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Every year, millions of consumers around the world become victims of credit card fraud. These individuals have to appeal to their credit card companies to reverse unauthorized charges. This study aims to profile the American consumers’ experience when complaints to their credit card companies about unauthorized charges fail to produce a resolution. Using a large database of consumer complaint filings with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), the characteristics of these consumer complaints are identified, and the drivers of consumer financial hardship resulting from credit card fraud are determined.

A random sample of consumer complaints about their credit card companies’ perceived mishandling of cases, filed with the CFPB, is used to conduct content analysis. The resulting content analysis categories are used in a predictive model to determine the drivers of consumer hardship.

In nearly one-quarter of all complaint filings, the credit card company had blamed the complainant as the party responsible for the fraudulent charges or refused to open a fraud investigation altogether. Nearly 60% of complaint reports contain expressions of emotional distress and many mention financial hardship. Nearly half of all complainants consider the fraud department operations of their credit card company as lacking in service quality, many reporting inability to reach the department or to receive a returned call. Even after CFPB intermediation, only 15% of complainants receive some form of financial relief from their credit card company. The majority of the complainants report a lack of willingness by the credit card company to reverse unauathorized charges, leaving the complainant financially responsible for them.

This study focused on data collected from consumers. Future research can expand the scope of inquiry by surveying the staff and executives in the fraud investigation departments of credit card companies to determine the norms of fraud investigation used within the industry.

This study sheds light on the financial hardship and emotional pains that consumers victimized by credit card fraud experience in dealing with their credit card companies.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to empirically examine American consumers’ complaints about the fraud investigation operations of their credit card companies. Using data captured through the complaint filing system of a federal bureau (CFPB), the findings have implications for policymakers, regulators and credit card companies.

Vocational education and entrepreneurship are constantly increasing in research fields. However, what is the current state of vocational education and entrepreneurial research? Where will the area go next? These questions are still unanswered; thus, this study tries to map the research landscape of the study area to get insights and provide directions for future research.

This research collected extant literature on vocational education and entrepreneurship using Scopus scientific database. Bibliometric analysis has been performed to extract insights from 175 documents published in the study area. Content analysis on the extant literature has also been committed to getting contextual information and developing an integrated research framework for future researchers.

The bibliometric analysis revealed that training, career choice, curriculum, self-employment, student psychology, better job opportunity, learning environment and innovation are the most discussed in the vocational education and entrepreneurship literature. Developed nation’s strong presence, indicated by the number of publications in the field.

This study significantly contributes to entrepreneurship by disclosing advances in the literature and some of the most active research fronts in this sector, delivering insights that have yet to be wholly appreciated or appraised. The study also developed an integrated framework that could benefit various vocations, education and entrepreneurship stakeholders.

We develop a conceptual framework as a basis for thinking about the impact of extractive industries and emancipatory potential of alternative accounts. We then review selected alternative accounts literature on some contemporary issues surrounding the extractive industries and identify opportunities for accounting, auditing, and accountability research. We also provide an overview of the other contributions in this special issue.

Drawing on alternative accounts from the popular and social media as well as the alternative accounting literature, this primarily discursive paper provides a contemporary literature review of identified issues within the extractive industries highlighting potential areas for future research. The eight papers that make up the special issue are located within a conceptual framework is employed to illustrate each paper’s contribution to the field.

While accounting has a rich literature covering some of the issues detailed in this paper, this has not necessarily translated to the extractive industries. Few studies in accounting have got “down and dirty” so to speak and engaged directly with those impacted by companies operating in the extractive industries. Those that have, have focused on specific areas such as the Niger Delta. Although prior studies in the social governance literature have tended to focus on disclosure issues, it is questionable whether this work, while informative, has resulted in any meaningful environmental, social or governance (ESG) changes on the part of the extractive industries.

The extensive extractive industries literature both from within and outside the accounting discipline makes a comprehensive review impractical. Drawing on both the accounting literature and other disciplines, this paper identifies areas that warrant further investigation through alternative accounts.

This paper and other contributions to this special issue provide a basis and an agenda for accounting scholars seeking to undertake interdisciplinary research into the extractive industries.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the role of short sellers in foreign direct investment (FDI) decisions. Drawing on threat rigidity theory, the authors argue that short sellers pose a threat to chief executive officers (CEOs) by exerting downward pressure to target firms’ stock prices. That threat will evoke rigid managerial responses that hinder new FDI activities. The authors also posit that CEOs will be less reactive to short sellers’ threats when they are generalist CEOs who have extensive general work experience or when they serve as the board chair.

The authors collect data from S&P 1,500 firms, and the final sample consists of 717 firms and 6,930 firm-year observations from 1998 to 2016. The authors use an Arellano and Bond generalized method of moments static linear probability panel data model and an instrumental panel count data model to test the hypotheses.

The findings support the hypotheses and suggest that CEOs who are under more pressure from short sellers engage in fewer new FDI activities. The negative impact of short sellers on FDI decisions is less salient when CEOs have general work experience or are the chairperson of the board.

This study contributes to the international business research by stressing the need to consider the role of short sellers in firm internationalization decisions.

The menstrual health and menstrual hygiene management (MHM) of incarcerated women remains relatively low on the agenda of public health interventions globally, widening the inequitable access of incarcerated women to safe and readily available menstrual health products (MHP). The COVID-19 pandemic has adversely impacted on the MHM gains made in various development sectors in the global North and South, through its amplification of vulnerability for already at-risk populations. This is especially significant to developing countries such as South Africa where the incarcerated female population are an often-forgotten minority.

This viewpoint highlights the ignominious silence of research and policy attention within the South African carceral context in addressing MHM. The ethical and political implications of such silences are unpacked by reviewing international and local literature that confront issues of inequality and equitable access to MHP and MHM resources within incarcerated contexts.

Structural inequalities in various contexts around the world have exacerbated COVID-19 and MHM. Within the prison context in South Africa, women face multiple layers of discrimination and punishment that draw attention to the historical discourses of correctional facilities as a site of surveillance and discipline.

This study acknowledges that while this viewpoint is essential in rising awareness about gaps in literature, it is not empirical in nature.

The authors believe that this viewpoint is essential in raising critical awareness on MHM in carceral facilities in South Africa. The authors hope to use this publication as the theoretical argument to pursue empirical research on MHM within carceral facilities in South Africa. The authors hope that this publication would provide the context for international and local funders, to assist in the empirical research, which aims to roll out sustainable MHP to incarcerated women in South Africa.

The authors believe that this viewpoint is the starting point in accelerating the roll out of sustainable MHP to incarcerated females in South Africa. These are females who are on the periphery of society that are in need of practical interventions. Publishing this viewpoint would provide the team with the credibility to apply for international and national funding to roll out sustainable solutions.

It is hoped that the gaps in literature and nodes for social and human rights activism highlighted within this viewpoint establish the need for further participatory research, human rights advocacy and informed civic engagement to ensure the voices of these women and their basic human rights are upheld.

The authors' work aims to identify the employer-specific drivers of the college (or university) wage gap, which has been identified as one of the major determinants of the dynamics of overall wage and income inequality in the past decades. The authors focus on three employer-level features that can be associated with asymmetries in the employment relation orientation adopted for college and non-college-educated employees: (1) size, (2) the share of standard employment and (3) the pervasiveness of incentive pay schemes.

The authors' establishment-level analysis (data from the Basic Survey on Wage Structure (BSWS), 2005–2018) focusses on Japan, an economy characterised by many unique economic and institutional features relevant to the aims of the authors' analysis. The authors use an adjusted measure of firm-specific college wage premium, which is not biased by confounding individual and establishment-level factors and reflects unobservable characteristics of employees that determine the payment of a premium. The authors' empirical methods account for the complexity of the relationships they investigate, and the authors test their baseline outcomes with econometric approaches (propensity score methods) able to address crucial identification issues related to endogeneity and reverse causality.

The authors' findings indicate that larger establishment size, a larger share of regular workers and more pervasive implementation of IPSs for college workers tend to increase the college wage gap once all observable workers, job and establishment characteristics are controlled for. This evidence corroborates the authors' hypotheses that a larger establishment size, a higher share of regular workers and a more developed set-up of performance pay schemes for college workers are associated with a better capacity of employers to attract and keep highly educated employees with unobservable characteristics that justify a wage premium above average market levels. The authors provide empirical evidence on how three relevant establishment-level characteristics shape the heterogeneity of the (adjusted) college wage observed across organisations.

The authors' contribution to the existing knowledge is threefold. First, the authors combine the economics and management/organisation literature to develop new insights that underpin the authors' testable empirical hypotheses. This enables the authors to shed light on employer-level drivers of wage differentials (size, workforce composition, implementation of performance-pay schemes) related to many structural, institutional and strategic dimensions. The second contribution lies in the authors' measure of the “adjusted” college wage gap, which is calculated on the component of individual wages that differs between observationally identical workers in the same establishment. As such, the metric captures unobservable workers' characteristics that can generate a wage premium/penalty. Third, the authors provide empirical evidence on how three relevant establishment-level characteristics shape the heterogeneity of the (adjusted) college wage observed across organisations.