Accounting conservatism and corporate governance

We predict that firms with stronger corporate governance will exhibit a higher degree of accounting conservatism. Governance level is assessed using a composite measure that incorporates several internal and external characteristics. Consistent with our prediction, strong governance firms show significantly higher levels of conditional accounting conservatism. Our tests take into account the endogenous nature of corporate governance, and the results are robust to the use of several measures of conservatism (market-based and nonmarket-based). Our evidence is consistent with the direction of causality flowing from governance to conservatism, and not vice versa, indicating that governance and conservatism are not substitutes. Finally, we study the impact of earnings discretion on the sensitivity of earnings to bad news across governance structures. We find that, on average, strong-governance firms appear to use discretionary accruals to inform investors about bad news in a timelier manner.

Das Glühbirnendekret der EU – ein unnötiges Verbot

Since September 2009, the European market for household lamps is subject to EU regulation 244/2009, which enforces the gradual phase-out of incandescent light bulbs. As of September 2012, only energy-efficient lighting sources such as halogen lamps, light-emitting diodes (LED), or compact fluorescent lamps—often referred to as energy-saving lamps—will be allowed for sale. The EU’s justification for the phase-out of conventional light bulbs maintains that a reduction in the electricity consumed will not only lead to lower energy costs for private households and industrial consumers, but at the same time lead to a decrease in greenhouse gas emissions. This article discusses possible reasons for the slow market diffusion of energy-saving lamps and shows that the investment in energy-efficient lamps does not necessarily lead to significant cost reductions in every case. Drawing on some illustrative examples, we demonstrate that the use of cheaper incandescent bulbs instead of energy-saving lamps can be economically rational in cases of rather low usage times, in which the higher initial purchasing price might only pay off after very long time spans. Furthermore, due to the coexistence with the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), this regulation will not lead to any additional reduction of carbon emissions exceeding the amount caused by the ETS. We thus conclude that the general ban of incandescent light bulbs is inappropriate and should be abolished by the Commission.     

Regional environmental and economic impact evaluation: An input-output approach

This article develops a regional input-output model which deals with both the environmental sector and the traditional treatment of the economy. The model differs from previous work in that environmental interactions are treated non-linearly and explicit account is taken of environmental feedback to the economic sector. Estimation of non-linear environmental feedback makes it possible to more accurately assess the sensitivity of the regional economic-environmental structure to shifts in final demand over time.     

New concepts in planning for tourism and recreation

Many tourism development plans are, in practice, not capable of being implemented. It is argued here that obstacles to implementation can be overcome in the planning stage itself by taking account of a range of factors, eg the socioeconomic, political, sociocultural and environmental context of tourism developments, and the spread of activities and actors involved in the tourism sector. Integrated planning is thus viewed as essential, and the Product's Analysis Sequence for Outdoor Leisure Planning (PASOLP) is offered as a creative, pragmatic and operational approach.     

Marginalité urbaine et mouvements sociaux au Mexique

In Monterrey, third city of Mexico, there exists one of the most important urban social movements in the world: the ‘posesionarios’ of the ‘colonias proletarias’. Quantitatively: they number 100 000 in a city of 1 600 000. Qualitatively: they are ideologically radical, politically conscious and realistic, mostly based on political self-reliance. A short stay within the movement has permitted the author to grasp some non-confidential information that should be disseminated as one of the most interesting experiences of recent urban struggles in Latin America.     

Multi‐Criteria Analysis of Input Use in Agriculture

In this paper we present a methodology for the analysis of input use in the agricultural sector. The novelty of the theoretical model described here is that it has been developed considering a multi‐criteria environment. Thus, the optimal input use condition is determined by evaluating “multi‐attribute utility” and “multi‐attribute marginal utility”. We show how the approach adopted in this paper is a generalisation of the single‐attribute expected utility theory. The theoretical model developed is thereafter implemented in an empirical application that studies water for irrigation use as a particular case. The results show how multi‐attribute utility functions elicited for a sample of 52 irrigators explain differences in irrigation water use in relatively homogeneous agricultural systems, albeit exhibiting dissimilar partial utility functions for water use. We conclude that these differences come from the dissimilar weights that farmers attach to each attribute in the aggregate utility function.     

An Applied General Equilibrium Model to Assess the Impact of National Tax Changes on a Regional Economy

This paper presents two versions of an applied general equilibrium model for the regional economy of Andalusia, Spain, that differ in the closure rule adopted to describe the behavior of the public sector. We use the model with to analyze the impact that the reform of the personal income tax (Act 40/98) implemented in Spain as a whole would have had on the Andalusian region in particular. The model is of the neoclassical variety and includes not only the productive sectors of the economy but also the foreign sector and the government, which are usually absent from theoretical general equilibrium models. Both versions of the model are calibrated by using a Social Accounting Matrix of Andalusia for 1995. The analysis shows that the reform is not self-financing, not even partially, despite governmental claims. It also indicates that there is a positive but smaller than anticipated economic stimulus. In welfare terms, we find that the category of Urban Salaried consumers is the one that benefits the most in real income terms.     

Monetary policy and asset prices

The purpose of this paper is study the effect of monetary policy on asset prices. We study the properties of a monetary model in which a real asset is valued for its rate of return and for its liquidity. We show that money is essential if and only if real assets are scarce, in the precise sense that their supply is not sufficient to satisfy the demand for liquidity. Our model generates a clear connection between asset prices and monetary policy. When money grows at a higher rate, inflation is higher and the return on money decreases. In equilibrium, no arbitrage amounts to equating the real return of both objects. Therefore, the price of the asset increases in order to lower its real return. This negative relationship between inflation and asset returns is in the spirit of research in finance initiated in the early 1980s.     

The Skill Content of Inter- and Intra-Industry Trade: Evidence for the United Kingdom

In this paper we investigate the relative importance of net exchanges of skills embodied in intra-industry and inter-industry trade for the UK’s trade with some middle income countries. We also separately measure the net exchanges of skills embodied in vertical and horizontal intra-industry trade (IIT). We find that there are substantial factor exchanges involved in IIT, implying that traditional factor content studies may have seriously underestimated the actual factor content of total trade flows. This means that the adjustment effects of IIT may be greater than is often presumed. We also find, in line with theory, that vertical IIT involves similar net exchanges of labour of different skills to that of inter-industry trade, while horizontal IIT involves much smaller net exchanges of skills. JEL no. F11, F14