Did the City of Columbus Slay a Giant in its Legal Battle with Online Travel Agencies?

Recent research by Turner College management professor Kirk Heriot and colleagues from the College of Charleston and Fresno State University examines the City of Columbus’ lawsuit (in 2006) over uncollected accommodation taxes against online travel agencies, such as Expedia and Orbitz. As a result of the lawsuit, the companies delisted Columbus hotels from their websites, a situation that existed until the lawsuit was settled (after a few years). As Heriot and his colleagues indicate in their 2018 publication in Cornell Hospitality Quarterly, the episode provided for a non-experimental “real life” exploration of the power balance between online travel agencies and municipalities.

That exploration indicates that online travel agencies have less power than is generally assumed, as the City of Columbus emerged victorious in their claim to associated accommodation taxes, while local hoteliers experienced an increase in revenues. According to the authors, an important takeaway from their research is that delisting is not the deterrent that conventional wisdom suggests. That said, another takeaway concerns the expected cost of a lawsuit like that initiated by the City of Columbus. As they advise, any taxing authority should assess the likelihood of a courtroom success before commencing legal action against an online travel agency.

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New Butler Center Report Identifies Employment Gaps in the Columbus Area

Officials in the Turner College's Butler Center for Research and Economic Development recently put the finishing touches on an extensive report on trends in educational programs and occupations in the Columbus area. The report also includes data on business and technology trends. According to Fady Mansour , Director of the Butler Center, there are several key takeaways from the report regarding 10 occupational gaps that currently exist in the Columbus area. First, software development occupation exhibits the biggest labor shortage, with the report adding that the TSYS School has a bachelor's degree program in information technology along with a new AI track for the bachelor's degree in computer science, both of which can qualify students for this occupation. Other educational programs are in demand, such as computer programming and cloud computing. Second, there is a gap of 30 employees per year in general and operations management. This gap could be addressed by the Turn...

ABDC Releases 2025 Journal Review, Now Ranks Journal Edited by Phil Bryant

The long-awaited journal review being conducted by the Australian Business Deans Council (ABDC) has been released and there are a number of news items that relate to faculty in the Turner College. One of these is the ABDC's decision to now include Compensation and Benefits Review in its journal rankings. This is big news for the Turner College as its editor, Phil Bryant , is a professor of management in the Turner College. The ABDC is proposing that the journal enter its system for the first time as a C-rated journal. Acting Turner College Dean Tesa Leonce sits on the journal's editorial board, while Turner College management professor Mark James has guest-edited an issue of the journal. Published by SAGE, Compensation & Benefits Review is the leading journal for senior executives and professionals who design, implement, evaluate and communicate compensation and benefits policies and programs. The journal supports compensation and benefits specialists and academic ex...

TSYS School, Jianhua Yang, Lixin Wang Each among Top Five in the World

New research by computer scientists in the School of Information Technology at Universiti Utara Malaysia that ranks institutions and individuals on the basis of scholarship in the area of stepping-stone attacks heaps praise on the Turner College’s TSYS School of Computer Science and two of its faculty – Jianhua Yang and Lixin Wang . The article, published in the April 2023 issue of the International Journal of Research in Engineering and Science , provides a bibliometric analysis of both publication and citation data from 2000 to September of 2022 related to research on stepping-stone intrusion. Among several results, it reports that Columbus State University ranks second worldwide, trailing only the University of Houston, using total publications on the subject as the basis of comparison. A number of other U.S. institutions appear in the top 10, including third-ranked North Carolina State University, fourth-ranked University of Illinois, sixth-ranked Iowa State U...

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