Managing Earnings with Intercorporate Investments

Abstract:  We explore to what extent firms deliberately manage their financial reports by exploiting the flexibility of generally accepted accounting principles. Using a sample of Oslo Stock Exchange-listed firms with 20–50% equity holdings in other firms, we find that firms with high financial leverage tend to maximize reported earnings from these investments through their choice between the cost method and the equity method, possibly in an attempt to reduce debt renegotiation costs or to avoid regulatory attention. In contrast, managers do not systematically bias reported earnings to extract private benefits or to signal revised expectations about future cash flows. Firms use different earnings management tools in a consistent way, as the earnings effect of the cost/equity choice is not offset by discretionary accruals.     

Pharmaceutical cost‐sharing systems and savings for healthcare systems from parallel trade

This paper studies the consequences of parallel trade in a two‐country model. It compares a coinsurance scheme (consumers pay a percentage of the drug price) and an indemnity insurance scheme (reimbursement is independent of the drug price) with respect to changes in copayments and public health expenditure. In the destination country, copayments for patients decrease to a larger extent under indemnity insurance, whereas reductions in public health expenditure occur only under coinsurance. In the source country, copayments increase less under coinsurance, whereas health expenditure is reduced more under indemnity insurance. In both countries, total expenditure under parallel trade is lower.     

股改降低了上市公司代理成本吗?——来自中国A股市场的经验证据

以我国A股上市公司为研究样本,以代理成本为研究对象,对股改之于代理成本的影响进行实证分析发现：股改的完成并没有显著地影响代理成本,控股类型仍然是影响代理成本的主要因素,股权分置改革对于企业代理成本的积极影响不能一蹴而就,股改完成后我国还需要在法规、制度、市场以及公司治理结构等方面进行全方位的配套改革。     

Estimating Recreation Preferences Using Hedonic Travel Cost and Random Utility Models

Over the last decade, several authors have questioned thevalidity of the hedonic travel cost model, arguing instead that the random utility model is a superior method forvaluing recreational site attributes. This paper demonstrates that the two methods emanate from a similar utilitytheoretic framework; yet in practice these methods differ in the assumptions made in their application.Constraining the underlying utility functions to be consistent, both models are applied to the valuation ofrecreational site attributes in the Southeastern United States. The way in which each method estimates preferencesfor site attributes is shown to depend critically on the method and the functional form of theunderlying utility function.     

从一个简单博弈探讨中小企业信用体系建设

市场经济是信用经济,诚信是市场经济机制的第一法则。信用缺失已成为我国中小企业面临的一个严重问题,其结果不仅使社会交易成本不断提高,而且在很大程度上抑制了中小企业的健康发展。采用博弈论的分析方法,在信用博弈模型分析的基础上,对中小企业信用缺失的成因进行分析,并提出中小企业信用体系建设的思路。     

我国公共租赁房的租金定价模型

公租房补充和完善了我国保障性住房制度,但如何制定合理的公租房租金标准,才能促进公租房健康可持续发展显得尤为重要。公租房租金制定应遵循一定的原则,即成本回收、差别定价和可持续性原则。     

退耕还林工程成本补助:性质、结构及有效分担

阐明退耕还林工程的成本构成、补助性质和分担情况;对工程成本资金管理和运作责任主体不明确、补助成本结构设置不尽合理、退耕农户成本总体弥补不足的问题突出、地方政府在退耕还林中实际负担过多成本以及补助期偏短、配套基础建设进展缓慢、培育替代产业难度大等退耕还林工程成本补助管理及成本分担问题进行深入剖析;提出退耕还林工程成本有效分担的原则、财政职责在政府间的合理分配、保证退耕还林工程区地方政府正常工程管理工作运转的资金需要、兼顾效率原则和改进成本补助资金方法等创新退耕还林工程成本分担机制,优化政府间财政措施的建议。     

主体功能区生态补偿标准研究

建立合理的生态补偿标准对于区域协调发展具有重要的意义。以主体功能区划为背景,通过分析作为保护型功能区的苏北某县为实现生态系统服务功能所付出的成本,并依据区位熵理论确定成本分担系数,核算外部应承担的生态补偿标准,得出该县2010-2020年应得到的生态补偿金额为52.8亿元。设计了以为实现主体功能区划而产生的生态成本来进行核算的方式,为明确主体功能区划的生态补偿标准带来了便利。     

论养老基金平衡机制--基于辽宁试点模式对养老基金平衡的透视

我国处于转轨中的养老模式面临着人口老龄化和转轨成本的双重压力,为此,2001年7月开始在辽宁省进行社保改革试点。本将以试点模式为研究起点,并将养老基金平衡剖析为两个收支平衡：一是横向平衡,二是纵向平衡。就横向平衡而言,笔认为难关的突破在于强化政府的社会保险责任,而纵向平衡的难关在于基金收益率。为此,本提出一些拓展性的社保改革思路,并认为在此基础之上养老基金的平衡是可以实现的。