This study provides current comprehensive information about the formal work/family planning practices of the "100 Best Companies for Working Mothers" (Working Mother Magazine, Moskowitz and Townsend, 1994). These companies are chosen by researchers from thousands of firms that actively campaign for a place on the "100 Best" roster. The major objectives of this study were twofold: (1) to determine what factors may contribute to the successful implementation of employee work/family practices; and (2) to examine the characteristics of companies which have initiated progressive supportive work family programs and to describe the state of art of corporate work/family practices. The focus of this study was to examine the characteristics of specific work/family practices within U.S. private industry. The primary question addressed was, Do those corporations recognized as leaders in work/family policy management share similar traditions, comparable business philosophies and priorities, and certain industry, employee, and geographic characteristics? A mail survey consisting of sixteen questions was used to examine the company characteristics of recognized leaders in work/family program development and to describe the state of art in corporate work/family practices. Data analysis consisted of descriptive statistics and Pearson's correlation. Descriptive statistics were used to report and summarize findings on the survey items describing specific components of the firms' work/family practices. Pearson's correlation was employed to test the study's eleven research hypotheses. Results of data analysis suggest that there is extensive and comprehensive development and use of work/family programs within the 100 Best Companies for Working Mothers. The trend appears to be toward greater long-range planning work/family. Unionized firms in this study outnumbered the national average two to one. Study findings suggest that family supportive human resource programs are most likely to be adopted by companies that: have a large percentage of female managers and senior vice-presidents, maintain a relatively high proportion of well-paid, young, female technical and professional, skilled and non-union employees. Firms tend to be large in size, reflect a consumer orientation and have a history of concern for employees and their families' well-being.

Major League Baseball, alone among industries of its size in the United States, operates as an unregulated monopoly. This twentieth century regulatory anomaly has become known simply as the "baseball anomaly." Major League Baseball developed into a major commercial enterprise without being subject to antitrust liability. Long after the interstate commercial character of baseball had been established, and even recognized by the Supreme Court, baseball's monopoly remained free from federal regulation. This study explains the baseball anomaly by connecting baseball's regulatory status to the larger political environment, tracing the game's fate through four different regulatory regimes in the United States. The constellation of institutional, ideological and political factors within each regulatory regime provides the context for the persistence of the baseball anomaly. Baseball's unregulated monopoly persists because of the confluence of institutional, ideological and political factors which have prevented the repeal of baseball's antitrust exemption to date. However, both the institutional and ideological factors, which have in the past protected baseball's unregulated monopoly, are fading. Baseball's owners can no longer claim special cultural significance in defense of the exemption, nor can they claim that the commissioner system approximates government regulation sufficiently. Both of these strategies have been discredited by the labor unrest in baseball over the last decade. While baseball is one labor strike away from losing part of its exemption, it will likely retain the aspects of the exemption which cover the contractual relationship between the major and minor leagues, as well as the part of the exemption which allows Major League Baseball to regulate the migration of individual franchises. These aspects of baseball's exemption with likely be codified and expanded to all professional sports leagues. The eventual partial repeal of baseball's exemption and the likely expansion of part of baseball's exemption to other sports makes it both an outdated anomaly and a harbinger of sports antitrust policy in the twenty first century.

Public concern over the state of the environment has grown over the past decade. All indications are that this concern will continue to influence policy making into the foreseeable future. Road transport is seen as the major contributor to environmental degradation. Transportation planners around the world face the question: cleaner air and/or faster commutes? While individual vehicles can be made more environmentally friendly, the sheer scale of growth in world-wide vehicle numbers is projected to cause significant environmental degradation in the longer run, and in the absence of newer and stricter polices. It is a challenge for governments to find policies that ensure congestion-free metropolitan areas while guaranteeing both critical environmental quality levels and a sufficient infrastructure access to all groups involved. The objective of the dissertation is to provide a mathematical framework to study transportation policy models for the purpose of controlling congestion and pollution. Towards this objective. a series of transportation policy models are developed to study travel behavior and to quantity the reductions in congestion and automobile emissions. The dissertation begins with a brief historical overview of some of the pioneering works in urban transportation economics and later presents the theoretical foundation for the transportation policy models developed. The dissertation introduces single modal and multimodal transportation network policy models that accomplish road pricing with the imposition of goal targets on link loads. as well as, integrated traffic equilibrium models with marketable mobile emission permits. Furthermore, equilibrium conditions are derived for each model, and both qualitative analysis and computational procedures are studied. Finally, the dissertation concludes with a comparative study of the relationship between regulatory pricing models and marketable emission permit transportation models and a discussion on key factors that influence implementation of the proposed policy models. The framework of variational inequalities has been utilized in our dissertation, because it is ideal for equilibrium systems. With the addition of pricing policy interventions and the integration of marketable mobile emission permits, traffic equilibrium models become extremely complex. Consequently, the computation of the equilibrium is made more difficult. However, it is shown in the dissertation that in addition to pricing interventions and the integration of a marketable emission permit system that it is possible to incorporate multiple modes of transport and even to handle the issue of noncompliance, using the framework of variational inequalities.

Much has been written and theorized concerning the emergence of technologically dynamic industrial regions. These regions are characterized by the spatial clustering of small and medium-sized firms into flexible production networks. Economic growth models speak to the virtues of spatially concentrated, inter-linked firms and their ability to quickly respond to changing global market demands. According to these models, emerging industrial clusters and expansive competitive strategies emanate from the collaboration among firms within a region where cooperative yet competitive inter-firm relations create the ability to exploit certain "competitive advantages" in an uncertain global economy. Empirical case studies of industrial clusters in the United States have included the center of semiconductor production in the Silicon Valley of California and the concentration of mini-computer producers along the Route 128 Corridor in Massachusetts. These so-called "core clusters" have received the greatest attention due to their technological dynamism and global competitiveness. Home-based core clusters also hold an attraction because they offer the potential for comparative case studies with technologically dynamic clusters within other industrialized nations. Attempts to compare and emulate industrial development patterns in more celebrated geographic regions has limited scholarly research to more advanced industrial sectors of the economy. Mature industrial sectors have received far less attention, despite their growing vitality and contribution to the economic base of their respective regions. The empirical case study of the plastics industry of North Central Massachusetts uncovered a unique industrial cluster with a distinct spatial pattern and organization of production. The case study and contextual analysis offer a formative perspective on a reemerging industrial region that helped to explain the correlation between the spatial concentration of firms and the local production network. The conclusions provide a wider and more varied explanation of regional industrial development, and a meaningful framework for the formulation of appropriate reindustrialization policies and strategies. This has clear implications for industrial planning and development practice. Appropriate and successful economic development planning will need to rely more on grounded interpretive research, require greater local capacity building, and consider the development of more formalized networks of institutional support.

The dissertation deals with the allocation of resources, among profit producing elements within a company, to achieve satisfactory results over a planning horizon. The company is viewed as a confederation of profit making elements called Strategic Business Units (SBU) which are independent of each other and held together by a central authority. The dissertation uses a computerized simulation model of the deterministic type in a timesharing mode. The model is deterministic with some limited probabilistic The model is deterministic with some limited probabilistic effects. It is used to develop projected balance sheets and profit and loss statements for each period in a predetermined planning horizon and to evaluate the success of a set of alternative futures of the SBU. The set of SBU alternatives to be evaluated as the "company" may be arbitrarily chosen by the operator or chosen through the use of a near-optimal, integer programming algorithm for a variety of measurement criteria and subject to various restraints on the balance sheet. The research uses data generated by the long-range planning process at an intermediate sized, multinational corporation listed on the New York Stock Exchange. The data consist of assets, liabilities, and profit and loss statement items for each period in a planning horizon and for each of three alternatives of each SBU in the study. In addition, a beginning corporate balance sheet is required as are planned corporate expense items and the specification of operating restrictions. Research into the effect of several strategic policies, including dividend rate and debt to equity ratio, on the future prospects of the company in accordance with the optimal value of five different measurement criteria, is reported. The five measurement criteria are present value of shareholder equity, growth in earnings per share, growth in total assets, total assets and growth in sales. The appendix material contains listings of computer programs used in the model (written in the Basic computer language), the research data used, numerous computer printouts, and technical discussions on the model. Several tentative conclusions are listed, many areas for further research are suggested, and strengths and constraints of the model are discussed. It is concluded that the techniques developed have good potential for increasing cash generation and the efficiency of the investment process in a company; the dividend rate has a significant effect on how fast a company can grow; and the model is flexible and can be used for a number of investigative purposes to support company decision-makers. An interesting area for further research is the tentative conclusion that return on assets, when used as an optimization criterion, produces a significantly different set of SBU alternatives from the one which results from using the other measurement criteria.

The purpose of this research was to apply specific organization development strategies in a professional school to test the applicability of Argyris' Theory and Method Model for this setting. The research was designed to determine the effectiveness of group decision-making processes before and after intervention. In order to accomplish this, the research included two phases. The purpose of Phase One was to involve all members in the organization development program so valid information could be collected about strengths, limitations, and problems of the organization. Data for this phase were collected by individual and group interviews. These interviews, while unstructured, were designed to accomplish four objectives: (1)to provide information about perceived strengths and limitations, (2)to ascertain the direction participants wanted the organization to take, (3)to identify specific problem areas, and (4)to ascertain the perceived need for change. In addition, participants were asked to complete a questionnaire designed to elicit perceptions of emphasis given to four missions of the school and the adequacy of the support services and personnel. As a result of the data collected, a new organizational structure was developed by the participants and the researcher. Problem areas were also identified. Phase Two of the research was an experimental study of impact of three interventions on the effectiveness of a group. Effectiveness was measured by a positive change in (1)the degree of collaboration used in problem solving, (2)the effectiveness of communication, (3)role clarity, and (4)the level of trust, concern, and individuality behaviors. The two larger departments were selected for this phase, one serving as the experimental group and the other as the control group. Two data collection methods were employed, the Meetings Questionnaire and nonparticipant observation. The Meetings Questionnaire, a 36-item instrument, measures perceived collaboration, communication, and role clarity. Participants were asked to complete this questionnaire before and after intervention. Nonparticipant observation data were collected by trained observers using Argyris' system of categories. Baseline information on the percent of trust, individuality, and concern behaviors were collected for three weeks before intervention. Post-intervention data were collected for three weeks by the same observers. The organization development strategies employed in the three-week intervention period were surveyed feedback, process consultation, and coaching/modeling. In the survey feedback, data collected from both the questionnaire and the observations were reported to the experimental group during the first week at a two-hour department meeting. The observational categories were also explained and discussed. During the next two weeks, the researcher served as process consultant at the experimental group department meetings, using coaching and modeling of facilitative behaviors as a teaching method. Post-treatment data indicated no significant change in collaboration, communication, role clarity, or trust, concern, and individuality behaviors. The conclusions drawn were that the organization development strategies had little impact on improving organizational effectiveness. The fact that none of the hypotheses were supported does not mean that OD has no value for professional schools, but may be due to the inadequacy of the instruments used. It was further suggested that the time actually spent on intervention may have been too short and the intervention too mild to effect a change in the numerous dependent variables of the research.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

No description available.