Differences in managerial discretion across countries: how nation‐level institutions affect the degree to which ceos matter

The concept of managerial discretion provides a theoretical fulcrum for resolving the debate about whether chief executive officers (CEOs) have much influence over company outcomes. In this paper, we operationalize and further develop the construct of managerial discretion at the national level. In an empirical examination of 15 countries, we find that certain informal and formal national institutions—individualism, tolerance of uncertainty, cultural looseness, dispersed firm ownership, a common‐law legal origin, and employer flexibility—are associated with the degree of managerial discretion available to CEOs of public firms in a country. In turn, we show that country‐level managerial discretion is associated with how much impact CEOs have on the performance of their firms. We also find that discretion mediates the relationship between national institutions and CEO effects on firm performance. Finally, we discuss two inductively derived institutional themes: autonomy orientation and risk orientation. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Keynesian Multiplier Effect Reconsidered

In the standard Keynesian framework, government spending on useless public works has a larger multiplier effect than spending on government transfer payments does. In other words, spending on useless public works increases national income by more than an equivalent increase in government transfer payments would. Nevertheless, their effects on national benefit are identical. For both, the national benefit equals the direct benefit created by the spending. If there are two income classes, some transfers reduce both the national income and the national benefit. Some government purchases completely crowd out private consumption and reduce the national benefit.     

Board Committees in Corporate Governance: A Cross‐Disciplinary Review and Agenda for the Future

The importance of board committees – specialized subgroups that exist to perform many of the board's most critical functions, such as setting executive compensation, identifying potential board members, and overseeing financial reporting – has grown over time due to increased legal requirements and greater complexity of the environment in which firms operate. This has resulted in a large body of work examining board committees across the accounting, finance, and management disciplines. However, this research has developed rather independently within each discipline, preventing scholars and practitioners from developing a comprehensive understanding of board committees. To address this issue, we conduct a comprehensive review of the literature that: 1) summarizes and synthesizes antecedents and outcomes associated with board committees in publicly‐traded firms in English common law countries; and 2) offers a critical analysis of existing research, providing recommendations for advancements and new directions in board committee research.     

中日农村医疗保险制度比较研究

纵向比较分析中日两国农村医疗保险制度的发展历程,从覆盖范围、筹资方式、补偿方式、资金收支情况等方面横向比较中日两国的农村医疗保险制度,探讨中日两国农村医疗保险制度的优缺点,为我国完善新型农村合作医疗制度提供相关建议。     

高管机会主义品行与公司信息披露决策

文章构建相应策略识别了高管机会主义品行，并探究其对公司信息披露决策的影响。研究结果表明，高管的机会主义品行会显著增加公司信息披露违规、真实盈余管理行为；提升公司选择非国际“四大”会计师事务所的概率，并支付更高的审计费用。随着高管机会主义水平上升，公司更有可能作出上述决策。进一步地，国有产权能在一定程度上抑制高管机会主义品行对信息披露质量的负面影响，却显著增加了公司应计盈余管理；当高管机会主义水平较高时，国有产权也无法发挥有效治理作用。从经济后果看，高管的机会主义品行能被资本市场识别，并显著减损公司未来价值。     

ANSI认可标准制定组织以及美国国家标准批准程序

美国作为市场化程度高、技术水平先进的国家，其标准化管理体制和运行模式遵循了标准化的自身规律。能够快速响应不断变化的市场需求、政府监管的需要，同时又能支持技术创新、促进经济、贸易发展，提升美国的竞争实力。美国国家标准是自愿性的，并且由美国国家标准学会（ANSI）认可的标准制定组织制定。本文分析了ANSI的基本情况、ANSI认可标准制定组织的管理程序、美国国家标准批准和废止的条件及程序。希冀对中国的标准化改革有所借鉴。     

上海合作组织命运共同体:一项研究议题

构建上海合作组织命运共同体是中国政府提出的关于促进上海合作组织长远发展的重大倡议。由于上海合作组织命运共同体理念的提出时日尚短,学术界关于该理念的研究尚未全面启动。要使上海合作组织命运共同体理念成为一个有效的研究议题,不仅需要明晰上海合作组织命运共同体的具体内涵,而且需要将其纳入国际共同体、国际组织和大国外交等议题的研究,提炼出一些具有普遍性的理论命题。就攸关上海合作组织命运共同体构建的重大问题而言,至少需要回答上海合作组织命运共同体提出的理论与实践意义、上海合作组织命运共同体构建应遵循的基本路径、上海合作组织命运共同体构建的基础和条件、上海合作组织命运共同体构建面临的挑战与障碍、学术界能为上海合作组织命运共同体构建提供的对策建议等重大问题。在此过程中,学术界还需将其与周边命运共同体、人类命运共同体等家族相似性的概念纳入同一研究视域,以澄清上海合作组织命运共同体的内涵与外延,辨识上海合作组织命运共同体演变的动力与机制,并从理论层面提炼上海合作组织发展经验的特殊性与普遍性。     

Debt Covenant Restriction,Financial Misreporting,and Auditor Monitoring*

Theory suggests that financial report-based debt covenants engender incentives for the manager to relax covenant constraints through accounting choices in order to avoid costly covenant violations. Prior studies directly testing this hypothesis in the context of financial misreporting fail to find consistent evidence. Using a more refined measure of debt covenant restriction, we find that debt covenant restriction is positively associated with the probability of financial statement misstatements. This positive association is driven by performance covenants rather than capital covenants and is more consistent with the manager striving to avoid a “false-positive” violation than to delay the violation. Our results also imply that managers resort to both income-increasing and non–income-increasing misreporting to relieve covenant constraints and rely more on the latter when faced with greater earnings management constraints. Additionally, the auditor charges higher audit fees to firms with more binding covenants even outside the violation state, and audit fees increase with constraints relative to both performance and capital covenants, reflecting greater financial reporting risk and bankruptcy risk, respectively. Within capital covenants, we find some evidence of even higher audit fees for tighter intangible-inclusive versus intangible-exclusive capital covenants. Lastly, our evidence suggests that the positive association between covenant constraints and misreporting is attenuated when the auditor has more experience with debt covenants, has greater bargaining power over the client, or faces greater litigation risk.     

做好医院内部审计工作的几点思考

目前,随着我国社会经济的高速发展,医疗产业发展与经营形式的不断变化,医疗资源紧缺与群众就医需求的矛盾凸显,对医疗机构的内控管理提出了更高的要求。完善内部审计机制,优化内控管理的整体质量,不仅是新时期医院实现自我监督的改革路径,同时也是提升医疗资源配置形式,协调不同工作部门责任关系的关键内容。在此基础上,建立现代化内部审计机制,结合医院新时期发展特征,不断调整内控机制中不适应发展需求的部分,已经成为当前阶段医疗机构满足内部发展需求,创新财务管理模式的首要任务。     

新形势下医院内审范围及内容的思考

本文主要介绍了新形势下医院内审的范围及内容,并针对审计工作范围及内容扩大这一情况,提出了相应的解决对策。