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Business & Economics, Database Highlights & Trials, Services

Featured Librarian: Marianne Hageman

Welcome to new series here on the blog: the Featured Librarian!Marianne

We figured it would be fun for everyone to know who we are and, along the way, learn a bit about what we love about the place we work.  First up is Marianne Hageman, a business librarian who works mainly on the St Paul campus.

Here are some answers she gave in a recent interview:

  1. What departments are you a liaison for?
    I’m a liaison librarian for business, specializing in (but not limited to) marketing resources. I’m also liaison for the advertising and PR side of COJO.
  2. What resource – in your topic area – do you think is the coolest?
    That’s hard, since we have so many cool resources. But I’ll give a huzzah to MRI+ Mediamark Reporter, the demographics database.
  3. What’s one cool thing that resource can do?
    MRI+ can give you information on who buys what, and then ties that to different characteristics, including what magazines people read and the kinds of television programs they watch. There’s a separate section for teen data, and it’s pretty cool (or creepy, depending on how you look at it) to see what teens like to eat for breakfast.
  4. Who is your favorite author?
    I can’t limit it to just one! A favorite author from childhood is Lucy Maud Montgomery, author of the “Anne of Green Gables” books and so much more. She’s a great comfort read. A favorite British author, recently deceased, is Diana Wynne Jones, who wrote “Howl’s Moving Castle” (made into a film by Hayao Miyazaki (it’s a great film, but the book is better.) A favorite Minnesota author is Lois McMaster Bujold; I’m working on reading all of her books this year. If you ask me tomorrow, I might have a different list.

Marianne can be contacted for research assistance or classroom sessions by email, or by phone at (651) 962-5404.  See more information about her, and schedule a research consultation, on the library website.

Business & Economics, News & Events, Political Science

Happy 100th Birthday Mr. Taxman

With April 15th rapidly approaching I was wondering when and how the U.S. Federal Income Tax came into being. Well it turns out that the 16th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the one authorizing the Federal Government to levy taxes, was ratified in 1913. Here’s the text:

Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever sources  derived, without apportionment among the several states, and without regard to any census or enumeration” 

Prior to this amendment’s passage the Federal Government had levied taxes (ex. the Lincoln Administration during the Civil War) but it was the 16th that laid the foundation for the tax code we all know and love. If you would like to learn more about this topic just follow this link to the Library of Congress’ History of U.S. Income Tax guide. If you’d like to see what the 1913 Form 1040 looked like just click here.  

 

Business & Economics, Database Highlights & Trials

Renaming Frenzy

Hello Business Researchers!

Welcome to Fall Semester 2012! As we all gear up for a great semester, are you looking for a database you’ve used before, but can’t find it?

Have no fear; you’re not going crazy! Our vendors just had a bit of a renaming frenzy this summer. Here are the changes:

You can find these, along with all of our wonderful business databases, in both our A-Z List of Databases and our list of Databases by Subject.

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Recognize these faces?  We UST Business Librarians have been busy all summer making sure we’re all set to provide you the best service we can this fall.

We hope to use this blog to help share news and information that will be of interest to you.

Do you have any questions you’d like answered? An idea for a blog post?  Anything fun to say about how awesome the UST librarians are?  For any of those – and more! – please feel free to contact any business librarian or consult the faculty resource guide on the UST Libraries website.

 

Business & Economics, Database Highlights & Trials, News & Events

Emerald Management is the new Dr. Frankenstein

It’s alive!  IT’S ALIIIIIIIIIVE!!!!  Emerald Management sent me an email today that reads,

Emerald Business and Management content is supported with a range of FREE videos and podcasts that bring to life the topics from Emerald’s peer-reviewed journals.

So the whole “bring to life” thing got me thinking about that sweet scene in the original Frankenstein where the good doctor goes all nutso. (As an aside I just want to say how much I enjoy the acting in old movies.  So subtle.  So nuanced).   And just because everything about this movie is HILARIOUS, I give you that same scene in Young Frankenstein.

I may have wandered slightly off-topic, but my point is Emerald Management is a collection of peer-reviewed management and business journals.  They’ve now supplemented their collection with free videos and podcasts to animate what’s being written about.  So if you like your management articles acted out, you might want to check out this new free resource.

Business & Economics, Database Highlights & Trials

Happy Valentine’s with Euromonitor Passport!

Welcome to Spring Semester, business researchers!

We’re less than one week away from Valentine’s Day, and I thought it was a good time to share some interesting Valentine’s-themed nuggets of note our vendor has shared with us that will (hopefully) help you to fall in love with one of our favorite market research databases: Euromonitor Passport GMID!

First, the Dashboards in Euromonitor Passport GMID reveal that the US is the largest market in the world for chocolate confectionery.  Good news for chocolate lovers, but growth in this market has declined since 2009.

 

Secondly, Mars is the dominant player in the confectionery market after overtaking The Hershey Company in 2008 (I’m excited to see Lindt and Ferrero on this list, personally).

And finally, if jewelry is more your style this Valentine’s Day, new data available for Passport Industrial reveals that Tiffany’s is the largest producer of jewelry in the US.

Continue Reading

Business & Economics, Libraries, News & Events, Uncategorized

It’s baaaack: The PNC Christmas Price Index!

CPI

Did you know?  Each holiday season, your favorite UST business librarians anxiously await the release of one of our favorite traditions:the PNC “Christmas Price Index!”

The PNC CPI tracks how much it would cost to buy each of the 78 gifts in “The Twelve Days of Christmas.”  PNC has been doing this every year since 1984, so they really know their stuff.   For those of you who aren’t some of my amazing Finance students, this CPI is a play on the “Consumer Price Index,” which tracks the changes in price of goods and services like housing, clothing, food, and transportation that reflect American consumers’ spending habits.

PNC makes a fun website every year depicting their CPI and allowing us to discover the costs of each individual gift; this year we get to hop aboard the “Index Express” railway.  As we travel through “Fluctuation Farm,” “Inflation Station,” “Index Falls,” and “Percentage Peak” to hear how the golden rings, partridges in pear trees, ladies dancing, and more are faring in the markets.

CPI Express

And the results? The 2011 CPI increased by 3.5% over last year – to (drummers drumming please):

$24,263.18

The largest increases were for the poultry this year: the Two Turtle Doves (25%) the Partridge in the Pear Tree (14.2%), the Swans-a-Swimming (12.5%), and Geese-a-Laying (8%).  The Four Calling Birds were left out of this trend, with a 13.3% decrease. Four French Hens remained constant at $150, as did the price of Ladies Dancing ($6,294.03) and Lords-a-Leaping ($4766.70), although the dancers did get a large salary increase last year.  And, as some of you who follow the markets might predict, the cost of everyone’s perennial favorite, Five Golden Rings, is at $645 – a decrease of 0.8% from last year.

cpigraphic

If you do a Summon search on the Twelve Days of Christmas, there are nearly 73,000 items – which is an increase of over 325% from last year!  Included are thousands of books, videos, music, and more to help get you in a holiday spirit (and perhaps help you out of finals doldrums?) from some our favorite authors and artists.  Check them out!

Happy Holidays!

Business & Economics, New Materials

New Books!

Business librarians have been busily buying new books!

That’s certainly a tongue-twister, if I ever heard one.  The results are some great brain gymnastics, as well.

Here are a few recent arrivals:

Book Cover

The Accountant’s Guide to the Universe: Heaven and Hell by the Numbers

Dilbert meets Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy in this hilariously quirky book  about God “outsourcing Heaven and Hell” to an accounting firm.  A quick and fun read –  by the end, you’ll be amazed how much you’ve learned about finance and accounting.

Fixing the Game : Bubbles, Crashes, and what Capitalism can Learn from the NFL

What better way to learn than combining your favorite Sunday afternoon activity with your study of corporate management?  Author Roger Martin discusses how and what corporate leaders can learn from the NFL’s success, including everything from finance to customer loyalty.

Brand Champions: How Superheroes Bring Brands to Life

This is chock-full of great case studies showcasing the individuals within organizations who nurture and sustain brands, bringing them to lifethrough their everyday, superhero performances.

World 3.0 : Global Prosperity and How to Achieve It

“In World 3.0, Pankaj Ghemawat provides a fresh look at cross-border integration and its implications. He demonstrates why integration and regulation must be seen as complementary. And he offers great recommendations that should inspire all stakeholders in times of major global challenges. A must-read.”
–Pascal Lamy, Director-General of the World Trade Organization (WTO).

Interested in seeing more?  A list of this month’s newest business books is always available on the library homepage, or you can subscribe to it as an RSS feed.

Purchase recommendations are always welcome, as well – simply fill out this form!

Business & Economics, Database Highlights & Trials

TRIAL – Three Additional Collections in Emerald Management 175

The UST libraries have subscribed to Emerald Management 175 for over five years because of the access it provides to scholarly full text management and international management journal articles. Now for a limited time UST is putting on trial other collections in Emerald previously unavailable in our current subscription.

To search the additional collections, go to the main Emerald search page and conduct a keyword search.  From the results you may choose to look at all of the results or limit the hits within an individual collections.

emerald2

Emerald’s Business, Management and Economics eBook Series Collection
This collection contains over 400 volumes across multiple business and economic topics such as Management Science, Business Strategy and Organization Studies with new titles added regularly. The interface allows users to search through entire books or books on the chapter level. Many books and chapters are written from authors world-wide to ensure a global perspective.

Emerald Social Sciences eBook Series Collection
The Emerald Social Sciences eBook Series Collection extends the current Emerald business portfolio with high-profile international authorship and high quality cross-disciplinary research with over 240 volumes from over 35 book series titles in the fields of politics, psychology, sociology, health care and education.

Emerging Markets Case Studies Collection
Emerald Emerging Markets Case Studies is a new online collection of peer-reviewed case studies focusing on business decision making and management development throughout key global emerging markets written by case writers working in developing economies that offer local perspectives.

The trials end 11/5/11. Please get any comments or questions to Andrea Koeppe at arhudson@stthomas.edu.

Business & Economics, Database Highlights & Trials

TRIAL – AdData Reference

addatareference

Attention marketing researchers! Our trial for AdData Reference is live starting today.

AdData Reference provides facts, figures and insights into the 10,000+ leading brand advertisers in the U.S. It details each brand’s ad spending for the past 5 years, identifies target markets, relationships to parent companies, the brand’s different ad agencies, plus full contact information for key personnel. To log in, use your St Thomas email address to create an account.

Trial ends Oct. 31

Please send comments to Laura Hansen