On the identification of extreme outliers and dragon-kings mechanisms in the upper tail of income distribution

The presence of extreme outliers in the upper tail data of income distribution affects the Pareto tail modeling. A simulation study is carried out to compare the performance of three types of boxplot in the detection of extreme outliers for Pareto data, including standard boxplot, adjusted boxplot and generalized boxplot. It is found that the generalized boxplot is the best method for determining extreme outliers for Pareto distributed data. For the application, the generalized boxplot is utilized for determining the exreme outliers in the upper tail of Malaysian income distribution. In addition, for this data set, the confidence interval method is applied for examining the presence of dragon-kings, extreme outliers which are beyond the Pareto or power-laws distribution.     

Estimation of common location parameter of two exponential populations based on records

Consider the problem of estimating the common location parameter of two exponential populations using record data when the scale parameters are unknown. We derive the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE), the modified maximum likelihood estimator (MMLE) and the uniformly minimum variance unbiased estimator (UMVUE) of the common location parameter. Further, we derive a general result for inadmissibility of an equivariant estimator under the scaled-squared error loss function. Using this result, we conclude that the MLE and the UMVUE are inadmissible and better estimators are provided. A simulation study is conducted for comparing the performances of various competing estimators.     

Antecedents and Consequences of Marital Satisfaction in an Emirati Sample: A Structural Equation Model Analysis

This study surveyed 1,000 married Emirati men and women to explore a model of marital satisfaction in relation to self-esteem, satisfaction with life, gender-role attitudes, and general health (physical and psychological). The Emirati Marital Satisfaction Scale (EMSS), State Self-Esteem Scale (SSES), Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS), the Arabic General Health Questionnaire, and the Sex-Role Egalitarianism Scale were used. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) on the EMSS indicated a moderate fit of the data to one factor structure. CFA on SSES and SWLS indicated an adequate fit of the data to the four-factor solution and one factor, respectively. The structural equation model for the EMSS showed that both general health and gender-role attitudes predict marital satisfaction and that marital satisfaction seems to predict the individual’s well-being as measured by life satisfaction and self-esteem. These results are discussed within the context of the United Arab Emirates culture and directions for future research are provided.     

Household welfare and women empowerment through microcredit financing: Evidence from Malaysia microcredit

Microcredit financing is considered a crucial vehicle to flourish the socioeconomic conditions of women and women empowerment, especially among those who are from low-income households and deprived of access to financial services. Nevertheless, the literature arrived with a conflicting conclusion about its effect and women demonstrate that microcredit has small or no effect. This study is intended to scrutinize the impact of a productive loan provided by Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia (AIM) on women household welfare and empowerment. A cross-sectional survey was employed through the distribution of a questionnaire to 495 of old and new borrowers. We observe that microcredit has significant positive effects on borrowers’ household income and personal asset acquisition. However, even though the effect of microcredit empowers women borrowers in households’ decisions-making, it has no effect on women control over minor financials.     

Aspirations of Migrants and Returns to Human Capital Investment

Although there is adequate literature on the topic of state-employer collusion, this literature is barely underpinned in any theoretical framework. This article attempts to fill this theoretical lacuna by revisiting Gouldner’s (Patterns of industrial bureaucracy: a case study of modern factory administration, The Free Press, New York, 1954a) pioneering theoretical framework on patterns of bureaucracy, and extends his concept of mock bureaucracy to develop a new concept called ‘mock state bureaucracy’ to illustrate state-employer collusion in controlling workers in plants in developing third world economies. The article revisits and extends Gouldner’s (1954a) unit of analysis from the ‘firm’ level to the ‘state’ level and argues that the new concept mock state bureaucracy provides a better illustration of the state-employer collusion. The article argues that both ‘state’ and ‘employer’ are important units of analysis and they should be brought back to the centre stage of any discourse on employment relations of developing countries.     

Demand shocks and employment adjustments: Does employment protection legislation create rigidity?

With state‐level panel data from the Indian manufacturing sector for 2000–12, and labour turnover as a proxy for employment adjustments, the authors estimate differential effects of demand shocks on employment adjustment across states with high and low levels of EPL. They find that EPL does not hinder employment adjustment; the response of labour separation rates to negative demand shocks is relatively higher in states with high levels of EPL, and labour turnover is inversely associated with EPL, which may be viewed as indicative of the beneficial effects of EPL for both enterprises and workers.     

Hybrid happening: Organizational reputations in corporate crises

Public relations professionals strive to develop mutually beneficial relationships among key publics that will result in favorable organizational reputations, but crises typically threaten those reputations. Much of public relations crisis research focuses on how to respond after a crisis, but drawing on Expectation Violation Theory (EVT), this research focuses on the expectations of stakeholders before a crisis and how they process information during a crisis. Drawing from reputation management research in marketing, it conceptualizes corporate reputations as encompassing associations related to corporate ability (CA) and corporate social responsibility (CSR). Reputation management research generally has investigated reputations as strong on either CA or CSR, but this research examines the effects of a “hybrid” reputation, which is strong in terms of both CA and CSR associations. The results of an experiment reveal that stakeholders’ responses during a crisis vary based on their expectations, how they perceive a hybrid reputation, and the crisis type. The study has theoretical implications regarding stakeholders’ information processing during a crisis, and it provides public relations professionals insights regarding how to cultivate and protect an organizational reputation.     

The Pyramid of Nonprofit Responsibility: The Institutionalization of Organizational Responsibility Across Sectors

Observers have noted that organizations in all sectors, whether business, nonprofit, or government, have been moving toward rationalized structures that presuppose and express empowered organizational actorhood. We draw upon neo-institutional theory in this paper to extend the argument: The arrival of organizational actorhood has precipitated a concomitant, cross-sectoral movement toward organizational social responsibility. Whereas existing research has tended to theorize the social responsibilities of businesses, we develop a pyramid conceptual schema to array the social responsibilities of nonprofits. We then document the coevolution of organizational actorhood and responsibility across both sectors with a metastudy of nearly 200 extant surveys. We chart the institutionalization of a slate of formal structures that express organizational actorhood (i.e., mission statements, vision statements, and strategic plans) and that profess and define organizational social responsibilities (i.e., core values, ethics codes, and responsibility communications). We close with implications and future directions for organizational studies and research on corporate social responsibility.     

Conflating Muslim “Conservatism” with “Extremism”: Examining the “Merry Christmas” Saga in Singapore

In late 2015, there was a controversy with regard to a foreign Muslim preacher being “barred” from delivering a speech in Singapore. While the government did not comment directly on the incident, it subsequently expressed concern about the growing trend of Singaporean Muslims refusing to greet “Merry Christmas” or “Happy Deepavali” to their non-Muslim friends, and stated unequivocally that it would not hesitate to ban foreign preachers who promote disharmony from entering the country. This essay seeks to critically analyse this incident, not in its specificity but with regard to the broader implications. I contend that there has been a conflation of religious conservatism with religious extremism in this episode. This conflation is not unique to Singapore, as similar expressions of wariness towards conservative Islamic positions have been articulated throughout the world, especially in Western analyses of the “Islamic problem”. This paper calls for the problematization of this conflation. It seeks to comprehend the concepts of “conservatism” and “extremism” properly. I further postulate that the act of mistaking conservatism for extremism may not only be due to misunderstandings of what the two concepts entail, but it may also has its roots in the idea of “Orientalism” as described by Edward Said.     

The relationship between circulating testosterone and inflammatory cytokines in men

Testosterone is the predominant gonadal androgen in men. Low testosterone levels are found to be associated with an increased in metabolic risk and systematic inflammation. Since adipose tissue is a source of inflammatory cytokines, testosterone may regulate inflammation by acting on adipose tissue. This review aimed to explore the role of testosterone in inflammation and its mechanism of action. Both animal studies and human studies showed that (1) testosterone deficiency was associated with an increase in pro-inflammatory cytokines; (2) testosterone substitution reduced pro-inflammatory cytokines. The suppression of inflammation by testosterone were observed in patients with coronary artery disease, prostate cancer and diabetes mellitus through the increase in anti-inflammatory cytokines (IL-10) and the decrease in pro-inflammatory cytokines (IL-1β, IL-6, and TNF-α). Despite these, some studies also reported a non-significant relationship. In conclusion, testosterone may possess anti-inflammatory properties but its magnitude is debatable. More evidence is needed to validate the use of testosterone as a marker and in the management of chronic inflammatory diseases.