Can Direct Payments Facilitate Agricultural Commercialisation: Evidence from a Transition Country

We investigate the impact of direct payments on agricultural commercialisation in Kosovo. Kosovo is one of the poorest countries in Europe but, with European assistance, provides substantial funds to support agriculture, made up of many small and often semi‐subsistence farms. Thus, the effect of this support is a central policy issue. Identifying the effect of direct payments on market participation faces endogeneity issues arising from the possible simultaneous determination of participation in support programmes and market participation. In order to achieve proper identification of the endogenous direct payments, we use a strategy of targeted identification search that employs several different methodological approaches. We find that direct payments for fruit and vegetables, and those for cereals and oilseeds have a positive effect on market participation. However, we cannot identify any definite effect of livestock payments.     

Are people in the SADC region willing to pay more tax to fund public healthcare?

ABSTRACT

For Africa to develop and achieve sustainable development, African governments have to prioritise spending on public health. However, the current spending data shows that health spending is a continuing struggle for African countries. Many researchers have the view that African governments have to collect more tax to spend enough on public healthcare. The question here is what extent people are willing to pay more tax to increase spending on public healthcare? Employing a multilevel regression model on Afrobarometer survey data, this paper examined to what extent individual and country level factors influence people’s willingness to pay more tax to increase spending on public healthcare in 12 Southern African Development Community (SADC) member states. This study found that peoples’ trust in their government is an important determinant of willingness to pay more tax, while factors such as the country’s quality of democracy, economic condition, and current per capita health expenditure have no influence.     

(In)equality and the South African Constitution

ABSTRACT

Does the South African Constitution constrain or empower government, courts and citizens in addressing systemic social and economic inequalities? This article argues that the Constitution is explicitly ‘transformative’, but is an enabling document, providing ‘scaffolding’ for political and legal activities. It is government, strong institutions and civil society that are ultimately responsible for securing its equality aspirations. Here the Constitution admits of different understandings of equality and different economic and social policy choices. This article identifies these contested meanings of equality and suggests that a liberal egalitarian/social democratic version is dominant in policy choices and the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court. It illustrates this with reference to the Court’s jurisprudence on equality, and suggests that more radical and transformative interpretations remain possible. However, it concludes that we cannot escape politics, the need for good policy choices and effective implementation and enforcement.     

外商直接投资对工业技术溢出效应的分析——基于江苏省与广东省的比较研究

江苏和广东是我国FDI流入最为集中的地区,有关资料显示,两个地区的外资流入量占我国外资流入量的60%左右,同时流入两省2/3的资金流向工业。本文检验了1995～2006年间江苏与广东的外商直接投资对工业的技术外溢效应,同时检验了FDI外溢效应影响因素人力资本、贸易开放度和R&D对外溢效应的影响。研究认为,从总体上看两省利用FDI有正的溢出效应,但并不显著。     

Political Entrepreneurship and the Democratic Allocation of Economic Resources

Political entrepreneurship occurs when an individual acts on a political profit opportunity. These profit opportunities can be divided into two categories: productive, and predatory. Productive opportunities enable entrepreneurs to profit from enhancing the efficiency of government, while predatory opportunities enable entrepreneurs to profit from forcibly transferring resources from some to others. This analysis shows that political institutions tend to favor predatory over productive political entrepreneurship, and shows that what is sometimes referred to as political exchange does not have the same efficiency characteristics as voluntary exchange in private markets.     

出口、对外直接投资与企业的异质性研究

出口和对外直接投资是一国企业进入国外市场的两种重要模式，本文通过建立一个简单的理论模型来分析企业对这两种进入模式的选择问题。本文将企业异质性引入模型分析，同时将企业的R＆D活动作为内生变量来进行研究。在理论分析的基础上，本文结合中国出口和对外直接投资发展的实际情况提出了相关政策建议。     

Does direct foreign investment affect domestic credit constraints?

Firms in developing countries cite credit constraints as one of their primary obstacles to investment. Direct foreign investment may ease credit constraints by bringing in scarce capital. Alternatively, if foreign firms borrow heavily from domestic banks, they may crowd local firms out of domestic capital markets. Using firm data from the Ivory Coast, we test whether: (1) domestic firms are more credit constrained than foreign firms, and (2) whether borrowing by foreign firms exacerbates domestic firm credit constraints. Results provide support for both hypotheses. We also find that state-owned enterprises (SOEs) are less financially constrained than other domestic enterprises.     

中国外商直接投资的区位决定因素分析:城市数据

本文以全国210个地级以上城市为对象,分析了外商直接投资的区位决定因素。本文采用OLS和逐步回归分析方法以及2002年的横截面数据,在以往研究的基础上选择四项区位决定因素包括三种成本因素、三种市场因素、四种集聚因素和四种制度因素进行实证研究。结果表明,劳动力成本对各城市的外商直接投资的区位选择影响不明显,而市场规模、基础设施、教育和研究开发条件以及地方金融规模对外商直接投资的区位选择的影响具有显著性。本文的逐步回归分析结果还表明,就东部地区而言,能源条件和市场规模是较重要的区位决定因素;就中西部地区而言,市场规模、基础设施、教育和研究开发条件以及地方金融成为较重要的区位决定因素。     

The relevance of democracy to organizational management

The relationship between democratic ideals and organizational structuring and functioning receives attention in this article. After a brief historical consideration of liberal democracy in the United States, we analyze social, managerial, ethical, and economic issues defining the relevance of democracy to organizational management. These issues lead to a presentation of specific purposes that particular mechanisms of organizational democracy can serve. Because of other scholarly attention to participative management and employee ownership, hierarchical constraints receive emphasis here.     

Adverse selection in group insurance: The virtues of failing to represent voters

Compared with non-union workers, union workers take more of their compensation in the form of insurance. This may be because unions choose democratically, and democratic choice mitigates adverse selection in group insurance. Relative to individually-purchased insurance, we show that group insurance chosen by an ideal profit-maximizing employer can be worse for every employee, while group insurance chosen democratically can be much better. The reason is that democracy can fail to represent the preferences of almost half the group.Received: January 2003, Accepted: September 2004, JEL Classification: J51, D82, G22