Telecommunications and energy policy

As the energy problems of the West continue, an increasing amount of attention is focused on methods of energy conservation. The authors develop an ‘activist’ view of the role of telecommunications as a component of energy-conservation policy. Advanced telecommunications offer an alternative to many forms of travel. The results of research aimed at quantifying and comparing the direct energy consumption of travel and telecommunications are presented. Telecommunications developments can induce changes in business organisation, transport, urban development, and environmental quality, as well as increased freedom of location. The authors consider whether such changes are feasible and desirable.     

The anti-export bias in commercial policies and export performance : Some evidence from the recent Brazilian experience

Zusammenfassung Die Benachteiligung der Exporte durch eine protektionistische Handelspolitik und die Entwicklung der Exporte: Neuere brasilianische Erfahrungen. — Die Ergebnisse dieses Aufsatzes sind zwar auf Brasilien beschr?nkt, erh?hen aber das immer gr?βer werdende empirische Wissen darüber, daβ eine protektionistische Handelspolitik das Wachstum der Exporte behindert. Auβerdem scheinen die Ausfuhren auf einen Wandel in der Politik zu reagieren, wenn sich die Diskriminierung im Auβenhandel aufgrund wirtschaftspolitischer Maβnahmen verst?rkt. L?nder, die ihren Export steigern m?chten, sollten sowohl die Protektion ihres heimischen Marktes als auch die direkten Maβnahmen zur F?rderung des Exports überprüfen.

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Résumé Le biais anti-exportatrice en politiques commerciales et le développement des exportations: Quelque évidence de la récente expérience brésilienne. — Les résultats présentés dans cet article bienque limités au Brésil supportent l’évidence empirique accroissante qui indique que les politiques commerciales protectionnistes empêchent la croissance des exportations. De plus, les exportations semblent être sensitives aux mesures politiques qui changent le biais commercial des incitations des politiques économiques. Les pays qui désirent d’augmenter leurs exportations devraient évaluer leur protection du marché local aussi bien que des politiques qui stimulent les exportations d’une manière directe.

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Resumen El sesgo anti-exportador de políticas comerciales y el comportamiento de las exportaciones: algunas evidencias de la experiencia brasilera reciente. — Los resultados que se presentan en este artículo, aunque reducidos al Brasil, contribuyen a la creciente evidencia empfrica que indica que las políticas comerciales proteccionistas impiden el crecimiento de las exportaciones. Más aún, las exportaciones parecen responder a cambios de política que alteran el sesgo comercial de los incentivos de política económica. Los países que buscan mejorar el comportamiento de sus exportaciones deberían evaluar la protección a su mercado doméstico como también las políticas directamente relacionadas con incentivos a la exportatión.

     

Executive preferences for governance modes and exchange partners: An information economics perspective

This study investigates how executives address information asymmetry and adverse selection surrounding international joint ventures (IJVs) and acquisitions. We argue that executives can address such exchange hazards not only through their governance decisions, as prior research indicates, but also through their selection of exchange partners. Our experimental design complements prior research on firms' governance choices in three ways: (1) by incorporating multiple potential exchange partners rather than taking a single partner as given for a realized transaction; (2) by accommodating multiple potential entry modes to address interdependencies across governance structures; and (3) by providing direct evidence on executives' assessments of IJVs and acquisitions. We join together organizational governance research and decision‐making research on IJV partner selection, two literatures that have largely developed separately. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Enclosing the Commons in Honduras

We are witnessing in the 21^st century a dramatic new wave of enclosures of common resources and traditional or indigenous landholdings, as small agrarian producers across the global South are losing their land to large corporations and landowners, especially in the agribusiness and extractive industries. In the context of competing theories about land grabbing and the global commons, this article will offer a detailed empirical account of the strategies by which capital has seized land from smallholders and communities in Honduras, with emphasis on the wide variety of tactics that are used to both grab the land itself and also to maintain an aura of legality around a process that often includes at least the threat of violence.     

Funding conditions and insurance stock returns: Do insurance stocks really benefit from rising interest rate regimes?

We examine funding conditions and U.S. insurance company stock returns. Although constrained funding conditions, signaled by restrictive Federal Reserve monetary policy, correspond with increases in the future payouts of fixed‐income securities held by insurance firms and potentially provide value through the liability side of insurer balance sheets, they also decrease the values of securities currently held in insurer portfolios. Prior research finds that restrictive policy has a negative effect on equity returns in general. Our results suggest the negative impacts of constrained funding environments outweigh the potential positives, as insurance company stock returns are significantly lower during periods of constrained funding. This effect varies within a given funding state and also across insurer type. The effect is strongest during the first 3 months of a constrained funding environment and for life and health insurers—insurer types with longer portfolio durations. For property and liability (P&L) insurers, lower stock return performance only exists in the first 3 months of a constrained funding environment. In the subsequent months, P&L insurers actually have higher stock returns during constrained periods, consistent with their typically shorter duration asset portfolios, which are more quickly rolled over into new higher‐yielding securities.     

Did the PCAOB's 2009 Office Expansion Improve Audit Quality?*

We investigate whether the PCAOB's decision to expand the number and location of its inspection offices in 2009 improved the reliability of US audits. We use a difference-in-differences empirical design to consider the impacts of the expansion on audit quality and find that audit quality significantly improved following the PCAOB's expansion in markets where new offices opened relative to markets without an office opening. We find that the improvement in audit quality appears to be driven by auditors' reaction to real changes in PCAOB oversight and that triennially inspected auditors appear to be impacted the most by this office expansion. Our findings provide new insights into the PCAOB's operational decision-making and suggest that the regulator's additional investment in audit oversight was effective in improving audit quality.     

Impacts of news media coverage on Canadian medical crowdfunding campaigns

While donation-based crowdfunding for health-related purposes raises hundreds of millions of dollars yearly, most campaigns fail to meet their fundraising goals. Crowdfunding campaigners are advised to seek traditional news media coverage of their campaigns to increase donor interest and fundraising success. In this study, we seek to better understand what happens to donor behavior via donation-based crowdfunding campaigns after they receive news media coverage. While research has focused on the impact of social media sharing on donation-based crowdfunding, academic analyses of the impact of news media coverage is largely speculative. We searched the Newsstream and Factiva databases for Canadian news coverage of domestic donation-based health-related crowdfunding campaigns. This news coverage was paired with the crowdfunding campaign reported on in the story. Campaign text and daily fundraising totals and donor amounts were recorded for the 7 days before and after publication of the news article. The authors identified emergent patterns in this data around the amplification of personal information from the crowdfunding campaign to a wider audience and inclusion of new personal details. This process identified 17 relevant pairs of news stories and crowdfunding campaigns over a review period of just under 5 months in 2021–22. These campaigns raised a total of CAD$443,134 (median CAD$20,030) out of a total goal of CAD$772,500 (median CAD$40,000) or 57.4% of the requested funds. Median campaign donations and donor numbers increased for the 3 days following publication of the news article. Our exploratory analysis shows a relationship between crowdfunding campaigns that receive news media coverage and the numbers of donations and total amount donated shortly after this coverage. Campaigners may feel pressure to participate in news media coverage in order to reach their fundraising goals. Media coverage has implications for campaign recipient privacy and the equitable distribution of health-related funding. This exploratory analysis establishes the need for additional research on this topic.     

Regulatory capital and asset risk transfer

We explore whether life insurers use a unique reinsurance arrangement to manage assets tied to their regulatory capital. Typical reinsurance allows insurers to reduce their regulatory capital by transferring liabilities (reserves), and the associated assets, to reinsurers. With modified coinsurance (ModCo), insurers maintain control of their liabilities and assets while transferring regulatory capital requirements to the reinsurer. Holding fixed an insurer's reported capital, we find that ModCo allows insurers to report higher risk-based capital ratios. Insurers with ModCo are less likely to fire sale downgraded bonds. We also find suggestive evidence of regulatory arbitrage, as most ModCo is purchased from reinsurers in countries with low capital requirements or within the same insurance group.     

Regulation,entrepreneurship, and firm size

Journal of Regulatory Economics - We empirically investigate the theory that regulatory growth within an industry disproportionately burdens small businesses relative to their larger competitors....