The American labor market faces many deep-rooted problems, including persistence of a large low-wage sector, worsening inequality in earnings, employees' lack of voice in the workplace, and the need of employers to maximize flexibility if they are to survive in an increasingly competitive...

After experiencing spectacular economic growth and industrial development for much of the postwar era, Japan plunged abruptly into recession in the early 1990s and since then has suffered a prolonged period of economic stagnation, from which it is only now emerging. Japan's malaise, marked by...

This book reviews and assesses environmental policy over the past three decades--primarily in the United States but with implications for other nations. The editors place U.S. environmental policy within the framework of the transition from 1970s-era policies that emphasized federally controlled...

Even minute increases in a country's growth rate can result in dramatic changes in living standards over just one generation. The benefits of growth, however, may not be shared equally. Some may gain less than others, and a fraction of the population may actually be disadvantaged. Recent...

Arthur Okun - teacher at Yale in the 1950s, member and later Chairman of the President's Council of Economic Advisors in the 1960s, and Fellow of the Brookings Institution throughout the 1970s - was one of the three or four most important macroeconomists of the past twenty years. He was perhaps...

This series presents economic research on health care and health policy issues. The papers are written primarily for a policy audience. Each volume contains approximately five papers from an annual conference held in Washington, D.C. Topics covered include the effects of health policy reforms,...

An organization is more than the sum of its parts, and the individual components that function as a complex social system can be understood only by analyzing their collective behavior. This book shows how state-of-the-art simulation methods, including genetic algorithms, neural networks, and...

The study of investment under uncertainty was stagnant for several decades, until recent developments in real options provided the tools to revitalize the field. The techniques and insights derived from option pricing can now be used to quantify the elusive elements of managerial operating...

In this revealing study, Larry Hirschhorn examines the rituals, or social defenses, organizations develop to cope with change. Using extended ease studies from offices, factories, and social services, he describes why these often irrational practices that fragment and injure individuals within...

Although social scientists generally agree that technology plays a major role in the economy, economics and technology have yet to be brought together into a coherent framework that is both analytically interesting and empirically oriented. This book draws on the tools of science and technology...