Derek Jones, the Irma M. and Robert D. Morris Professor of Economics, is the co-author of an article published in the current issue of Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics. “The Determinants of Membership in Cooperative Banks: Common Bond Versus Private Gain” was written with Iiro Jussila of Pellervo Economic Research PTT in Helsinki and Panu Kalmi of Finland’s University of Vaasa.
The article focuses on the authors’ analysis of Finnish cooperative banks and compares two empirical concepts of the membership ratio. They found evidence that monetary incentives are important reasons to join, but also the size of the community from which members are recruited plays a role.
They concluded that “cooperatives that offer interest rates that are more attractive to members have higher member to population rates, and that cooperatives where customer[s] use the services more intensively have higher member to customers rates.” They also found that associational motivations are most apparent for group size, with cooperatives operating in smaller localities having higher member per population ratios.
Earlier this summer, Jones attended the The Beyster Symposium on Employee Ownership in La Jolla, Calif., where he chaired the keynote session on “The Vanishing Corporation and What It Means for Employee Ownership: New Institutions for a New Economy.”
He also served as a discussant for “Causal Effects of Stock Options on Employee Retention: A Regression Discontinuity Approach” by Qing Gong of the University of Pennsylvania.
The annual symposium focuses on the study of broad-based forms of financial participation in capital ownership and capital income, such as broad-based employee stock ownership, equity compensation, profit sharing, gain sharing and worker cooperatives. It brings together more than 120 participants in the Fellowship Program of the School of Management and Labor Relations at Rutgers University. The fellows study these issues at more than 30 universities, colleges and research centers nationwide.
