Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2003. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references. Available also from UMI Company.

This study examines the existence of pay-performance sensitivity in total compensation and bonus during the financial crisis, using data between 2007-2010 from Swedish 196 listed firms. We perform panel data regression analysis of CEO compensation on financial performance measured as stock returns. Our results indicate that there is, although not significant, a weak positive relationship between CEO compensation and firm performance during 2007-2010. However during 2009-2010 in a market state defined as post-crisis we find weak negative pay-performance sensitivity at a significance level of 10 %. Nevertheless, as regards to the bonus paid to executives there was a significantly positive relationship relative bonus % and firm performance. These results contribute to our understanding of the pay-performance sensitivity in times of financial disturbance, highly relevant to the existing debate considering CEO compensation.

Many public school districts around the nation have implemented performance pay programs to provide teachers the opportunity to earn additional pay based on measures of student achievement. These programs aim to improve student achievement and teacher effectiveness. Existing research on performance pay demonstrates no positive impact of such programs on student and teacher outcomes; however, little research assesses the impact of performance pay combined with addition supports and working condition improvements on student achievement and teacher effectiveness. This study empirically examined the impact of teacher performance pay combined with additional human capital improvements on student growth and teacher mobility in one Texas school district. The district implemented the program in only 15 of the district’s 144 schools. Nine schools implemented the full intervention, which included performance pay, teacher supports, and working condition improvements, while six schools partially implemented the program, offering teachers the opportunity to earn performance pay only. Results demonstrate that student growth was significantly, positively related to full program implementation in math and reading; yet, the magnitude of the results was small. Over time, teacher effectiveness increased on campuses that implemented the most comprehensive version of the program. Average teacher turnover rates increased on full program campuses the year before and the year after implementation; yet, the most effective teachers remained on campuses that provided performance pay and improved working conditions. Results suggest that financial incentives combined with additional human capital improvements, rather than financial incentives alone, could lead to small improvements in student achievement and teacher effectiveness in high need, urban public schools. These findings hold implications for policymakers and researchers, providing evidence on how to best design and implement school district human capital initiatives that show promise in improving student and teacher outcomes. / text

The city of Austin in recent years has undertaken a number of planning initiatives to guide future development in the rapidly-growing urban area. What has emerged is a clear commitment to a broad definition of sustainability that includes environmental, economic, and social sustainability among both policy makers and the public. The city of Austin has made great strides towards its goal of becoming a model city for sustainability, but it still faces many challenges. The long-term sustainability of Texas construction jobs is threatened by declining wages, dangerous working conditions, and few employment-based benefits. To help address these challenges, the Workers Defense Project (WDP), a local community-based organization dedicated to improving working conditions for Austin’s low-wage workers, has partnered with industry and community stakeholders to create the Premier Community Builders (PCB) certification program. Certification programs, which require businesses to meet minimum set of standards in exchange for a seal or trademark that publicizes their commitment to corporate social responsibility, have become a popular tool in recent years for improving conditions in a variety of industries. Implementing a certification program, however, often drives up costs associated with adopting more sustainable practices and is highly dependent upon consumers’ willingness to pay a price premium for the certified product. The purpose of this research is to explore consumer willingness to pay among downtown Austin residents and tourists for PCB certification. This exploratory study utilizes a contingent valuation survey as the primary instrument to determine whether or not downtown Austin consumers are willing to pay more for PCB certified construction and identify any demographic or identity-related factors associated with downtown consumers’ willingness to pay for PCB certification. / text

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Mass customization (MC) constitutes a promising strategy for companies which aim to provide products which are better adapted to individual customers' aesthetic and functional preferences. Drawing on commodity theory, we argue that the perceived uniqueness of a self-designed product is a second driver of utility in MC. We find that in addition to the significant effect of aesthetic and functional fit, the perceived uniqueness of a self-designed product (1) contributes independently to the utility a customer experiences, and (2) that this effect is moderated by the consumer's need for uniqueness. In product categories which can serve this counterconformity motive for onsumers, this suggests that MC toolkits should be constructed with the objective of facilitating the creation of unique products as well as providing affirmative feedback that this uniqueness has been achieved. (authors' abstract)

Titel: Hur står sig de billigare substituten emot premium produkter? Nivå: C-uppsats i ämnet företagsekonomi Författare: Giancarlo Mancuso & John Gustafsson Handledare: Jonas Kågström Datum: 2012 – Maj Syfte: Syftet med denna uppsats är att vi vill undersöka hur de billigare substituten står sig emot premium produkter genom att ställa de emot varandra i ett blindtest föreslagits av tidigare forskning Ogenyi Ejye (1994). Vi vill veta om det finns en stor skillnad mellan de billigare varianterna och de premier produkterna enligt tidigare gjord forskning. Metod: Vi har utfört ett experiment i form av ett blindtest där vi sätter fyra olika Cola sorter emot varandra. Under genomförandet av experimentet har vi använt oss utav enkäter för att samla in data. Detsamma gäller för vår webb undersökning. Resultat & slutsats: Det vi kom fram till i vår undersökning är att varumärken påverkar oss konsumenter både positivt och negativt. Vi kan tydligt se i det blinda testet att det inte skiljer sig så mycket mellan premier produkterna och de billigare substituten när det kommer till smaken. Men i det visuella testet kan vi se en tydlig skillnad mellan de olika sorterna. Vidare visade vår undersökning att det genomsnittliga priset som våra deltagare var villiga att betala för de olika produkterna ligger över det faktiska priset i både det visuella och det blinda testet. Förslag till fortsatt forskning: En intressant vidare forskning skulle vara att ta samma deltagare och genomföra två olika experiment på dem. Den ena skulle vara ett blindtest där deltagarna är omedvetna om vad det är de dricker och det andra skulle vara ett visuella test där deltagarna är medvetna om vilket varumärke det är de dricker, därefter jämföra resultatet. En annan vidare forskning i detta sammanhang skulle vara att undersöka WTA(Willingness To Accept) för att se vilket pris man som konsument skulle vara villig att betala.  Uppsatsens bidrag: Det vi kom fram till är att skillnaden mellan de olika Cola sorter inte är så stora när man tar bort varumärket. Det är ett bevis på att de billiga substituten börjar matcha det premium produkterna i form av smak preferenser. Vi ser också hur viktigt det är att skapa ett starkt varumärke. Nyckelord: Brand, Brand Equity, Willingess to Pay, Consumer price perception, Pricepremium / Title: How do the cheaper substitutes withstand the premium products? Level: Degree in Business Administration Author: Giancarlo Mancuso & John Gustafsson Supervisor: Jonas Kågström Date: Maj – 2012 Aim: The purpose of this paper is to investigate how cheaper substitutes hold up to premium products by comparing them to each other in a blind test suggested by previous research Ogenyi Ejye (1994). We want to know if there is a major difference between the cheaper versions and the premium products in accordance with previous research. Method: The research had been done in the form of a blind test. Four different Cola varieties and have been compared against each other using a survey to collect data. This form of testing applied to our online survey as well. Result & Conclusions: The conclusion of our study is that brands do affect us as consumers, both in a positive and negative way. We could clearly see that in the blind test between the premium products and the cheaper substitutes there was not much of a difference in taste. In the visual test we could clearly see a difference between the products. Furthermore this research has shown that our participants are willing to pay more than the actual retail price for this product in both the visual and blind test. Suggestions for future research: It would be interesting with further research to take the same participants and perform two different experiments on them. One could be a blind test and the second could be in a visual test. During which the participants are aware of what they taste to see if there would be a major difference between the results. It would also be interesting to see research done using WTA (Willingness to Accept) in this context.  Contribution of the thesis: Our research has shown that there is not a great difference between the tastes of the products. It has given further proof that the cheaper substitute products are delivering almost the same quality as the premium product, which shows how important it is to build strong brand equity. Key words: Brand, Brand Equity, Willingness to Pay, Consumer price perception, Price premium

The use of functional foods by individuals to address health issues has become increasingly common. Pomegranate fruits and other pomegranate products contain phytochemicals, including several antioxidants that may have benefits when consumed as a functional food. The production of pomegranates in the United States is concentrated in California; yet pomegranates can be grown successfully in other regions. The purpose of this study was two-fold: 1) to address the market potential and consumer preferences for pomegranate fruits and other pomegranate products in Texas and 2) to address issues of experimental auction design and estimation in regards to novel products and health benefits of food products. A nonhypothetical experimental procedure was developed that combined preference rankings with a uniform nth-price auction to elicit preferences and willingness-to-pay (WTP) for pomegranate fruit products. Demographic and behavioral characteristics were collected from a representative sample of subjects in the Bryan-College Station area of Texas. Subjects submitted baseline preference rankings and bids on six pomegranate products and a control fruit product, all with the same retail price. Most participants had never purchased or tasted a pomegranate product. Additional information on the pomegranate products was provided in three forms: tasting information, health and nutrition information, and anti-cancer information. Subjects had the greatest WTP for the control product, followed by the juice product, followed by the ready-to-eat products; the whole pomegranate fruits had the lowest WTP. The preference rankings indicated the same order of preferences for the baseline round, but the ranking of the juice product dropped and the ranking of the ready-to-eat and Texas whole fruits rose when additional information was provided. Estimations of the WTP were done using random-effects tobit models and mixed linear models on the full bids and individual changes in bids. Unengaged bidders and bid censoring were addressed. Demographic variables were typically not predictors of WTP with the exception of previous purchases of pomegranates and household size. There were differences in WTP across information treatments, with tasting information having a greater effect than either health and nutrition information or anti-cancer information. Providing a reference price also increased WTP. Preference rankings were estimated using a rank-ordered logit and a mixed rank-ordered logit model. There was an interaction effect of each information treatment with the product characteristics, indicating that studies of effects of information treatments on preferences are not generalizable across products. There was divergence in the results for the preference rankings from the results of the experimental auction; preference rankings and bids gave different results for the same products.

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The study deals with the causes of unjustified differences in pay between women and men in the banking sector. The purpose of this paper has been to examine how a gender project implemented in the private banking organizations from a gender-and implementation perspective. The aim of the project examined is to even unjustified differences in pay between men and women in the banking and finance sector. The main issues are: ● How has the project been implemented and what are the real and perceived results? ● How can the opportunities and barriers to successful implementation course with emphasis on gender? The method used is a qualitative study, where the empirical material consisted of focus group interviews. The two main conclusions that we can say is : First, the organization's managers needs to take action in practice for implementation to be successful in the organization, otherwise they constitute an obstacle to the implementation of equal pay for equal work. The barrier consists of the implementation cannot be realized without active management actions. From a gender perspective, this can be understood as the prevailing gender structures maintained and thus unwarranted pay differentials. Second, long-term need for equality implementation. A long-term approach is essential , from a gender perspective to gender patterns are deeply rooted in our culture. They are so ingrained in our way of thinking about gender which can´t change in just a few years. It requires long-term and duration to correct overcoming unwarranted pay differentials. Short-term work preserves gender structures and therefore constitutes an obstacle in the implementation of equal pay for equal work by segregating them or become a side issue.