Tax policy and returns to education

This paper considers how asymmetric tax treatment, where labour market earnings are taxed but household production is untaxed, affects educational choice and labour supply. We show that taxes on labour market earnings can generate a large (non-marginal) switch to home production and the ensuing deadweight losses are large. Using a cross-country panel, we find that gender differences in labour supply responses to tax policy can explain differences in aggregate labour supply and years of education across countries.     

Earnings announcements and the variability of stock returns

This article is concerned with the dissemination process of firm-specific annual earnings information in the Norwegian capital market. We find a significant reduction in stock price volatility in the post-announcement period relative to the pre-announcement period for companies traded on the Oslo Stock Exchange in the period 1990–1995. Potential explanations for this phenomenon are tested by relating the observed return volatility to changes in the volatility of the underlying business, the speed at which information is incorporated into stock prices, and the amount of noise in the price process. The empirical analyses reveal no significant changes in either the underlying business variance or the price adjustment coefficients. However, we find a significant decline in the noise term for the largest companies after the earnings release date, supporting the hypothesis that earnings announcements reduce informational asymmetries among investors.     

Earnings and stock returns: evidence from Germany

Past research in the US indicates that stock prices and earnings per share are related. Evidence pertaining to this relationship in other countries is not as extensive. This paper extends two recent studies focusing on Germany, and provides additional information concerning the important informative role played by DVFA earnings. DVFA earnings are a metric jointly constructed by the Deutscher Vereinigung für Finanzanalyse und Anlageberatung and the Schmalenbach-Gesellschaftwith the purpose of providing investors and others interested in share value with a more meaningful measure of economic income than the traditional published earnings figure     

Age-dependent skill formation and returns to education

This study investigates the distribution of returns to investments in cognitive and self-regulatory skills over the life cycle. In our simulation model, the distribution of returns to education results from the interaction of neurobiological and socioeconomic factors in age-dependent skill formation. A novel feature of our extension of the technology of skill formation [Cunha, F., Heckman, J.J., 2007. The technology of skill formation. The American Economic Review 97 (2), 31–47] is a life span model that integrates skill depreciation at older ages and calibrates it to German data. Our evidence quantitatively illustrates the role early childhood plays in the shaping of human capital formation, inequality and economic growth.     

From sending to host societies: immigration in Greece,Ireland and Spain in the 21st century

In a relatively short period of time, new immigration patterns have changed the geography of immigration of the EU15, bringing three old emigration countries, Ireland, Spain and Greece, to the forefront of the new immigration wave. This article studies the analogies and differences of the recent immigration experience of this group of countries, focusing on the demographic characteristics of the immigrants (origin, sex, gender and education), labour market insertion (wages, labour market segregation and quality of matching) and overall economic performance in terms of poverty rates.     

The external returns to education: Evidence from Chinese cities

Following Rauch's seminal study, there has been a growing interest among economists in estimating human capital externalities at the individual level [J. Rauch, Productivity gains from geographic concentration of human capital: Evidence from the cities, Journal of Urban Economics 34 (1993) 380–400]. In this paper, we provide a first set of estimates of the external returns to education in Chinese cities. We find that the external returns are at least as high as the private returns to education. OLS estimates of the external returns range from a low of 4.9% to a high of 6.7%. Two-stage least squares estimates indicate that a one-year increase in city average education could increase individual earnings by between 11 and 13%. We also examine the impact of economic reforms on the external returns to education and find suggestive evidence that economic reforms have raised the external returns to education in Chinese cities.     

Heterogeneous economic returns to higher education: evidence from Italy

This paper uses official Italian micro data and different methods to estimate, in the framework of potential outcomes, the marginal return to college education allowing for heterogeneous returns and for self-selection into higher education. Specifically, the paper is focused on the estimation of heterogeneity of average treatment effect (ATE) on a cohort of college and high school graduates using the 2008 survey on household, income and wealth of the Bank of Italy. Methodologically, this study was carried out by using both propensity-score-based (PS-based) methods and a new approach based on marginal treatment effects (MTE), recently proposed by Heckman and his associates as a useful strategy when the ignorability assumption may be violated. In the PS-based approach, heterogeneous treatment effects are estimated in three different manners: the traditional stratification approach (propensity score strata), the regression adjustment within propensity score strata and, finally, a non-parametric smoothing approach. In the MTE approach, the treatment effect heterogeneity across individuals is estimated in a parametric as well as a semi-parametric strategy. Our empirical analysis shows that the estimated heterogeneity is substantial: following MTE based results (quite representative of other methods) the return to college graduation for a randomly selected individual varies from as high as 20 % (for persons who would add one fifth of wage from graduating college) to as low as ?22 % (for persons who would lose from college graduation), suggesting that returns are higher for individuals more likely to attend college. Furthermore, the results of different methods show very low (point) estimates of ATE: average college returns vary from 3.5 % by the PS-smoothing method to 1.8 % by the parametric MTE method, which also leads a greater treatment effect on treated (5.5 %), a moderate, but significant sorting gain and a negligible selection bias.     

The external returns to education: UK evidence using repeated cross-sections

Augmenting a Mincerian earnings function with industry level data we estimate the external return to schooling for a repeated cross-section of individuals in the UK over the period 1994–2004. For men age 30–49 we find that a one year increase in the industry average level of schooling is associated with an increase in individual wages of 2.6 to 3.9%, around 2 to 3 fifths of the private return to schooling. We illustrate the sensitivity of external return estimates to industry ICT use and union density, and individuals' own level of schooling.     

规模扩张、盈余变异程度与盈余持续性

以我国2007-2014年非金融类A股上市公司为样本,研究发现我国上市公司盈余大幅波动的现象较为普遍,盈余波动影响盈余持续性。进一步通过划分时间窗口、计算盈余变异系数,研究发现过度波动将导致现金盈余的持续性被破坏,在盈余波动较小的时间窗口中应计盈余与现金盈余的持续性没有表现出显著差异。研究表明企业规模大幅度变动是影响同一时间窗口中盈余波动幅度的重要因素:相比行业的平均水平而言,企业在某个年度规模的变化幅度过大或过小都将导致盈余波动加大;当企业规模在某个时间窗口中不存在较大变化时,在该时间窗口前出现的融资可以减弱该时间窗口中的盈余波动。     

业绩预告、业绩“变脸”与审计治理效应

研究发现,注册会计师审计能提高上市公司业绩披露的质量,是会计信息的把关者,注册会计师审计是促使上市公司业绩预告"变脸"发生的重要原因。但同时也发现可能存在上市公司与注册会计师串通的情况,证券监管部门应加强对上市公司业绩预告制度执行情况的检查。     

Earnings inequality in Hungary: A comparative analysis of household and enterprise survey data

This study examines trends in the distribution of gross earnings in Hungary since 1988, using official household budget surveys and enterprise-based earnings surveys. We find a significant growth in inequality since 1988, to levels comparable with western Europe. There is little evidence of a serious discrepancy between the two data sources used.     

After, before and during: returns to education in Hungary (1986–1998)

How valuable are the skills acquired under socialism in a market economy? This paper throws light on this question using unique data covering the years before and during transition (1986–1998) for about 3 million Hungarian wage earners. We find that returns to a year of schooling increased by 75% from 6.4% in 1986 to 11.2% in 1998. We also find that the private sector rewards formal education more than the public and, in terms of gender, although in 1986 women had greater returns to schooling than men, by 1998 this difference had been eliminated.     

Overnight stock returns,intraday returns,and firm-specific investor sentiment

In this study, we propose a new index for measuring firm-specific investor sentiment using overnight and intraday stock returns. We use actual equity data to construct the firm-level investor sentiment index and find that the new index has characteristics expected of a sentiment measure. In addition, we propose a novel sentiment-weighted trading strategy and apply it to momentum and short-term reversal strategies. We find that the sentiment-weighted trading strategy generates better performance in momentum and short-term reversal strategies. The sentiment-weighted trading strategy’s superior performance is evidence that our firm-level investor sentiment index possesses predictive powers with regard to future returns.     

Estimating the returns to education for Australian youth via rank-order instrumental variables

This paper employs the rank-order instrumental variable (IV) procedure of Vella and Verbeek [Vella, F., Verbeek, M., 1997. Using rank order as an instrumental variable: an application to the return to schooling, CES Discussion Paper 97.10, K.U. Leuven.] to estimate the returns to education for Australian youth. The attraction of this approach is that it can account for the endogeneity of schooling in the wage equation via the use of instrumental variables without the use of exclusion restrictions. We find, after accounting for the endogeneity of schooling, that an additional year of schooling is associated with an increase in wages of approximately 8%. Furthermore, we find that the rank-order IV approach is able to identify the presence of endogeneity in this particular empirical example. However, despite this, the adjusted estimate of how schooling affects wage is close to the ordinary least squares (OLS) estimate.     

上市公司控制权转移中的应计项盈余管理及真实盈余管理

本文以2007-2009年发生控制权转移的公司为样本,采用截面Jones模型、DD模型、真实盈余管理模型计算控制权转移公司的盈余管理。研究发现,尽管市场环境(股权分置改革、会计准则)发生改变,上市公司控制权转移中仍然普遍存在盈余管理行为,控制权转移公司的盈余管理程度较高。进一步分析控制权转移特征后发现,协议转让的公司、最终控制人发生变化的公司、董事长发生变更的公司更偏好盈余管理。     

Option values,stipends and the returns to educational investment

In this paper we use a dynamic model of the returns to educational investment to analyze the flow of students moving through the various stages of an educational system. Dropout and graduation rate are linked to the profitability of an educational stage and thus may be influenced by an appropriate choice of stipend level. To determine the effects of changes in stipends on the output of the educational system we hypothesize a probability distribution of abilities in the population. The parameters of this distribution permit the estimation of the effects of stipends on the graduation rate of each educational stage.     

经理人盈余操纵、风险投资与盈余管理方式选择——基于三方博弈模型分析

本文以2002—2016年我国上市公司为研究样本,实证检验在IPO前后等五个重要阶段风险投资支持公司经理人盈余操纵方式的选择策略,同时分析公司盈余管理的阶段性变化特征。研究表明:上市公司在IPO当期的盈余管理程度高于其他各阶段;风险投资支持公司盈余管理程度在IPO前后阶段的动态变化更为显著,公司盈余管理程度在风险投资完全退出后大幅下降,显著低于解禁退出前阶段,成功IPO以及配合股份减持等多重动机促使风险投资对公司盈余管理的监督水平发生波动;公司经理人对风险投资应计盈余管理监督水平调整的敏感度小于对风险投资真实盈余管理监督水平调整的敏感度,公司经理人的盈余操纵方式在各阶段存在应计盈余管理和真实盈余管理交替和并存,但更倾向于选择真实盈余管理。     

Cross listing,disclosure regimes,and trading volume sensitivity to stock returns

In this paper, we propose that investors of cross-listed firms use trading volume to revise their perception of firms’ value. We further propose that firms that cross list from low-disclosure regimes (usually from emerging economies) have higher trading volume sensitivity to returns than those that cross list from high-disclosure regimes (usually from developed economies), as those from low-disclosure regimes have relatively lax and less stringent disclosure requirements. We use a sample of foreign firms that are cross listed in the U.S. as exchange-listed American Depositary Receipts, adopted the international financial reporting standards (formerly international accounting standards), and filed Form 20-F reconciliation with the U.S. Securities and Exchanges Commission during the period of 1994–2005. Using these firms and a matched-sample of U.S. firms based on exchange, industry and firm size, we document results supporting our hypotheses. Our results have implications for policy makers, regulators and academics.