Agency hazards and alliance portfolios

Prior research over several decades has catalogued many positive motives underlying firms' decisions to engage in joint ventures and other forms of alliances. In this empirical analysis, we investigate whether agency problems brought about by the separation of ownership and control also stimulate the development of firms' joint venture portfolios. By focusing on joint ventures, as opposed to diversification in general or acquisitions, we address the recent debate on agency theory's domain. Results from a sample of U.S. manufacturing firms' alliance portfolios offer supporting evidence, and comparable findings are obtained for international and domestic joint ventures. Agency hazards are also found to bring about extensions of firms' nonequity alliance portfolios in both the international and domestic settings. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Incentives and Information Exchange in International Taxation

The exchange of taxpayer-specific information between national tax authorities has recently emerged as a key and controversial topic in international tax policy discussions, most notably with the OECD's harmful tax practices project and the EU's savings tax initiative. This paper analyzes the effects of information exchange and withholding taxes, recognizing that countries which agree to exchange information do not forfeit the ability to levy withholding taxes, and also focusing in particular on the effects of innovative revenue-sharing arrangements. Amongst the findings are that: (i) the transfer of withholding tax receipts to the residence country, as planned in the European Union, has no effect on equilibrium tax rates, but acts purely as a lump-sum transfer; (ii) in contrast, allocating some of the revenue from information exchange to the source country—counter to usual practice (though no less so than the EU agreement)—would have adverse strategic effects on total revenue; (iii) nevertheless, any withholding tax regime is Pareto dominated by information exchange combined with appropriate revenue sharing; and, in particular, (iv) sharing of the additional revenues raised from information provided, while efficiency-reducing, could be in the interests of large countries as a means of persuading small countries to provide that information voluntarily. JEL Code: H77, H87, F42     

Spatial Competition and Shopping Externalities: Evidence from the Housing Market

In search markets, greater spatial concentration of sellers increases price competition. At the same time, though, a greater concentration of sellers can create a shopping externality by attracting more buyers to the site. Using housing sales data, we test for spatial competition and shopping externality effects on prices and marketing time. We find that they reflect both competitive and shopping externality effects from surrounding houses, although the relative strength varies with how fresh the house is in the market, the freshness of surrounding houses, and the phase of the market cycle. New listings have the strongest shopping externality effect on neighboring houses that have been on the market for some time. Vacant houses have their strongest competition effects in the declining market and externality effects in the rising market. Fresh houses on the market reap little benefit from shopping externalities in all phases of the market cycle.     

国内金融市场完全开放对国有商业银行的影响

按照入世协定书中的开放时问表，我国在入世5年后也即2006年底将实行金融业的全面开放。本文认为，我国金融市场完全开放将对国内商业银行带来深远影响：一是在政策层面，经济政策、金融政策、配套政策的进一步开放将使金融业的进入门槛降低，从而带来竞争主体的多元和竞争的更加市场化；二是在市场层面，客户的金融知识的普及和客户的议价能力的提高造成客户对银行需求也在不断提高；三是在竞争层面上，竞争主体、竞争模式和竞争手段的改变将使银行业面临更为复杂的竞争局面。为应对上述影响，国有商业银行应根据自身优势，扬长避短，根据不同情况，综合运用不同战略，以期达到持续发展的目标。     

当前我国国内横向税收竞争的实证分析

目前我国理论研究的不足阻碍了对现实生活中各类税收竞争问题的有效治理。为此,着眼于我国国内横向税收竞争的实践,对其进行总结和归类,剖析其背后的体制与制度原因,评价其经济效应,并由此提出促进我国国内横向税收有序发展的政策措施是必要的。     

西部新型工业化道路的特殊性及战略选择

西部目前正处于工业化初期向中期过渡期,加深工业化仍然是一项艰巨的历史性任务。由于西部工业基础薄弱,结构不尽合理,且信息化、现代化程度低,与东部发达地区相比,西部新型工业化道路具有特殊性。因此,优化西部地区产业结构、提高现代化新技术水平,用资源引进资本以及推动农业工业化等,是西部新型工业化的必由之路。     

经济全球化条件下我国市场结构问题的理论思考和对策建议

经济全球化对我国市场结构的影响集中体现为跨国公司的进入和WTO规则的执行对我国行业中企业之间垄断竞争关系的影响.本文就此对开放条件下我国市场结构有效竞争模式进行理论思考,重点探讨了维护国家经济安全与促进国内市场开放、反对垄断与发展规模经济、促进竞争与防止竞争过度等方面问题,并在此基础上提出优化我国市场结构的政策建议.     

企业经营的价值构成与战略权衡

企业为顾客所提供的产品或服务的总价值由顾客价值与企业价值构成。相对于同业中的竞争者或历史上的企业自身，如果企业更能创造顾客价值，则可认为企业有当下经营优势；如果企业更能创造顾客价值与企业价值，则可认为企业有持续经营优势。顾客价值与企业价值是企业经营过程中既对立又统一的两个方面。如何跨期考虑顾客价值与企业价值之间的比例关系，是企业应该而且必须做出的战略权衡。     

Revenue Sharing versus Expenditure Sharing in a Federal System

Problems of intergovernmental policy coordination can take many forms and are becoming increasingly important with continuing economic integration. In this paper we focus on the fiscal competition problem where the non-cooperative choice of taxes and transfers among governments typically leads to a suboptimal outcome. We look at the effect of two widely used corrective policies: revenue sharing and expenditure sharing (or intergovernmental matching grants). Our main result is that these two corrective policies have opposite effects depending on the form of competition between governments, namely whether governments compete in taxes or expenditures. More precisely, for any form of competition, revenue sharing is desirable exactly when expenditure sharing is not and vice versa. The implication is that the choice of the optimal corrective policy requires a complete understanding of the underlying non-cooperative behavior among governments. Our second main result is that neither revenue sharing or expenditure sharing can be sustained as a Nash equilibrium among governments, although all governments would benefit from one of these two corrective policies. Central intervention is therefore inevitable unless governments can pre-commit to the optimal corrective policy before setting their fiscal policies.     

建筑企业如何开展人才管理

建筑企业实施人才管理十分重要，建筑企业是否成功，很重要的因素是企业经理是否具有丰富的领导才能，负责日常运营的企业管理是否具有高素质的“将才”，基层第一线生产是否成为冲锋陷阵的先锋。建筑企业必须切实制度好人才管理策略，建立健全人才储备库，善于控制人才，吸引高素质人才，并引入竞争机制，优胜劣汰。