A behavioral model of work-trip mode choice in Shanghai

This paper analyzes travelers' choice behavior by using combined revealed preference/stated preference (RP/SP) survey data on work-trip mode choice in Shanghai, taking into consideration different scales across the two data sources. Several versions of a multinomial choice model are specified and estimated. The estimation results suggest that the utility function with money cost divided by income by equivalence scale be chosen as the preferred model. Based on the preferred model, values of time and sample aggregate elasticities of choice probabilities are calculated. The results show that values of “in-vehicle time” and “out-of-vehicle time” are 64 and 82% of the sample mean wage, and that in terms of elasticities, “in-vehicle time”, “out-of-vehicle time” and “money cost” are the most important attributes for bus, subway and taxi passengers, respectively. The conditional elasticities given low, middle and high income levels indicate that bicycles seem to be an inferior good for all income levels. Bus and subway transport are inferior goods for people at middle and high income levels but normal goods for those at a low income level. Taxis are a normal good only for low income levels; for middle and high income levels, they are a luxury good. The results obtained may be used for transportation policymaking in Shanghai.     

Why has income inequality in Thailand increased?: An analysis using surveys from 1975 to 1998

This paper identifies the determinants of income inequality in Thailand, which increased between 1975 and 1998. Our regression results strongly suggest the significance of agricultural factors. We also obtain some limited evidence that sectoral factors, financial development, and education level disparities play a roughly equally important role in explaining inequality changes in Thailand.     

A Ricardian analysis of the economic impact of climate change on agriculture: Evidence from the farms in the central highlands of Afghanistan

This paper provides evidence on the economic impact of climate change on agriculture in the Central Highlands of Afghanistan by exploring the climate sensitivity of crop net revenue per unit of land. A Ricardian model and a novel 2017 dataset for 1502 farmers in three central provinces along with 34 years of weather information are used to study the impact of variations in seasonal precipitation and annual temperature. The findings suggest a significant and nonlinear effect of climate factors on crop net revenue. The impact of seasonal precipitation is found to vary across space and time. The effect of increased annual temperature is found to be generally positive and significant—both statistically and economically. The predicted impact of future climate change is largely beneficial, mainly due to warming.     

公共部门内部的激励机制:一个文献述评——兼论中国分权式改革的动力机制和代价

本文对近年来研究公共部门内部激励机制的理论文献做了一个述评，讨论了它们对中国经济转型的意义，并指出了将来的研究方向。本文首先刻画了公共部门区别于私人部门的一些特征性事实，如多任务性、委托人的异质性、弱的显性激励等等；进而结合现有文献更具体地分析了公共部门激励机制的特征，理论的解释以及替代的激励机制。作为理论的一个应用，本文还从公共部门激励的角度，分析了中国分权式改革的动力机制及其代价。     

Tax Incentives for Business Investment: A Primer for Policy Makers in Developing Countries

The use of tax incentives is widespread even though the available empirical evidence on the cost-effectiveness of such incentives in stimulating investment is highly inconclusive. This paper is primarily intended as a primer on the use of tax incentives for policy makers, especially those in developing countries. It discusses the objectives, cost-effectiveness, and transparency of implementing tax incentives; assesses the comparative merits of alternative forms of such incentives; and provides a review of the empirical literature. Its main conclusions are that the justification for the use of tax incentives should be limited to the rectification of market failures, and that the preferred form of tax incentives are those that provide for faster recovery of investment costs.     

持续性绩效期望落差与OFDI——基于威胁刚性理论视角

处于经营困境中的组织如何进行战略决策以扭转困境一直是研究者关注的焦点。尽管企业行为理论对这一话题进行了开拓性分析,但由于过度关注企业战略决策参考点而忽视了企业绩效不佳的持续性在绩效反馈中的时间价值,极大地限制了企业行为理论在战略实践中的解释力。本研究引入持续性绩效期望落差这一概念,从威胁刚性理论的视角分析了持续性绩效期望落差如何影响上市公司对外直接投资（OFDI）的区位选择。研究表明：持续性的绩效不佳加剧了组织的困境威胁,导致企业在实施积极的国际化战略调整时会选择与母国制度距离相近的国家（地区）;高管海外经历和企业规模会进一步强化上述关系,而行业竞争程度则会弱化上述关系。本研究通过将持续性绩效期望落差概念引入到绩效反馈框架中,丰富和扩展了企业行为理论在国际商务领域的应用。     

Perceived relative income,fairness, and the role of government: Evidence from a randomized survey experiment in China

Previous studies have shown that Chinese citizens generally are optimistic about their economic opportunities and tolerant of the high levels of inequality in their society. This paper conducts a random survey experiment to examine whether the established views on fairness and inequality change after the respondents receive the general information on wealth concentration or the customized information on their household income ranking. We find that both types of information lead respondents to view society as less fair than they had initially believed. The information on the wealth concentration also increases public concern about social inequality. Nevertheless, neither information offered to the respondents make them think that government should play a more significant role in reducing inequality. This lack of demand for government intervention may be partially explained by a lower level of trust in the local government induced by the two information treatments.     

Changes in Chinese Competitiveness in Major Food Products: Implications for WTO Membership

Chinese entry to the WTO in December 2001 marks a new phase in agricultural trade, both nationally and globally. After a context review of Chinese agriculture and WTO-related policy issues, this paper first uses a Balassa index approach to examine China's relative competitiveness in some major food products over the period since 1985, followed by an analysis of price-cost ratios and production cost structures for these products. It is found that China has revealed comparative advantages in meat products but disadvantages in cereals. With limited land resources, its production and trade competitiveness has declined despite rapid substitution of capital for labour, due to a marked rise in relative labour price in agriculture. In the long run, it is expected that WTO membership will boost Chinese agricultural trade, but its impact on competitiveness will probably depend more on production costs, and will differ between crops and animal products.     

A Case of Sticky Floors: Gender Wage Differentials in Thailand

Using 2004 Household Socio‐Economic Survey data for Thailand, we explore the gender wage differentials across the entire unconditional wage distribution and find a strong sticky floor effect. Glass ceilings, although observed along with sticky floors in the raw data and pooled regressions, disappear in the counterfactual decompositions, suggesting a strong sticky floor pattern in gender wage differentials in Thailand. Whereas the evidence for most European countries points to glass ceilings, our findings for Thailand are qualitatively similar to those from other South Asian and Southeast Asian countries for which evidence exists; namely, Singapore, the Philippines and Sri Lanka.     

中印吸引外国直接投资 (FDI) 税收政策的比较

本文从税收政策角度考察了中印两国在吸引FDI方面的类似与不同,指出,中国除实行内外资企业所得税法的统一,还应在双重征税免除协定的签订以及产业、技术和地区引导等方面加强努力,以提供一个公平的税收环境。     

Voluntary Reporting Incentives and Reporting Quality: Evidence from A Reporting Regime Change for Private Firms in Taiwan

This paper examines the effect of voluntary financial reporting on firms' reporting quality using a reporting regime change in Taiwan. Before 2001, Taiwan's Company Act imposed a mandatory public reporting requirement of filing audited financial statements on private firms with contributed capital exceeding a certain threshold. This requirement was rescinded in 2001 and private firms since have had discretion over public financial reporting. We divide private firms retroactively into two groups: voluntary reporting firms, those continuing the practice of filing financial statements after the regime change; and nonvoluntary reporting firms, those discontinuing the reporting practice after the regime change. We find that financial reporting quality is higher for voluntary reporting firms than for nonvoluntary reporting firms and that this quality difference translates into a lower cost of debt for voluntary reporting firms. Our results support the view that reporting incentives play an important role in determining reporting quality.     

Options for cement production in Papua New Guinea: A study in choice of technology

This paper examines the technical options for local production of cement to satisfy Papua New Guinea's needs. Both rotary and vertical kiln methods and different plant sizes are compared on economic grounds and also assessed against national objectives. Because of Papua New Guinea's small and scattered demand for cement and high internal transport costs, the smaller vertical kiln units are more economic while small-scale manufacture is also more in line with national objectives.     

The determinants of income inequality in Thailand: A synthetic cohort analysis

This paper presents tests and estimates of the human capital model of income inequality using synthetic cohort data for Thailand: 1992–2011. The model focuses on four primary determinants of income inequality: mean per capita income levels, the variances in years of education, in the number of children, and in the number of earners in the household. All of these factors are important sources of income inequality in Thailand, with relative impacts that differ across demographic groups and types of household structure. An inverted-U relation between mean per capita income levels and inequality is found, reflecting gender differences of the head of household, differences in household composition, and variation in access to finance. Although the human capital model emphasizes education, estimates presented here show other household characteristics, such as number of children and number of earners, can be even more important sources of inequality.     

Budget Structure and Pollution Control： A Cross-country Analysis and Implications for China

In the published literature, the differences in environmental performance across countries are typically explained using the Environmental Kuznets Curve. The Environmental Kuznets Curve states that pollution initially increases with economic growth. Once GDP per capita reaches a certain level, the relationship reverses. In the present paper, we provide an alternative hypothesis, where budget structure plays an important role in explaining the variations in pollution across the world.＂ the lower the business-related taxes as a share of total tax revenue, the higher the property tax in total tax revenue and the higher the ratio of public health expenditure in total expenditure, then the stronger the incentive of pollution control and the lower the pollution level. Our empirical findings reveal that the budget structure does have an important impact on pollution control. The policy implication of this research is that effective control of environmental pollution requires changes in tax structure and expenditure assignment. This research has important policy implications for China ＂s tax system reform and pollution control efforts.     

Sustainable livelihood principles and urban greening in informal settlements in practice: A case of Zandspruit informal settlement,South Africa

This article looks to investigate the practice of using the ‘sustainable livelihood approach’ in a multifaceted urban greening project, Trees for Homes. The urban greening project was implemented to improve the quality of life and help marginalised citizens of an informal settlement in South Africa to adapt to climate variability through tree planting. We explored the actual execution of the independent techniques being utilised in the implementation of the Trees for Homes project and how it can promote sustainable livelihood objectives in the Zandspruit informal settlement in South Africa. Using a qualitative approach, the study was able to effectively apply sustainable livelihood principles. It was also found, however, that the multi-level principle was limited by the lack of political muscle which is endemic to many disempowered poor citizens of developing economies. Although the project was successful in many ways, political vulnerability within the development cycle threatens the longer term sustainability of the project outcomes.     

A Comparative Analysis of Export Price Pass-through in Three Open Asian Economies: Korea,Singapore and Thailand

Abstract

The degree of exchange rate pass-through is of paramount importance to small and open economies as it has a direct impact on domestic inflation as well as the effectiveness of exchange rate as an adjustment tool. High exchange rate pass-through (ERPT) is often cited as a reason for a “fear of floating”. This article analyzes the degree of ERPT into the export prices of three Asian economies—Korea, Thailand and Singapore for the period 1980: Q1–2006: Q4 using both US dollar bilateral rates as well as nominal effective exchange rates. The study also examines whether there are asymmetries in ERPT between exchange rate appreciation and depreciation.