The education pillar of the Europe 2020 strategy: a convergence analysis

Empirica - In March 2010, the European Commission launched the Europe 2020 strategy ‘for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth’ in the EU. Education is a major pillar of the Europe...     

Exploring sources and outcomes of trust and commitment to nonprofit organizations: The case of Amnesty International Portugal

The interactions between customers and organizations have been regarded as a core aspect in cocreating and developing new products and practices. The current study explores these interactions in the context of citizens and nonprofit organizations. The study comprises two parts: (a) a qualitative approach using interviews and the analysis of social networks to better understand the organization's social media marketing practices and corresponding outcomes and (b) a quantitative approach to analyze antecedents and outcomes of trust and being committed to participate in a nonprofit organization such as Amnesty International. From the qualitative approach, the findings highlight that Amnesty International uses social media (Facebook) to share information, and citizens tend to consider sharing posts, but they do not express new ideas or interact with the organization. These findings contribute to structure the model analyzed in the second stage of the research. Regarding the qualitative approach, the results show that organizational credibility is the most significant driver of trust followed by communicative ability. Affectively commitment to participation and relationship perception act as outcomes of overall commitment.     

Local tax interaction and endogenous spatial weights based on quality of life

This paper studied the role of municipal quality of life as a driver of strategic tax interactions among local governments. A number of studies point out the existence of strategic interactions using spatial econometric models in which the spatial weights are mostly based on non-economic criteria or basic economic variables such as per capita gross domestic product (GDP). We propose the more sophisticated well-being indicator of municipal quality of life as the driver for these interactions. To deal with the potential endogeneity, we rely on instrumental variable estimators. The empirical analysis focuses on the main local tax in Spain (property) and on municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants, and it confirms the relevance of differentials in quality of life for the understanding of tax choices.     

Financial Instruments and Promotional Banking in the EU are Growing — But is this Justified?

Institutions and the European Investment Bank are at the forefront of EU investment policy. Their role is expanding and it is now a widely-held position that an improvement in the economy will not eliminate the need for their intervention. The proposals for the 2021–2027 MFF launch more financial instruments and present ‘InvestEU’ as a larger more powerful version of the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI). However, promotional banking is often misunderstood and so is the actual size of promotional banking in Europe in which InvestEU will operate.     

Impact of state-dependent oil price on US stock returns using local projections

In this paper, we investigate the impact of oil prices on both aggregate and industry US real stock returns over the period 1973–2017. The empirical analysis contributes to the related literature introducing a state-dependent oil price (high and low) and the local projections approach. Our main finding is that, depending on the nature of the shock and industry, the negative effects of oil price shocks become exacerbated -and the positive effects get moderated- if oil prices are already high.     

The equity impacts of bus rapid transit: A review of the evidence and implications for sustainable transport

The paper offers an analysis of empirical evidence on the equity impacts of operational Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) systems in the Global South. The focus is on vertical equity, i.e. whether BRT systems achieve progressive benefits for poorer segments of the population. Findings from Africa, Asia, and Latin America all suggest that BRT does offer significant benefits to low-income groups, in terms of travel time and cost savings, access enhancement, and safety and health benefits. However benefits are often skewed toward medium-income users and thus less progressive than they might be. Two primary reasons for this are insufficient spatial coverage and inappropriate fare policies. While many features of BRT potentially allow it to deliver pro-poor outcomes, such outcomes only materialize if BRT implementers pay specific and sustained attention to equity. The paper identifies key issues that need to be addressed to steer BRT implementation toward more socially sustainable outcomes—including better integration with other transit, paratransit, and nonmotorized transport services, and with the housing sector.     

Intermediate Inequality and Welfare: The Case of Spain, 1980–81 to 1990–91

The 1990–91 household expenditures distribution in Spain dominates, in the relative ("rightist") Lorenz sense, the 1980–81 distribution, but the latter dominates the former in the absolute ("leftist") Lorenz sense. This situation constitutes a textbook case for intermediate or "centrist" notions of inequality and social welfare. This paper presents the first empirical application of this sort, using the intermediate inequality concept introduced in Del Río and Ruiz-Castillo (2000). The data reveal that there is a decrease in household expenditures inequality for a relatively small set of centrist attitudes.     

The “swing of the pendulum” from public to market support for science and technology: Is the U.S. leading the way?

The structure and financing of science and technology activities are undergoing a slow, but profound, change. This change can be briefly characterized as a shift from relying and supporting public science to a stronger emphasis on “market-based” incentives for science and technology. In this paper we analyze this shift in a historical perspective, discussing both the theoretical explanations and the empirical trends of the ongoing change. While we do not claim to provide a comprehensive and exhaustive identification of the causes of this shift, we argue that it is largely driven by the perception of a shift of the U.S. policy towards market-based, rather than publicly supported, incentives for science and technology. This, in turn—given the strong economic performance of the United States over the 1990s—has influenced policies in most OECD countries, especially in Europe.We conclude by analyzing the evolution of research in U.S. higher education and find two major trends: an increasing diversity in the number of institutions of different types other than universities and a steady and continuous public funding of the leading U.S. universities. This has allowed the construction of an infrastructure now used largely by the private sector, but it also noted that the United States has not compromised public support for core areas or in those fields in which there is a clear perception that market incentives are not sufficient for meeting the strategic targets of the U.S. policy. The implication is that there is a considerable policy diversity in the U.S. practice and that all aspects of this diversity should be considered when using the United States as a reference.     

Alternative Forms of Mixing Banking with Commerce: Evidence from American History

Much of the discussion about banking and commerce in America has failed to make several crucial distinctions and has not accounted for many arrangements that have promoted the mixing of these activities. We investigate the history of banking and commerce in the United States, looking both at bank control of commercial firms and commercial firms' control of banks. We trace how these controls have changed with shifting definitions of "bank" and changing methods of "control." Despite the regulations prohibiting some arrangements that promote financial control, we find evidence of extensive linkages between banking and commerce in the United States. These linkages usually build on devices that are very close substitutes to the arrangements prohibited by law. Altogether, our findings question the often made claim that traditionally banking in the United States has been separated from commerce. Furthermore, given that research on Japan and Germany has shown that the mixing of banking and commerce matters for a variety of issues, our evidence also raises some questions on similar research in the United States which makes the simplifying assumption that these industries are separated.     

Analysing the factors influencing clean technology adoption: a study of the Spanish pulp and paper industry

Technological change has a relevant role to play in the transition towards a sustainable industry. However, slow diffusion of clean technologies can be observed in OECD countries. The analysis of the determinants and barriers to clean technology adoption should be a main goal of economists and social scientists. This paper shows that three sets of interrelated factors prevent but also stimulate the widespread adoption and diffusion of clean technology: these are factors external and internal to the firm, conditions of the potential adopters and characteristics of the environmental technology. These factors are included in the so‐called ‘triangular model’, which is further applied to the analysis of clean technology adoption in the pulp and paper industry in Spain. The empirical study shows that clean technology adoption decisions are the result of an interaction between these factors, often involving contradictory signals for the potential adopter. The paper closes with some public policy recommendations for the effective and efficient promotion of clean technology diffusion. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.