The Effects of Foreign Direct Investment Colocation: Differences Between Manufacturing and Service Firms

Colocation may result in positive performance effects because of agglomeration benefits or in negative outcomes because of fiercer competition. Using the notions of industrial organization economics, this study offers a comprehensive industry‐specific analysis on the performance effects of international colocation. We predict that bigger firms will benefit more from colocation of foreign firms in a host country. Considering industry and home country peers, the analysis suggests that positive effects dominate for manufacturing firms whereas service firms are negatively affected. However, these effects are mitigated by a firm's size in a location. A large‐scale empirical analysis on firm‐level data supports the hypotheses. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Lachen als Lernstoff

Zusammenfassung  Nicht nur zu Karneval — Heiterkeit kann heilsam sein, das zeigen inzwischen sogar wissenschaftliche Studien. Die Clowns-Visite hilft kleinen Patienten. Aber auch wir Pflegekr?fte selbst sollten mehr l?cheln als l?stern.     

Research Productivity in Business Economics: A Reply

Abstract. We reply to a comment by Diamantopoulos and Wagner questioning the face validity of our research productivity ranking for the field 'Marketing and Sales'.     

An examination of the values that motivate socially conscious and frugal consumer behaviours

This article extends social psychological research on the motivations for sustainable consumption from the predominant domain of ecologically conscious consumer behaviour to socially conscious and frugal consumer behaviours. A UK‐based survey study examines relationships between socially conscious and frugal consumer behaviours and Schwartz's value types, personal and socio‐political materialism, and demographics among the general public. Socially conscious consumer behaviour, like its ecological counterpart, appears to be an expression of pro‐social values. In contrast, frugal consumer behaviour relates primarily to low personal materialism and income constraints. As such, it does not yet represent a fully developed moral challenge to consumerism.     

Micro-Entrepreneurship in Niger: Factors Affecting the Success of Women Street Food Vendors

Micro-entrepreneurship in the informal sector plays a vital role in generating employment and income in West Africa. In this article, the authors examine business success factors for micro-entrepreneurs involved in the production and sale of street foods in Niger, drawing on the resource-based view theory. Business success was measured by size of firm and vendor's perception of enterprise growth. Their results indicate that business experience is an important success factor, while the need for cash is a constraint for business success. A rare resource, limited access to financial assets translates into limited opportunities for growth of these informal micro-enterprises into viable businesses.     

Preference Erosion and Multilateral Trade Liberalization

Because of concern that tariff reductions in Organisation forEconomic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries willtranslate into worsening export performance for the least developedcountries, the erosion of trade preferences may become a stumblingblock for multilateral trade liberalization. An econometricanalysis of actual preference use shows that preferences areunderused because of administrative burdens—estimatedto be equivalent to an average of 4 percent of the value ofgoods traded. To quantify the maximum scope for preference erosion,the compliance cost estimates are used in a model-based assessmentof the impact of full elimination of OECD tariffs. Taking intoaccount administrative costs eliminates erosion costs in theaggregate and greatly reduces the losses for countries mostaffected by preference erosion.     

Import prices,income, and inequality

We compare three theoretical explanations for the positive empirical relationship between importer income per capita and traded goods prices. A first explanation is that consumers with higher incomes demand higher quality goods with higher prices. A second explanation is that wealthier people exhibit an increased willingness to pay for necessary goods as more goods enter the consumption set in a hierarchic demand system, and can thus be charged higher markups. A third explanation is that consumers with higher incomes are more finicky regarding their preferred variety in an ideal variety framework and can thus be charged higher markups. We discriminate between these three theories by focusing on the effect of income inequality on trade prices. Based on a large dataset with bilateral HS6 level data on 1260 final goods categories from more than 100 countries between 2000 and 2004, we find a highly significant negative effect of income inequality on unit values. This contradicts both the demand for quality and finickyness theories, while providing support for the increased willingness to pay theory linked to hierarchic demand. These findings on income inequality do not falsify the quality expansion model and the ideal variety model per se. However, the results do argue for place of importance of hierarchic demand.     

Do natural resources define convergence clubs? Empirical evidence from the Kazakh regions

This paper deals with the hypothesis that natural resources are important in forming convergence clubs. We check this hypothesis by applying a dependence and an endowment measure of natural resource abundance and a regression tree analysis. The results indicate that for the Kazakh regions natural resources do indeed play an important role in forming convergence clubs. It is further shown that natural resource endowment rather than resource dependence determines initial conditions and thereby convergence clubs.     

Sovereign debt assistance and democratic decision-making

Organizational reforms stimulating democratic decision-making play a role in the economic effectiveness of concessional debt and debt relief. Effectiveness is defined as the increase in project approval produced by debt assistance. This claim is supported by a theoretic model illustrating the role of democratic decision-making in increasing lending as well as in determining the effectiveness of debt assistance. Using the framework of group decision-making in a fixed-size committee, we suggest a novel explanation to the advantage of conditioning debt assistance on organizational reforms that target the decision-making structure in organizations. The results imply that if the aid organization can affect the level of democratization in organizations, it can exploit its advantage and set the debt assistance that induces the maximal increase in project approval. We derive conditions under which organizational reforms that impose various forms of democratic norms in decision-making are important for increasing the effectiveness of debt assistance. We also point to the case where replacing an autocratic decision maker can cause debt assistance effectiveness to decline.