财政分权、地方政府行为与地方政府规模——基于区域差异的视角

利用1995~2008年省际面板数据针对中国财政分权对地方政府规模影响的地区差异效应进行计量检验。研究发现,中国财政分权对地方政府规模影响存在地区差异。财政转移支付制度、财政竞争形式、地方政府父爱主义倾向以及地方政府对境外投资资本优惠力度等是造成此现象的主要原因。     

中小企业内部会计控制对策

本文以我国中小企业内部会计控制的相关理论、概述为出发点,对中小企业实施内部会计控制重要性,内部会计控制中存在的问题以及如何改善内部会计控制度提出一些对策.加强企业内部控制,进而有效的提升企业会计控制力度,只要各中小企业重视内部会计控制制度建设,按照有效的内部控制制度不断对其进行约束和评价,分析原因,总结经验,结合自身特点来开展工作,将会计控制切实的放在企业控制中,相信各中小企业会取得更好的成绩,从而为我国的经济建设做出巨大的贡献.     

Regular Price $299; Pre-order Price $199: Price Promotion for a Pre-ordered Product and the Moderating Role of Temporal Orientation

Retailers typically use the strategy of providing a discount to induce the sale of a new product at a pre-order stage. Despite the prevalence of this strategy, providing discounts might not be effective for all consumers. The present research shows that the positive effect of a discount depends on consumer temporal orientation. Results from four experimental studies reveal that a large discount positively affects present-oriented, but not future-oriented, consumers. The findings suggest that perceived financial risk and perceived product quality sequentially mediate the effect of discount size on value toward the deal and purchase intention. A third-party product quality rating boosts quality perceptions, which in turn reduces perceived financial risk and positively enhances value toward the deal along with purchase intention. Our findings demonstrate that when the brand itself acts as a reliable signal of quality, a discount has its intended effect for both present- and future-oriented consumers. Overall, the findings of this research suggest that a retailer can use quality cues along with a discount, especially for a new brand, to appeal to the broadest group, as it will attract both future- and present-oriented consumers.     

When nutritional guidelines and life collide: family fruit and vegetable socialisation practices in low socioeconomic communities

Abstract

Parents play a critical role in promoting fruit and vegetable consumption, for eating patterns established early in life tend to persist into adulthood. Despite this, the factors that facilitate or inhibit parents’ capacity to socialise fruit and vegetable consumption into their children’s daily diets remain poorly defined. Thirty-eight semi-structured interviews with residents, allied healthcare professionals, community leaders, community programme leaders and a local government leader living or working in two low socioeconomic suburbs were consequently conducted to ascertain factors exogenous and endogenous to the family unit that shaped parental food socialisation practices. Budgetary and time constraints emerged as exogenous factors that constrained fruit and vegetable socialisation. Constraining effects were also found for a range of endogenous factors, including commensal experiences, children’s food fussiness and the feeding styles employed by parents. As such, while many caregivers may wish to socialise fruit and vegetable consumption into their children’s daily diets, their capacity to do so is often inhibited by factors beyond their volitional control. Failure to take heed of these factors could therefore result in the development of social marketing campaigns that are ineffective at best or give rise to unintentionally harmful outcomes at worst.     

企业规模对职工工资的影响:来自中国竞争性劳动力市场的证据

本文使用在浙江省收集的企业一职工配对数据研究了国际学术界困惑已久的企业规模对工资的溢价谜题。我们发现,当控制了企业所处的地区、行业和职工的人力资本后,企业的技术效率可以完全解释企业规模对职工工资的正向作用。大企业提供高工资,主要是由于它们拥有高素质的职工和较高的技术效率。与国际上使用发达国家数据的同类文献相比,本文所使用数据的独特性在于两个方面:一是企业与职工的配对,便于控制个人和企业层面的特征;二是在制造业方面,中国的劳动力市场更接近于一个竞争性市场,因而更容易识别企业规模对工资的影响。     

Reassessing Firm Size in International Marketing Research

This study investigates the relevance and importance of firm size as a current research variable in international marketing while being cognizant of the reasons behind previous researcher's focus on firm size. Utilizing two different databases and analyses, this study integrates existing research on the effects of firm size variables on decisions in international marketing and draws a general conclusion. The main research questions center on whether firm size matters in internationalization decisions and whether firm size is a meaningful proxy for specific firm resources. Our results suggest that the effect of size on internationalization becomes less significant over time and that the effect of firm size on choice of ownership is significantly less than that of other firm-specific variables such as R&D intensity and advertising intensity, suggesting that strategic international marketing decisions are more related to a firm's unique assets than to its size.     

Efficiency characteristics of a market for state contingent claims

This paper concludes that a market for state-contingent claims (UK horserace betting) displays evidence of pervasive but heterogeneous forms of inefficiency, in significant contrast to earlier investigations. Using hitherto unavailable data, comparison of notional returns implicit in parallel sets of bookmaker and parimutuel odds identifies inefficiency in terms of zones of distinct but contrasting forms of cross-;market returns differential. The inefficiency is rationalized in terms of both buyer and supplier behaviour; its durability is explained in terms of limited arbitrage opportunities.     

Analysis of Korean millennials’ travel expenditure patterns: an almost ideal demand system approach

ABSTRACT

Generational cohorts can differ in their consumption patterns and preferred travel behavior. As the millennial generation represents an important economic force and influences new consumption trends, this study utilizes nationwide data and almost ideal demand system (AIDS) approach to examine expenditure patterns of Korean travelers during holidays. In this process, the joint effects of travel-related characteristics are also examined. The results of the AIDS estimation on data from 871 domestic travelers reveal significantly different travel expenditure patterns for cohorts. The findings contribute to furthering the understanding of how different generational cohorts allocate their travel budgets to respective travel expenditure categories.     

Airport stops and flights on small airplanes as inhibitors of tourism-related air travel: A case study

This article discusses the extent to which prospective tourists' concerns about airport stops and flights on small airplanes inhibit air travel to tourist destinations, drawing on data from telephone surveys conducted in the Dallas–Fort Worth, Texas area. Respondents were queried about the extent to which one airport stop, two airport stops, and one airport stop followed by a flight on a small, propeller-powered airplane, respectively, would deter them from flying to a destination 1096 miles (1764 km) away. Findings suggest that marketers of similar destinations in similarly distant markets that are accessible by air only after two airport stops risk having their promotional appeals ignored by roughly half those who would prefer to reach such destinations by air. Moreover, those most concerned about such flight schedules were more likely than other respondents to have high incomes and to use the Internet to obtain vacation or travel information.     

Do family farms really converge to a uniform size? The role of unobserved farm efficiency*

We analyse the growth of family farms in Israeli cooperative villages during a period of economic turmoil. We use instrumental variables to account for the endogeneity of initial farm size, and correct for selectivity as a result of farm survival. We also include a technical efficiency index, derived from the estimation of a stochastic frontier production model, as an explanatory variable. Our aim is to check whether ignoring efficiency could have been the reason for convergence results obtained elsewhere in the literature. We found that technical efficiency is an important determinant of farm growth, and that not controlling for technical efficiency could seriously bias the results. In particular, larger farms are found to grow faster over time, while without controlling for technical efficiency the farm growth process seemed to be independent of initial farm size. The increasing polarisation of farm sizes in Israel has ramifications for the inefficiencies induced by the historical quota system, for the political power of the farm sector and for the social stability of farm communities.