Above the Bottom Line or The Economics of Network Industries

Above the Bottom Line

Author: Robert C Solomon

ABOVE THE BOTTOM LINE focuses on the issues of the individual in the business environment, rather than focusing on large-scale, ethical decision making. Business is defended as a necessary and valuable component of contemporary life, a range of entrepreneurial ventures that should be approached in a principled, thoughtful, and honest manner. Looking at the importance of corporate culture, students are given direction in making personal and professional decisions at work, relating these to the concepts of social responsibility, employer and employee rights, whistle-blowing, corporate governance, bankruptcy, and many other timely business issues. This text explores moral choices within the business environment, and considers current business policy issues. It is also a guide on how to think about business and a life in business, using vignettes from history and bits of literature and anthropology to broaden the students' outlook on commercial endeavors.

See also: Reorganizing the Factory or Executive Coaching

The Economics of Network Industries

Author: Oz Shy

Networks are fastest-growing components in most industries. Network industries include the Internet, e-mail, telephony, computer hardware and software, music and video players, and service operations in businesses overseas, banking, law, and airlines. Oz Shy conveys the essential features of how strategic interactions among firms are affected by network activity, and how social interaction influences consumers' choices of products and services. Oz Shy is on the faculty of economics at the University of Haifa, in Haifa, Israel. His previous book is Industrial Organization: Theory and Applications (MIT Press, 1996).

Table of Contents:

1. Introduction;
2. The hardware industry;
3. The software industry;
4. Technology, advance, and standardization;
5. Telecommunication;
6. Broadcasting;
7. Markets for information;
8. Banks and money;
9. The airline industry: social interaction;
10. Other networks; Appendix A. Normal-form games; Appendix B. Extensive-form games; Appendix C. Undercut-proof equilibria.