scholarly journals HRM and Small-Firm Employee Motivation: Before and After the Great Recession

ILR Review ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 72 (3) ◽  
pp. 749-773 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex Bryson ◽  
Michael White
Keyword(s):  
Small Firm ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
High Performance ◽  
Small Firms ◽  
Employee Motivation ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Hrm Practices ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Firm Investments ◽  
Intrinsic Job Satisfaction

A long-running debate in the small-firms’ literature questions the value of formal human resource management (HRM) practices, which have been linked to high performance in larger firms. The authors contribute to this literature by exploiting linked employer–employee surveys for 2004 and 2011. Using employees’ intrinsic job satisfaction and organizational commitment as motivational outcomes, the authors find the returns to small-firm investments in HRM are U-shaped. Small firms benefit from intrinsically motivating work situations in the absence of HRM practices and find this advantage disturbed when formal HRM practices are initially introduced. Firms can restore positive motivation when they invest intensively in HRM practices in a way that characterizes high performance work systems (HWPS). Although the HPWS effect on employee motivation is modified somewhat by the Great Recession, it remains robust and continues to have positive promise for small firms.

An Analysis of Big 4 Pricing and Firm Size: The Differential Impact of Demand and Supply Shocks on Large and Small Clients

2017 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 204-230 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fatima Alali ◽  
Randal Elder ◽  
Jian Zhou
Keyword(s):  
Small Firm ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
Small Firms ◽  
Unique Contribution ◽  
Demand And Supply ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Audit Market ◽  
Sarbanes Oxley ◽  
Big 4 ◽  
Recession Period

We investigate Big 4 pricing over the period of 2000 to 2010. We classify the data into five periods: 2000-2001 as the pre-Sarbanes–Oxley Act (SOX) period, 2002-2003 as the SOX period, 2004-2006 as the Auditing Standard 2 (AS2) period, 2007 as the AS5 period, and 2008-2010 as the Great Recession period. The shocks to the audit market associated with these changes in auditing regulations and the economic environment have differential impacts on large clients and small clients. The percentage of small clients using Big 4 auditors dropped significantly over these shocks, whereas the percentage of large clients using Big 4 auditors experienced a large drop only from the SOX period to the AS2 period. We find that Big 4 pricing increased significantly from the pre-SOX period to the SOX period and continued to increase significantly in the AS2 period. Big 4 pricing experienced a significant decline in the AS5 period and declined insignificantly in the Great Recession period. Big 4 small firm pricing decreased significantly in the AS2 period compared with the SOX period and in the Great Recession period compared with the AS5 period. We find that the Big 4 pricing for small clients is contingent on the nature of competition. The Big 4 charged small firms higher prices in the SOX period, AS5 period, and Great Recession period when competition was lower. Our paper provides a unique contribution as a comprehensive analysis of Big 4 pricing and Big 4 small firm pricing.

Financial Crises and the Public Discourse on Financial Elites

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Youssef Cassis ◽  
Giuseppe Telesca
Keyword(s):  
Great Depression ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Codes Of Conduct ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Early Twenty ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Late Twentieth

Why were elite bankers and financiers demoted from ‘masters’ to ‘servants’ of society after the Great Depression, a crisis to which they contributed only marginally? Why do they seem to have got away with the recent crisis, in spite of their palpable responsibilities in triggering the Great Recession? This chapter provides an analysis of the differences between the bankers of the Great Depression and their colleagues of the late twentieth/early twenty-first century—regarding their position within, and attitude towards the firm, work culture, mental models, and codes of conduct—complemented with a scrutiny of the public discourse on bankers and financiers before and after the two crises. The authors argue that the (relative) mildness of the Great Recession, compared to the Great Depression, has contributed to preserve elite bankers’ and financiers’ status, income, wealth, and influence. Yet, the long-term consequences of their loss of reputational capital are difficult to assess.

scholarly journals Wealth Disparities Before and After the Great Recession

2013 ◽  
Vol 650 (1) ◽  
pp. 98-123 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fabian T. Pfeffer ◽  
Sheldon Danziger ◽  
Robert F. Schoeni
Keyword(s):  
Great Recession ◽  
Wealth Distribution ◽  
Wealth Inequality ◽  
Longitudinal Analyses ◽  
Minority Status ◽  
Socioeconomic Groups ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Substantial Rise ◽  
American Families

The collapse of the labor, housing, and stock markets beginning in 2007 created unprecedented challenges for American families. This study examines disparities in wealth holdings leading up to the Great Recession and during the first years of the recovery. All socioeconomic groups experienced declines in wealth following the recession, with higher wealth families experiencing larger absolute declines. In percentage terms, however, the declines were greater for less advantaged groups as measured by minority status, education, and prerecession income and wealth, leading to a substantial rise in wealth inequality in just a few years. Despite large changes in wealth, longitudinal analyses demonstrate little change in mobility in the ranking of particular families in the wealth distribution. Between 2007 and 2011, one-fourth of American families lost at least 75 percent of their wealth, and more than half of all families lost at least 25 percent of their wealth. Multivariate longitudinal analyses document that these large relative losses were disproportionally concentrated among lower-income, less educated, and minority households.

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