Lexical Meaning and Discourse Understanding——Make Use of Lexical Contextual Clues to Get a Comprehensive Understanding of Discourses

Discourse teaching is the key point and goal in reading instruction. And vocabulary is the critical element that affects readers’ speed and their comprehension of the reading material. Therefore,less time should be spent in vocabulary teaching,the best learning skills should be employed to achieve better learning effects. So,one of the important issue in English teaching is to foster students’ guess ability of English words. This thesis is aiming to guide the students to find clues in English reading through the analysis of the function of the contextual clues in discourse understanding to improve the comprehensive ability.     

What Does a High School Diploma Get You? Employment, Race, and the Transition to Adulthood

We compare the employment of African American and white youth as they transition to adulthood from age 18 to 22, focusing on high school graduates and high school dropouts who did not attend college. Using OLS and hazard models, we analyze the relative employment rates, and employment consistency, stability, and timing, controlling for a number of factors including family income, academic aptitude, prior work experience, and neighborhood poverty. We find white high school graduates work significantly more than all other youth on most measures; African American high school graduates work as much and sometimes less than white high school dropouts; African American dropouts work significantly less than all other youth. Findings further suggest that the improved labor market participation associated with a high school diploma is higher over time for African Americans than for white youth.     

Once more on the Gerschenkron effect — a reply to Larsen and Nilsson

Abstract

One general conclusion from my analysis of prices and volume in Sweden's commodity production during the last decade of the nineteenth and the first two thirds of the twentieth century, was that expansive commodities, branches or sectors were becoming less expensive, that is, they were characterized by falling relative prices.¹ Even if this had been a dominant, long-run phenomenon, in certain periods it was quite pronounced. These variations can be traced to the entrepreneurial activity, the introduction and diffusion of innovations and the like, which markedly have reinforced the correlation between falling relative prices and volume growth.     

Do Shareholders Assess Managers' Use of Accruals to Manage Earnings as a Negative Signal of Trustworthiness Even When Its Outcome Serves Shareholders' Interests?*

We examine how shareholders' trust in managers is affected by (i) the outcome of earnings management (inconsistent vs. consistent with shareholders' interests) and (ii) the method of earnings management (accruals vs. real methods). Using a controlled experiment, we predict and find that trust is impaired when the outcome of earnings management suggests that managers have put their interests above shareholders' interests and/or when the method of earnings management suggests that managers misreported the firm's economic performance. We argue that shareholders assess managers putting their interests above shareholders' interests as a signal of untrustworthiness because it involves a transfer of the firm's resources away from shareholders to managers. We argue that shareholders also assess managers' use of accruals to manage earnings as a signal of untrustworthiness because, in this instance, managers misreport the firm's economic performance. Finally, we show that trust mediates the combined effects of the outcome of earnings management and the method of earnings management on investment decisions. Our study incrementally contributes to the literature by highlighting the adverse implications of managers' use of accruals to manage earnings even when its outcome serves shareholders' interests.     

Evaluation of Chinese higher education by TOPSIS and IEW — The case of 68 universities belonging to the Ministry of Education in China

This study uses techniques for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) combined with information entropy weight (IEW), to investigate the performance of 68 Chinese universities belonging to the Ministry of Education (MOE) from 2002 to 2011. Assessments in teaching & research, and development ability reflect the short-term and long-term performance respectively. Development ability, consisting of human & physical capital, is an essential determinant, which is hardly found in the former evaluation. The performance of universities suggests that current fiscal expenditure allocation mechanism on Chinese universities is unreasonable, and Chinese higher education as a whole is inefficient. Furthermore, the performance of universities within the eastern region is better than the universities within the central and western regions, and that of the comprehensive universities is better than most specialist universities. Research and development ability largely determine the overall performance of universities. And the superiority and inferiority still co-exist in Chinese universities.     

What happens to Japan if China catches a cold?: A causal analysis of Chinese growth and Japanese growth

In this paper, we conduct an empirical study to investigate the directionality of the dependence between the Chinese economy and the Japanese economy. Taking a probabilistic causal approach, we infer the causal dependence among the Japanese economy and the Chinese economy based on observed data. We find evidence that the Chinese growth has both contemporaneous and temporal causal effects on Japanese growth, though the effect is very small. We did not find any evidence that the Japanese growth might have temporal or contemporaneous causal effect on Chinese growth.     

Is China up to the Test？ A Review of Theories and Priorities for Education Investment for a Modern China

This paper reviews the key theories relating to the role of education in economic development and social change and how education, as a critical component of total factor productivity, contributes to sustained economic growth. It examines how China ＂s education policy reflects the country＇s unique dual economy. Focusing on the post-reform period, the paper contends that while progress has been made, there are risks to China＇s future growth prospects from failing to reap the benefits of sound education policy. It argues that if the Chinese education system is to continue to be a driver of rather than a drain on economic growth, and if China is to successfully manage its transition towards more inclusive, sustainable and equitable growth, reforms will be needed to improve the quality of education at all levels and to create an environment in which China＇s extensive human capital is duly recognized and respected. Crucially, the education system should be transformed to ensure it promotes a comprehensive range of human capabilities, including those that go beyond the part humans play in augmenting production possibilities.     

The application of Participative Management training and its relationship to Thai cultural values： Is there a good fit？

This study examines the relationship between training in participative management （PM） and work-related cultural values and managerial attitudes toward PM. The sample 127 male and 117 female managerial employees at an international Thai corporation. The results indicated that contrary to expectations, paternalism is positively related to PM. The results are discussed in relation to Thai work-related cultural values and what may still be unknown about applying western management practices in other cultures. The results do not fit with western perceptions of what are appropriate relationships between cultural values and PM. The paper concludes with recommendations for future research.     

Is there a Pareto solution to the misaligned incentives and competing objectives of water grabbing in the Lao PDR?

‘Water grabbing’ in the Mekong River has been accelerating at a feverish pace. The stakes have never been greater. Talks between international socio‐environment groups, public–private dam partners, and Mekong countries are increasingly fractious and dysfunctional. The departure of the multilateral agencies, such as the World Bank and Asian Development Bank, from large‐scale infrastructure funding has allowed the private sector access to investment opportunities in hydropower, and as a result facilitated the promise of rapid hydropower growth in the Lao PDR. The antagonism of international social and environmental groups towards these dams is due primarily to the transboundary impacts of multiple constructions and modifications to the Mekong. We posit that the dilemma in the negotiations over the Mekong dams in Lao can be best understood from the perspective of misaligned incentives‐objectives. We examine the major stakeholders involved in contractual negotiations and group parties according to their aligned incentives‐objectives. We employ a criteria trade‐off framework to show that if talks take place over two rounds under particular rules, compromises of objectives and trading of incentives are possible. We stipulate that a Pareto‐optimal solution is indeed possible—if a non‐partisan, authoritative agent with retributory powers to design and enforce corrective incentives for all stakeholders takes part in both negotiation rounds.     

Structural reform,intra-regional trade,and medium-term growth prospects of East Asia and the Pacific—Perspectives from a new multi-region model

This paper analyses the potential benefits from reforms aimed at promoting domestic demand in the region, as well as the effects of slower growth in the US and the G3 (US, euro area, and Japan) on the members of the Executives’ Meeting of East Asian-Pacific Central Bank (EMEAP). The analysis is based on simulation scenarios using an expanded version of the IMF Global Integrated Monetary and Fiscal (GIMF) model which is particularly useful for conducting medium-term policy analysis, as it incorporates rich layers of intra-regional trade, production, and demand allowing the transmission mechanism of structural reforms and external shocks to be fully articulated. The simulation results show that reforms to rebalance the pattern of demand in regional economies (such as Mainland China) more towards domestic demand could entail non-negligible benefits for the EMEAP. These benefits could be even larger for those economies that more flexibly adjust to the shift in China's trade pattern. The simulation results also demonstrate that structural reforms in EMEAP economies will allow them to reduce vulnerabilities to economic downturns in major economies.     

Dual Labour Market Intermediaries in Italy: How to Lay off “Lemons”—Thereby Creating a Problem of Adverse Selection

Using longitudinal data from the Bank of Italy that cover the period from 2004 to 2014, this paper investigates the wage- and career implications of temporary jobs across the entire wage profile via unconditional quantile regression models and dynamic panel probit models. Building on Autor’s contributions, we consider temporary jobs to be a Labour Market Intermediary that deals with job-matching problems, such as information asymmetries, search cost reductions, worker-side adverse selection, and pay-productivity gaps. Assuming that wage is a proxy for workers’ productivity, we examine the chances that temporary workers who are located in different quantiles of wage distribution have of making the transition towards a stable employment position in the primary labour market. Results clearly indicate that temporarily employed individuals suffer significant wage- and career penalties. Not only are these individuals overly concentrated in the lowest decile of wage distribution, but the career penalty associated with temporary jobs also remains stable independently of the wage/productivity quantile to which the workers belong. If firms use FTC or TWA at all, they do so to remove less productive workers, whose work contract is not renewed once expired. In light of this evidence, it is clear that the hypothesis—proposed in the economic literature—that temporary employment contracts might serve as a screening tool to identify the most productive workers who would then be offered a stable position in the primary labour market does not hold in the highly dualised labour market of Southern Europe.     

The entry price system for fresh fruit and vegetable exports from China to the EU — Breaking a fly on the wheel?

China's exports of apples and pears to the EU have increased substantially, although the EU production of apples and pears is protected by the EU entry price system (EPS), aiming to protect EU producers against international competition by restricting imports below a minimum import price. This study investigates the relevance of the EPS for Chinese exports of apples and pears to the EU accounting for changes over time and seasonal variation. Our results suggest that the high relevance of the EPS for apples originating in China was of temporary nature, whereas the relevance of the EPS for pears originating in China is of a more general nature. In addition, the relevance of the EPS varies seasonally. Finally, we find that the production of pears in China is more competitive than the production of apples vis-à-vis the EU. Therefore, China's fresh fruit and vegetable (FFV) producers would benefit more from an improved EU market access for pears than for apples. Thus, China should put more effort in negotiating improved EU market access conditions for pears rather than for apples.