scholarly journals Reshoring and Plant Closures in Covid-19 Times: Evidence from Italian MNEs

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Enrica Di Stefano ◽  
Giorgia Giovannetti ◽  
Michele Mancini ◽  
Enrico Marvasi ◽  
Giulio Vannelli
Keyword(s):  
Plant Closures

“Scrap-Heap Storiesˮ: Oral Narratives of Labour and Loss in Scottish Mining and Manufacturing

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (2-2018) ◽  
pp. 8-21
Author(s):  
Arthur McIvor
Keyword(s):  
Working Class ◽  
Lived Experience ◽  
Oral History ◽  
Job Loss ◽  
Sense Of Self ◽  
Oral Narratives ◽  
Industrial Work ◽  
Working Lives ◽  
Plant Closures ◽  
The Impact

This article is an attempt to comprehend deindustrialisation and the impact of plant downsizing and closures in Scotland since the 1970s through listening to the voices of workers and reflecting on their ways of telling, whilst making some observations on how an oral history methodology can add to our understanding. It draws upon a rich bounty of oral history projects and collections undertaken in Scotland over recent decades. The lush description and often intense articulated emotion help us as academic “outsidersˮ to better understand how lives were profoundly affected by plant closures, getting us beyond statistical body counts and overly sentimentalised and nostalgic representations of industrial work to more nuanced understandings of the meanings and impacts of job loss. In recalling their lived experience of plant run-downs and closures, narrators are informing and interpreting; projecting a sense of self in the process and drawing meaning from their working lives. My argument here is that we need to listen attentively and learn from those who bore witness and try to make sense of these diverse, different and sometimes contradictory stories. We should take cognisance of silences and transgressing voices as well as dominant, hegemonic narratives if we are to deepen the conversation and understand the complex but profound impacts that deindustrialisation had on traditional working-class communities in Scotland, as well as elsewhere.

scholarly journals Managing Shutdown Decisions in Merchant Commodity and Energy Production: A Social Commerce Perspective

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alessio Trivella ◽  
Selvaprabu Nadarajah ◽  
Stein-Erik Fleten ◽  
Denis Mazieres ◽  
David Pisinger
Keyword(s):  
Energy Production ◽  
Local Community ◽  
Binary Classification ◽  
Problem Definition ◽  
Stochastic Dynamic ◽  
Anticipated Regret ◽  
Social Commerce ◽  
Asset Value ◽  
Plant Closures ◽  
Operating Policies

Problem definition: Merchant commodity and energy production assets operate in markets with volatile prices and exchange rates. Plant closures adversely affect societal entities beyond the specific plant being shut down, such as the parent company and the local community. Motivated by an aluminum producer, we study if mitigating these hard-to-assess broader impacts of a shutdown is financially viable using the plant’s operating flexibility. Academic/practical relevance: Our social commerce perspective toward managing shutdown decisions deviates from the commonly used asset value maximization objective in merchant operations. Identifying operating policies that delay or decrease the likelihood of a shutdown without incurring a significant asset value loss supports socially responsible plant shutdown decisions. Methodology: We formulate a constrained Markov decision process to manage shutdown decisions and limit the probability of future plant closures. We provide theoretical support for approximating this intractable model using unconstrained stochastic dynamic programs with modified shutdown costs and explore two classes of operating policies. Our first policy leverages anticipated regret theory, and the second policy generalizes, using machine learning, production-margin heuristics used in practice. We compute the former and latter policies using a least squares Monte Carlo method and combining this method with binary classification, respectively. Results: Anticipated-regret policies possess desirable asymptotic properties absent in classification-based policies. On instances created using real data, anticipated-regret and classification-based policies outperform practice-based production-margin strategies. Significant reductions in shutdown probability and delays in plant closures are possible while incurring small asset value losses. Managerial implications: A plant’s operating flexibility provides an effective lever to balance the social objective to reduce closures and the financial goal to maximize asset value. Adhering to both objectives requires combining short-term commitments with external stakeholders to avoid shutdown with longer-term internal efforts to reduce the probability of plant closures.

Transitioning economies, plant closures and affected communities: identifying potential pathways to health inequities

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathryn Browne–Yung ◽  
Anna Ziersch ◽  
Sharon Friel ◽  
Toby Freeman ◽  
Fran Baum
Keyword(s):  
Health Inequities ◽  
Plant Closures

The Effects of Mega-Mergers

2021 ◽  
pp. 43-54
Author(s):  
John N. Drobak
Keyword(s):  
Economic Theory ◽  
Price Increases ◽  
Merger Regulation ◽  
Financial Benefits ◽  
Significant Harm ◽  
New Firm ◽  
Plant Closures ◽  
The Government ◽  
Economic Considerations

Chapter 4 shows that a good part of the decrease in competition has resulted from the recent wave of large mergers. Merger regulation, which is based solely on economic considerations, is limited to assessing the potential anticompetitive effects among the competing firms, without any consideration of the size alone of the combined firm or the effects on noncompeting firms. In addition, many mergers are justified by a claim of increased efficiencies in the new firm, which is often the result of layoffs and plant closures. Not only does this cause significant job losses, it also hurts families and communities. Even though economic theory does not take these kinds of externalities into account, they are nonetheless harmful consequences of mergers. Numerous studies have shown that many mergers do not result in lower prices, while some mergers have even led to price increases. In these mergers, workers suffered not for the sake of consumers but for the financial benefits reaped by the shareholders and managers of the merging firms and by the professionals who put the deals together. It also appears that investment advisors encourage mergers just so that they can profit from the transactions, regardless of the degree of benefit provided to consumers (or even shareholders). With little or no benefit to consumers from some mergers and significant harm to labor, the chapter argues that we need to reassess how the government should review mergers.

scholarly journals Auto plant closures, policy responses and labour market outcomes: a comparison of MG Rover in the UK and Mitsubishi in Australia

2008 ◽  
Vol 29 (3) ◽  
pp. 343-355 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathy Armstrong ◽  
David Bailey ◽  
Alex de Ruyter ◽  
Michelle Mahdon ◽  
Holli Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
Market Outcomes ◽  
Policy Responses ◽  
Plant Closures ◽  
Labour Market Outcomes ◽  
The Uk

CHINA THREATENS PLANT CLOSURES

2004 ◽  
Vol 82 (22) ◽  
pp. 9
Author(s):  
JEAN-FRANCOIS TREMBLAY
Keyword(s):  
Plant Closures
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