What Plato Knew About Enron

This paper applies Plato’s cave allegory to Enron’s success and downfall. Plato’s famous tale of cave dwellers illustrates the different levels of truth and understanding. These levels include images, the sources of images, and the ultimate reality behind both. The paper first describes these levels of perception as they apply to Plato’s cave dwellers and then provides a brief history of the rise of Enron. Then we apply Plato’s levels of understanding to Enron, showing how the company created its image and presented information to support that image, and how the public eventually emerged from the cave to realize the truth about Enron’s actual accounting practices and financial state, which led to the corporation’s downfall. We find Plato’s allegory both useful in analyzing the relationship between Enron and the public and instructive about the power and moral responsibility of Enron’s executives.     

Auditing Goodwill in the Post‐Amortization Era: Challenges for Auditors

The elimination of goodwill amortization in 2001 brought about significant change in how companies are required to account for goodwill. This change in accounting also brought with it new challenges for auditors, namely evaluating the reasonableness of management's assumptions related to goodwill valuation. In addition to introducing technical challenges, this task is particularly difficult given the misalignment in incentives it creates between managers who likely prefer to avoid recording an impairment and auditors who seek to minimize the bias in management's impairment testing. This study focuses on the consequences of the misaligned incentives that auditors face under the current goodwill assessment process. We find that the decision to record a goodwill impairment is associated with an increase in the probability of auditor dismissal. Consistent with the presence of significant friction with clients, our results also indicate that the likelihood of auditor dismissals is negatively related to the favorability of the impairment decision. Furthermore, we find that companies impairing goodwill prior to dismissing auditors subsequently employ auditors that are, on average, more favorable to clients in their impairment decisions.     

Impact of Auditor Report Changes on Financial Reporting Quality and Audit Costs: Evidence from the United Kingdom

While substantial revisions to auditor reporting requirements are being implemented internationally, the impact of these reforms on financial reporting quality is unknown. We exploit the United Kingdom's recent auditor reporting changes and find that the United Kingdom's new reporting regime is associated with an improvement in financial reporting quality as proxied by significant decreases in absolute abnormal accruals and the propensity to just meet or beat analyst forecasts, and a significant increase in earnings response coefficients. As for audit costs, we do not find a significant change in audit fees or audit delay surrounding the implementation of the new reporting regime. Taken together, the results of this study suggest that new auditor reporting requirements are associated with a significant improvement in financial reporting quality without detecting a significant increase in audit costs.     

Institutionelle Unabhängigkeit als Freiheit vom Recht?

Die politische Unabh?ngigkeit der Europ?ischen Zentralbank wurde in den entsprechenden Vertr?gen gesichert. Wie sieht es aber mit ihrer Rechtsbindung aus? Wer kann die EZB vor Gericht aufgrund von Pfl ichtverletzungen verklagen und ist dies grunds?tzlich überhaupt m?glich? Diesen Fragen geht der Autor hier nach. Er widmet den Beitrag Ernst-Joachim Mestm?cker zu seinem 85. Geburtstag am 25. September.     

理性选择、比较方法与国际政治经济学

国际政治经济学从国际关系中分离之后,汲取了经济学和比较政治学等诸多学科的研究方法,研究方法成为国际政治经济学区别于国际关系其他领域的重要特征,也是区分国际政治经济学国际组织学派和英国学派的重要标准。在国际政治经济学发展过程中常用的两种研究方法是理性选择和比较方法,后者通常可以划分为大样本统计和小样本案例分析。是否采用源自经济学的理性选择和使用大样本统计还是小样本案例分析成为目前国际政治经济学方法论争议的核心问题。国际政治经济学研究应当充分重视研究方法的掌握,作为西方国际政治经济学理论的消费者,要实现同西方学者的对话,我们必须掌握相应的研究方法;研究方法服务于议题设定,任何方法都有其优势和局限性,应当根据自己议题需要谨慎地使用某种或者多种研究方法;应当关注经济学和比较政治学发展的新动向和新发展,这两个学科对国际政治经济学及其研究方法的影响还将继续。     

国际制裁缘何难以奏效?——“非故意后果”的视角

国际制裁一直面临着有效性不足的困境。既有研究将之归因于制裁有效性发挥的三大必要条件——足够的制裁强度、准确的承受主体和可信的制裁承诺——得不到满足,但忽视了制裁的非故意后果的作用。非故意后果是制约国际制裁有效性的重要因素之一,它削弱了制裁方的意志,却增强了被制裁方的抵抗决心;增加了制裁持续时长和制裁成本,却阻碍了主要制裁目标的实现。在既有研究基础上,作者首先提出了一个探讨制裁的非故意后果的分析框架,其次对非故意后果影响制裁有效性的作用机制进行了分析,最后以联合国为例探讨了制裁方在应对非故意后果问题上的尝试。     

An Empirical Analysis of the Demand for Imports in Three CARICOM Member Countries: An Application of the Bounds Test for Cointegration

This paper provides fresh estimates of income and price elasticities of import demand in Guyana, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago using a bounds test for cointegration. In addition, the paper also provides estimates of the consumption, investment, and exports elasticities of import demand. These latter elasticities were all found to be positive and statistically significant with values ranging from 0.16 to 0.55 in the long-run.     

THE EFFECTS OF CORPORATE RESTRUCTURING ON AGGREGATE INDUSTRY SPECIALIZATION

It has been widely argued that the purpose of corporate restructuring during the 1980s was to produce a population of more industry-specialized, competitive firms in response to intensifying global competition. A number of studies show that corporate restructuring resulted in increased corporate focus during the 1980s. However, no study has yet examined whether corporate restructuring resulted in increased specialization at the industry level during the 1980s. This study examines this issue. First, we examine whether or not aggregate industry specialization increased during the 1980s. That is, we ask: did the average firm in any given U.S. industry become more or less specialized to that industry during the 1980s? Second, we examine whether corporate restructuring was a significant determinant of change in aggregate industry specialization during the 1980s. Using a sample of 686 four-digit SIC industries and 64 two-digit industry groups, this study finds that aggregate industry specialization declined very slightly at both the four-digit and two-digit level between 1981 and 1989. This study also finds that sell-offs of establishments through corporate control transactions or interfirm asset sales had no significant effect on aggregate industry specialization.