The Role of Gender in Further Training for Spanish Workers: Are Employers Making a Difference?

This paper investigates whether gender differentials in three categories of nonformal educational training that exist among Spanish employees – firm-financed training, public-financed training, and self-financed training – using the Survey on Adult Population Involvement in Learning Activities (AES), conducted in 2011. Although this study finds no gender gap in the probability of overall training participation, there is a negative gap in firm-financed training for women. Since this study does not detect differential preferences for training between Spanish women and men employees, gender discrimination in access to firm-financed training is at the root of this gender gap. While this discrimination does not extend to training returns among employees who take part in firm-financed courses, taking part in such training increases the probability of obtaining a salary increase or promotion, and it is discrimination in the access to firm-financed training that leaves Spanish women employees at a disadvantage.     

The effects of remittances on support for democracy in Africa: Are remittances a curse or a blessing?

We examine the effect of remittances on the legitimacy of democracy in Africa, testing whether remittance recipients are less likely to support democracy than non-recipients. We hypothesize that the effect of remittances on support for democracy varies across classes (i.e., groups or subtypes) of individuals sharing similar but unobserved background characteristics. Using the Afrobarometer surveys, we try to find out whether the respondents fall into different hidden classes in such a way that the effect of remittances on the degree of support for democracy depends on the class. Our results support that remittances may be a curse for the degree of endorsement and support for democracy, depending on the class of individuals that we consider. The analysis of the probability of being in the remittance curse class indicates that the perception of national priorities plays an important role. People who attest that freedom and rights are the main national priorities have a lower probability of belonging to the remittances curse class than individuals who choose national priorities that are oriented towards the economic conditions of their country.     

How Important Are Scale Effects for Growth When Knowledge Is a Public Good?

In this paper, by proposing an R&D accumulation law for an economy with an expanding number of firms, I seek to reconcile the following three facts: the positive relationship between the fraction of income allocated to R&D expenditure and growth; the positive relationship between the number of firms and total factor productivity growth; and knowledge as a non‐rival and non‐excludable good. There are scale effects because of the public nature of knowledge, but the economy also grows in the absence of population growth. I find that population growth explains one‐fifth of market income growth but only one‐sixteenth of efficient income growth.     

Price Premiums for Eco-friendly Commodities: Are ‘Green’ Markets the Best Way to Protect Endangered Ecosystems?

‘Green’ markets represent a means through which public goods can be privately provided. A green product is an impure public good consisting of a private good (e.g., rain forest honey) bundled with a jointly produced public good (e.g., biodiversity protection). In the context of ecosystem protection, popular green commodities include eco-tourism excursions, coffee grown under forest canopies (‘shade-grown’), tagua nuts for buttons and ornaments, rainforest nuts and oils for cosmetic products, and rain forest honey. We examine the dynamic efficiency of eco-friendly price premiums in achieving ecosystem protection and rural welfare goals by contrasting the use of price premiums to the use of payments that are tied directly to ecosystem protection. We demonstrate analytically and empirically that direct payments are likely to be more efficient as a conservation policy instrument. Depending on the available funds, the direct payments may be better or worse than green price premiums in achieving rural welfare objectives. If direct payments are not feasible for social or political reasons, we demonstrate analytically and empirically that the price premium approach is likely to be more effective at achieving conservation and development objectives than the currently more popular policy of subsidizing capital acquisition in eco-friendly commercial activities.     

Too Much of a Good Thing? The Economics of Investment in R&D

Research and development is a key determinant of long-run productivity and welfare. A central issue is whether a decentralized economy undertakes too little or too much R&D. We develop an endogenous growth model that incorporates parametrically four important distortions to R&D: the surplus appropriability problem, knowledge spillovers, creative destruction, and duplication externalities. Calibrating the model, we find that the decentralized economy typically underinvests in R&D relative to what is socially optimal. The only exceptions to this conclusion occur when the duplication externality is strong and the equilibrium real interest rate is simultaneously high.     

Strategic Technology Alliances: A Way to Innovative Enterprises in Russia?

This article examines whether, how, and to what extent international technology partnerships of Russian enterprises and research institutes contribute to their technological capability building. It presents results obtained by analysis of both a unique survey of Russian enterprises and research institutes co-operating with Western partners in seven selected high-technology fields and four Russian regions with a high concentration of R&D, and additional evidence from 16 in-depth interviews with managers of such Russian high-technology entities (HTE).     

Are Korean consumers willing to pay a tax for a mandatory BSE testing programme?

The outbreaks of mad cow disease (BSE) have significantly increased the demand for food safety programs in the Korean beef market. Two issues that are getting much attention are about whether Korea should implement mandatory testing of slaughtered domestic cattle for BSE and whether consumers are willing to pay a tax for the programme. No study, however, has examined consumers’ willingness to pay (WTP) a tax for a BSE testing programme. We conducted a contingent valuation (CV) study using a double-bounded dichotomous choice approach to estimate Korean consumers’ valuation for a mandatory BSE testing programme on slaughtered domestic cattle that are 21 months or older. Our results show that the sample-population adjusted mean estimate of WTP a tax per year is 4482 KRW (US $4.01) per household. This suggests that Korean consumers have a strong preference for a mandatory testing of domestic cattle for BSE. This study also found that Korean consumers’ WTP for the programme is greater than estimated implementation costs of the programme. These results imply that implementing a mandatory BSE testing programme in Korea could confer positive consumer welfare.     

Are the kinship networks a resource or a curse for small firms in post-communist countries? The case of Albania

Cross-sectional data are compiled from the 2002, 2005, 2008 and 2012 World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study databases for Albania. Based on responses from 1169 firms, the entrepreneurs’ kinship networks are found to influence firm activity in a positive and negative way. The positive contribution occurs through employment, be it formal or informal. The persisting impact of the kinship networks fades away, and business and friendship networks have gained importance in recent years.     

The Economics of the Greenium: How Much is the World Willing to Pay to Save the Earth?

Environmental and Resource Economics - Sadly, not much. This paper provides a theoretical and empirical analysis of the greenium, the price premium the investor pays for green bonds over...     

Is the CSR Craze Good for Society? The Welfare Economic Approach to Corporate Social Responsibility

Abstract

Welfare economic analysis of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) equates CSR with the provision of private goods bundled with provision of public goods (or, in the symmetrical case, bundled with the curtailment of public bads). Two common examples are cause-related marketing and “green goods” where private goods are sold at premiums that are then used to pay for provision of public goods and/or curtailment of public bads. This paper expands upon the model of Besley and Ghatak (2007 Besley, T. and Ghatak, M. 2007. “Retailing Public Goods: The Economics of Corporate Social Responsibility,”. Journal of Public Economics, 91(9): 1645–1663. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) for the case of imperfect government to develop a complete typology for analyzing whether the provision/curtailment of public goods/bads will be best served by companies (through CSR), by imperfect governments or by non-profit organizations. Finally the paper discusses the main differences between the welfare economic approach to CSR and the general multi-disciplinary CSR literature.     

Are regional asymmetries detrimental to tax coordination in a repeated game setting?

This paper reexamines the main findings of Cardarelli et al. [Cardarelli, R., Taugourdeau, E., Vidal, J.-P., 2002. A repeated interactions model of tax competition, Journal of Public Economic Theory 4, 19-38], and Catenaro and Vidal [Catenaro, M., Vidal, J.-P., 2006. Implicit tax co-ordination under repeated policy interactions, Recherches Economiques de Louvain 72, 1-17], who show that regional asymmetries undermine the implicit collusion of tax coordination in a repeated game model of capital tax competition. In particular, this paper investigates how increased regional differences in per capita capital endowments and/or production technologies affect the willingness of each region to cooperate in achieving tax coordination. It is shown that there may exist cases where as regional asymmetries in net capital exporting positions increase, regions are more likely to cooperate on capital taxes and thereby achieve tax coordination.     

An Increase in the Federal Minimum Wage: Good for Employees,Bad for Stockholders?

International Advances in Economic Research -     

Diversification: a road to inefficiency in product innovations?

Motivated by recent empirical observations made in industries such as the automobile industry, this paper employs an agent-based industry simulation model to examine the strategic relationship between product diversification strategies and some aspects of the product innovation strategy of a single producer. In particular, it is established that an increase in the average degree of product diversification in an industry increases the incentive for a producer to reduce the time to market for innovations at the expense of product quality. However, if all firms adapt their strategies according to these incentives, this results in a severe loss of average firm profits in the industry and also to a reduction in consumer surplus. It is then studied how the strength of this dilemma depends on several parameters describing the market structure and patent policy.     

The defence industry as a locomotive for technological renewal in Russia: are the conditions in place?

This article examines the extent to which the conditions for successful military to civilian technological spin-offs are in place in Russia. This is important because Russian authorities use the potential for such spin-offs as one of several arguments for justifying large defence expenditure. Six conditions are identified, all of which are derived from the theoretical literature on the transfer of technology from the military to civilian sector. We conclude that despite some government efforts to generate spin-offs by providing technology brokering, and despite some joint military–civilian technological development taking place within defence industry enterprises, most of the conditions required to generate substantial technology transfer from the military to civilian sector are not present in Russia.     

The Political Economy for Low-carbon Energy Transition in China: Towards a New Policy Paradigm?

China has become the leading country to develop wind and solar energy industries. By presenting the institutional arrangement and interest constellations of China’s regulatory system of renewable energy sectors, this paper argues that the reasons for China’s swift expansion of wind and solar energy investment go beyond the notion of a state-led model. It also reveals that due to a series of internal power struggles and external shocks, the current regulatory system is undergoing significant restructuring. A new policy paradigm is emerging that is largely different from the previous decades of policy orientation that centred on capacity expansion and instrumental interests for renewable energy development. The new paradigm would face tremendous challenges from existing institutions and vested interests, and it requires new set of ideologies that can help renewable energy sector to truly competing with the energy incumbents in order to bring about meaningful low-carbon energy transition in China.