Conceptual metaphor theory promotes the view that metaphors are first cognitive, then expressed in language. In this study, an analysis of the conceptual metaphors of four bank executives from Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase, and Morgan Stanley was conducted. Specifically, this investigation looked at how these executives framed their roles in the financial system. Particular attention was placed on how the bank executives delivered their facework public personas) during a period of politically charged and challenging events at two separate hearings: the Congressional Committee on Financial Services Hearing: TARP Accountability: Use of Federal Assistance by the First TARP Recipients held on February 11, 2009 and The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission: First Public Hearing, Day 1 held on January 13, 2010. The research methodology developed was a combination of Lakoff and Johnsons conceptual metaphor analysis, Charteris-Blacks critical metaphor analysis, and Rohrers method of conceptual domain mapping. The resulting research method helped to minimize the subjective nature of conceptual metaphor analysis and provided a systematic approach to metaphor identification to mitigate the risk of researcher bias. An inter-rater reliability study was also incorporated into the methodology. The analysis revealed a system of metaphors that was quite consistent across speakers and across hearings. The identified metaphorical system was a complex interrelationship among four different conceptual metaphors and conceptual keys: ECONOMIC BUILDING, FINANCIAL PROBLEMS ARE NATURAL DISASTERS, TARP IS A TEMPORARY SHELTER, and KNOWING IS SEEING. The metaphorical system proposed implies that bank executives deflected any blame for the 2008–2009 financial crisis through the use of the metaphor of an ACT OF GOD. The findings of this research present a better understanding of linguistic strategies that executives used to position their companies while under public scrutiny. Keywords: conceptual metaphors, critical metaphor analysis, financial crisis, TARP, House Committee on Financial Services, Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, bank executives

My dissertation examines the magnitude of switching costs for bank-dependent borrowers, their relationship to macro-financial variables and their impacts on the effect of monetary policy. I also investigate the implication of bank entry and bank product differentiation on social welfare. The first essay explores the magnitude of bank-dependent borrowers switching costs arising from informational asymmetries and their relationship to macro-financial variables. I estimate the magnitude of borrowers switching costs in the banking sector across a large set of countries. I find switching costs are significant in the banking sector for all 31 countries under investigation and the magnitude of the costs for borrowers is systematically higher in developing countries than in developed countries. My results also show the indicators of informational asymmetries, such as bank penetration and market concentration in the banking sector, have strong impacts on switching costs. These costs are also likely to increase during a debt crisis. The second essay studies the relationship between switching costs for bank-dependent borrowers and the effectiveness of monetary policy through the bank lending channel. I apply the model of Kim, Kliger and Vale 2003) to provide structural estimates of switching costs in the market for bank credit in the United States and show that these costs have an important effect on the environment in which monetary policy is conducted, and that this effect is independent from that of financial constraints of the banking industry itself. Specifically, the higher switching costs, the larger the impact of monetary policy shocks on the real side of the economy. The third essay empirically quantifies the welfare implication of bank entry between 2000 and 2008. A distinctive feature of my framework is to predict the operating decision of single-market and multi-market banks using an equilibrium product type choice model. My estimates suggest firms entering the wrong location in the product space to be the major source of welfare loss. But product differentiation greatly improves social welfare in general. Without differentiation, the loss in consumer surplus is 27%–28% in 2000 and 20%–38% in 2008, and the loss in bank profit is 18–59% between 2000 and 2008.

The number of bank failures has increased dramatically over the last twenty-two years. A common notion in economics is that some banks can become “too big to fail.” Is this still a true statement? What is the relationship, if any, between bank sizes and bank failures? In this thesis, the proposed modeling techniques are applied to real bank failure data from the FDIC. In particular, quarterly data from 1989:Q1 to 2010:Q4 are used in the data analysis, which includes three major parts: (1) pairwise bank failure rate comparisons using the conditional test (Przyborowski and Wilenski, 1940)； (2) development of the empirical recurrence rate (Ho, 2008) and the empirical recurrence rates ratio time series； and (3) the Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average (ARIMA) model selection, validation, and forecasting for the bank failures classified by the total assets.

Past research has offered differing results as to the effects of job motivation and job satisfaction on job performance. Using a correlational research design, this quantitative study examined the relationship among these variables in order to determine the effects of job motivation and job satisfaction on job performance in bank employees. A convenience sample of 70 bank employees participated in the study. Participants completed the demographic questionnaire and three Likert-like questionnaires, the Ray-Lynn Motivation Instrument, the Job Satisfaction Instrument, and the BANKSERV Customer Service Instrument. Collected data was analyzed using both Pearson r and multiple regression techniques. The results of the study showed a positive correlation between job motivation and job performance in bank employees, r (68) ＝ .43, p &lt； .01, and a positive correlation between job satisfaction and job performance in bank employees, r (68) ＝ .29, p &lt； .05. Additionally, the combination of job motivation and job satisfaction was found to significantly predict job performance in bank employees, R2 ＝ .18, F (2, 67) ＝ 7.62, p &lt； .01. Other factors tested did not have a significant relationship to job performance, including gender r (68) ＝ -.28, p ＞ .05, age r (68) ＝ -.01, p ＞ .05, salary r (68) ＝ .26, p ＞ .05, and stress r (68) ＝ -.03, p ＞ .05. These results suggest that by applying managerial strategies to increase job motivation and job satisfaction, job performance can be potentially improved in bank employees. Future research is needed to re-test whether such correlations can be found in other types of business in the interest of finding industry specific variance.

Abstract not available.

In the aftermath of the 2008 Financial Crisis, policymakers have been forced to consider options that strengthen the financial system and safeguard the assets of depositors. However, policymakers have also been charged with promoting economic recovery. Reserve requirements impact both in that raising such requirements would promote stability, but would come at a cost in terms of shrinking the monetary aggregate, specifically M1 and M2. This paper studies the relationship that raising or lowering the reserve requirement has on aggregate lending volume and interest rates faced by borrowers in the marketplace. It concludes that raising the reserve requirement is associated with a significant decrease in aggregate lending volume and a significant increase in market interest rates. These results are useful to policymakers seeking to strike a balance between promoting policies that strengthen the financial system and also promote an expedient economic recovery.

MMFs have been a popular vehicle for both investors and borrowers. However, during the 2008 financial crisis, the Reserve Primary Money Fund was forced to drop their NAV below a dollar. The MMF business was highly stressed with many investors rushing to withdraw their investments. The situation stabilized when the U.S. Treasury stepped in and provided a guarantee to all investors in MMFs that the government would not allow the NAVs to fall below one dollar. After the incident, there has been a wide ranging discussion within the investment community and its government regulators over the appropriate regulation of MMFs. During the recent debate, one topic that has not been extensively discussed is the economic value of the MMF business to the investors and borrowers in the industry. In this dissertation, we estimate the demand for MMF funds by borrowers and the supply of MMFs funds by investors. Using concepts similar to the concept of consumers and producers surplus, we estimate the investors and borrowers surplus from the existence of the MMF business. In the empirical section of the paper, we estimate the supply and demand curves in the MMF business. These estimates then allow us to estimate the investors and borrowers surplus. Some commentators have suggested that recent regulatory changes have resulted in an increased spread between borrowing and lending rates in the MMF business of 0.1 percent. Our model allows us to estimate the economic loss resulting from this regulation. While the fact that the regulation causes economic loss does not mean that it should not be implemented, it is important for regulators to determine if the benefits of the increased regulatory burden and worth the costs incurred.

This dissertation examines how commercial banks and voluntary associations affect employment in residential communities. The first chapter investigates how the presence of certain types of banks affects employment in residential communities. By providing financial resources to businesses, banks are spurring entrepreneurship and creating jobs. But locally-owned and absentee-owned banks differ in both their lending practices and their dependence on the communities where they operate. Moreover, the effect of banks on community employment is contingent what kinds of businesses exist in those communities. Empirical analysis of every community in the contiguous United States from 1994 to 2007 show that locally-owned banks that have at least one branch in another community contribute the most to local employment growth, while the contribution of absentee-owned banks to employment growth depends on the number of businesses with high levels of tangible assets relative to total assets, and the contribution of locally-owned banks that have all their branches in the focal community to employment growth varies with the number of businesses with low levels of tangible assets relative to total assets. Robustness checks validate these findings. The second chapter investigates how different types of voluntary associations affect the ability of communities to spur the creation of new organizations and to support existing businesses. Voluntary associations allow people with common interests to come together in a non-competitive environment. But voluntary associations vary in the extent to which they facilitate demographic diversity in their members social networks and the degree to which their members participate in association activities. Empirical analysis of every community in the contiguous United States from 1994 to 2007 show that professional, political and social advocacy associations contribute to increases in the number of establishments, while business, civic and social, and religious associations, and labor unions either decrease or do not affect the number of establishments in communities. The same pattern of results was found when examining the affect of voluntary associations on foundings of locally-owned banks that have all their branches in the focal community. Moreover, in support of the vital role played by these banks, results show that increased presence of these banks results accentuates the effect of voluntary associations that increase the number of establishments in communities and attenuates the effect of voluntary associations that decrease or have no affect on the number of establishments in communities. Robustness checks validate these findings.

Using the weekly U.S. banks balance sheet from 1975:Q1 to 2010:Q2, this paper shows that the credit shift among banks balance sheet explains the chain of critical events led to the recent bank panic. The finding upgrades the risk management in several ways. Firstly, we found that there was no dramatic change in money supply currency, M1 and M2) in the 2000s. When under such capital supply constraint, banks had to cut off other assets in order to finance more real estate loans. This tradeoff force them to be cautious with mortgage issuance. Secondly, we also found that the shadow banking system was used as a trading platform mainly to share and eliminate idiosyncratic shocks among banks rather than to transfer credit risk from banking to other financial sectors. The ease of trading significantly increased banks asset flexibility, thus further encouraged them to aggressively replace their defensive assets with real estate loans for higher profit. Last but not least, banks failed to recognize the market limitation of the shadow banking system. After banks shifted too much credit to real estate loans, their ability to absorb the systematic shocks is severely compromised. Banks found themselves exposed to the combination of market risk, liquidity risk and credit risk. Since current risk management monitors these risks separately, it failed to signal any warning before such compound impact crashed both the shadow banking system and the global real economy. Keywords: liquidity risk, easy credit, subprime crisis, bank run, defensive asset, shadow bank system, securitization

Financial institutions are increasingly finding difficulty defending against information security risks and threats, as they are often the number one target for information thieves. An effective information security training and awareness program can be a critical component of protecting an organizations information assets. Many financial institutions have invested numerous resources in implementing information security training and awareness programs, but few have explored deeper to examine the effectiveness of these training programs. The purpose of this study was to examine the effectiveness of an information security awareness program within a financial services institution in Western Pennsylvania. Effectiveness of information security training program was determined by transfer of learning, knowledge retention, and the level of trainee satisfaction. Additionally, the study was designed to determine whether the implementation of two different modes of training delivery, Instructor-based Training IBT) and Computer-based Training CBT) led to different results of effectiveness. The study used a quasi-experimental, quantitative approach to measure and analyze the results, which included administering pre- and post-tests within both IBT and CBT groups. The study found that instructor-based trainees had higher levels of transfer of learning and overall trainee satisfaction when compared to their computer-based counterparts. The results of the study showed that computer-based trainees had a higher level of knowledge retention than the instructor-based trainees within the 60-day post-test period. However, there was no statistically significant difference in knowledge retention between either groups within the 90-day post-test period.