Is property assessment really essential for taxation? Evaluating the performance of an ‘Alternative Assessment’ method

Many countries evade the formal valuation of real property for taxation purposes by using qualitative and spatial criteria in order to pursue an equitable distribution of burden. This paper evaluates the performance of a prototypical setup as such, by analyzing the relationship between property value, household income and the actual tax paid, in the exact framework of which the qualitative criteria are set to determine tax assessment. Drawing on detailed data from the Israeli Household Expenditure Surveys 1997–2005, the strong correlation between the three variables is evident. Yet, the limited differences in rates, compared with large variation in property value, make it regressive. Policy implications are relevant for many other countries using non-ad valorem taxation.     

Responsible Leadership for Multinational Enterprises in Bottom of Pyramid Countries: The Knowledge of Local Managers

The gulf between multinational enterprises’ focus on high income countries and the reality of 80% of the world living in developing, bottom of pyramid (Hahn, J Bus Ethics 84:313–324, 2009) economies could magnify the anti-globalisation movement and political backlashes in the twenty-first century. The global financial crisis of 2008 and 2009 has increased such social tensions throughout the world and creates greater challenges for, responsible leadership. In this conceptual article, the authors analyse the value and identity of local managers, and the liability of foreignness caused by over-reliance on expatriate managers and under-reliance on local managers in bottom of pyramid countries (Hahn, 2009). It is argued that multinational enterprises need to assess local managers’ knowledge and contributions as having not only operational and market value, but also institutional value, such as access to local knowledge and local social capital; such a holistic approach will ensure fairer, equal treatment of all managers in the multinational enterprise. Responsible leadership in the twenty-first century requires a greater appreciation of local managers’ institutional value and the overcoming of any psychological distance towards local managers of bottom of pyramid countries.     

Import Demands for Norwegian Farmed Atlantic Salmon and Wild Pacific Salmon in North America,Japan and the EC

Import demands for Atlantic and Pacific salmon are estimated for Japan, the European Community and North America. Cross-price elasticities indicate that wild high-valued Pacific salmon (chinook. coho and sockeye) and farmed Atlantic salmon are substitute goods in the marketplace. This finding implies that movements in the prices of both fanned and wild salmon can be caused by supply or demand changes in the market for either type of salmon. This result in turn has important implications for future markets and prices of fanned and wild salmon in Canada and the United States La demande à l'importation pour le saunion de l'Atlantique et du Pacifique esl eslimée pour le Japon, la CEE et l'Amerique du Nord. Les valeurs d'elaslicité croisée montrenl que le saumon “sauvage” du Pacifique hautement prisé (chinook, coho et sockeve) et le saumon d'elevage de l'Atlantique peuvent se substituer l'un à l'autre sur le manhé. Cette consultation signifie quedes mouvements dans les prix des deux types de saunion peuvent étre causés par des fluctuation de l'offre et de la demande affectant l'un ou l'autre type. Cela comporte d'imponantes répercussions pour I'avenir sur le manhé el sur les prix du saumon tant sauvage que d‘élevage au Canada et aux États-Unis     

Altera:ROI说了算！

Altera是市场容量相对较小却又十分重要的可编程市场上两家占有统治地位的公司之一。虽然PLD的销售额名列第2,但是Altera已经从首要竞争者赛灵思公司手中抢夺了一定的市场份额,这部分地要归功于Altera不断探求什么才是FPGAs和ASICs在当今工业中的合适定位？EDN执行主编Ron Wilson和Altera总裁兼首席执行官John Daane进行了一次对话,后者的经历给予他一个独一无二的窗口来观察半导体工艺、全球芯片工业和系统设计之间的交互性。     

A demand‐based perspective on sustainable competitive advantage

We develop an approach to analyzing the sustainability of competitive advantage that emphasizes demand‐side factors. We extend the added‐value approach to business strategy by introducing an explicit treatment of how firms create value for consumers. This allows us to characterize how consumer heterogeneity and marginal utility from performance improvements on the demand side interact with resource heterogeneity and improving technologies on the supply side. Using this approach, we address a variety of questions including whether technology substitutions will be permanent or transitory; the sequence in which new technologies attack different market segments; how rents from different types of resources change over time; whether decreasing marginal utility and imitation give rise to similar rent profiles; the extent of synergies within a firm's resource portfolio; the emergence of new generic strategies; and the conditions that support strategic diversity in a market. Our focus on consumer utility and value creation complements the traditional focus in the strategy literature on competition and value capture. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Board 3.0: What the Private‐Equity Governance Model Can Offer Public Companies∗

The authors view board structures as an adaptive institution that responds to the key challenges faced by public companies: helping management solve the problems of production and organization of large‐scale enterprise; limiting managerial agency costs; serving as a delegated monitor of the firm's compliance obligations; and responding to the governance environment of changing shareholder ownership patterns. U.S. company board structures are shown to have evolved over time, often through discontinuous lurches, as particular functions have waxed and waned in importance. This article is part of a larger project that traces two iterations of the public company board, what the authors call Board 1.0 (the “advisory board”) and Board 2.0 (the “monitoring board”). The authors argue in particular that Board 2.0, as embedded in both current practice and regulation, now fails the functional fit test for many companies. First, it does not scale to match the dramatic increase in the size and complexity of many modern public corporations. Second, at a time of reconcentrated ownership achieved through institutional investors and increased activism, it does not have the expertise and commitment needed to resolve the tension between managerial or market myopia, or “short‐termism,” and managerial “hyperopia.” This article holds out an optional alternative, Board 3.0, which would bring to the public company board some strategies used by private equity firms for their portfolio company boards. Such “Portco” boards consist of directors who are “thickly informed,” “heavily resourced,” and “intensely interested.” Bringing such “empowered directors” to public company boards could facilitate evolution of the public company board model in response to dramatic changes in the corporate business environment. The authors also suggest possible routes for implementing Board 3.0, including the enlisting of PE firms as “relational investors” that would have both capacity and incentives to engineer changes in board structure.     

FOREIGN EXCHANGE RATE EXPECTATIONS: SURVEY AND SYNTHESIS

Abstract.  This paper reviews the empirical literature on foreign exchange rate expectations. Prominent issues are the forward premium puzzle, expectations formation in financial markets, heterogeneity of expectations, market microstructure, time-varying risk premiums and forecast performance. Although much has been learned in each field, this survey highlights the areas of research in which our understanding of the mechanism of exchange rate expectations is still incomplete. Our survey suggests that both irrational expectations and time-varying risk premiums account for the forward discount anomaly, that long-term expectations reverse towards their long-run equilibrium values and that heterogeneous behaviour of market participants has the potential of explaining some of the empirical regularities in the international finance literature.     

Does Meeting Earnings Expectations Matter? Evidence from Analyst Forecast Revisions and Share Prices

This paper investigates whether the market rewards firms meeting current period earnings expectations, and whether any such reward reflects the implications of meeting expectations in the current period for future earnings or reflects a distinct market premium. We document that abnormal annual returns are significantly greater for firms meeting expectations, controlling for the information in the current year's earnings. We then test whether firms meeting expectations experience higher returns simply because their expected future earnings are also higher. We find firms meeting expectations have significantly higher earnings forecasts and realized earnings than firms that do not. We find that controlling for these higher future earnings, firms meeting expectations in one or two years do not receive a greater valuation than their fundamentals would suggest. We find, however, that the market assigns a higher value to firms that meet expectations consistently, controlling for an estimate of the firm's fundamental value.     

Preservation or Conversion? Valuation and Evaluation of a Mangrove forest in the Philippines

Mangrove ecosystems are rapidly declining in many parts of the world. This has resulted in the loss of important environmental and economic products and services including forest products, flood mitigation and nursery grounds for fish. The aquaculture industry was the single biggest threat to mangroves in the Philippines until 1981 when conversion of the remaining mangrove stands was prohibited by law. However, the decreasing yield from capture fisheries is putting pressure for the re-examination of this policy. To understand the importance of mangroves, insight is needed into the value of products and services provided is needed. This article compares the costs and benefits of mangrove preservation with those generated by alternative uses such as aquaculture and forestry. Equity and sustainability objectives are taken into account, in addition to economic efficiency and analyzed according to the perspectives of the different types of decision makers involved.