Corporate lobbying,political connections,and the bailout of banks

Political involvement has long been shown to be a profitable investment for firms that seek favorable regulatory conditions or support in times of economic distress. But how important are different types of political involvement for the timing and magnitude of political support? To answer this question, we take a comprehensive look at the lobbying expenditures and political connections of banks that were recipients of government support under the 2008 Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). We find that politically-engaged firms were not only more likely to receive TARP funds, but they also received a greater amount of TARP support and received the support earlier than firms that were not politically involved.     

养老金制度改革中的工会影响——以智利和阿根廷为例

1981年智利养老金私有化改革取得了巨大的成功并创造了可观的利润,同时也为整个拉丁美洲的养老金改革树立了良好的榜样.但是通过对智利和阿根廷社会福利发展的政治经济模式进行分析,发现养老金私有化会令工人凝聚力下降,但同时也为工会创造更多获取对养老基金投资的控制权的机会.在两国的养老金改革过程中,工会具有的组织吸引力和凝聚力及其对于金融管理专业技能的掌握促进其在在养老基金管理方面的进一步参与.这为现阶段进一步引导我国工会参与社会保障机制完善提供有力借鉴.     

企业年金管理模式研究

我国社会保障制度改革的目标是形成基本养老保险、企业年金和自愿储蓄“三根支柱”构成的多层次的老年经济保障制度,融再分配、储蓄和保险功能于一体,达到给老年人提供更好的经济保障并促进经济增长的目的。其中,企业年金改革作为社保基金改革的重要一环,其成功与否关系到经济的良性循环和可持续发展。本文通过对我国企业年金发展模式的研究,提出了未来多主体参与的企业年金发展模式并提出相关建议,另外,文章对商业银行开拓企业年金市场也提出了包括加强自身建设提高综合服务水平;积极研发企业年金业务管理核心系统;交叉发展企业年金业务和其他金融服务,拓展服务空间等相关建议。     

The Role of the Auditor in Modern Society: An Exploratory Essay

This paper examines competing proprietary and political cost arguments for incentives facing managers of different types of Australian and UK pension fund, to voluntarily disclose pension liability information in annual reports sent to their participants. For Australian defined benefit pension funds, the disclosure reveals the fund's actuarial surplus or deficit, which conveys information to participants about the pension fund's ability to generate future cash flows. Tests are conducted on the voluntary reporting practices of a sample of 119 Australian and 100 UK pension funds, using variables which prior research suggests affects their financial valuation and performance. The empirical results support predictions that managerial discretionary disclosure carries proprietary cost implications for Australian defined benefit pension funds, as proxied by their investment risk and funding ratio, and political cost implications for Australian defined contribution and UK defined benefit pension funds, as proxied by their size.     

Macroeconomic control, political costs and earnings management: Evidence from Chinese listed real estate companies

Firms in China have faced high political costs during China’s economic transition, because they are affected by macroeconomic policies. However, research to date has offered no consistent conclusions on the relationship between political costs and earnings management in China. This study tests whether real estate firms attempt to decrease earnings during periods of macroeconomic control, using variables related to the national real estate market as proxies for political costs. We find that political costs are negatively related to earnings management in listed real estate firms. In addition, we find that non-state-owned enterprises utilized more income-decreasing accruals during this period. Our results are consistent with the political costs hypothesis.     

Corruption,governance, and public pension funds

We examine the effects of state corruption as well as political and governance factors on U.S. public pension funds. We find that pension funds in states with more corruption have lower performance; a one standard deviation increase in corruption is associated with a decrease in annual returns of at least 14 basis points, and this relationship is robust to state-level and pension-level fixed effects. Pensions located in more corrupt jurisdictions also invest a larger fraction of their assets in equities. We find that having a new treasurer decreases the negative effects of corruption, suggesting that more frequent changes in administrations are beneficial in corrupt jurisdictions. Governance-related variables and political affiliation variables are by themselves not significantly related to pension returns, although these variables are associated with differences in asset allocation.     

Shareholder activism of public pension funds: The political facet

This paper studies the political incentive of public pension funds in shareholder activism. Using a sample of shareholder proposals from 1993 to 2013 and a hand-collected data set of the political variables of public pension funds, we document evidence consistent with the “political attention hypothesis.” We find that the number of politicians on public pension fund boards is significantly positively related to the frequency with which portfolio firms are targeted. Moreover, the frequency of social-responsibility proposals by public pension funds increases significantly, as the funds have a greater number of board members running for election to public office. However the frequency of corporate governance proposals is not related to the number of board members running for elections to public office. Furthermore, we document that political connection between a portfolio firm and a public pension fund mitigates the firm’s likelihood of being targeted by the fund with social-responsibility proposals. This result supports the “political contribution hypothesis.” The paper provides direct evidence that public pension-fund board members employ shareholder proposals to enhance their political capital.     

Managerial risk taking incentives and corporate pension policy

We examine whether the compensation incentives of top management affect the extent of risk shifting versus risk management behavior in pension plans. We find that risk shifting through pension underfunding (and, to a lesser extent, through pension asset allocation to risky securities) is stronger with compensation structures that create high wealth-risk sensitivity (vega) and weaker with high wealth-price sensitivity (delta). These findings are stronger for chief financial officers (CFOs) than for chief executive officers (CEOs), suggesting that pension policy falls within the CFO’s domain. Risk shifting through pension underfunding is also lower when the CFO’s personal stake in the pension plan is larger. Overall, these findings show that top managers’ compensation structure is an important driver of corporate pension policy. They also highlight firms within which the moral hazard concerns fueled by Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation insurance are most relevant.     

我国老年保障研究中的“健康老龄化”研究趋向及其价值

老年保障是面向老年人群的社会保障系统,它的健全与完善对解决我国人口老龄化所带来的相关社会经济发展问题有十分重要的现实意义。而相关政府研究则主要为老年保障建设实践提供理论支撑与决策依据。本文以"健康老龄化"为研究视角,就目前学术界有关老年保障研究中的相关研究成果和重要观点进行梳理和总结。从现有文献来看,学界已提供了较为丰富的理论和实证分析,但也还存在一些不足,尤其是未从统筹角度将健康与养老结合起来进行分析,因此今后有必要将养老与健康纳入一个系统进行综合分析,真正形成医、养间的互通互融,以期为老年保障体系的健全与完善提供理论依据。     

Public capital, public pension, and growth

This paper constructs an endogenous growth model with overlapping generations, whose engine of economic growth is productive public capital. We investigate a public policy under which the government allocates tax revenue between investment in public capital accumulation and public pension provision. We show that increasing the share of spending on public pensions always reduces economic growth. However, we show numerically that public pension provision improves social welfare and there exists an optimal share of spending on public pension provision unless the value of the time discount factor of the government is sufficiently high. Moreover, we show that in an economy facing an aging population, an increase in social security provision for the old rather than an increase in public investment can be preferable from the viewpoint of social welfare.     

公务员养老保险改革国际趋势及对中国启示

公务员养老保险制度是社会保障制度重要组成部分,公平与可持续的公务员养老保险制度关系着经济的持续发展与社会的长治久安。随着社会经济环境的变化,一些国家受人口、经济、政治、管理等因素影响,已经或正在进行公务员养老保险制度改革。改革主要趋势由"分立"转向"统一",由给付确定制(DB)转向缴费确定制(DC),改革主要措施包括引入积累制因素、建立自主缴费制度、制定科学的计发办法、逐步提高退休年龄等。我国自20世纪90年代开始实施养老金制度改革,但公务员养老保险一直延续着计划经济时代所确立的离退休制度,改革进程缓慢。随着市场经济的深入发展,机关和企业双轨制的养老保险制度的弊端日益显露,结合自身国情借鉴国际经验加速改革步伐势在必行。     

Political patronage and analysts’ forecast precision

We test whether the channel by which the government plays the role of political patron to selected firms influences analysts’ forecast precision in Malaysia. Correcting for analysts’ self-selection bias, we find a negative relation between analysts’ forecast errors and the social dimension of political patronage, as proxied by government-controlled institutional ownership. The reverse is found for the economic dimension of political patronage, as proxied by the percentage shareholding of government-linked corporations. We find no evidence that the personal dimension of political patronage influences analysts’ forecast precision.     

我国社会养老保障制度的城乡统筹问题探析

社会养老保障制度的城乡统筹是我国城乡统筹的重要方面,是保持社会稳定、实现社会和谐发展的现实需要。社会养老保障制度的城乡统筹思想建立在丰富的理论基础上,有着深厚的历史积淀,符合社会发展的客观规律,在我国已经开始实践探索。进一步推进我国社会养老保障制度的城乡统筹,需要以建立和完善农村养老保险制度为突破口,需要创新制度、破解资金难题、统一管理体系和健全法律。     

Investor sophistication and risk taking

Using investment policy data of 857 Dutch pension funds during 1999–2006, we develop three indicators of investor sophistication. The indicators show that pension funds’ strategic portfolio choices are often based on coarse and less sophisticated approaches. First, most pension funds round strategic asset allocations to the nearest multiple of 5%, similar to age heaping in demographic and historical studies. Second, many pension funds invest little or nothing in alternative, more complex asset classes, resulting in limited asset diversification. Third, many pension funds favor regional investments and as such do not fully employ the opportunities of international risk diversification. Our indicators are correlated with pension fund size, in line with the expectation that smaller pension funds are generally less sophisticated than large pension funds. Using the indicators for investor sophistication, we show that less sophisticated pension funds tend to opt for investment strategies with less risk.     

意大利公共养老金制度发展和改革研究

经历了私有属性的养老金制度的前期发展以后,意大利建立了主导性的以职业分割的卑斯麦式的公共养老金体系。待遇和缴费层面上的权利义务不对等,经济人口发展的不利因素以及国内国际的政治金融多重压力促使意大利开始改革公共养老金体系,恢复公共财政的可持续发展。意大利的公共养老金改革不仅建立了待遇和缴费的对应关系,也扩大了养老金的福利融资渠道并鼓励了私有属性的公共体系外养老金制度的发展。另外,发展阶段针对非雇佣关系或自雇业者的公共养老金体系的非政府的管理方式在改革中得到了保留。发展与改革阶段的一系列举措深刻的影响和塑造了意大利公共养老金制度的现有功能和形态,对于正处在发展改革过程中各国的公共养老金制度建设也是重要的启示。     

The political origin of pension funding

The paper seeks to explain the huge cross country variation in private pension funding, shaped by historical choice made when universal pension systems were created after the Great Depression. According to Perotti and von Thadden [Perotti, E., von Thadden, E.-L., 2006. The political economy of corporate control and labor rents. J. Polit. Econ., 145–175], large inflationary shocks due to war damage devastated middle class savings in some countries in the first half of the XX century. This shaped political preferences over the role of capital markets and social insurance, and contributed to the Great Reversals documented by Rajan and Zingales [Rajan, R.G., Zingales, L., 2003. The great reversals: The politics of financial development in the 20th century. J. Finan. Econ. 69 (1), 5–50]. Wealth distribution shocks are indeed strongly related to private pension funding, as a large shock reduces the stock of private retirement assets by 58% of GDP. While the sample size is limited, the results are robust to other explanations, such as legal origin, original financial development, past and current demographics, religion, electoral voting rules, redistributive politics, national experiences with financial market performance, or other major financial shocks that were not specifically redistributive. Corroborating evidence indicates that such redistributive shocks help explain the cross country variation in social expenditures, state ownership of industry, financial development and employment protection measures as predicted by the political shift hypothesis.     

上海市事业单位养老保险改革的财政压力分析

养老保险制度是一项社会经济制度,它的建立与完善关系到民生的改善和经济的长远发展。而现阶段事业单位养老保险改革的步履蹒跚,在某种程度上也制约着社会经济的发展及社会保障体系的完善。上海市作为此次事业单位养老保险改革的5个试点省市之一,其现行养老保险制度、人口老龄化程度、经济发展水平等相关因素与其他几个试点地区都有很大的不同,有着重要的研究、试行和示范意义。因此,本文以上海为研究平台,以动态人口发展模型为测算基础,通过对上海市事业单位养老保险转制成本的分析,从存量的角度去解读事业单位养老保险的财政压力,并提出相应的建议和对策。     

Inside the black box: Bank credit allocation in China’s private sector

This study examines how the Chinese state-owned banks allocate loans to private firms. We find that the banks extend loans to financially healthier and better-governed firms, which implies that the banks use commercial judgments in this segment of the market. We also find that having the state as a minority owner helps firms obtain bank loans and this suggests that political connections play a role in gaining access to bank finance. In addition, we find that commercial judgments are important determinants of the lending decisions for manufacturing firms, large firms, and firms located in regions with a more developed banking sector; political connections are important for firms in service industries, large firms, and firms located in areas with a less developed banking sector.     

Support for pension reforms: What is the role of financial literacy and pension knowledge?

Despite the relevance of the issue of pension system sustainability in most advanced economies, the factors associated with the opposition to pension reforms are still under-studied. In this paper, we investigate the correlation between financial, pension and institutional knowledge and support for pension reforms. Using an ad hoc module of the SHARE data for Italy, we find that financially literate and pension knowledgeable individuals are more willing to accept pension reforms. In particular, individuals with a basic level of pension knowledge recognize that population ageing, low economic growth, and low contributions by the young make the public pension system hardly sustainable.     

关于完善企业年金运行机制的研究

构建中国特色福利制度体系是实现"中国梦"的重要保障,需要国家福利、企业福利等各种福利形式合力发挥作用。我国老龄化程度的快速加深、经济增长阶段的转换、基本养老保险面临的收支压力、劳资关系的紧张等都对企业年金提出了巨大需求,但实践中发展并不理想。基于企业年金市场化性质的分析,本文认为与企业实力、税收优惠政策相比,运行机制是今后一个时期影响企业年金发展最重要的因素,应该成为制度政策的着力点。围绕完善企业年金运行机制,从充分发挥市场机制作用、合理定位政府角色、划清相关当事人的责任界限、加快配套制度的建立四个方面提出了若干具体建议。