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PurposeIn this paper, the authors assess the responsiveness of OOP healthcare expenditure to macro-fiscal factors, as well as to tax-based, SHI, mixed systems and voluntary PHI financing. Although the relationship between OOP expenditure, macroeconomy, aggregate public and PHI financing is well documented in the existing empirical literature, little is known for the impact of several macro-fiscal drivers and the existing health financing arrangements associated with voluntary PHI on OOP expenditure.Design/methodology/approachThe authors gather panel data by applying three official organizations’ databases. They elaborate static and dynamic panel data methodology to a dataset of 49 European and OECD countries from 2000 to 2015.FindingsThe authors’ findings do not indicate a considerable impact of GDP growth and general government debt as a share of GDP on OOP payments. Unemployment rate presents as a positive driver of OOP payments in all three compulsory national health systems post to the 2008 economic crisis. OOP payments are significantly influenced by countries’ fiscal capacity to increase general government expenditure to GDP in SHI and mixed health systems. Additionally, study findings present that government health financing, irrespective of the different health systems structure characteristics, and OOP healthcare payments follow different directions. Voluntary PHI financing considerably counteracts OOP payments only in tax-based health systems.Practical implicationsIn the backdrop of a new economic crisis associated to the COVID-19 epidemic, health policy planners have to deal with the emerging unprecedented challenges in financing of health systems, especially for these economies that have to face the fiscal capacity constraints owing to the 2008 financial crisis and its severe recession.Originality/valueTo the best of authors’ knowledge, there is no empirical consensus on the effects of macro-fiscal parameters, different compulsory health systems financing associated with the parallel voluntary PHI institution funding on OOP expenditure, for the majority of European and OECD settings.

In this paper, we examine the impact of macroeconomic, as well public and private health insurance financing (PHI) factors on out of pocket (OOP) healthcare expenditures, by using fixed/random effects and dynamic panel data methodology to a dataset of 26 EU and OECD countries for a period lasting from 1995 to 2013. The existing empirical literature has focused on testing the hypothesis that several macroeconomic and health financing determinants have an effect on OOP healthcare expenditures. Nevertheless, the related articles have not well tested the hypothesis concerning the potential impact of PHI financing on OOP spending. We find that public and PHI financing have a significant countervailing effect on OOP spending. Moreover, we show that unemployment rate has a significant positive impact on OOP expenditures. Sensitivity tests with variation of specifications and samples show that our findings are robust. We argue that policy-makers should give serious consideration to PHI institution; our results indicate that there is an inverse effect on OOP spending. We suggest that our examined countries have to provide financial risk protection to their citizens against OOP payments, rather than only attending health budgetary retrenchments in order to adjust public finances.

SMEs, diachronically, have been characterized by scholars, practitioners and administrators as economic drivers, major employers and innovators. The identity of SMEs, along with their characteristics, attributes and competencies, had been considered to be distinctly different from that of their much larger counterparts. Their strengths and limitations, as well as their opportunities and threats, were therefore linked to their size and its natural pros and cons. The twenty-first century, however, combining significant technological and communications advancements with intense globalization and significant sociopolitical changes, has changed the identity and role of SMEs, substantially broadening their opportunities and the challenges they need to overcome. This book, therefore, brings together a collection of scholarly works that present these contemporary issues through different case studies, perspectives, industries and markets, and individually and collectively add to our knowledge and understanding of SMEs in today’s business and socio-economic context, along with the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead.

SMEs, like most organizations across the typological spectrum, have substantially and visibly been affected by the wider (r)evolution that has transformed the business context internationally. The well-established, albeit undefined and unpredictable combination of forces, such as information and communication technologies, sociocultural and political changes, economic crises and rising consumer bargaining powers, have reshaped the very foundations upon which SMEs traditionally grew and competed. And though change in itself has diachronically been a constant in business contexts, its current extent, nature and pace leave few lessons to be learnt from past experience. SMEs, thus, struggle to find their position and role in this new world, and to do so they first need to understand it. This book presents scholarly and executive readers alike with a collection of independent works that are mutually joined by their contribution to our understanding of these changing conditions that ultimately shape the business context of SMEs, providing, along the way, valuable information of both scientific and practicable worth.

This chapter develops insight for the management of businesses, in various sectors of economic activity, that take, or wish to adopt, a proactive or reactive approach to the triple dimensions of sustainability, suggesting itself to support both academics and practitioners in the wide area of business management. More in detail, this book analyzes, from different points of view, how SE and proper relationship management can contribute to achieving corporate sustainability goals by creating value for the business and particularly ethical and environmental values for the entire community.

Stakeholders play a relevant role in sustainable business models’ definitions, but their influence on a company’s strategic choices varies according to different factors. The heterogeneity of business models and the different approaches used to achieve the goal of sustainability, in which social or environmental purposes can prevail, require more in-depth research to identify new solutions that can help to develop business models able to create positive external effects for the environment and society.

Purpose Healthy and safety food issues are more and more becoming the purchasing process core of conscious consumer. “Type 1” wheat flour means higher protein and ash content. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the attributes usually referred to the characteristics of wheat flour known to consumers and at implementing a predictive model of purchasing that allows to make correct decisions without the necessary experience of a real human expert. Design/methodology/approach In order to investigate the research aims of the paper, an online survey was carried out and conducted by means of the Google Forms in the detection time January-April 2016. The online survey collected responses from 467 Italian respondents asked to give feedback about their buying habits of various types of flour. The responses were analyzed through a data mining approach. This paper implements predictive analytics to create a statistical model of future behavior by means of a machine learning algorithms. Findings In line with recent healthy and dynamic trends in the food industry, conscious consumer seems to be willing to pay a price for “type 1” wheat flour that is four times higher than the price related to the basic types of wheat flour. Social implications Consumer seems not to know well the “type 1” wheat flour and its healthy characteristics; then, it should be crucial to implement promotional strategies and marketing hand in hand. Promotion can be a key element in putting across the health benefits of special kinds of wheat flour. Originality/value Highlighting health issues about the “type 1” wheat flour gives insights and sheds some light on the crucial need of changing eating and purchasing behavior. Then, originality of this paper can be found in the used predictive algorithm of the artificial intelligence.

The high level of out of pocket (OOP) payments constitutes a major concern for Greece and several other European and OECD countries as a result of the significant down turning of their public health finances due to the 2008 financial crisis. The basic objective of this study is to provide empirical evidence on the effect of combining social health insurance (SHI) and private health insurance (PHI) on OOP payments. Further, this study examines the catastrophic impact of OOP payments on insured's welfare using the incidence and intensity methodological approach of measuring catastrophic health care expenditures. Conducting a cross-sectional survey in Greece in 2013, we find that the combination of SHI-PHI has a strong negative influence on insured OOP payments for inpatient health care in private hospitals. Furthermore, our results indicate that SHI coverage is not sufficient by itself to manage with this issue. Moreover, we find that poor people present a greater tendency to incur catastrophic OOP expenditures for hospital health care in private providers. Drawing evidence from Greece, a country with huge fiscal problems that has suffered the consequences of the economic crisis more than any other, could be a starting point for policymakers to consider the perspective of SHI-PHI co-operation against OOP payments more seriously.

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships between service evaluation, corporate image, switching barriers, and customers’ intentional loyalty. The proposed model was tested and valuated in the mobile services context. A field survey was conducted using a structured questionnaire about the investigated concepts. To test the proposed hypotheses, a model was constructed and estimated using the method of partial least squares. Findings indicate that service evaluation constructs have both direct and indirect effects, through customer satisfaction and corporate image, on customers’ intentional loyalty. The outcomes suggest that marketers, in their effort to develop more customer-oriented marketing plans, should consider both the pool-in factors, reflecting the value of the provided services, customer satisfaction, and corporate image, and the interactions among them, as well as the push-back factors, as they all impact on customers’ behavioral intentions. The research was limited to on...

Diverse kinds of knowledge are vital for each organization that would successfully compete today in an international scenario. The emergent relevance of knowledge and its management in an even more complex environment opens up the possibility to analyze, investigate and deepen our understanding on different aspects related to several functional areas in business management. Nowadays, firms that create new knowledge and apply it effectively and efficiently will be successful at creating competitive advantages. The choices of the firms in selecting and applying different knowledge process (such as knowledge sourcing, transferring and exploiting) as well as knowledge tools may be crucial. Thus, the role of knowledge as the key source of potential advantage for organizations and indeed whole economies is still a hot debate in the international landscape. This book develops insights for the management of knowledge in cross-functional business areas to originate an innovative approach to the classical Knowledge Management (KM) field. This book provides a fresh perspective on different knowledge related topics in an international landscape, highlighting the key role of knowledge and its management in business activities. Overall, the primary aim of this book is to extend our understandings on how KM can be helpful in several cross-functional management areas, such as strategic management, finance, HRM and innovation as well as in different business circumstances such as M&A, internationalization processes and risk management.

This chapter philosophically identifies a widening of the gap between theory and practice across the spectrum of business research, and highlights the imperative of scholarly works to bridge this gap in a temporally ‘synchronous’ fashion, as opposed to the more ‘cyclical’ one diachronically adopted. The chapter is positioned against an incessantly shape-shifting global business environment, in which mainstream, time-honoured strategies are becoming increasingly irrelevant and incapable of dealing with new realities. It proposes that, while scholars and practitioners appear fully aware of these changes and are decisively geared towards successfully, albeit erratically, adapting to these, they also appear to have missed a critical factor of success underlying this process: namely, the rate of change of the business world measured against the rate of interrelationship between theory and practice. The authors specifically pose that the lack of congruence and the temporal relation of theory and practice in business, which constitute a diachronic inherent weakness of the field, are quietly and elusively becoming the Achilles’ heel of contemporary scholarly business research and, by extension, of business in general. They thus suggest a composed and equalised approach to theorisation of practice and, reversely, a practicability of theory that signifies a potential new approach to scientific works.

The lack of congruence between theory and practice in business remains a widely discussed topic. This lack of synergy is quietly and elusively becoming the Achilles' heel of contemporary scholarly business research and, by extension, of business in general. Focusing on the deviation of means and ends between business theory and practice, this book comprises thirteen chapters, which present an array of theoretical and geographical contexts, and aim to bring scholarly thinking and scientific analysis together with managerial rationale and practical applications. Presenting valuable insights and demonstrating an equalised perception of the theorisation of practice, and reversely, the practicality of theory, this innovative book signifies a new philosophy of scientific work and provides thought-provoking reading for scholars in a range of business sub-disciplines.

This contribution aims to cover a literature gap as to conceptualizing the nexus between sustainable corporate policy and globalization phenomena challenges exemplified by migration. The work is designed as a conceptualized chapter derived from a synthesis of discussed concepts and a case study of migration based on documentary analysis. Based on a review on mainstream literature on a still scattered and ambiguous body of knowledge in the research stream of corporate and/or business diplomacy, the work suggests a synthesis of the two concepts with international curative marketing for sustainable corporate policy. The contribution suggests a distinction between business and corporate diplomacy complemented by multidisciplinary concepts derived from the curative international marketing paradigm and a distinction between legitimacy and reputation-orientated corporate mindset.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of tourists’ perceptions of political and economic instability and risks of terrorism on their intentions to travel to countries associated with various risks. Design/methodology/approach A total of 648 Greek, Israeli and Portuguese students completed a questionnaire focusing on their perceptions concerning factors that shape their travel decisions. Findings The findings showed that among tourists from Greece and Portugal, the experience of economic crisis and the salience of economic and political hardships mitigated their intentions to travel to destinations with similar problems. These factors had no effect on Israelis, who have not experienced such problems in their country. Frequent terrorist incidents diminished the intentions of Greek tourists to travel to destinations marked by terrorism, such as Israel. Thus, different factors affect tourists’ travel-related decisions in each of the three countries. Originality/value The study sheds light on how potential tourists construe the risks of traveling to specific destination countries based on hazards in their home countries, a topic that to date has received little research attention.

This chapter aims to address the characteristics, strengths, and weaknesses of Palestinian formal and informal small businesses, thus linking the theoretical to the practical perspective of these business categories in addition to prescribing the needed policies to foster these businesses. It combines a literature review with a mixed-methods study. A sample of 300 formal and informal small businesses was surveyed; in-depth interviews with representatives from government, private sector, banks, and microfinance institutions were conducted. The results describe a mixed profile of theoretical and ad-hoc practical behaviors, both in terms of strengths and weaknesses and in relation to aspects such as employment, income generation, labor skills, technology affordability, gender, information, market and finance accessibility, expertise, and infrastructure.