"The Economists' Voice" on the financial crises

A very timely special issue of The Economists' Voice (September 2008) is entitled "Financial Regulation, Financial Crisis, and Bailouts". Included are the following articles:

• "Investment Banking Regulation after Bear Stearns" (Dwight M. Jaffee and Mark Perlow);
• "Why Paulson is Wrong" (Luigi Zingales);
• "Dr. StrangeLoan: or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Financial Collapse" (Aaron S. Edlin); and
• "Questioning the Treasury's $700 Billion Blank Check: An Open Letter to Secretary Paulson" (Aaron S. Edlin).

The Economists' Voice, from the Berkeley Electronic Press project, is hailed as "the decade's most successful publishing innovation for professional economists..... Regular contributors include five Nobel Prize winners, three past chairs of the President's Council of Economic Advisors, public intellectuals like Paul Krugman and Richard Posner, and a veritable "Who's Who" of modern economic theory and policy. The Economists' Voice is a source of expertise directed at once at the professional economist, policy makers, students, and anyone curious about the economy today."

USF subscribes to this online journal. If you are off-campus and the above link does not work, login to Blackboard, go to the USF Libraries main page and use "e-journals by title" to locate the journal and issue.

Tampa Bay Partnership - local economy...

A useful resource when researching the local Tampa Bay economy:

The Tampa Bay Partnership is "the regional organization that works with its partners to market the region nationally and internationally, to conduct regional research and to coordinate efforts to influence business and government issues that impact economic growth and development."

From their web site, you can register for a monthly e-newsletter about the Tampa Bay region, view the organization's annual report, read news and research on the local economy, or download the regularly updated Regional Economic Scorecard.

The Regional Economic Scorecard uses economic indicators such as employment, housing, income, and transportation, to compare the economic health of Tampa Bay against economic performance in Atlanta, Charlotte, Dallas, Jacksonville, and Raleigh-Durham. The most recent scorecard, dated Spring 2008, reflects the widely-reported economic downturn....

International business resource & blog...

GlobalEDGE, a recognized international business resource from Michigan State University, recently launched an International Business Blog.

GlobalEDGE is "is a knowledge web-portal that connects international business professionals worldwide to a wealth of information, insights, and learning resources on global business activities." A user-friendly interface allows you to search for industry profiles, country reports, news, a database of international business statistics and much more. You can also register and receive a monthly email newsletter with tips and information about new resources. The new blog is yet another way to keep current.

This is a great, easy to use resource for international business research....

New Books in Business and Economics, USFSP

New books in BUSINESS and ECONOMICS, Poynter Library, USFSP
(in LC Call Number order, HB-HJ only)
September 8-19, 2008

The following new business and economics books are kept on the “New Books” cart on the first floor in the library for a few weeks, and then moved to the circulating collection on the second floor, unless checked out…

Jingji Xue : the history of the introduction of western economic ideas into China, 1850-1950 / Paul B. Trescott.
HB126.C6 T73 2007

World resources : a report by the World Resources Institute and the International Institute for Environment and Development. 2008.
HC10 .W827

Winning in the Indian Market : Understanding the transformation of consumer India / Rama Bijapurkar.
HC79.C6 B545 2008

Caught in the middle : America's heartland in the age of globalism / Richard C. Longworth.
HC107.A14 L66 2008

Hunger : a modern history / James Vernon.
HC260.P6 V47 2007

Russia's capitalist revolution : why market reform succeeded and democracy failed / Anders Åslund.
HC340.12 .A844 2007

Capitalism without democracy : the private sector in contemporary China / Kellee S. Tsai.
HC427.95 .T73 2007

The elephant and the dragon : the rise of India and China and what it means for all of us / Robyn Meredith.
HC435.3 .M47 2007

Qualitative research in the study of leadership / Karin Klenke.
HD57.7 .K54 2008

The emerging markets century : how a new breed of world-class companies is overtaking the world / Antoine van Agtmael.
HD62.4 .A35 2007

Knowledge processes in globally distributed contexts / edited by Julia Kotlarsky, Ilan Oshri and Paul C. van Fenema.
HD66 .K62 2008

Leadership and management in China : philosophies, theories, and practices / edited by Chao-Chuan Chen and Yueh-Ting Lee.
HD70.C5 L43 2008

Race and entrepreneurial success : Black-, Asian-, and white-owned businesses in the United States / Robert W. Fairlie and Alicia M. Robb.
HD2358.5.U6 F35 2008

Building a future with BRICs : the next decade for offshoring / Mark Kobayashi-Hillary, editor.
HD2365 .B85 2008

An American's guide to doing business in India : a practical guide to achieving success in the Indian market / Eugene M. Makar.
HD2899 .M345 2008

Stuffed and starved : the hidden battle for the world food system / Raj Patel.
HD9000.5 .P277 2007

The end of food / Paul Roberts.
HD9000.5 .R578 2008

Bottlemania : how water went on sale and why we bought it / Elizabeth Royte.
HD9349.M542 R69 2008

Accounting/finance lessons of Enron : a case study / Harold Bierman, Jr.
HD9502.U54 E5724 2008

When steamboats reigned in Florida / Bob Bass.
HE631.F6 B37 2008

Blue skies : a history of cable television / Patrick R. Parsons.
HE8700.72.U6 P36 2008

The essential guide to business etiquette / Lillian Hunt Chaney and Jeanette St. Clair Martin.
HF5389 .C468 2007

OBD : obsessive branding disorder : the business of illusion and the illusion of business / Lucas Conley.
HF5415.1255 .C66 2008

Domesticating the world : African consumerism and the genealogies of globalization / Jeremy Prestholdt.
HF5415.33.A354 P74 2008

The she spot : why women are the market for changing the world--and how to reach them / Lisa Witter and Lisa Chen ; foreword by Gary Hirshberg.
HF5415.332.W66 W577 2008

The Sarbanes-Oxley section 404 implementation toolkit : practice aids for managers and auditors / Michael Ramos.
HF5686.C7 R3483 2008

Mastering financial calculations : a step-by-step guide to the mathematics of financial markets instruments / Bob Steiner.
HF5691 .S657 2007

Small loans, big dreams : how Nobel Prize winner Muhammad Yunus and microfinance are changing the world / Alex Counts.
HG3290.6.A8 G73 2008

Essays in derivatives : risk-transfer tools and topics made easy / Don M. Chance.
HG6024.A3 C475 2008

A more complete list of new books at the Poynter Library can be found here. New book lists will be produced and distributed every few weeks.

A list of new AUDIOVISUAL materials in the library can be found here. This list is updated periodically.

Please let me know if there are any particular publications that you would like to see in the library collection. Thank you,
Marcy

Rankings & market share -- a starting point...

Looking for quick market share data, or rankings of companies or brands?
A common starting point is to look for a table in one of two annual reference publications -- Business Rankings Annual or Market Share Reporter, both published by Gale.

These publications are also search-able through a database to which USF subscribes, Business and Company Resource Center. Unfortunately, locating these resources may not be obvious. Here's a quick tip:

First, go to the "advanced search" screen and in the drop-down box, change the content area to "rankings". Then, you can search on a keyword such as coffee. You'll be returned a set of documents divided into two groups - click the tabs at the top for "Business Rankings" or "Market Share" to see which documents are available from each of the two publications.

The documents are usually tables which have been extracted from secondary sources, which are also noted. For example, a document entitled "Largest coffee chains, 2006" includes a brief paragraph discussing the summary data from the Specialty Coffee Association of America and a chart ranking the chains by number of outlets (i.e., Starbucks, Caribou Coffee, etc.) - and the source indicated is an article from the Los Angeles Times, June 1, 2006.

There are of course other resources for researching market share -- (such as the database "TableBase" from RDS or market research report collections such as Marketline Information Centre or Minitel) -- but this is another quick and easy starting point (once you know where to look!)...

"Google still struggling to conquer outposts"

This article from the Financial Times (Sept 16, 2008) looks at the overwhelming success of non-Google search engines in other countries. For example, Yandex has a 46% share of all searches in Russia, Seznam has 63% of the market in the Czech Republic, and Baidu handles about 60% in China.

"Some common themes lie behind these local success stories, internet veterans say: Google has played second fiddle to rivals who invested much earlier, perfected their technology to work with local languages and came up with innovations that Google is now having to copy."

Google, of course, is not giving up....

The article includes links to related articles and there is an interactive map of the non-Google world with the market share of individual competitors.

Business.gov - Official Business Link to the U.S. Government

Business.gov is "the official business link to the U.S. government."

Small business guides are arranged by topic, such as "Advertising and Marketing," "Business Law," "Taxes," and "Start and Manage a Business". Each guide provides a concise annotated list of links to relevant U.S. government information.

Under the tab "State & Local Info" there is a clickable map of the U.S. For each state there is a small business guide with links to local resources and answers to FAQ. The Florida Small Business Guide is available here -- at the far left is a link to the web sites for cities and counties in the state.
(This is a great resource for students working on local marketing projects....)

Financial crises...

News from the financial markets has been more than a bit overwhelming lately: Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, AIG.... This special issue of "Knowledge at Wharton" (Sept 17-30, 2008) is devoted to the current financial crisis and includes articles, podcasts and video from Wharton professors and other financial experts.

College Sustainability Report Card 2008

According to the College Sustainability Report Card 2008: "While schools are earning higher marks for green initiatives in campus operations, a majority of the wealthiest institutions continue to lag in applying sustainability practices to their endowment investments." The report is issued by the Sustainable Endowments Institute, "a nonprofit organization engaged in research and education to advance sustainability in campus operations and endowment practices."

The Sustainability Report Card includes a full report and an Executive Summary, as well as individual school profiles. The one-page school profiles include the scores for each of eight categories (administration; climate change & energy; food & recycling; green building; transportation; endowment transparency; investment priorities; and shareholder engagement.) Six schools received the top rating of A-; USF received a D+. (My alma mater, Carleton College, scored an A- :))

From this page, you can also link to related articles from Forbes on "America's Greenest Colleges" and the first "green issue" of the New York Times Magazine.

Environmentally friendly colleges & universities...

Sierra Club published its second "Cool Schools" ranking of the top ten environmentally friendly schools. Included are small private colleges like Middlebury College(VT), as well as large schools like the University of Florida at Gainesville and Arizona State University at Tempe. "The top schools earned points in ten categories: policies for building, energy, food, investment, procurement, and transportation; curriculum; environmental activism; waste management; and overall commitment to sustainability." Information about the Sierra Club's ranking system and related articles, such as hot environmental jobs, can be found here.

Google &/v. advertising agencies

Google has built a 40-person group to court advertising agencies, who have often had a somewhat adversarial relationship with the giant search firm. But now that Google has expanded beyond simple search, it has found a need for more positive and collaborative relationships with ad agencies. The reaction from ad agencies appears to be mixed -- Google is still known to some as a "frenemy" or a "froe". This NYTimes article, "Googling in Person to Make Friends" has an interesting discussion of the development.

Consumer and marketing research

ACNielsen, the marketing research arm of The Nielsen Company, conducts marketing and consumer research and offers some of the reports for free publicly. The Global Consumer Reports section of the web site includes reports on such topics as consumer confidence, consumers and designer brands, and packaging and the environment. For example, the June 2008 report on the Nielsen Global Consumer Confidence Index found the following:

"Consumer confidence fell in 39 out of 48 countries in the past six months, with New Zealand, USA and Latvia suffering the deepest declines. Among the 39 markets recording a decline in consumer confidence, 15 fell by double-digits."