The size and development of the shadow economy: An empirical investigation from states of India

Using the state level data from India, this paper investigates the size of the hidden economy in Indian states over the period 1974/75 to 1995/96. Our analysis has shown that after liberalization of the Indian economy in 1991/92, the growth in the size of the hidden economy has decreased on an average. Our results show that the growth in the size of the hidden economy is approximately 4% less in scheduled election years than in all other years. We also demonstrate that the growth is significantly lower in those states where the coalition government is in power. An increased growth of newspapers and the literacy rates translate to cleaner governance, e.g. to fewer amounts of shadow economy activities in the economy.     

International Public Sector Accounting Standards （IPSAS） Implementation in the European Union （EU） Member States

The aim of this paper is to analyze the implementation level of International Public Sector Accounting Standards （IPSAS） in the member states of the European Union （EU）. After an introduction of the legislative framework in the EU and a review of the literature about the implementation of IPSAS in the EU member states, this paper classifies, on the basis of a survey, the states according to their formal implementation levels of IPSAS. It also analyzes the types of accounting （cash basis accounting, modified cash basis accotmting, accrual accounting, and modified accrual basis accounting） used by the states studied. The survey shows that there are important disparities among the member states, both for the application of IPSAS and for the type of accounting that is used. Furthermore, it appears that even if IPSAS is not legally adopted in most European member states, there is a tendency to use modern accounting systems based on accrual accounting close to IPSAS.     

Multiple Species Boreal Forests – What Faustmann Missed

Recent research in natural sciences shows that the dynamics in boreal forests are much more complex than what many models traditionally used in forestry economics reflect. This essay analyzes some challenges of accounting for such complexity. It shows that the optimal harvesting strategy for forest owners is history dependent and for some states of the forest, more than one strategy may be optimal.This paper confirms earlier literature on shallow lakes and coral reefs and shows that this kind of phenomena seem much more common than previously thought. They are valid for a wide range of ecosystems that cover large surfaces and they do not depend on the choice of some specific function to model the non-linearity. There are also indications that theses results could be obtained even for resources with concave growth if at least one species with non-linear growth affects their dynamics.     

Absorbing Team Games

A team is a group of people having the same motives but possibly different available actions. A team game is a game where two teams face each other. An absorbing game is a repeated game where some of the entries are absorbing, in the sense that once they are chosen the play terminates, and all future payoffs are equal to the payoff at the stage of termination. We prove that every absorbing team game has an equilibrium payoff and that there are -equilibrium profiles with cyclic structure. Journal of Economic Literature Classification Numbers: C72, C73.     

Momentum crash,credit risk and optionality effects in bear markets and crisis periods: evidence from the US stock market

This study explores whether the credit risk anomaly exhibits option-like behaviour similar to the momentum anomaly. It finds that the inverted credit risk spread indeed displays option-like behaviour in bear market states. Unlike a momentum portfolio, which is effectively a short call option on the market, an inverted credit risk portfolio appears to be a long call option on the market.     

Integration Between the Baltic and International Stock Markets

Using cointegration tests, this paper analyzes the existence of long-run relationships among Baltic stock markets and major international stock markets, including the United States, Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom, and France. Bivariate and multivariate cointegration tests indicate a common trend linking Latvia to European markets. Evidence indicates that the German market dominates this long-run relationship. In general, short-term Granger causality indicates causality running from the European markets to the Baltic markets, as well as among the Baltic states, excepting Latvian and Lithuanian short-term effects on the Estonian market. Overall, the results suggest that international investors can obtain diversification benefits given a long-term investment horizon because of the low degree of integration between the Baltic and international capital markets.     

Inflation in New EU Member States: A Domestically or Externally Driven Phenomenon?

This article empirically analyzes the domestic and external inflation determinants for eight non-eurozone new EU member states (NMS), using a structural vector autoregression model. Results indicate that foreign shocks are a major factor in explaining inflation dynamics in the medium run, while the short-run inflation dynamics are mainly influenced by domestic shocks. Moreover, the importance of the foreign inflation component has had a rising trend in the precrisis period in all NMS and mostly coincided with their accession to the EU. This trend ended with the onset of the global financial crisis. The study implicates the need to augment the classical Taylor rule with foreign factors in the case of small open economies.     

Not Every Kind of Outward FDI Increases Parent Firm Performance: The Case of New EU Member States

Using a large firm-level dataset we investigate what kind of firms from new EU member states from Central and Eastern Europe (CEECs) tend to invest abroad (testing of self-selection hypothesis), and what is the impact of outward FDI on their productivity (testing of learning-by-investing hypothesis). We find that the best firms tend to self-select into outward FDI. There is also a positive effect of outward FDI on productivity growth of investing firms from CEECs, the strongest being in the case of Estonia, Romania, Czech Republic, and Slovakia. The positive impact of becoming a first-time foreign investor is relatively long lasting, but comes into effect only in investments in Western European or other CEECs and in the case of manufacturing subsidiaries.     

日本经验与东亚发展型国家

日本经济模式的显著特点就是政府主导,东亚其他国家和地区的发展模式又与日本发展模式极为相似,这就是通常所说的东亚"发展型国家"。那么,日本政府导向型经济的具体特征是什么?对其他东亚国家和地区有什么影响?发展型国家与比较优势是怎样结合的?日本主导的东亚经济格局正在发生那些变化?本文力图回答这些问题。     

Appetite for destruction: Counterintuitive effects of attractive faces on people's food choices

Faces in general and attractive faces, in particular, are frequently used in marketing, advertising, and packaging design. However, few studies have examined the effects of attractive faces on people's choice behavior. The present research examines whether attractive (vs. unattractive) faces increase individuals’ inclination to choose either healthy or unhealthy foods. In contrast to the beliefs held by most marketing professors, but consistent with visceral state theories, exposure to attractive (vs. unattractive) opposite-sex faces increased choice likelihood of unhealthy foods. This effect was moderated by self-view-relevant attributes and exerted a particularly powerful influence on individuals who were single (vs. in a relationship) and individuals rating themselves as unattractive (vs. attractive). Furthermore, the effect was mediated by arousal, was stronger for men than for women, but did not generalize after exposure to attractive (vs. unattractive) same-sex faces. As pictorial exposure is sufficient for the effect to occur, these findings have important implications for marketing, advertising, and public health.