Institutions and economic growth in Portugal: a quantitative exploration

This paper presents a broad diagnostic of the level of institutional development in Portugal in the legal, corporate governance and financial systems. A comparative assessment suggests that Portuguese institutions are less developed than their European Union and East Asian counterparts, more developed than Greek institutions and on a level similar to that of Spanish institutions. We use data for a wide cross-section of countries since 1960 and correlate indicators of institutional development with the long-term average growth rate, identifying issues where reform is likely to significantly affect economic growth. We construct three new indices that measure the potential of institutional reform - the impact of reform on growth, the required reform effort and the efficiency of reform index - by taking into consideration the institutional distance between Portugal and the European Union. These indices measure, respectively, which reforms have the most payoff in terms of growth, which are less costly to undertake and which deliver the most growth per required effort. Our results strongly suggest that in a large number of issues, institutional reform may translate into substantially higher rates of economic growth. Of the ten most promising reforms, six are in the legal area, irrespective of which of the indices is considered. Whereas legal reform is promising at the aggregate and the microeconomic levels, in the financial sector aggregate indicators offer the wider scope for productive reform, while in the corporate governance area it is indices at the micro level that hold the most promise. These results support the view that a comprehensive reform effort is likely to deliver higher rates of growth in Portugal, allowing faster real convergence with the rest of the European Union.Received: January 2003, Accepted: February 2004, JEL Classification: O0, O5, K00, K4, G2, G3This paper is based on Firms, Financial Markets and the Law: Institutions and Economic Growth in Portugal, prepared for the conference Desenvolvimento Económico Português no Espaço Europeu: Determinantes e Políticas, organized by the Banco de Portugal. Financial support by the Banco de Portugal, NOVA FORUM and FUNDAÇÃO Para a Ciência e tecnologia and Polti through feder are gratefully acknowledged. Comments from Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, two anonymous referees and the editor are sincerely appreciated. The usual disclaimer applies.     

衰退产业中企业创新战略选择

衰退产业是一种越来越普遍的产业形态。产业创新是衰退产业中企业的生存选择。衰退产业创新有三种基本战略,即进攻型创新战略、防御型创新战略和模仿与依赖型创新战略。     

Teams, Firms and the Evolution of Profit Seeking Behavior

Even as advances in information theory over the last quarter century have cast increasing doubt on the proposition that firms successfully maximize profits, the objective of profit maximization continues to be an axiomatic feature of the neoclassical theory of the firm. This paper attempts to improve our understanding firms by treating the objective function as an open question. Specifically, an ontogenetic thought experiment is undertaken to address the question of what differentiates production teams from firms by asking why team members would sell their control rights to a principal, thereby transforming the team into a firm. What results is an account of the emergence of the objective of profit seeking. Profit seeking emerges endogenously as a more fit alternative than the objective of value maximization, which is less capable of coping with uncertainty through purposive adaptation.     

企业技术创新网络治理机制研究

企业技术创新网络是在现代技术创新环境中产生的新型创新模式。其目的是在提高企业技术创新能力的同时,使网络中所有成员共同获益。在对企业技术创新网络的组织结构及特征进行论述的基础上,分析了其在运行过程中存在的主要问题,并针对性地给出了企业技术创新网络的一系列组合治理机制。     

论强制性环境治理制度的实施效率

In the eco-environmental governance system,the compul-sive institutions are the most important as well as the mostcommonly utilized.A nation utilizes its administrative,lawand economic power to forbid,boost,bestir and help indi-viduals’behavior concerning environmental governance toensure the realization of eco-environment conservation.The fact,however,turns out to be disappointing about theimpulsive institution’s implementation.Actually,the unsatis-factory practices sometimes even lead to“…     

The tax (dis)advantage of a firm issuing options on its own stock

It is common for firms to issue or purchase options on the firm's own stock. Examples include convertible bonds, warrants, call options as employee compensation, and the sale of put options as part of share repurchase programs. This paper shows that option positions with implicit borrowing—such as put sales and call purchases—are tax-disadvantaged relative to the equivalent synthetic option with explicit borrowing. Conversely, option positions with implicit lending—such as warrants—are tax-advantaged. I also show that firms are better off from a tax perspective issuing bifurcated convertible bonds—bonds plus warrants—rather than an otherwise equivalent standard convertible.     

公司治理结构·会计信息系统·独立审计:结构与效率分析

公司治理结构、会计信息系统和独立审计是微观经济运行系统的三个基本组成单元。三者以委托代理关系为中心形成了功能互补、共生互动的经济运行系统 ,共同维持着受托责任机制运行中的公平与效率。通过对三者的经济关系结构进行理论描述 ,分析其内在关系结构的缺陷以及与虚假会计信息之间的关联性 ,并在此基础上提出共同预防虚假会计信息的治理措施     

集群治理:社会资本价值量提升的手段

社会资本是产业集群中一种重要的经济资源。在现有的社会资本价值模型基础上,从集群治理的角度对社会资本价值量的提升进行了研究,得出集群治理是社会资本价值量得以提升的重要手段的结论。     

公司治理与会计信息质量:一项经验研究

文章以盈余管理程度的反向作为衡量会计信息质量的标志,构建了一个会计信息质量的综合指数,采纳“泊松回归”分析方法,对公司治理的六个层面(包括股权集中度、高层管理当局薪酬、最终控制人性质、高层管理人员数量、高层管理当局持股比例、公司治理中的会议频次等)对会计信息质量的影响进行相应的经验研究。     

银行竞争、专用性人力资本投资激励与国有商业银行的公司治理

本文结合中国银行业竞争日趋激烈的现实背景,从商业银行专用性人力资本投资激励的独特视角入手,分别讨论了银行高层管理者和普通员工的专用性人力资本投资激励与他们参与银行公司治理机制的有关问题.研究发现,在国有商业银行公司治理结构改善过程中,更需要增加专用性人力资本投资的有效激励,并通过积极引入境外战略投资者和加强职工代表在银行监事会中影响力的办法,进一步激励银行员工进行能够提高银行经营绩效的专用性人力资本投资.