Network ties and export propensity of Vietnamese small and medium enterprises

This paper investigates the impacts of different network ties on export propensity of Vietnamese small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the manufacturing sector. Using data from a survey of over 2,600 manufacturing SMEs in 2015, we found that social networks contribute positively to the export propensity of SMEs, while the size of business networks negatively associates with the likelihood of export. However, bank networks and political networks are not significant for the propensity to export of Vietnamese SMEs. We discuss the results in detail and offer recommendations for SME owners, managers and policy makers.     

Do capital flows drive credit growth and consumption in Central and Eastern Europe?

Domestic credit expansion in CEE economies, fuelled in part by foreign capital inflows, helped increase household welfare before the 2008 financial crisis caused a contraction across the region. How strong are the linkages between the current account, domestic credit and consumer spending? This study compiles a quarterly dataset of domestic credit as a share of GDP for 11 CEE European Union members and isolates structural breaks in the series’ growth rates that often align with the 2008 crisis. Vector autoregressive methods, particularly impulse response functions, show that increased current-account deficits lead to increased consumption in six of the 11 countries and increased credit growth in three, and that shocks to credit growth increase consumption in six countries. Capital inflows significantly increase consumption through domestic credit in Slovenia, while the Baltics show a large share of significant effects.     

Price Effects on Compound Commodities

We examine the effect of simultaneous price changes on the total demand for a group of goods, which we call a compound commodity. Specifically, we consider unit and proportional cost components (e.g., taxes, transportation costs) imposed on compound commodities. If the unit cost is positive, then the proportional cost raises the relative price of the more expensive good, and thus induces substitution towards the less expensive good within this group. Then, the substitution effect of the proportional cost for a compound commodity is non‐negative if and only if the compound commodity and the other goods are, on average, not strongly substitutable.     

Road safety determinants in low and middle income countries

The objective of this article is to summarize and review the literature on the determinants of road traffic injuries and fatalities, to identify the relevant research gaps in particular for low and middle income countries. We also present a cross-country analysis of the determinants of road traffic injuries and fatalities that take into account a wide range of potential environmental, economic and social factors. The present study focused on differences based on the level of development. The goal was to identify relevant commonalities that may assist in the creation of road safety policies common to countries at a similar level of development. The countries were divided according to the level of gross national income per capita, and these income-level groups were the primary units of interest. The results presented here focus on the differences by income level.     

锚企业与科技新城共生模式研究:以阿里巴巴和杭州未来科技城为例

以阿里巴巴和杭州未来科技城为例，采用Logistic模型探讨锚企业与科技新城共生模式，结果表明：总体而言，阿里巴巴和未来科技城属于互利共生模式，阿里巴巴成长会促进未来科技城发展，而未来科技城发展也会反哺阿里巴巴的成长。2013-2016年两者共生系数之间的差值不断缩小，表明阿里巴巴和杭州未来科技城的共生模式从偏利共生转向互利共生。     

Is DNA fingerprinting the gold standard for estimation of adoption and impacts of improved lentil varieties?

In the early 1980s, disease susceptibility in short-season lentil landraces began to limit productivity in areas where relay cropping took place in Bangladesh. Since then, several improved high-yielding lentil varieties, which are resistant to rust and blight and suitable in the relay cropping system, have been released jointly by national and international research centers. This study used three methods, namely a panel of experts, a survey of 1000 households where the respondents named the variety they used, and DNA fingerprinting of seed samples collected from all lentil plots cultivated by survey households to estimate adoption. Double hurdle and instrumental variables regression methods were applied to the household survey and DNA fingerprinting data to identify determinants of adoption and measure their impacts. Of particular interest was whether estimates of adoption, determinants of adoption and impacts varied by method of variety identification. Results showed that the expert panel overestimated the adoption of more recent varieties while about 89% of the farmer-reported varieties were accurate, as verified by DNA fingerprinting. DNA fingerprinting appears to have little advantage for estimating the level of adoption in this case, where few varieties of lentils are found, local variety names do not exist, and most seed is obtained through a formal system. However, even under these conditions, determinants of adoption vary by identification method, and use of farmer-reported information on the variety can lead to erroneous conclusions about determinants of adoption. Because recent breeding efforts have focused on taste and cooking considerations, yield impacts were not significantly different from zero.     

Life insurance decisions under recursive utility

In this paper, we generalize recursive utility to include lifetime uncertainty and utility from bequest. The generalization applies to discrete-time as well as continuous-time recursive utility, and it is an important step forward in the development of recursive utility. We formalize the problem of optimal consumption, investment, and life insurance choice under recursive utility, and we state a verification theorem with a generalized Hamilton-Jacobi-Bellman equation. Our generalization of recursive utility allows us to study optimal consumption, investment, and life insurance choice under separation of (market) risk aversion, elasticity of inter-temporal substitution, and elasticity of substitution between bequest and future utility. The separation gives rise to hump-shaped consumption patterns as observed in realized consumption.     

Why Distinguish Between Statistics and Mathematical Statistics–The Case of Swedish Academia

A separation between the academic subjects statistics and mathematical statistics has existed in Sweden almost as long as there have been statistics professors. The same distinction has not been maintained in other countries. Why has it been kept for so long in Sweden, and what consequences may it have had? In May 2015, it was 100 years since Mathematical Statistics was formally established as an academic discipline at a Swedish university where Statistics had existed since the turn of the century. We give an account of the debate in Lund and elsewhere about this division during the first decades after 1900 and present two of its leading personalities. The Lund University astronomer (and mathematical statistician) C. V. L. Charlier was a leading proponent for a position in mathematical statistics at the university. Charlier's adversary in the debate was Pontus Fahlbeck, professor in political science and statistics, who reserved the word statistics for ‘statistics as a social science’. Charlier not only secured the first academic position in Sweden in mathematical statistics for his former PhD student Sven Wicksell but also demonstrated that a mathematical statistician can be influential in matters of state, finance as well as in different natural sciences. Fahlbeck saw mathematical statistics as a set of tools that sometimes could be useful in his brand of statistics. After a summary of the organisational, educational and scientific growth of the statistical sciences in Sweden that has taken place during the last 50 years, we discuss what effects the Charlier–Fahlbeck divergence might have had on this development.     

Advancing environmental productivity: Organizational mindfulness and strategies

This study investigates the importance of mindfulness‐based organization systems and policies on the organization's continuous efforts to become a greener company. The study is devised as a pooled cross‐sectional time series analysis of productivity in energy consumption, water utilization, and waste generation and recycling of U.S. companies. The data set taken from U.S. Newsweek 500 recorded 600 companies dispersed into 63 industries during the period of 2012–2014 and provided 1,498 company–industry–year observations. The study found that systems and policies (e.g., deployment of third‐party auditors for its environmental metrics report; linkage of the remuneration of company's senior executive team with the achievement of environmental performance targets; and establishment of a committee at the Board of Directors' level whose mandate includes sustainability of the company in environment‐ and resource‐related matters) connect the company's mindfulness to its effort in improving the environmental quality through the company's productivity in energy consumption, water utilization, and waste generation and recycling. The relationships are positive and significant. Also, systems and policies serve as a motivator for the firm to continue to improve upon the current achievements. The study emphasizes the importance of translating organizational and individual mindfulness into organization policies and systems in order to motivate the organization to continuously improve its productivity in energy consumption, water utilization, and waste generation and recycling leading to improvements in environmental quality.