A NOTE ON PRICING OF PRODUCT QUALITY FOR STATUS CONCERNS

The paper analyses the optimal pricing of the product quality scheme when concerns for relative standing exist among consumers. We demonstrate that if the proportion of high‐value consumers is over (respectively, under) 1/2 of the total consumers, a firm has an incentive to select a large (respectively, small) quality gap among products. Therefore, there exists a cut‐off level for status concerns, which eliminates quality differences, and the firm assigns the same quality to all the consumers. These results indicate that consumers’ qualities will reflect distortions at the top and bottom. Accordingly, the firm's profit depends on which consumer category is larger.     

系统论视角下中国特色领导者素质研究

领导职能从属于管理系统,领导职能的发挥对整个管理系统良性发展有着重要的意义。领导者是否具备应有的素质就成为领导职能发挥的关键,进而影响和制约着整个管理系统。领导者应具备良好的政治素质、知识素质、能力素质和心理素质,不断拓展自身的素质和能力。     

公司社会声望与高管薪酬:公共服务抑或职业声誉

本文基于“隐性—显性”契约激励研究范式,探讨公司社会声望对高管薪酬的影响以及作用机制。本文选取2009—2017年间的非金融A股上市公司为样本,研究发现,拥有较高社会声望的公司,其高管显性薪酬较低。具体而言,公共地位较高的国有企业、具有较高市场声誉的民营上市公司,其高管薪酬平均而言分别比其他上市公司低4.97%和6.30%。进一步地,我们发现公司声望对我国高管显性薪酬契约存在两种作用机制:一方面,公共地位较高的国有企业,可以为高管带来较高的社会声誉和社会认可,满足了“公共服务”类高管的社会声望偏好,从而降低了显性薪酬的支付水平;另一方面,市场声誉较高的民营企业,可以为高管带来较高的职业声誉和未来职业利益,符合“以商为荣”类高管的社会声望偏好,使高管愿意接受较低的显性薪酬。本文的结论为公司声望作为一种有价值的资源,可以对高管显性薪酬形成议价能力提供了重要证据,揭示了公司声望对高管显性契约激励的影响路径;同时,为国有企业高管薪酬契约设计以及激励机制提供了一定启示。     

Social entrepreneurship as an essentially contested concept: Opening a new avenue for systematic future research

Social entrepreneurship has emerged as an active area of practice and research within the last three decades. Nevertheless, in spite of its growing popularity, scholars and practitioners are far from reaching a consensus as to what social entrepreneurship actually means. This has resulted in a number of different definitions and approaches within the field of social entrepreneurship. The purpose of this article is to shed light on the ongoing contestation of social entrepreneurship and to offer a novel conceptual understanding of the concept that can facilitate the development of systematic and structured future research. To this end, we analyze social entrepreneurship on the basis of the theory of essentially contested concepts, which was proposed by Walter Bryce Gallie in 1956. Building upon this theory, this article shows that social entrepreneurship can be regarded as an essentially contested concept and that a universal definition that would be accepted among contestant parties is hardly possible. Responding to this recognition, the article proposes the conceptualization of social entrepreneurship as a cluster concept, which can serve as a conceptual tool to help advancing social entrepreneurship as a coherent field of research despite its contested nature.     

The relationship between multinationality and performance: Knowledge-intensive vs. capital-intensive service micro-multinational enterprises

This research explores the relationship between multinationality and firm performance (M-P) in the context of micro-multinational enterprises (mMNEs) within the service sector. We examine the moderating effects of industry characteristics using a data set of 1082 Spanish service mMNEs over an eight-year period. The empirical results provide statistical evidence that knowledge-intensive service mMNEs exhibit an inverted U-shaped M-P relationship, while capital-intensive service mMNEs present a U-shaped relationship. Our findings demonstrate that knowledge-intensive service mMNEs increase their performance in the initial stage of multinationality, encounter a threshold of internationalization at relatively low levels of multinationality and have a propensity to over-internationalize. By comparison, capital-intensive service mMNEs experience negative performance effects at low levels of multinationality and positive ones as they further internationalize. Given that their operations are scale-sensitive, they tend to expand internationally by concentrating their operations in few foreign markets as a means to overcome the liabilities of internationalization and smallness. We contribute to the literatures on multinationality research in the service sector and on SME internationalization by showing that the effects of multinationality on the performance of mMNEs depend on industry characteristics and that such contextual factors provide a better understanding of the M-P relationship.     

国际不对称税收竞争与FDI流动研究——兼议中美劳动力成本差异与美国减税下的应对策略

当前全球经济增长放缓,美国等发达国家竞相减税吸引外商直接投资.文章从劳动力成本、市场规模双重不对称的视角,构建了一个两国竞争FDI的理论模型,重点考察了两国均衡税收水平的差距.研究发现:市场规模相同时,劳动力成本较低国家的均衡税收较高;而劳动力成本、市场规模都不相同时,当且仅当劳动力成本较低国家的市场规模高于一定下限时,其均衡税收水平才高于另一国.以中美为例,本文利用2013～2018年两国相关数据的数值模拟分析也表明不对称税收竞争下的劳动力成本和市场规模因素解释了大部分FDI流动中两国税收差距的原因.介于此,在美国特朗普政府减税的挑战下,中国是否只能采用逐底型税收竞争策略,该研究提供了另外一种思路.     

Offshoring and skill overlap: An empirical investigation

Conventional international trade theory predicts that bilateral offshoring flows will be highest when two countries have very different relative factor endowments. In contrast, the new trade theory contends that offshoring is more likely to exist when countries’ relative factor endowments are similar. This paper empirically tests the relationship between offshoring and relative factor endowments, measured by the skill overlap index between two countries and finds evidence that there is an inverted U‐shape relationship. Our empirical results predict that the rise in educational attainment in China will motivate U.S. multinationals to send their tasks to China in the short run; over the long run, however, U.S. multinationals will have fewer incentives to send their tasks to China. This finding sheds new light on the current trade tensions between the United States and China and has implications for trade policy.     

深山“皮夹沟” 崛起一座城

立春,傍晚。群峰叠嶂之中,万州龙驹镇的大街上仍显热闹,店铺闪烁的霓虹灯,商家揽客的热情,居民区升腾起的炊烟,构成了一幅特别的边城夜景图。龙驹镇是脱贫攻坚战中,重庆确立的18个深度贫困乡镇之一。一个长期以穷出名的偏远小镇,如今繁华初显,场镇人口达2.6万余人。它的蝶变,令人称奇。新年伊始,我们走进龙驹镇,从它浓浓的烟火味中,感受它的改变。     

On Education and Democratic Preferences

We make the point that preferences for democracy are positively correlated with level of education. This correlation is robust even after controlling for a range of personal characteristics, including country of residence, income, age, or using different definitions of preferences for democracy or using instrumental variables. Interestingly, the results hold across countries with different level of democracy. We use data from World Values Surveys and show that our results are consistent with a simple theoretical model in which education makes political accountability easier.     

国企利润分配制度改革与资本积累

依据鲍尔斯等学者对"剩余产品"的相关论述,本文将国企利润分配制度改革分为"利润控制主体改革"和"利润使用方式改革",按照这两个维度,立足于《资本论》中的理论与方法,建立了马克思主义理论框架,对国企利润分配制度改革作出了新的阶段划分,并解释了新中国成立以来国有工业企业的长期资本积累历程。本文的基本结论是,"利润控制主体改革"和"利润使用方式改革"均影响资本积累。当前,深化国有资本经营预算改革面临的真正挑战是预算支出结构改革将导致公平与效率的权衡,在民生支出提高的情况下需要保证国有资本经营预算的相对独立性,切实提高国有资本经营生产性支出效率。