Dynamic business modeling for sustainability: Exploring a system dynamics perspective to develop sustainable business models

In the last decade, business models for sustainability have gained increasing attraction by corporate sustainability scholars with international conferences and scientific journals encouraging the development of the debate on their design, use and innovation processes. Capitalizing on the basic principles, requirements, and methodological limitations found in the literature on sustainability‐oriented business model design, this paper aims to conceptualize a dynamic business modeling for sustainability approach, which combines an adapted sustainable business model canvas and system dynamics modeling. To this end, the paper also illustrates the key operating principles of the proposed approach through an exemplary application to Patagonia's business model. Findings suggest that dynamic business modeling for sustainability may contribute to sustainable business model research and practice by introducing a systemic design tool, which frames environmental, social, and economic drivers of value generation into a dynamic business model causal feedback structure, thus overcoming methodological gaps of the extant business model design tools.     

IMPACT OF TIME ILLIQUIDITY IN A MIXED MARKET WITHOUT FULL OBSERVATION

We study a problem of optimal investment/consumption over an infinite horizon in a market with two possibly correlated assets: one liquid and one illiquid. The liquid asset is observed and can be traded continuously, while the illiquid one can be traded only at discrete random times, corresponding to the jumps of a Poisson process with intensity λ, is observed at the trading dates, and is partially observed between two different trading dates. The problem is a nonstandard mixed discrete/continuous optimal control problem, which we solve by a dynamic programming approach. When the utility has a general form, we prove that the value function is the unique viscosity solution of the associated Hamilton–Jacobi–Bellman equation and characterize the optimal allocation in the illiquid asset. In the case of power utility, we establish the regularity of the value function needed to prove the verification theorem, providing the complete theoretical solution of the problem. This enables us to perform numerical simulations, so as to analyze the impact of time illiquidity and how this impact is affected by the degree of observation.     

Openness and optimal monetary policy

We show that the composition of international trade has important implications for the optimal volatility of the exchange rate, above and beyond the size of trade flows. Using an analytically tractable small open economy model, we characterize the impact of the trade composition on the policy trade-off and on the role played by the exchange rate in correcting for price misalignments. Contrary to models where openness can be summarized by the degree of home bias, we find that openness can be a poor proxy of the welfare impact of alternative monetary policies. Using input–output data for 25 countries we document substantial differences in the import and non-tradable content of final demand components, and in the role played by imported inputs in domestic production. The estimates are used in a richer small-open-economy DSGE model to quantify the loss from an exchange rate peg relative to the Ramsey policy conditional on the composition of imports. We find that the main determinant of the losses is the share of non-traded goods in final demand.     

Employment transitions and computer use of older workers

Our empirical analysis studies the impact of computer use on out of employment transitions of older workers, disentangling the effect of using a Personal Computer (PC) at work from that of being PC literate. Data are drawn from the 2000, 2002 and 2004 waves of the Bank of Italy Survey on Household Income and Wealth. We provide empirical evidence that, even controlling for a wide set of covariates, older employees who use a PC at work have a higher probability of remaining employed in the future. However, our results also indicate that, once PC literacy is controlled for, the use of a PC at work decreases only marginally the risk of becoming not employed (i.e. the effect is smaller than the one registered when we do not control for PC literacy).     

On the Interpretation of Nonsymmetric Bargaining Solutions and Their Extension to Nonexpected Utility Preferences

In a recent paper, Rubinstein, Safra, and Thomson reexamine the foundations of the axiomatic bargaining theory as formulated by Nash. In it they reinterpret the Nash bargaining solution and extend it to a family of nonexpected utility preferences, providing an interpretation of this solution concept and an axiomatization by means of a suitable translation of Nash axioms. This paper extends the work of these authors to the family, characterized by Kalai, of nonsymmetric solutions that appear from the Nash bargaining solution when the symmetry axiom is dropped. This extension requires an axiom relating the solution outcomes of isomorphic games. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Number: C78.     

Performance competition in local media markets

This paper investigates the impact of tax and public service performance on English local government popularity by using data on local property taxes, service performance ratings and local election results after the introduction of a system of evaluation of local government performance (Comprehensive Performance Assessment). The evidence emerging from estimation of a re-election equation offers a somewhat more rounded portrait of the voter than the conventional fiscal conservative icon, by highlighting the beneficial consequences of public service performance on government popularity and pointing to the role of local media networks (the BBC regional television, local radio and web network) in shaping consensus by spreading tax-related information.     

How can biases affect entrepreneurial decision making? toward a behavioral approach to unicorns

International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal - How can cognitive biases affect the birth and evolution of entrepreneurial ventures? In Entrepreneurial Decision Making (EDM), this lively...     

PLAYING THE FERTILITY GAME AT WORK: AN EQUILIBRIUM MODEL OF PEER EFFECTS

We study workplace peer effects in fertility decisions using a game theory model of strategic interactions among coworkers that allows for multiple equilibria. Using register‐based data on fertile‐aged women working in medium‐sized establishments in Denmark, we uncover negative average peer effects. Allowing for heterogeneous effects by worker type, we find that positive effects dominate across worker types defined by age or education. Negative effects dominate within age groups and among low‐education types. Policy simulations show that these estimated effects make the distribution of where women work an important consideration, beyond simply if they work, in predicting population fertility.