movement in the implicit price of a hot summer, and evidence consistent with the hypothesis that the marginal person migrating from colder to hotter MSAs dislikes summer heat more than does the average resident of a hot MSA, which would also exert downward pressure on the implicit price of a hot summer.

The last mile of parcel deliveries is a key process to service providers, with global costs that reach up to 70 billion euros per year. Moreover, due to urban population growth and to the rise of e-commerce, the importance of last-mile deliveries and its impacts to the environment and quality of life in cities tend to increase even more. This chapter proposes a more comprehensive methodology to assess alternative last-mile distribution strategies in terms of environmental and economic aspects and presents an application to the distribution of a postal company located in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. We evaluated the use of small electric vehicles (i.e., tricycles) in the last mile deliveries by assessing two scenarios: (1) the baseline scenario using a light commercial vehicle and (2) a scenario using electric tricycles. Results indicated that the use of electric tricycle is a more feasible alternative regarding the economic and environmental aspects as well as to maintain the service level of the company.

This article explores the growing popularity and importance of client‐based management education. The article argues that an increasing number of UK organisations are seeking to develop partnerships with business schools to deliver and accredit their management development initiatives. The article describes a number of innovative developments in client‐based management education using case illustrations drawing upon the experience of Nottingham Business School’s Corporate Business Unit. The article concludes by providing guidance to organisations seeking to develop partnerships with higher education institutions.

In order to succeed in an action under the Equal Pay Act 1970, should the woman and the man be employed by the same employer on like work at the same time or would the woman still be covered by the Act if she were employed on like work in succession to the man? This is the question which had to be solved in Macarthys Ltd v. Smith. Unfortunately it was not. Their Lordships interpreted the relevant section in different ways and since Article 119 of the Treaty of Rome was also subject to different interpretations, the case has been referred to the European Court of Justice.

In years past, when life seemed simpler and the Law much less complicated, jurists were fond of quoting the age‐old saying: “All men are equal before the Law.” It was never completely true; there were important exemptions when strict legal enforcement would have been against the public interests. A classic example was Crown immunity, evolved from the historical principle that “The King can do no wrong”. With the growth of government, the multiplicity of government agencies and the enormous amount of secondary legislation, the statutes being merely enabling Acts, this immunity revealed itself as being used largely against public interests. Statutory instruments were being drafted within Ministerial departments largely by as many as 300 officers of those departments authorized to sign such measures, affecting the rights of the people without any real Parliamentary control. Those who suffered and lost in their enforcement had no remedy; Crown immunity protected all those acting as servants of the Crown and the principle came to be an officials' charter with no connection whatever with the Crown. Parliament, custodian of the national conscience, removed much of this socially unacceptable privilege in the Crown Proceedings Act, 1947, which enabled injured parties within limit to sue central departments and their officers. The more recent system of Commissioners—Parliamentary, Local Authority, Health Service—with power to enquire into allegations of injustice, maladministration, malpractice to individuals extra‐legally, has extended the rights of the suffering citizen.

The purpose of this study is to examine how corporate communication of their social programs on their websites affects the ratings of those programs by independent rating agencies. Firms expend resources on corporate social programs (CSPs) to promote their corporate social responsibility and sustainability credentials. Stakeholders, however, often respond to such “self-promotion” with skepticism because they believe that there are inconsistencies between corporate claims and actions. This research draws on attribution theory as a framework to examine how the perceived CSP performance of firms by uncontrollable sources are affected when firms disseminate CSP information on firm websites, i.e. a controllable source, where their claims may not be verifiable.

This study uses a two-step, mixed method study for the analysis using data from Fortune 500 companies. A qualitative content analysis process identifies the interfaces of CSP and their communications on firms’ website. The process allows the authors to collect CSP data systematically from firm websites and to identify relevant variables through the patterns that emerge from the analysis. The findings are used in a quantitative analysis to study how the patterns underlying CSP communication on their websites affect the ratings of firms’ CSP by independent rating agencies.

Results show that the location, the manner, the content and the scope of CSP information dissemination on firm websites, as well as perceived commitment to CSP identified on the website are important drivers of perceived CSP performance. A robustness check using an alternative independent rating of CSP also provides results that are supportive of the findings. In addition, the effects are found to differ by sector of operation, firm age and profitability.

This research suggests that communication of CSPs at controllable sources of firm information dissemination can have a significant effect on the evaluation of CSP at uncontrollable sources when such communication facilitates the assessment of other information from a firm to determine the motive underlying a firm’s CSP.

The findings show that firms and managers can influence the perceived ratings, rankings or scores of their CSP by stakeholders when they put the right information at the right place on their corporate websites. One of the findings shows that even moderate levels of CSP commitment demonstrated on firm websites result in positive perceptions of CSP, which has marked practical implications.

The findings show that integrating even a medium level of commitment to CSP increases the positive perceptions of a firm’s CSP. Thus, society benefits from the firm’s action without a substantial impact on the firm’s profits.

This research shows that firm-controlled sources of CSP information dissemination to stakeholders can affect uncontrollable sources of CSP information evaluation.

This paper aims to integrate the concepts of the internationalization process and relationship marketing (RM). It identifies two stages for internationalization (pre-internationalization and post-internationalization) and assigns RM components for each step.

The study undertakes a review and synthesis of the extant literature examining internationalization and RM. It then identifies two stages of the internationalization process and its steps, associated with RM components.

The study highlights that each step in the internationalization process requires appropriate RM component to be implemented successfully.

Findings of this study highlight the importance of managing internationalization for firms intending to enter to foreign market and identify the issues that need to be understood, if firms are to effectively manage their internationalization strategy.

The paper is the first to integrate the concepts of internationalization and RM and to identify the factors that make managing these two types of firm's strategy.

The paper aims to examine the effect of varying intensities of personal nostalgia on cognition, attitudes, and purchase intention.

Data were collected using convenience sampling via a self‐administered questionnaire in a large Australian university. Respondents were exposed to nostalgic cue laden advertising stimulus. A total of 514 responses were analysed. The questionnaire includes a thought collection exercise and scales to measure personal nostalgia, attitudes, and intention. Analysis of variance and multivariate analysis of variance were used to analyse the data.

A number of cognitive reactions are significantly affected when moving from a low to moderate or high level of personal nostalgia. However, no significant benefit in the cognitive responses tested is achieved by moving from moderate to high levels. In contrast, attitudes and intentions improve significantly with each increase of personal nostalgia.

The paper focuses only on personal nostalgia and one product category. Respondent characteristics are also limited. These issues should be examined with future research. Comparisons of responses under types of nostalgic reactions are also needed.

The paper provides practitioners with a vastly improved understanding of consumer responses when varying levels of personal nostalgia are experienced. Practitioners should note the significant change in advert‐execution related thoughts between intensity levels could be beneficial or harmful, depending on the desired response. The research indicates it is worthwhile to encourage high levels of personal nostalgia in comparison to settling for a low or moderate level as although cognitive responses do not significantly change, attitudes and intention to purchase significantly improve.

The vast majority of previous studies focus on nostalgia as a unified concept. Although personal nostalgia is distinct from other nostalgic reactions, no empirical research examines how consumer reactions are affected by varying levels of this specific nostalgic response.