Growth via Intellectual Property Rights Versus Gendered Inequity in Emerging Economies: An Ethical Dilemma for International Business

In this paper, we critique the emergent international normative framework of growth – the knowledge economy. We point out that the standardized character of knowledge economy’s flagship – intellectual property rights (IPRs) – has an adverse impact on women in emerging economies, such as India. Conversely, this impact on women, a significant consumer segment, has a feedback effect in terms of market growth. Conceptually, we analyze the consequences of knowledge economy and standardized IPR through a feminist lens. We extend the analyses by pointing to various contradictions surrounding growth norms; for example, there are inherent contradictions between established “formal” legalistic interpretation of IPR, “soft law” norms of corporate social responsibility, a fluid situation of moral claims of human rights, and different institutional capabilities at the international and domestic level. Consequently, we are able to demonstrate how standard IPR laws fail to deliver equity for all. We argue our case through exploring the growth aspects of the agricultural sector in India and the adverse impact of standard biopatenting on women farmers’ rights (as producers and consumers) and preservation of environment. We suggest that desired gendered equity is better achieved when there is a constellation of actors – private-sector business, the state, and civil-society leaders – working together to ensure a balanced development through tailoring of IPR to local needs.     

Existence of Unsolicited Ratings

Rating agencies provide unsolicited ratings voluntarily without the borrowers’ consent. Therefore, the agencies do not get paid for this service. While, supporters of unsolicited ratings argue that voluntary disclosure is done to build reputation, those opposing this practice argue that this leads to financial blackmail. In this paper, we build a model that addresses these issues. We identify the scenarios where rating agencies will provide unsolicited ratings. Finally, we find the welfare effect of unsolicited ratings and suggest policy implications.      

Economic and environmental impacts of trade liberalization: The case of Indonesia

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the environmental impacts of trade liberalization. This paper provides further discourse in this area with a study on Indonesia and its trade agreements with Japan (IJEPA) and ASEAN (AFTA). A static global CGE model, known as the Global Trade Analysis Project, was used to project the Indonesian economy to the year 2022, with and without tariff reforms agreed under the agreements. Environmental impacts are assessed using different pollution indicators—air, water and waste. The study suggests that Indonesia would grow rapidly over the period considered with a large deterioration in its environment. Following these, however, the agreements only have a marginal positive impact on Indonesia's output but with a noticeable increase in trade flows and signs of trade diversion. Overall AFTA has a greater impact on the Indonesian economy compared to IJEPA. Similarly, the impact of trade liberalization on the environment is marginal. On the whole, tariff reform is inducing air pollution and reducing water pollution. In conclusion, the study suggests that Indonesia's participation in the AFTA and IJEPA agreements is not likely to bring drastic changes to her economic and environmental performance.     

On estimating the reliability after sequentially estimating the mean: The exponential case

Sequential estimation problems for the mean parameter of an exponential distribution has received much attention over the years. Purely sequential and accelerated sequential estimators and their asymptotic second-order characteristics have been laid out in the existing literature, both for minimum risk point as well as bounded length confidence interval estimation of the mean parameter. Having obtained a data set from such sequentially designed experiments, the paper investigates estimation problems for the associatedreliability function. Second-order approximations are provided for the bias and mean squared error of the proposed estimator of the reliability function, first under a general setup. An ad hoc bias-corrected version is also introduced. Then, the proposed estimator is investigated further under some specific sequential sampling strategies, already available in the literature. In the end, simulation results are presented for comparing the proposed estimators of the reliability function for moderate sample sizes and various sequential sampling strategies.     

Economic liberalization and welfare in a model with an informal sector

The paper reexamines the conventional results relating to inflow of foreign capital, removal of protectionism and structural reform programmes, in a small open economy in terms of a two-sector general equilibrium model with an informal sector. The paper shows that in the presence of labour market distortion and a protectionist policy, inflow of foreign capital may be desirable irrespective of the pattern of trade of the economy due to its favourable impact on welfare. But the welfare implications of tariff reductions and/or structural adjustment programmes, such as deregulating the formal sector labour market, depend crucially on the economy's trade pattern. The paper provides an answer to the question as to whether in a developing economy labour market reform and tariff reform should go hand-in-hand or whether one should precede the other for welfare improvement.
JEL classification: F10, F13, F21, O17.     

Remarks on sequential estimation of a linear function of two means: The normal case

Asymptotic normality of the stopping time ofMukhopadhyay [1976] relating to the point estimation problem is proved. Also moderate sample size behaviour of this stopping time has been studied by Monte-Carlo methods.     

An optimum sampling design to base HT-method of estimating a finite population total

The problem of constructing a sampling design with the value of the sum of second order inclusion probabilities attaining its lower bound for non-integral values of the expected effective size of a sample in the design has been considered in this paper. If the values of the characteristic of interest on all the units in the population are non-negative the design is admissible (in the sense of variance) with respect to Horvitz-Thompson estimator in the class of designs with the same set of values of the first order inclusion probabilities of the units. Again such a design is best to use Horvitz-Thompson estimator of population total in the sense of smallest average variance of the estimator under a special superpopulatio model.     

Univariate Time-Series Analysis of Public Debt

Journal of Quantitative Economics - This paper presents a method whereby the properties of the undiscounted debt/GDP time-series for a country can be directly assessed in terms of components of...     

Impact of Regional Economic Integration in East Asia

The current study evaluates the economy wide impact of trade liberalization in the ASEAN region along with China, Japan and Korea (ASEAN + 3) by the year 2020 using the GTAP framework. The study also assesses the environmental impact of the trade liberalization in the region focusing on the seven environmental indicators (CO₂, CH₄, N₂O, BOD, COD, Suspended Solid and Industrial Waste). The result shows that the countries under agreement (ASEAN + 3) will benefit with increased output, expansion of trade and welfare due to trade reforms. Further, the integration will increase the global welfare, although the regions not under agreement in the world will show a decline in output growth. Vietnam will be gaining with the highest output growth among the ASEAN region; however, the impact on the environment would not be favourable. The environmental impact reveals a mixed outcome for participating countries under the agreement. The paper provides useful insight in pursuing greater trade liberalization among the countries under the study.     

International market selection and subsidiary performance: A neural network approach

How should multinational enterprises (MNEs) select international markets? We develop a model of international market selection that adds firm-specific advantages and transaction cost considerations to previously explored target market factors based on Dunning's Eclectic Framework. Results obtained using neural network (NN) analysis indicates that our model has strong predictive power in explaining international market selection. Further tests show that firms selecting international markets predicted by the model reported significantly higher subsidiary performance relative to firms whose investments were not predicted by the model. Our results provide strong initial evidence that a firm-level strategic approach to international market selection facilitates MNE success.