National Policy of Tourism in Brazil From Municipalisation to Regionalization

The decade of 1980 has been a time of changes to the world and also in Brazil. The fall of the Berlin Wall and the globalization are phenomena which marked the late 20th century. Brazil was part of this scenario as it went through structural changes, including Real Plan, which brought stability along with the possibility of growth and development. Tourism is enveloped by neoliberalism as a way of attracting investments, investors, better infrastructures, and changing the country＇s image. As far as Brazilian public policies of tourism are concerned, there are two points that constitute the objective of this present work： to analyze the national Program of Municipalisation of Tourism （PMNT） and the Program of Regionalization of Tourism （PRT） considering the context of post-democratization in Brazil and its influences on the organization of national tourism. This analysis has been focused on the content of constitutional documents which have oriented tourism public policy, as well as authors who investigate this theme. From a conceptual map, the relations between political context and the moment when documents were elaborated have been built up. By the end of this work it will be possible to point out the prevalence of the neoliberal model, along with the interest of market agents over Brazilian touristic context.     

Earnings management strategies in Brazil: Determinant costs and temporal sequence

This paper describes a study that analyses earnings management strategies involving accounting choices or real activities in Brazil. An analysis is conducted of the relationships between earnings management strategies their determinant costs and of the temporal sequence in which these management strategies are applied. The results of empirical tests indicate that adoption of management strategies is dependent on their relative costs. There is a temporal relationship between the two types of strategies for manipulation of year-end results, with real activities preceding accounting choices. It was also observed that the level of manipulation by accruals (real activities) reduced (increased) after adoption of the IFRS in Brazil.     

International specialization and structural change in the Swedish Manufacturing Industry, 1969–1992

International Specialization and Structural Change in the Swedish Manufacturing Industry, 1969–1992. — The increasing trade orientation of Swedish manufacturing 1969–1992 was mainly caused by increasing intraindustry specialization with most industries. Intraindustry specialization was found to be related positively to the skill intensity of the industry and negatively to average plant size and the incidence of trade barriers. The paper evaluates the links between specialization and inter-as well as intraindustry structure. It was found that changing patterns of relative international competitiveness among industries accounted for more than half of the total interindustry structural change in employment in 1969–1992. The mean plant size tends to increase with intraindustry specialization.     

Remittances and Development in Latin America

Flows of workers’ remittances have become a major source of external finance for developing countries and are particularly important in Latin America and the Caribbean, where they are estimated to have reached $40 billion in 2004. Not surprisingly, academics, policymakers and development practitioners in general have been devoting increasing attention to the potential development impact that these flows may have on receiving countries. This paper contributes to this debate along four dimensions. First, it reviews the evolution of remittances flows to Latin America, using Balance of Payments data, and compares these statistics with estimates of remittances income based on Household Surveys. Second, the paper describes the varying profile of remittances recipients in ten Latin American countries. Third, the paper reviews the few macro‐ and microeconomic studies that have estimated the impact of remittances on poverty and inequality. Finally, the paper expands some of the existing works to investigate the extent to which that impact is different in Latin America and varies across countries in the region.     

The Working Curve and Commodity Storage under Backwardation

There remains controversy over whether the empirical curve relating intertemporal commodity price spreads and stocks, originally drawn by Holbrook Working in 1933 (i.e., the Working curve), is a valid stylized fact in commodity markets. The core of the controversy is the portion of the curve representing commodity stocks under backwardation. In this article we analyze the original data used by Working, plus more disaggregated numbers. We find that the Working curve is indeed valid. The diversity of stockholders and different stockholding motives most likely explain the empirical Working curve relationship.