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Understanding Inequalities in Ride-Hailing Services Through Simulations
Get PDFDespite the potential of ride-hailing services to democratize the labor market, they are often accused of fostering unfair working conditions and low wages. This paper investigates the effect of algorithm design decisions on wage inequality in ride-hailing platforms. We create a simplified city environment where taxis serve passengers to emulate a working week in a worker’s life. Our simulation approach overcomes the difficulties stemming from both the complexity of transportation systems and the lack of data and algorithmic transparency. We calibrate the model based on empirical data, including conditions about locations of drivers and passengers, traffic, the layout of the city, and the algorithm that matches requests with drivers. Our results show that small changes in the system parameters can cause large deviations in the income distributions of drivers, leading to an unpredictable system that often distributes vastly different incomes to identically performing drivers. As suggested by recent studies about feedback loops in algorithmic systems, these short-term income differences may result in enforced and long-term wage gaps
Coordination challenges in implementing the three lines of defense model
Get PDFThe three lines of defense model (TLoD) aims to provide a simple and effective way to improve coordination and enhance communications on risk management and control by clarifying the essential roles and duties of different governance functions. Without effective coordination of these governance functions, work can be duplicated or key risks may be missed or misjudged. To address these challenges, professional standards recommend that the chief audit executive (CAE) coordinates activities with other internal and external governance stakeholders (assurance providers). We consider survey responses from 415 CAEs from Austria, Germany, and Switzerland to analyze determinants that help to implement the TLoD without any challenges and to explore the extent of (coordination) challenges between the internal audit function and the respective governance stakeholders. Our results show a great variance in the extent of coordination challenges dependent on different determinants and the respective governance stakeholder
Typologies of "Just Transitions": Towards Social-Ecological Transformation
Get PDFThe "Just Transition" (JT) approach emerged as an answer to balancing human welfare, jobs and the need for deep decarbonisation. The concept was developed by trade unions in the industrialised world as a unifying rallying cry around the demand that ecological transformation be undertaken in a socially just way. Starting out in the US in the 1970s, it has increasingly been adopted and adapted by different groups, including unions and workers themselves, environmentalists, academics, governments, international institutions and nongovernmental organisations. While the flexibility of the concept and the easy translatability of “fairness” have arguably been its strength and the reason for its popularity, JT has also been criticised for its vagueness, inoperability in practice, and in particular for being used to fight for various, and sometimes antithetical, conceptualisations of justice. Without negating the political challenges of JTs, this paper will look at divergent types of current formulations of JT, within a modified framework of Hampton’s (2015) trade union climate approaches, which includes 1) "neoliberal political economy/market" (NPE), 2) "ecological modernisation/state" (EM), and 3) "social-ecological transformation" (SET) climate approaches. Different JT approaches are aligned along "Market Policies" and "Just Transition" axes (Figure 1) of which NPE and SET form two extreme approaches. This paper will elaborate on why a radical SET formulation of JT, which moves past only class-based climate approaches (Hampton’s (2015) Marxist Political Economy) to include broader critiques based on environmental justice, degrowth and ecofeminism, is needed to adequately challenge current multiple crises related to the environment and society.Series: Ecological Economic Paper
Macroeconomic forecasting in the euro area using predictive combinations of DSGE models
Get PDFWe provide a comprehensive assessment of the predictive ability of combinations of Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DSGE) models for GDP growth, inflation and the interest rate in the euro area. We employ a battery of static and dynamic pooling weights based on Bayesian model averaging principles, prediction pools and dynamic factor representations, and entertain eight different DSGE specifications and four prediction weighting schemes. Our results indicate that exploiting mixtures of DSGE models tends to achieve superior forecasting performance over individual specifications for both point and density forecasts. The largest improvements in the accuracy of GDP growth forecasts are achieved by the prediction pooling technique, while the results for the weighting method based on dynamic factors partly leads to improvements in the quality of inflation and interest rate predictions.Series: Department of Economics Working Paper Serie
Revisiting the association between temperature and COVID-19 transmissibility across 117 countries
Get PDFFunktioniert Homeoffice für alle? Das Projekt „New ways of working“ der Erste Bank
Get PDFWie soll die Arbeitswelt nach der Krise aussehen? Ausgehend von den überraschenden Erkenntnissen der Befragung von 18.000 Mitarbeitenden soll die Zukunft von Homeoffice & Co. im öffentlichen Dienst diskutiert werden
“Now, What Exactly is the Problem?“ Media Coverage of Economic Inequalities and Redistribution Policies: The Piketty Case
Get PDFA clear sign of the heightened interest in economic inequality was the surprising popularity of Thomas Piketty’s book, Capital in the Twenty-First Century, presenting a dense synopsis and major contribution to the economics of inequality. This article investigates discourses on inequality in news media, through the highly controversial debate raised by Piketty’s best-selling book, in selected print media in four European countries.We conceive of the media as having an impact on the perceptions and knowledge of economic processes, thus influencing preferences of the public for economic policy making. This is in line with Veblen, who terms the press an “educational system.” Regarding the topics of inequality, we will show that media coverage leads to a biased picture of both inequality and the role of redistribution policies to possibly curb such a development
Whistleblowing and labour law: The Whistleblower Directive - development, content and obstacles
Get PDFWhile some people consider whistleblowers to be selfless heroes, others tend to see them as snitches and denunciators. One way or another, whistleblowing is a prominent term, whose meaning everyone seems to know, whilst simultaneously remaining significantly vague. With the entry into force of the Whistleblower Directive on 17th December 2019, the subject of whistleblowing is gaining further medial and scientific attention. This legal act will certainly have, inter alia, an influence on the future design of industrial relations since whistleblowing is closely intervened with the work environment. Without going into the concrete implementation possibilities of the respective Member States, this article is dedicated to highlighting issues of particular relevance to labour law. Before dealing with these specific aspects, there will be a broad analysis of the thematic area of whistleblowing in terms of the understanding of the concept, the interests at stake and the background of the new Directive
Europe Dwarfed by Media and Low Self-confidence
Get PDFThis article rejects the dominant assertion that the world will become bipolar, with the sole remaining superpower USA as the retreating pole and China as the upcoming power on the road to leading in the new world order. We counter that forecasters should not forget Europe. In its geographical borders, it is currently leading in several quantitative and qualitative dimensions such as exports, quality
manufacturing, life quality, and life expectancy. If the EU joins forces with countries already affiliated or looking for closer ties, and acts in a more coordinated manner across its members, it can be a partner of the US and China on a level playing field. This fact is currently ignored by international
media and analysts. The article ventures to carve out some policy changes, which could increase Europe’s leverage. The new world order will not arise in a linear way and new middle powers will exist alongside the strongest actors: China, Europe, and the US
Thought Experiments and Philosophy in Organizational Research
Get PDFOrganization theory seems to be caught between a rock and a hard place: on the one hand, there are arguments that the field is too preoccupied with theory, leaving its work abstract and practically irrelevant. On the other hand, there are arguments that the field is overly empirical and too methods-driven, which hampers the creation of ideas that resonate with constituencies beyond the organization studies community. How to resolve this apparent conundrum? In this essay we argue that neither more theorizing nor more forensic data-driven work might address the problem; rather, and perhaps surprisingly, we propose that a philosophical stance might offer a remedy. The aim of this essay is (1) to explore thought experiments as a genuine philosophical method that is designed to develop promising ideas and concepts and (2) to reflect on how such conceptual work can help shape organization theory to be conceptually more stimulating and practically more relevant. We argue that this particular kind of conceptual work has been and should continue to be one of the hallmarks of organization theory. Thus thought experiments represent a valuable methodological extension of our toolkit as they provide crucial devices triggering transformations in thought and practice