Redistribution and regional development under tax competition

This paper considers how capital tax competition affects transfer and development policies in the presence of regional income disparity. In each country, development policies determine the number of rich (poor) regions that (do not) engage in production activities, while transfer policies redistribute income between rich and poor regions. The mix of transfer and development policies is inefficient under tax competition: conditional on the equilibrium tax rate, too much revenue is spent on development policies and too little on transfer policies. This analysis of the expenditure mix implies that development policies are used as a means of regional redistribution even if transfer policies are efficient instruments for this purpose. Moreover, it is shown that the overall level of public expenditure may be too high because of the possibility of over-development.     

“一带一路”沿线地区航空物流与经济协调发展研究

以“一带一路”沿线六大地区38个国家为研究对象,选取2013-2018年的航空物流与经济数据指标,研究了两个系统的耦合协调度与时空分异特性。从耦合协调指数看,38个国家的航空物流与经济趋于协调发展,整体耦合协调度存在东高西低、北高南低的地区分异特点;从空间变化看,38个国家存在空间自相关关联,且各国家空间正相关效应显著,其中,哈萨克斯坦和捷克的航空物流发展水平急需提升。针对这一结果以及未来“一带一路”倡议的发展趋势,提出了“一核心、两助力、三完善”的发展建议。     

Accounting education in Russia today

The West has not perhaps appreciated the role of the command or planned economy on the provision of education. The extent and detail of that involvement is first reviewed in respect to accounting education. The changes which are already under way are described and future trends in which Western academics may participate are outlined. Russia and the rest of the former Soviet Union (FSU) is in the process of changing a well-established, clear structure of education for a less rigid but more idiosyncratic approach. Accountants and accounting educators in other countries should be aware of the history and emerging structures in Russia and the FSU if their involvement is to be worthwhile.     

Measurement of development and regional disparities in Greek periphery: A multivariate approach

The identification of regional disparities and regional growth patterns is an important factor affecting policy formulation. Single indicator, usually GDP-based, approaches have revealed significant shortcomings. In this work we provide a methodology and the respective tools to analyse regional disparities and development patterns. Aiming at capturing the different aspects of development and quality of life our approach is multi-dimensional: we, first, develop a composite index; we, then, apply multivariate clustering for identifying regions with similar socio-economic profiles. The methodology is applied to examine Greek regions. The results do not provide strong evidence for convergence of Greek regions during the period 1995–2007.     

Determinants of total factor productivity in former Soviet Union economies: A stochastic frontier approach

This paper investigates the process of GDP generation in former Soviet Union (FSU) economies to provide an understanding of the impact of technology channels on countries’ efficiency. We apply a stochastic frontier approach to 15 FSU economies over the period 1995–2008 and find that FDI and human capital improve countries’ technical efficiency. Furthermore, we show that these factors also have a positive impact on total factor productivity (TFP), which, in turn, improves real GDP growth. Hence, our results suggest that FSU countries should promote public policies that provide incentives to attract foreign investment and enhance domestic education in order to improve their economic growth. Additionally, our empirical evidence argues against the resource curse hypothesis. We also show, by computing efficiency change and technological change indices at the country level, that FSU economies benefit more from exploiting technological progress than from catching up to the best practice frontier.     

A survey of poverty research in Russia: Does it follow the scientific method?

This paper presents the first critical review of the literature on poverty published in Russia between 1992 and 2006. Using a dataset of about 250 publications in Russian scientific journals we assess whether the poverty research in Russia satisfies the general criteria of a scientific publication and if such studies could provide reliable guidance to the Russian government as it maps out its anti-poverty policies. Our findings indicate that only a small proportion of papers on poverty published in Russia in 1992–2006 follow the universally recognized principles of the scientific method. The utility of policy advice based on such research is questionable. We also suggest certain steps that could, in our view, improve the quality of poverty research in Russia.     

促进长吉图区域经济发展税收优惠政策的有关问题分析

长吉图开发开放先导区作为国家级战略,必将成为新的经济增长而推动我省经济的快速发展。税收作为国家宏观调控的经济杠杆,是促进区域经济快速发展的一项重要的经济政策。随着《增值税暂行条例》的重新修订和《中华人民共和国企业所得税法》的出台,在全国铺开了增值税转型和企业所得税的优惠政策,在一定程度上制约了长吉图战略经济的快速发展。因此,我们税务工作者和税收理论研究人员应充分分析税收优惠政策存在的问题,找到症结所在,提出解决措施,给出具体政策建议。     

Entrepreneurship and regional competitiveness: The role and progression of policy

Regions have gained a position at the forefront of the economic development policy agenda. However, the regional approach to economic strategy remains contested. This paper tests the extent to which regional policy in less competitive regions is accounting for issues relating to entrepreneurship and enterprise development as a tool for improving regional competitiveness. It does so by examining policies undertaken by the UK Labour government 1997–2010, drawing on interviews with policy makers and an analysis of relevant policy documents. This paper finds that entrepreneurship policy at the regional level is multidimensional, with policies broadly ranging from those that are either economically or socially driven. Although there is a considerable policy activity in these areas across less competitive regions, enterprise policy making remains relatively undifferentiated across the regions. There are a number of evolutions in regional policy occurring, especially a shift from policies relating to the facilitation of clusters to those focused on developing regional innovation ecosystems. It is found that regional policy makers are under pressure to measure short-term outputs at the expense of long-term nurturing. The paper also finds that there is a tension between using enterprise policy as a tool for improving regional competitiveness or for addressing economic and social disadvantage.     

Spatially blind trade and fiscal impact policies and their impact on regional economies

The evidence for the US suggests that spatially blind policies often generate greater impacts on regional economic growth and development than policies specifically targeted at regions on regional issues generally. In this presentation, attention will be directed to two sets of national policies that have been promulgated without due consideration of their specific spatial (regional) impacts – trade policy and fiscal policy.Drawing on research conducted for the US, Japan and Brazil, an examination of trade policies will be presented, using the experience of NAFTA in North America and MERCOSUR in Brazil. Some further analysis of experience in Colombia will also provide insights into the role of national trade policy and, in the case of Colombia, fiscal decentralization policies. The second part of the presentation will examine fiscal policy impacts mediated through regional business cycles; the experience of Japan and the US will be examined.The results affirm the important implications that national (spatially blind) policies can have on regional economies; in the case of Brazil, trade policies have exacerbated already wide differentials in per capita income across states.     

Assessment of development regions for financial support allocation with fuzzy decision making: A case of Turkey

European Union is a project focused on the balanced distribution of the prosperity, established by the common market, to all regions. For this purpose, in order to collect comparable statistics, socio-economic zones have been established within the framework of certain criteria using the classification of Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS). These regions are formed in 3 levels, based on the countries that are members and candidates for membership. Supports provided within the framework of the EU in order to reduce regional socio-economic disparities and to ensure regional development are being made and measured on the basis of regions (development zones) established with Level 2 NUTS. As a candidate country to the EU, Turkey also tries to achieve harmonization and regional development through Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance (IPA). In this study, the extent to which the development regions identified in the Turkish scale should benefit from such supports is assessed on the basis of specific criteria. How to distribute IPA support, which is a limited resource, to the regions according to framework agreements and regional development goals is a complex issue. In order to solve this problem, development zones are evaluated using two different Multi Criteria Decision Making methods: Fuzzy-PROMETHEE and Fuzzy-MULTIMOORA. As a result, a framework to provide specific distribution of funds to support regional development and to show the weaknesses of these regions is presented.     

Competitive subsidization in regional development

This paper uses a game-theoretic bidding model to analyze the process in which regional areas attract new companies by offering subsidies. It is shown that this is not a ‘negative-sum game’, and that companies tend to locate in those regions for which they have the greatest value. A constructive methodology for quantifying the value of the firm to a region including both direct and indirect benefits is developed. A non-cooperative equilibrium bidding strategy is developed for competing regions which expands on some of the behavioral conclusions in Hands and Mann (1987). Dependent value estimates by the regions and the region's attitudes toward risk are shown to influence optimal bidding strategies for new companies.     

On the suitability of income inequality measures for regional analysis: Some evidence from simulation analysis and bootstrapping tests

The paper looks at the sensitivity of commonly used income inequality measures to changes in the ranking, size and number of regions into which a country is divided. During the analysis, several test distributions of populations and incomes are compared with a ‘reference’ distribution, characterized by an even distribution of population across regional subdivisions. Random permutation tests are also run to determine whether inequality measures commonly used in regional analysis produce meaningful estimates when applied to regions of different population size. The results show that only the population weighted coefficient of variation (Williamson’s index) and population-weighted Gini coefficient may be considered sufficiently reliable inequality measures, when applied to countries with a small number of regions and with varying population sizes.     

Regional integration: an empirical assessment of Russia

Using a statistical model of commodity trade, we quantify the evolution of regional economic integration within Russia during 1995–1999, and explore potential determinants of this evolution. Our integration measure exhibits rich regional variation that, when aggregated to the national level, fluctuates substantially over time. In accounting for this behavior, we draw in part on theoretical models that emphasize the potential role of openness to international trade and regional disparities in income in threatening economic integration. Controlling for a host of additional regional- and national-level variables, we find a strong negative correspondence between openness to international trade and internal economic integration.     

Regional Heterogeneity in the Private and Social Returns to Human Capital

Abstract

It is thought that policies aimed at encouraging the accumulation of human capital in less productive regions can constitute a key factor in development. However, the effectiveness of this policy depends in large part on each region's capacity to give returns to human capital. The aim of this article is to demonstrate the existence of substantial spatial variations in private and aggregate returns to human capital, indicating that development policies based on stimulating the accumulation of education differ in effectiveness. Results for the Spanish regions suggest that regional variations in social returns are greater than those in private returns.     

Global human development: accounting for its regional disparities

This study’s multilevel statistical models quantify the effects of civilization zones and instrumental factors on the capacities for human agency that a country provides its citizens. These capacities are measured by the UN’s human development index, which synthesizes measures of literacy, longevity, and income. Indicators of political democracy, slavery, national debt, corruption, and internal conflict gauge the instrumental factors. Political freedom and emancipative employment coupled with civil order account for the regional differences in human development scores; civilization zones, heavily indebted poor countries, and corruption influence the variability among countries within the regions.     

Non-cooperative pollution control in an inter-jurisdictional setting

This paper examines various circumstances under which decentralized pollution policies can be efficient both in federal settings and in multi-region settings with labor mobility. We consider a model in which pollution control policies are set by regional governments non-cooperatively and pollution damages are borne by the residents of all regions. We characterize the efficiency of pollution policies, and of population allocation among regions, in a variety of scenarios, including when pollution policies are enacted before interregional transfers are determined by the federal government and before migration occurs; when migration decisions are taken before policy decisions; in the absence of a central government if regional governments can make voluntary interregional transfers; when decisions over pollution control policies are followed by voluntary contributions by regions to a national public good; when regions can commit to matching the abatement efforts of each other; and when regions can commit to specific levels of abatement contingent on the emissions of other regions not exceeding some maximum level.     

Data envelopment analysis and Malmquist indices for measuring group performance

This paper develops measures, based on the Malmquist index, that enable the decision making units’ internal inefficiencies to be distinguished from those associated with their group (or program) characteristics. The applicability of these measures is illustrated with the assessment of bank branches’ performance. The analysis involves the construction of an index reflecting the relative performance of branches in four different regions, which can be decomposed into an index for the comparison of within-group efficiency spread, evaluating internal managerial efficiencies, and an index for the comparison of frontier productivity, reflecting the impact of environmental factors and regional managerial policies on branches’ productivity.     

A multi-level model for studying the context and impact of work–family policies and culture in organizations

The purpose of this paper was to provide an integrative multi-level framework that could help scholars study the impact of work–family policies on individual employees as well as assist practitioners in making informed decisions regarding the adoption, design, implementation, and allowance of these policies. This multi-level model illustrates the various macro- and mesolevel factors that may influence individual perceptions (i.e., equity perceptions, negotiation power, sense of entitlement) regarding work–family policies. By providing such a model, a common language may be developed for researchers from various disciplines studying this issue and better insight into the various linkages that are involved. Additionally, the framework can provide HR practitioners with a deeper understanding of the contextual factors that may influence the effectiveness of work–family policies in their organizations.     

A house price index based on the SPAR method

Within the European Union there has been a push to provide European governments and the European Central Bank with the statistics they need for monitoring the owner-occupied sector. This paper reports on the results of a project to develop a house price index for the Netherlands. From January 2008, Kadaster, the Dutch land registry office, and Statistics Netherlands began jointly publishing house price index numbers for the whole country and for some specific dwelling types and regions. A number of special institutional features of the situation in the Netherlands contributed to the choice of index construction method. The indexes are computed using the Sale Price Appraisal Ratio (SPAR) method, which utilizes the ratios of transaction prices and previous appraisal values. We describe the SPAR method, compare it with repeat sales methods and assess the reliability of the official Dutch appraisal values. Empirical results for January 1995–March 2009 are presented. The SPAR method performs well compared to repeat sales, and the results reported will be of interest to other countries that have, or could instigate, institutional arrangements similar to those in the Netherlands.     

Economic cohesion and development of the European Union's regions and member states - A methodological proposal to measure and identify the degree of regional economic cohesion

The EU cohesion policy seeks to mitigate imbalances between countries and regions and enhance greater economic development of the whole Union. However, notwithstanding its efforts and certain progress on this issue, territorial disparities still represent an open challenge for the European Union, which requires improving the cohesion policy, particularly regarding its measurement, in order to allocate resources more efficiently.This article aims to propose an innovative methodology to measure and identify the degree of cohesion of both EU NUTS-2 regions and member states in economic terms. To this end we first selected the main indicators which would better explain GDP per capita growth by applying factor analysis; and second, we measure the degree of cohesion as the relationship between economic development and its potential attributable to the inequalities detected in the selected set of indicators. To ensure the robustness of this research, we compared the results obtained by applying the Gini, Atkinson, and Theil indexes. Finally, the Economic Cohesion Index (ECI) has been elaborated in order to identify regions that, regardless of their economic development, still present a very low level of cohesion within the group in which it is compared.The main findings indicate that the 27 EU countries are quite cohesive. On the contrary, from the regional perspective, the study shows important imbalances between economic development and its potential that mainly affect the regions of Greece, Spain, and Italy, where Greece is the leading country among less developed regions and Spain and Italy among more developed.