Small business lending and credit risk: Granger causality evidence

Because of their opaque nature, SMEs are overly reliant on bank lending. Therefore, we examine whether banks' credit supply to SMEs are affected by their financial conditions. To this end, we employ a Granger causality analysis to examine whether there is an indication of a significant direction of determination between SME lending and non-performing SME loans. The results reveal no bidirectional relationship between SME lending and NPL for the entire banking sector. For Islamic banks, however, we find two-way linkages between these two parameters: a negative causation is running both from SME lending to NPL growth and from NPL to SME lending. Given Islamic banks' deposit-oriented funding practices and their adherence to profit-and-loss sharing principles, this finding suggests the presence of heightened market discipline within the Islamic banking system.     

Assessing the nonlinear nature of the effects of R&D intensity on growth of SMEs: a dynamic panel data approach

Based on a sample of Portuguese SMEs for the period 1999–2006 and using two step estimation, namely probit regressions and dynamic estimators, this study makes two important contributions to the literature: (i) identification of a quadratic relationship between R&D intensity and SME growth that takes the form of a U, and so R&D intensity is a stimulating factor of SME growth for high levels of R&D intensity; being a restrictive factor of SME growth for low levels of R&D intensity; and (ii) the growth of SMEs seems to be dependent on the nonlinear effects associated with distinct levels of R&D intensity. The nonlinear effects identified suggest that Portuguese SMEs with high levels of R&D intensity more easily find an efficiency scale and are more dependent on internal financing and short-term debt as sources for funding growth, compared to the case of Portuguese SMEs with lower levels of R&D intensity.     

我国中小企业资本结构影响因素研究——基于上市中小企业的实证检验

企业资本结构影响因素研究对企业融资具有重要意义,中国中小企业的特殊性决定了其资本结构与一般企业存在差别。通过对影响中小企业资本结构的因素进行逻辑分类,用稳健回归方法分析了各个因素与中小企业资本结构的关系。研究发现行业因素、中小企业的企业规模、盈利能力、竞争能力、成长性、非债务税盾和资产担保价值对中小企业的资本结构选择影响显著。研究证明西方理论对中国中小企业的部分适用性,同时也发现中国市场环境下中小企业资本结构具有一定特殊性。     

Management practices and SME performance

We examine the association between management practices and SME performance in Britain over the period 2011–2015, using a unique dataset which links survey data on management practices with firm performance data from the UK's official business register. We find that SMEs are less likely to use formal management practices than larger firms. However, such practices appear to have demonstrable benefits for those SMEs who use them, being positively associated with firm survival, growth and productivity. Our results add further weight to policy initiatives which seek to encourage SMEs to improve their management skills and capabilities.     

Top management team social capital,exploration-based innovation,and exploitation-based innovation in SMEs

Despite increasing interest in ambidextrous innovations, mainstream literature has excluded discussions on developing and combining exploratory innovation (ERI) and exploitative innovation (EII) in the small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector. This issue from the SME perspective is worth addressing. Recent studies have conceptually argued the importance of the top management team (TMT) in managing ambidextrous innovations. Building on this argument, we explore how the top manager external social relationships foster ambidextrous innovations and whether internal social relationships among senior executives can be used to integrate such innovations. The results show that (a) distinct external managerial relationships cause differential innovations for SMEs, and (b) internal social capital among top managers could be used effectively to manage ambidextrous innovations. This research indicates that SMEs engaging in both high ERI and EII perform better when they focus on the balancing benefits of TMT internal social capital and the bridging benefits of TMT external social capital.     

银行结构与中小企业融资

本文建立了一个中小企业融资问题的分析框架。文章发现 ,中小企业的非匀质性 (heterogeneity)、贷款抵押和交易成本是影响中小企业从银行获得信贷的三个主要因素 ;缓和信息不对称程度、增加贷款抵押、降低交易成本 ,都将使中小企业得到的信贷增加。进一步 ,在一定的前提假设下 ,文章将中小金融机构引入模型 ,发现引入中小金融机构将使中小企业得到的信贷增加 ,增加社会的总体福利 ;并且在中小金融机构的信息优势、数量和中小企业的融资总额之间存在着正向关系。文章最后按照这一框架的思路 ,对中国的中小企业融资难题进行了分析 ,并提出了相应的政策建议。     

THE POVERTY REDUCTION SUCCESS OF PUBLIC TRANSFERS FOR WORKING AGE IMMIGRANTS AND REFUGEES IN THE UNITED STATES

Although there has been some research on the impacts of federal tax and transfer policies on poverty rates for immigrants, virtually no previous work investigates the most disadvantaged group of immigrants: refugees. We estimate probit models for three standard measures of poverty. We find that while immigrants and refugees in particular had much higher poverty rates in the early 1990s, the strong economic growth of the 1990s led to a convergence of those poverty rates by 2000. Our analysis demonstrates that the improvement was largely because of economic conditions and that welfare reform policies appear to have little differential impact on immigrants or refugees. We also find that refugees show a markedly greater response to local labor market conditions than other immigrants or native born. (JEL H3, I3, J1)     

Information, Informal Finance, and SME Financing

Informal finance exists extensively and has been playing an important role in small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME) financing in developing economies. This paper tries to rationalize the extensiveness of informal finance. SME financing suffers more serious information asymmetry to the extent that most SMEs are more opaque and can only provide less collateral. Informal lenders have an advantage over formal financial institutions in collecting “soft information” about SME borrowers. This paper establishes a model including formal and informal lenders and high- and low-risk borrowers with or without sufficient collateral and shows that the credit market in which informal finance is eliminated will allocate funds in some inefficient way, and the efficiency of allocating credit funds can be improved once informal finance is allowed to coexist with formal finance. Translated from Economic Research Journal, 2005, 7 (in Chinese)     

GROWTH, POVERTY, AND INEQUALITY IN LATIN AMERICA: A CAUSAL ANALYSIS, 1970–94

Taking advantage of consistent poverty and income inequality data for 12 Latin American countries between 1970 and 1994, we analyze the determinants of changes in the incidence of urban and rural poverty and in Gini coefficients over spells of years, stressing in particular the role of aggregate income growth. We find that income growth reduces urban and rural poverty but not inequality. We also find that income growth is more effective in reducing urban poverty if the levels of inequality and poverty are lower, and the levels of secondary education higher. We show that there is an asymmetry in the impact of growth on poverty and inequality, with recession having strong negative effects on both poverty and inequality. Since growth does not reduce inequality, economic cycles create ratchet effects on the level of inequality. However, post-structural adjustment growth is quite effective at reducing poverty, particularly if inequality is low.     

CSR disclosure and sustainable supplier management: a small to medium-sized enterprises perspective

The respective literatures on corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure and sustainable supplier management have grown in recent years, but little scholarly attention has been paid to the link between the two. Within a framework that incorporates legitimacy and neo-institutional theories, this study investigates how CSR disclosure in small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) influences CSR requirements and capacity building with suppliers. Based on an empirical data set of 146 000 SMEs, we test our hypotheses using multiple mediation analysis. Our results indicate that SME CSR disclosure has a positive direct effect on capacity building. When the mediating role of CSR requirements is taken into account, the study reveals that the more SMEs disclose their CSR activities, the more they require CSR from their suppliers, which in turn leads to an increase in capacity building with them. The study also suggests that the SMEs that limit their CSR requirements to the application step are more likely to build capacity with their suppliers than the SMEs that impose CSR verification. Overall, this article provides unique insights for practitioners seeking to determine the circumstances in which the SME practices of sustainable supplier management unfold in practice.     

银行业结构对中小企业融资的影响*

本文结合世界银行关于中国中小企业的调查数据和中国银监会发布的银行业分布数据,分析了银行业结构与中小企业融资的关系。本文发现：银行业结构与中小企业受到信贷配给的概率呈现“U型”关系,即存在最优水平的银行业集中度使中小企业受到信贷约束的概率最低。根据本文研究,我国银行业集中度总体上高于最优水平,但不同地区又有所差异。本文还发现,考察银行业集中度不能只关注国有大型商业银行比重的下降,大型股份制商业银行比重的替代性上升也没有有效解决中小企业融资难的问题。因此,鼓励发展中小金融机构,才是支持中小企业融资的有效途径。     

天津中小企业的成长性与区域选择

合理的区域选择是影响中小企业成长性的重要因素。结合中小企业区域选择的理论与原则,针对天津市中小企业的区域分布现状及特点,提出要增强天津市中小企业的成长性,就必须在进行行业定位时突出区域特色和优势,根据企业类型合理选址,充分发挥中小企业的区域联动作用,加快城市化进程。     

The effects of location and sectoral components of economic growth on poverty: Evidence from Indonesia

In this paper, we investigate the relationship between economic growth and poverty reduction by differentiating growth and poverty into their sectoral composition and urban–rural location using data from Indonesia. We find that rural services growth reduces poverty in all sectors and locations. However, urban services growth has the largest effect on poverty in most sectors. Finally, we also find that rural agriculture growth strongly reduces poverty in rural areas, the largest contributor to poverty in Indonesia. This implies that while agriculture growth in rural areas still plays a major role in reducing poverty, policies that enable strong growth in the services sector in both urban and rural areas would expedite poverty reduction.     

Poverty Dynamics,Violent Conflict,and Convergence in Rwanda

This paper analyzes the poverty impact of the violent events that affected Rwanda in the 1990s. The main objective of the paper is to identify systematically potential mechanisms linking violent conflict with changes in poverty across provinces and households in Rwanda before and after a decade of violence. In accordance with emerging literature on the long‐term economic effects of violent conflict, we find empirical evidence for economic convergence between richer and poorer Rwandan provinces and households following the conflict shocks. Using a small but unique panel of households surveyed before and after the conflict period, we find that households whose house was destroyed or who lost land ran a higher risk of falling into poverty. We do not find much evidence for an economic effect of violent deaths at the household level due to substitution effects of labor within the household. Non‐violent deaths however seem to increase income per adult equivalent for the survivors. Results are shown to be robust to sample selection and IV models.     

Trade Policy and Poverty In the United States: Theory and Evidence, 1947-1990*

This paper develops a two-sector general equilibrium model to examine the impact of technical progress, factor accumulation, labor growth, unemployment, trade policy, and the government's antipoverty programs on the rate of poverty. the results are then tested empirically using the data regarding the United States. We find that low unemployment, productivity growth, and government transfers have the expected effects of alleviating poverty; but trade liberalization has the unexpected effect of being associated with a major increase in poverty-a result contradicting traditional views.     

中小企业资本结构与盈利能力的实证研究——基于中小企业板中小企业上市前后数据的比较分析

本文以2004年在中小企业板上市的38家公司为样本,首先采用描述性统计分析方法对其资本结构、盈利能力进行上市前后差异的对比分析。然后在此基础上,先对总样本（2001—2007年）作实证,得出结论：资产负债率与企业盈利能力正相关;后分别对上市前（2001—2003年）和上市后（2004—2007年）的样本数据作面板模型实证,得出相同结论：上市前后公司资产负债率均与盈利能力呈现正相关的关系。数据显示,中小企业上市后,由于资产负债率不断下降,企业盈利能力也随之下降。     

Political openness and the growth of small and medium enterprises: empirical evidence from transition economies

This paper examines the growth determinants of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in transition and emerging economies, with a specific focus on the growth effects of political openness. Our findings indicate that product and process innovation, foreign market exposure through exports, providing training programs for employees, and the education level of employees are important growth factors for SMEs in transition economies. We also find that democracy and political openness have an adverse impact on the growth prospect of SMEs in transition economies. On the other hand, the negative effect of political openness on firm growth is decreasing as the proportion of the firm’s labor force with a university degree increases—a finding suggesting that the collective bargaining of low-skilled workers may hinder the growth of small firms in transition economies.     

中小企业理论研究的渊源与轨迹

随着人们对中小企业在经济社会发展中的地位和功能认识加深,尤其是在经历了国际金融危机后,中小企业再次成为世界各国理论界关注的热点。本文结合世界中小企业发展历程,对经济学和管理学历史长河中涉及到中小企业的理论做一简要梳理和重点归纳,并将中小企业理论研究大致分为初涉中小企业的理论探讨、企业理论框架下对中小企业的研究和逐步形成相对独立的学科体系等三个阶段。     

An analysis of new firm survival using a hazard function

A unique data set is used to provide a detailed examination of the survival of newly established manufacturing firms in north-east England. Using data on 781 firms established between 1973 and 2001, log-logistic hazard models are estimated separately for (i) micro-enterprises and (ii) small and medium establishments (SMEs). Both micro-enterprises and SMEs show clear evidence of positive duration dependence, followed by negative duration dependence. We find the two firm types are differentially affected by firm-specific and macro-economic variables. Increases in initial plant size impact negatively on micro-enterprise survival and positively on SME survival.     

Impact of remittances on male and female labor force participation patterns in Africa: Quasi‐experimental evidence from Ghana

In this paper, we examine how remittances, an outcome of labor mobility, affect labor market activities in Ghana using detailed household and individual‐level data. This is important, considering the extensive literature that has documented the remittance–poverty reduction nexus. First, we find a strong negative association between household remittance‐receiving status and individual labor supply decisions using instrumental variable estimation techniques. Second, we find the depressing effect of remittances on labor supply decisions to be much stronger in rural areas. Rural women who reside in remittance‐receiving households are less likely to be in the labor force compared with those who do not reside in such households. Remittances have very little impact on labor supply decisions in urban areas. Our findings support that remittances can exacerbate long‐term poverty reduction in rural areas through lower labor force participation, and as such rural‐based and gender‐based interventions may be needed to help redirect remittance income.