Renate Schubert

Analyzing and managing risks – on the importance of gender differences in risk attitudes

Purpose –This paper seeks to show optimal strategies for firms to cope with analysis and management of risks. Design/methodology/approach - Empirical and experimental studies on gender differences in risk analysis and risk management are reported and assessed. Findings - Women appear less sensitive to probabilities and more pessimistic towards gains than men. In risk management, women seem to have a comparative advantage with respect to diversification and communication tasks. Research limitations/implications - Empirical testing of the hypothesis that mixed teams of senior managers optimize risk analysis and management is still missing. Deeper insights into the optimal structure of mens and womens cooperation with respect to risk analysis and management are missing. Practical implications - A well established cooperation of men and women at the senior management level appears recommendable for firms which strive for an optimization of their risk analysis and risk management. Furthermore, such cooperation is desirable with respect to a societys perspective. Originality/value - Identification of gender differences in risk analysis and management are pointed. Such differences matter since analysis and management of risk are decisive issues for firms.

Scenario‐Based Risk Assessment of Multi‐Use Chemicals: Application to Solvents

The risk through chemical exposure is commonly characterized by ratios of exposure concentrations and effect levels (risk quotients). For chemicals with many different applications such as solvents, however, in addition to the risk quotients of different exposure situations it is useful to determine the corresponding numbers of exposed individuals, that is, not only the magnitude but also the extent of the risk. To this end, the Scenario-Based Risk Assessment (SceBRA) method has been developed that makes use of a large set of scenarios, each of which describes a typical situation regarding handling a solvent or solvent-containing product. The scenarios cover the life-cycle steps of production, distribution, and use of solvents. For each scenario, SceBRA provides the risk quotient, r, and the number of exposed individuals, N. This study investigated seven solvents that are used in large amounts in Switzerland. For each solvent, characteristic distributions of r and N values were calculated, making it possible to compare different solvents with respect to their risk profile. Graphical representations of the r, N data provide an informative way for analyzing and communicating the results of SceBRA.

What determines the shape of the probability weighting function

When valuing risky prospects, people typically overweight small probabilities and underweight medium and large probabilities, but there is vast heterogeneity in individual behavior. We explore the relationship between person-specific probability weights, estimated from investment decisions in a laboratory experiment, and personal characteristics. We find considerable interaction effects with gender. While women’s probability weighting is strongly and significantly susceptible to mood states, men’s is not. Moreover, we show that cheerful and optimistic people weight probabilities of investment gains more favorably than do pessimistic people. People who calculate expected payoffs are less prone to probability distortions than those who do not use a lottery’s expected value as a decision criterion. None of the factors studied impact subjects’ valuations of monetary outcomes.

Environmental Protection, Energy Policy and Poverty Reduction – Synergies of an Integrated Approach

This paper describes the mechanisms that link poverty reduction with climate and energy policy. First, there is a brief analysis of the relationship between ongoing climate change, energy use and poverty. This analysis is followed by an overview of different policy options that have the potential to fight poverty while simultaneously limiting global warming and environmental degradation. Mitigating climate change, transforming the energy systems in developing countries and financing adaptation to climate change are pointed out as central policy fields governments and developing agencies should focus on. Furthermore, one can argue that new technologies to increase energy efficiency and the dissemination of renewable energy systems have an especially strong impact on poverty. Access to clean and cost-efficient energy has a direct effect on the income generation potentials of the poor. Finally, this paper identifies appropriate financing mechanisms to implement the aforementioned strategies.

Frauen in Führungspositionen - Ist die "gläserne Decke" diskriminierend?

Abstract Häufig endet die berufliche Karriere von Frauen an einer sogenannten “gläsernen Decke”. Bei Männern scheint dies eher nicht der Fall zu sein. Dies ist erstaunlich, da sich heutzutage die Qualität der Berufsausbildung von Frauen und Männern stark ähnelt. Es stellt sich daher die Frage nach Gründen für Existenz und Persistenz der “gläsernen Decke” - und zwar gerade auch für Frauen in Führungspositionen. Ein wesentlicher Grund scheint darin zu liegen, dass Arbeitnehmer aufgrund von Erwartungen über ihre künftige Arbeitsproduktivität eingestellt und in unterschiedliche Positionen gebracht werden. Erwartungen über die Produktivität von Managerinnen sind maßgeblich von Stereotypen über den Durchschnitt der Frauen geprägt und können in den meisten Fällen empirisch nicht untermauert werden. Ein wichtiges derartiges Stereotyp ist etwa die Auffassung, Frauen würden häufiger als Männer und vor allem familienbedingt ihre Arbeitsstelle verlassen. Ein weiteres Stereotyp ist das einer höheren Risikoaversion von Frauen. Beide Stereotype sind insbesondere für Managerinnen nicht haltbar. Eine “gläserne Decke” ist daher als diskriminierend anzusehen.

Discrimination in the Labor Market: A Gender Perspective

The Swiss labor market is characterised by many differences between men’s and women’s situations. These include income, type and rate of participation, positions in hierarchies and so on. In this section, the most remarkable differences will be described.

Emission budget approaches for burden sharing: some thoughts from an environmental economics point of view

In this paper, we examine budget approaches as a device for burden sharing in mitigating climate change. The purpose of this comment is twofold: First, we provide an overview over the general concept of budget approaches and investigate into the role of such approaches within the current climate negotiations. Second, as these approaches have an obvious normative dimension, we discuss some of the issues raised by Schuppert and Seidel (2015) in this Special Issue from the stance of an environmental economist. We highlight that budget approaches may serve as a tool to communicate the urgency of action against climate change and to remind representatives from industrialized countries of their responsibility in the historical sense as well as in terms of ability-to-pay. This even holds when the allocation of national emission shares is based on relatively easy-to-calculate sharing rules that can potentially serve as normative heuristics.

Purchasing Energy-Efficient Appliances – To Incentivise or to Regulate?

Making energy use more sustainable and climate friendly requires a lot of different measures. Stopping the growth of private households’ energy demand is one of them, and increasing the energy efficiency of electric appliances which private households purchase may be helpful in this respect. This paper identifies key reasons which hinder even environmentally friendly private households from buying energy-efficient appliances. If information about the energy efficiency of devices would be more available, better accessible and more credible, a lot could be gained. Therefore, energy labels seem to be important to change private households’ purchasing behaviour. The variety and impacts of different energy labels are studied. Incentivizing labels, indicating financial savings from energy efficient appliances, seem to be a promising instrument. The results from various empirical studies are presented and supplemented by results from an online experiment, conducted with a Swiss retailer for electric appliances. Conditions under which incentivizing labels are preferable to regulation are explored.

Mainstreaming Impact over Time – Who Measures What for Whom?

Within environmental finance, the guiding question of “who measures what for whom” can be examined from different angles. In this paper the authors argue that, provided environmental markets are well-designed, measuring environmental performance is very closely related to measuring financial success for the primary actors on the market. Hence, at the aggregate level, market volume can be used as a highly correlated proxy for environmental success. In a second-order interpretation of the guiding question it is, however, revealed that information-related concerns need to go beyond simple measurement issues. It is argued here that transaction costs in the form of information barriers mainly account for inefficiently low levels of environmental finance. The authors explore this information-finance nexus on a actor-by-actor basis in order to identify the general nature of these barriers. From these general considerations, the authors deduce that a part of these transaction costs could be reduced through enabling actors to scale-up overall investments by pooling small-scale projects. In fact, different actors could assume the role of an Information & Technology Broker. Due to limitations in scope, the authors focus their analysis on two of these actors: the Clean Development Mechanism project developers and energy services companies. As it turns out, while seeking to secure project financing, these actors face information related barriers on the supply side. Commercial finance institutions apparently have difficulties to assess the risks associated with environmental small-scale projects, which is due to the lack of an established credit history as well as a deficit in banking expertise for these markets. To overcome such information related barriers, a case for intervention by governments or development finance institutions definitely exists. In this context, all measures fostering a “risk-reduced learning by doing” seem to be particularly promising.

Rural -Urban Migration On the Allocation of Risks in Developing Countries

In developing countries, for several decades, massive net rural-urban migration has been observed. Such migration can be interpreted as resulting from attempts to realize an optimal allocation of individual risks. However, in fact, the allocation of individual and collective risks is sub-optimal. The identification of main reasons for the failure of rural-urban migration is indispensable for improving welfare in developing countries.