What drives returns to euro area housing? Evidence from a dynamic dividend–discount model

We apply a dynamic dividend–discount model to analyse housing returns for eight euro area countries comprising over 90% of euro area GDP, both individually and as a panel. A vector autoregressive model (VAR) is estimated for four variables – excess return to housing, rents, the real interest rate and real disposable per capita income – using quarterly data over the period 1978–2009. This empirical investigation – which allows for a decomposition of house price movements into movements in rent (cash-flow) and expected return news components – indicates that the bulk of the variability of euro area house price movements can be attributed to movements in fundamentals. There remains nonetheless an important but less sizeable influence of market-wide (or expected-return) variations in house prices. Country-specific estimation indicates considerable heterogeneity around the euro area result, both for what concerns long-term impacts and dynamics. Notably, changes in expected returns play a relatively strong role in the house prices of Ireland and Spain.     

Environmental Finance: Innovating to Save the Planet*

This article demonstrates that it is not only possible, but urgently necessary, to apply principles of finance and economics—efficient use of scarce capital, price transparency, and lowered transaction costs—to environmental issues. From limiting acid rain with the sulfur dioxide‐allowance market to the implementation of the Clean Water Act, market‐based solutions have proven consistently more effective in protecting the environment than government regulation alone. Project financing, public‐private partnerships, and tradable permits have come to supplement or replace conventional command‐and‐control regulation and purely tax‐based instruments. Tradable permit systems have been deployed to phase down use of leaded gasoline, end the use of ozone‐depleting chloro‐fluorocarbons, and even reduce air pollution in the smoggy skies above Los Angeles. And the United Nations Environment Program has launched a Finance Initiative as a formal means of mobilizing the financial sector to take a more active role in protecting the environment. Such an approach can minimize the aggregate costs of achieving environmental targets while providing dynamic incentives for the adoption and diffusion of greener technologies.     

会计变革与经济效率：基于会计思想史的角度

财务会计是确定企业经济效益的工具。在企业外部,通过财务会计提供的企业利润信息,借助资本逐利天性,引导投资者的理性决策,客观上"自发地"实现社会资源的配置效率。在企业内部,经营者通过会计提供的利润信息,决策并引导资源在产品之间的有效率配置和有效率生产。因此,会计就是一个服务于提高经济效率的工具。当一个时期的会计能够满足实现提高经济效率的需要,它就对经济发展起促进作用;反之则会扭曲资源配置,阻碍经济发展。会计确定企业利润的方法,一定要与不同时期经济发展状况相适应,以满足合理引导资源配置、提高经济效率的需要,这是促进会计变革的根本动力。功利性利用会计未尝不可,但如何成功地功利性利用会计,是一个需要继续研究的问题。     

城市“公交优先”发展的模式分析与路径选择——以常州市为例

"公交优先"发展战略是当今世界许多国家实施可持续交通发展的治本之选,从公共管理的意义上更是体现了平民权利的优先.城市"公交优先"发展不仅是技术问题,更是制度问题,其中交织中政府与市场机制、政府与社会、社会各阶层的关系.本文从描述常州市城市公共交通发展的现状和问题出发.分析了城市公共交通产品的公益性和经济性目标,阐述了城市公共交通民营化运作的发展.指出只有通过公共交通的民营化改革.才能解决常州城市交通实施"公交优先"战略中的问题,建立起高效、可持续发展的城市综合交通体系.     

基于企业综合实力及增长率战略模型的实证分析

战略制定是企业管理领域中一个重要的研究热点,近年来许多专家和学者开始关注企业管理与战略目标理论基础。为了提高企业在市场经济下的核心竞争力,使得企业可以拥有更高的综合实力,根据相关理论基础提出基于定量分析的企业综合实力及其增长率模型,将该战略模型所在目标函数的横轴设置为整体实力,纵轴设置为整体实力增长率。按照全面性和可靠性等原则建立企业综合实力指标评价系统,使用SPSS数据分析软件对获得的指标数据进行要素分析,计算出各个待评价企业的最终综合实力评分和综合实力增长率。通过对我国重点行业相关企业数据的分析与研究,验证企业综合实力及增长率战略模型具有实用性和可靠性,可以为企业制定恰当的未来发展战略,为企业管理奠定正确的战略理论基础。     

后靠式移民对收入影响的研究:基于断点回归的估计

基于断点回归对后靠式移民政策的收入效应进行实证研究。研究结果显示移民政策对于涉及群体存在显著的负收入效应,移民使得涉及家庭收入减少超过3000元;相对于从事农业生计家庭超过4000元的收入损失,从事非农业生计策略的家庭具有更高的抗政策波动能力,损失1800元左右远小于农业生计策略;移民对于不同收入水平家庭影响不尽相同,整体上呈现为倒U型。     

New evidence on the impact of financial leverage on beta risk: A time-series approach

The traditional estimation of a project’s cost of capital often requires leverage adjustments to beta. Several researchers have empirically investigated the relationship between the debt/equity ratio (D/E) and beta implied by such leverage adjustments. Typically, this has involved cross-sectional analysis of a sample of U.S. firms in selected industry classifications. The major contribution of the current study is to extend this evidence by investigating the relationship between financial leverage and beta using a time-series approach. This has several advantages over the cross-sectional approach. Our results reveal that while the estimated unlevered beta produced by the time-series approach is quite close to the theoretically implied unlevered beta, the mean difference between the two measures across our sample of 348 U.S. stocks is highly significant. The analysis also reveals that 30–40% of our full sample rejects a theoretical D/E restriction on the time-series model. Moreover, the results suggest that the restriction is much more likely to be rejected for stocks with high debt/equity ratios, which in general have low unlevered betas. Further, there is a considerable cross-sectional variation in the proportion of these rejections across industry groupings. Accordingly, these results suggest that due care needs to be applied when taking the traditional view of delevering beta risk.