Purpose: With the explosive growth of the Internet, online travel agents (OTAs) have gained an increasing market share in the online booking market. However, OTAs are facing fierce competition from hotels' direct booking channels, as well as competition among themselves. Therefore, there is a need for an understanding of the evolution of the OTA market from a dynamic perspective. The purpose of this study is to investigate the long-term effect of OTAs on the hospitality industry and to find whether an equilibrium of this effect exists in the context of e-commerce.Design/methodology/approach: To gain a better understanding of the OTA market process, a mathematical framework is constructed on the basis of four assumptions. NetLogo 5.1.0 is used to perform a series of numerical simulations.Findings: The results indicate the following: (1) the development of the OTA market helps to improve net social welfare, but hotels (especially economy hotels) have suffered as a result; (2) clever exploitation of both online and offline channels that are based on hotels' historical data may improve hotels' performance; (3) a scale-priority strategy can be more helpful than a profit-priority strategy for enabling OTAs to maintain their long-term competitiveness; (4) the timing of participation in online-channel competition is a crucial factor in determining whether OTAs can achieve business success.Social implications: In this study, it is shown how consumer habits have changed since the development of OTAs. The online channels provided by OTAs create a convenient, low-cost user experience, and they consequently improve the net welfare of customers. OTAs should be encouraged appropriately, although some economy hotels may suffer from the rise of OTAs.Originality/value: In this empirical study, a mathematical framework is developed to describe the process of evolution in the OTA market, and it uses simulations as a means to validate prior research findings. Unlike previous studies, a dynamic perspective is used in this investigation to interpret the emergence of OTAs and to analyze their enormous impact on the hospitality industry. Thus, the findings of this study capture the competitive characteristics of online and offline channels in a network context and indicate potential strategies for the development of OTAs and which hotels may use OTAs to achieve better performance. In addition, the study findings could be easily extended to explain many of the classical economic phenomena regarding firms with intangible products.

Small and medium-sized enterprises play a crucial role in sustaining economic development in both developed economies and developing economies, however, many of them suffer from chronic and structural difficulties in accessing external financing. In this paper, we develop a theoretical framework to illustrate how information structures work in the strategic interactions between banks and firms in a supply chain, and why the transaction information in a supply chain may serve to reduce information asymmetry and improve SMEs’ access to external financing. We find that under incomplete information, the transactions between SMEs and suppliers can serve as signals for banks, which may help banks access the private information of SMEs, thus reducing information asymmetry between them. To maximize profit, banks should dynamically adjust both their interest rate policies and risk management strategies when providing financing services to SMEs, according to the structure of the financial market. The improvement of the external financial environment for SMEs may benefit the entire supply chain, thus facilitating its sustainable development and the growth of SMEs. Our framework sheds light on how SMEs in a supply chain may enhance their survivability and facilitate their development through appropriate strategies to improve business performances and manage credit risks.

Overwork is prevalent in labour-intensive industries, such as the hospitality sector, especially in Asia. This paper explores the dual-squeeze effect of professional life on personal life, which constitutes critical antecedents of overwork. Additionally, it investigates the organizational and individual consequences of overwork. A multi-wave, multi-source field study was conducted to verify a two-stage structural equation model. Results show that all three types of job demands (time demand, work intensity, and emotional labour demand) are positively associated with task performance. Not only do job demands directly affect overwork, but they also promote work–family conflict, which indirectly cause overwork. Further, overwork inhibits helping behaviour and aggravates interpersonal conflicts, which are covert organizational outcomes. The impacts of overwork on family satisfaction vary with marital status and gender. Our findings contribute to the literature of overwork by taking a ternary approach to work–family–leisure and elucidate the concealed consequences for organizations and individuals’ well-being.

China’s ski tourism industry has grown tremendously in the past few years, leading to an increasing amount of tourism-related carbon emissions with negative environmental impacts. Although the government and other market participants are trying to solve the problem from both legislative and technological perspectives, encouraging tourists to engage in low-carbon behavior may play a more important role. This study aims to explore how tourism involvement influences ski tourists’ low-carbon behavior. A sampling survey was conducted to collect 422 valid responses from two ski resorts (indoor and outdoor). Findings from structural equation modeling revealed a significant positive impact of tourism involvement on both low-carbon tourism behavior and low-carbon daily behavior, and this impact can be serially mediated by place attachment and environmental responsibility. In addition, we confirmed that the impact of ski tourism involvement on place attachment is more significant for outdoor ski resorts compared with indoor ones. This study expands the categories of destinations for research on ski tourism and low-carbon behavior. It provides implications for encouraging visitor pro-environmental behavior while corroborating the social value of ski tourism in addressing environmental issues. It also offers insights for government low-carbon campaigns, business management practices, and individuals with actionable attitudes. However, it is worth noting that this study was conducted in a single latitude region and did not conduct a comparative analysis with different locations across latitudes. Future research could investigate skiers in cities of different latitudes to gain a more comprehensive understanding.