Kérdőjelek a közgazdaságtanban és oktatásában = Challenges in economic research and education

Ez az esszé a teljesség igénye nélkül kísérli meg áttekinteni azt, hogy mire vezetett a közgazdaságtan világméretekben megindult és a 2008-2009. évi válság lezáratlansága miatt vélhetően évtizedes szinten zajló önvizsgálata. A tudományszak egészét egyszerre jellemzi egyfajta tartalmi kiüresedés és a társtudományokkal való erőteljesebb kapcsolatkeresés, a módszertanok és az iskolák egymás mellett élése - ami egyáltalán nem békés -, valamint a gyakorlat által felvetett kérdések elméleti általánosításának igénye. A magyar közgazdaságtan hagyományos követő szerepe megmaradt, viszont a képzésben szerzett negyedszázados tapasztalatok és az új globális kihívások lényegi átalakításokat indokolnának a mai, túlságosan egységesített képzésben. _____ This essay joins the soul-searching that has developed globally among economists since the financial crisis of 2008-2009, whose still open-ended outcomes make it likely that such self-critical reassessments will continue in the years to come. Economics is marked by the parallel existence of substantive hollowing and in-creased reliance on interfaces with neighbouring disciplines. So the plurality and none-too-peaceful coexistence of schools and methodologies is likely to persist. Similarly abundant are the attempts to theorize and generalize new phenomena in policy and business practices. Hungarian economics continues to be a follower - a trend-taker rather than trend-setter - as it was in the inter-war period. Experience has been accumulating for over 25 years in introducing Western-style higher education in economics. The increase of student numbers and steep decrease in public funding thereof call for major restructuring in curricula, institutions and teaching methods and styles alike.

The effects of experience in loyalty card adoption on the importance of the attributes of loyalty schemes

The popularity of loyalty programs worldwide shows that this is one of the most efficient marketing tools in highly competitive markets to retain customers. The saturation of loyalty schemes themselves can lead to a fierce competition between firms to gain wider penetration for their cards. The experience of the customers regarding adoption of loyalty programs can affect their attitude towards the different attributes of the programs. We found that more experienced customers evaluate the importance of the soft attributes of the loyalty schemes higher.

An empirical study of international private label branding in the food sector in Hungary

Private label branding strategies differ to that of the manufacturer. The study aims to identify optimal private label branding strategies for (a) utilitarian products and (b) hedonistic products, considering the special factors reflected in consumer behavior related to private labels in Hungary. The issue of House of Brands and Branded House strategies are discussed and evaluated in the light of retail business models. Focus group interviews and factor analysis of the survey found differences in branding strategies preferred by consumers for the two product categories. The study also outlines a strong trend in possible private label development based on consumer’s changing attitude in favor of national products.

E-commerce evolution in Hungary: an investigation of critical succes factor

In this paper we highlight how the use of internet has changed from 2004 to 2009 among Hungarian companies, how their expectations about the role of e-commerce as a competitive advantage has evolved and whether perceived benefits of e-commerce show a shift from 2004 to 2009.We investigate the role of environmental factors and market orientation as two relevant types of critical success factors proposed by the management literature and measure their impacts on Internet usage, expectations about e-commerce and perceived benefits of ecommerce. Our findings suggest that market orientation has a positive effect on Internet usage and perceived benefits of e-commerce. Internet usage and expectations are dependent on the vulnerability of the company to its macroeconomic environment. The positive outcomes of joining the EU seem to influence whether a company is able to exploit e-commerce benefits.

The role of enduring involvement in the relationship between reference price and price acceptance in the context of multichannel choice

Understanding online price acceptance and its determining factors can be essential if the companies try to manage different type of channels. The paper aimed to reveal the role of enduring involvement in price acceptance in a multichannel (online and offline) context. The study revealed that the hedonic value of shopping can increase the negative intention of price acceptance in the online channel, but also explored that for the segment without shopping motivations a similar price level can be applied both in the online and in the offline environment.

Technology Policy, R&D, and Innovation in China Traditional Approaches, and New Challenges

China’s long term development path has always been strongly infl uenced by its own ways of innovation and invention. Though around one thousand years ago China had been undoubtedly the most advanced country in the world, by the 17th century Europe had surpassed it. And when the PRC was founded in 1949, it was only a poor, severely underdeveloped country without adequate, modern technologies. In the last three decades, however, the country has achieved remarkable success in economic terms: China has become the second largest economy in the world, and its new economic, fi nancial and trading power has made it clear that the dominance of the USA and Europe has passed. At the same time China is still lagging behind technologically. Though there are huge efforts to narrow the gap, it is extremely diffi cult to build up a new technological and innovation system without deep, organic foundations. China, however, has rich experience of innovations from the past, and the question is whether it is possible to use them to formulate a new technology policy. In this paper I will try to examine China’s technology system, its functioning and its prospects, while comparing it with the traditional ways of innovations in China. I would like to show that current technology policy is, at least partly, based upon traditional values, and that high tech research, R&D, and state of the art innovations can be reconcilable with several thousand-year-old approaches.

Monetáris politikai tendenciák I. Eszköztárak (Tendencies in monetary policy I. - Asset prices)

A közgazdaságtan, szűkebben a monetáris politika előtt két elméleti és gyakorlati kihívást látok: a globális egyensúlytalanságoknak nevezett jelenséget és az eszközár problematikát. Előbbi a világgazdaságban koncentráltan fölhalmozódó adósságokat és követelésállományokat jelenti, utóbbi a banki és nem banki pénzügyi piacok folyamatainak lehetséges pénzügypolitikai vonatkozásaira utal. Mondandómat két cikkben fogalmazom meg. Ez az írás először a monetáris stabilitás és instabilitás kérdéskörét mutatja be történeti keretben, ami tekinthető mindkét aktuális témakör földolgozásához szükséges elméleti fölvezetőnek is. Ezt követi a monetáris politika és az eszközárak kapcsolatának vizsgálata. A következő cikk foglalkozik a globális egyensúlytalanságokkal. Azért választottam e sorrendet, mert a két téma szorosan összefügg, az itt leírt magyarázatok segíthetik a későbbiek megértését. Az írásban többször megfogalmazok saját véleményt, a hangsúly mégis a szakirodalom bemutatásán van. / === / Global imbalances and asset price booms and busts are the two main practical and theoretical challenges in economics, especially in monetary policy. The first of them concerns the accumulative tendencies of debts and claims in the world economy, the second challenge deals with the processes of bank and non bank money markets. These topics are dealt with in two articles. The first one presents the issue of monetary stability and instability from a historical perspective. With that the connections between monetary policy and asset prices will be studied. The next article will deal with global imbalances. The topics are closely related and this order helps better understanding. The articles are mainly based on the current literature although I insert my own views as well.

Global economics governance in the post-crisis world

The Great Crisis has made it clear once again that avoiding the derailment of globalization of trade and finance and the protecting the globe from fragmentation call for enhanced global cooperation and an efficient, flexible and coherent system of global governance. Three interconnected levels (national, regional, and global) comprise the system of global governance. This paper is dealing with some of the main issues of global economic governance in the post-crisis world. It reveals that the turbulence and the distress of the world of the early 21st century have deeper roots and broader sources than the crisis. Global governance therefore has to respond much broader set of challenges in comprehensive framework and long term perspective.

Online vs. Offline Gossip as a Source of Corporate Communicative Advantage

In a world that may be described by information revolution, it is becoming more and more important to discover the diffusion of information and news in a new technological environment. We are not dependent but, more in control of receiving and forwarding information in this technology driven environment. What we can find is that in today’s interpersonal communications, even corporate communications, gossip-like information gain a more important role. Starting from the psychological notion of gossip we asked the question how gossip occurs, evolves and disperses on the internet, what the main criteria of its diffusion and how these maybe taken into service of a company. The power of gossip derives from its biological basis that is communication advantage. The “newsmonger” maybe described with good memory, being up-to-date even in non-gossip like situations. The spread of info is faster and more precise among people with similar professions or of common interest. The content of the gossip adopts to the intellectual level of its audience. We conducted multiple research methods in order to discover about the nature of gossip of corporate interest: content analyses of blogs (N=10) and forums (N=10); online in-depth interviews (N=10); and individual consumer narratives (N=100). Our research shows that companies may lead and use gossip in an online context for their own communication intentions, however, corporate presence in terms of online gossips has to fulfill requirements in order to remain acceptable: that are specific language and place, openness, being direct about expressing intention and origin. In our paper we are going to present our major results and theoretical model