Roundup of Interesting Working Papers

22 October 2006 at 10:35 pm Peter G. Klein Leave a comment

| Peter Klein |

Kathy Fogel, Randall Morck, and Bernard Yin Yeung, “Big Business Stability and Economic Growth: Is What’s Good for General Motors Good for America?” NBER Working Paper 12394. On the relationship between Schumpeterian competition and overall economic performance.

Thomas Malone, Peter Weill, Richard K. Lai, Victoria T. D’Urso, George Herman, Thomas Apel, and Stephanie Woerner, “Do Some Business Models Perform Better than Others?” MIT Sloan Research Paper No. 4615-06. Interesting attempt to classify all 10,970 publicly traded US corporations from 1998 to 2002 according to two dimensions, what asset rights are sold (Creators, Distributors, Landlords, and Brokers) and what type of assets are involved (Financial, Physical, Intangible, and Human). Finds that some types outperform other types on particular performance dimensions, though no single type dominates all other types on all dimensions.

Naomi R. Lamoreaux and Jean-Laurent Rosenthal, “Contractual Tradeoffs and SMEs Choice of Organizational Form, A View from U.S. and French History, 1830-2000,” NBER Working Paper 12455. Asks why partnerships, rather than corporations, were the dominant business structure before the twentieth century. Uses US and French data to argue that partnerships and corporations are complementary organizational forms.