Kategoria BISAC: Business & Economics >> Industries - General

The turmoil and strife of the Middle East raises serious questions about the security of the world's oil supply. "Oil, Turmoil, and Islam in the Middle East" is a hard-hitting indictment of OPEC and OAPEC, arguing that these organizations can no longer afford to impose indiscriminate price increases on the marketplace because they hurt not only themselves but oil poor Third World nations, as well. The author analyzes the importance of Middle Eastern oil in world politics. He emphasizes that any consideration of the forces influencing development in the Middle East should take Islamic...

Lawrence, an economist, football fan, and official, is an authoritative and astute critic of what is wrong with football in higher education as regulated by the NCAA. Lawrence believes the NCAA has become a cartel that keeps expenses low by rewarding the players almost nothing comparable to their contribution. . . . This is not the book for a novice interested in the razzle-dazzle of sports, but it is highly recommended for one who wants to understand the present situation and efforts, some misguided, to control the sport. Lawrence makes an in-depth analysis of the symbiotic relationship...

How are political systems likely to shape the choices, uses, and effects of technological progress? This important new book addresses that question in a case study of Brazil's national alcohol program, Proalcool. Proalcool's stated goals are economic growth, and the reduction of personal regional income disparities, through the production of alcohol as a substitute for petroleum fuels used in internal combustion engines. Established by presidential decree in 1975, the program sought to save Brazil's floundering sugar industry and today can be counted as one of the world's largest and most...

Agriculture played an important role in the transition to capitalism in the United States in the mid-nineteenth century. In her study, Sue Headlee argues that the family farm system, with its progressive nature and egalitarian class structure, revolutionized this transition to capitalism. The family farm is examined in light of its economic and political implications, showing the relationship between the family farm and fledgling industrial capitalism, a relationship that fostered the simultaneous industrial and agricultural revolutions and the creation of an agro-industrial complex....

Japanese direct investment in the United States increased $100 billion during the late 1980s. By 1992, 400,000 Americans were employed in 2600 companies. This book, the first full-length study of Japan's U.S. business presence, describes the performance of Japanese companies and their approach to managing Americans. With a few exceptions, Japanese investment is unprofitable. Moreover, part of the blame for failure can be attributed to poor management. Sullivan reviews Japanese management practices and shows that, contrary to popular belief, they are rooted in the exercise of power rather...

This text presents for the first time the history of international business, using both a case and contextual approach. Case studies from around the world are analyzed in both their internal and external contexts. Divided into five geographical sections--Europe, North America, Central America/South America/the Caribbean, Africa, and Asia/the Western Pacific--the text features case studies of particular businesses of various periods, as well as essays on international business and economic integration in the particular regions. Introductions to each section define main themes and relate the...

This text presents for the first time the history of international business, using both a case and contextual approach. Case studies from around the world are analyzed in both their internal and external contexts. Divided into five geographical sections--Europe, North America, Central America/South America/the Caribbean, Africa, and Asia/the Western Pacific--the text features case studies of particular businesses of various periods, as well as essays on international business and economic integration in the particular regions. Introductions to each section define main themes and relate the...

The current restructuring of the world-economy under global capitalism has further integrated international trade and production. It thus has brought to the fore the key role of commodity chains in the relationships of capital, labor, and states. Commodity chains are most simply defined as the link between successive processes of manufacturing that result in a final product available for individual consumption. Each production site in the chain involves organizing the acquisition of necessary raw materials plus semifinished inputs, the recruitment of labor power and its provisioning,...

In the natural gas industry, competition and contracting are gradually replacing monopoly and regulation. In this volume, many leading economists who follow the gas industry present their views on current and future industry trends. To help regulators and industry leaders better understand these changes and to reform regulation, the authors apply economic theories of contestable markets, public choice, transaction costs and dynamic entrepreneurship to the gas industry. The issues addressed in this work are crucial, not just for the gas industry, but for all industries that have...

This study examines three major bomber aircraft acquisition programs: the B-36, the B-52, and the B-2. The central question for each of these programs is whether they were chosen to fit national strategic objectives or to meet the more narrow political and economic needs of the so-called military-industrial complex. The book concludes that U.S. Air Force senior leadership acquired better bombers than did civilian defense leaders. The extensive use of original documents in this book reveals that Air Force generals were less concerned about defending their own interests than previous...

Sridharan provides an interpretative comparison of the political economy of policy and development of a new industry--electronics--in three major developing countries --India, Brazil, and Korea--over a quarter of a century. Electronics, defined to encompass the entire microelectronics-based complex of industries, is the epitome of a new industry for developing countries. Promoting it involves all the dilemmas of industrial policy for developing countries: state versus market, multinations versus domestic firms, imported versus indigenous development of technology, import-substitution...

A well-written and extremely informative book about our energy industries, their significance to the economy, and how economists analyze the problems associated with energy production and consumption. The reader with only a cursory knowledge of economic principles, as well as trained economists, will learn much from Peirce's incisive and sometimes acerbic examination of the coal, oil, natural gas, electric utility, nuclear power, and the alternative energy industries. Choice review of First Edition

Economics of the Energy Industries, Second Edition, examines the...

The U.S.-Japan bilateral trade relationship is perhaps the most consequential and the most tumultuous in the world. Government and business leaders devote substantial time and effort to resolving the stream of disputes that arise between the two allies and trading partners. Many of the issues are rooted in the perception that Japan's impressive economic success may be due in some degree to anticompetitive practices through which Japan's domestic markets are protected, and that an unfair advantage is granted to Japanese companies as they expand abroad. Regardless of the validity of these...

When major league baseball cancelled its 1994 season following a player strike, fans were shocked that the national pastime could be brought to a standstill by a collective bargaining dispute. The strike was largely responsible for bringing the economics of the game into sports discussions and raising questions about the business of baseball. Will players' rising salaries destroy baseball? How will revenue-sharing and luxury taxes affect competitive balance? Should taxpayers subsidize their local team? This volume answers the basic questions about the economics of the sport, from salary...

The sports industry presents many unusual and interesting opportunities for the application of economic theory and econometrics. In 15 professional papers, this book addresses current economic issues in the industry, including the problem of competitive balance, the location of professional sports teams and their impact on local communities, managerial decision making, and issues related to labor markets. Extending the previous research in sports economics, the papers reflect the most recent applications of economic theory in this area. The book will be a valuable resource for professional...

Tourism has become the world's largest industry, according to the World Tourism Organization; no surprise when one considers that it incorporates the world's oldest profession. In some developing regions, such as the Caribbean or the South Pacific, tourism is the primary sector in which significant economic growth takes place. In other regions, including areas of Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, and formerly communist eastern Europe, tourism is just beginning to take off. In all of these areas, tourism's impact has been decidedly mixed. Nowhere is this more visible than in the...

Over the past two hundred years, transportation technology has enabled citizens of any nation to visit, for the purposes of entertainment and leisure, nearly any place on the entire globe. Nations compete for tourists, promoting themselves by showing off their beautiful landscapes and by holding out promises of previously unattainable excitement. As a result, locations and landscapes once considered sublime are becoming increasingly mediated and commodified into both products and elements of national identity constructs.

As digital photographs make possible the instant transmission of...

Seavoy insists that development economics is a failed discipline because it does not recognize the revolutionary difference between subsistence and commercial social values. Seavoy demonstrates that commercial labor norms are essential for producing assured food surpluses in all crop years and an assured food surplus is essential for sustaining the development process.

The commercialization of food production is a political process, as in the term political economy. If peasants have a choice, they will not voluntarily perform commercial labor norms. Central governments must overcome...

Examining the role of the public sector in small-business debt-capital formation, this book describes current approaches, conceptually and pragmatically, and evaluates their advantages and disadvantages from a variety of perspectives. It also suggests a model for improving our approach to small business capital formation in the United States.

Financing small business creation and expansion has always been difficult. Private debt capital providers tend to avoid small business because the latter are preceived to be too risky. Yet because of the importance of small businesses to...