企业年报阅读难易程度的衡量与影响因素研究——基于管理者操纵视角

以我国2007—2017年上市企业年报文本信息为研究对象,基于委托代理背景下的印象管理理论,从驱动、约束、风格三个维度分析易读性运用的影响因素。研究结果表明:企业绩效与易读性水平显著正相关,是易读性操纵的驱动因素;民营企业的盈利水平会显著驱动高管对易读性水平的操纵,而从长期公司价值的角度来看,不同所有制公司之间操纵的动机无显著差别;公司治理水平对管理者操纵年报易读性的抑制作用较为有限,监事会规模能发挥有效作用;保持高管团队的多样性和专业程度、提高女性高管占比、高管团队年轻化、提高受教育程度,均在提升年报易读性水平方面能够起到积极作用。     

Social stratification and mobility among Chinese middle class households: An empirical investigation

Middle class (MC) consumers’ demand for a better quality of life continues to drive economic growth in emerging markets (EMs). Given their importance for the dynamically transforming economy in EMs, the present study examines the extent to which consumption patterns are associated with social stratification and mobility among China's MC consumers. Building on the extant literature that links material and culture consumption to social stratification, we construct a typology of MC households in contemporary China, identifying the factors by which these newly emerging MC households vary or are similar in their consumption behavior. We find that, of the three widely recognized stratifying dimensions (income, education, and occupation), educational attainment is the strongest indicator explaining the variance in culture consumption among the MC households, while occupation plays a relatively weak role in explaining their consumption patterns. Among the alternative pathways into the social class position of MC, our findings suggest that merely becoming wealthy is negatively related to culture consumption of these new MC households while becoming MC defined by educational attainment or belonging to the core middle class (whose status is achieved on all of the three stratifying dimensions) has a profound effect on both material and culture consumption. The findings support the conclusion that social stratification and mobility are of importance for China's MC consumers in shaping and maintaining their lifestyles and consumption patterns.     

市场规模结构、竞争程度与小微 企业关系型贷款*

本文研究了银行业竞争度与小微企业关系型贷款之间的关系，以及市场规模结构对该关系的影响。信息假说认为，由于信息不对称和代理问题，垄断增加了银行内部化关系型贷款的收益，关系型贷款与竞争度之间呈负相关。然而，越来越多的研究对信息假说提出了质疑。本文在数理推导的基础上，采用江苏省县域地区352家小微企业2011-2015年非平衡面板数据，运用Fractional Logit模型进行实证分析。研究结果表明：市场规模结构是决定竞争度与关系型贷款之间关系的重要因素，当信贷市场中大银行的市场份额占比较大时，银行竞争的加剧对关系型贷款是不利的；当市场中小银行的市场份额占比较大时，竞争的加剧有利于关系型贷款的发放。以往研究对于市场规模结构的忽视可能是导致不同研究结论存在巨大差异的重要原因。本文在此基础上，提出了完善金融基础设施等相关政策建议。     

Patterns of integration

This paper compares the distribution of jobs by complexity and firms' willingness to hire low‐educated labour for jobs of varying complexity in Norway, Italy and Hungary. In investigating how unqualified workers can cope with complex jobs, it compares their involvement in various forms of post‐school skills formation. The countries are also compared in terms of the proportion of small businesses, which, it is assumed, manage and tolerate the losses from functional illiteracy more than large firms do. Unskilled Norwegians benefit from synergies that exist between work in complex jobs, post‐school skills formation and civil integration. Italy has an abundant supply of simple jobs and its small businesses employ unqualified workers even in complex jobs. Inadequate post‐school skills formation and the lack of a sizeable small‐business sector set limits on the inclusion of low‐educated Hungarians.     

Hierarchical Determinants of Brazilian Stock Returns During the 2008 Financial Crisis

Abstract:

We analyze the influence of firm- and industry-level determinants on stock returns during the 2008 financial crisis, using a hierarchical linear model to analyze the returns of 135 Brazilian firms. The impact of these determinants on stock returns has not received sufficient attention in periods of severe market decline. The following determinants were significant: (1) industry-level determinants (unlevered beta, historical sales growth, and regulated tariff), and (2) firm-level determinants (size, illiquidity, and book-to-market ratio). We also identified an indirect influence of unlevered beta over book-to-market that reflects a behavior that we call the “misconfidence effect.”     

Moderate prosperity,an adaptation of the middle class concept to a Malagasy rural area: the case of Itasy

In order to adapt the controversial sociological concept of ‘Middle Class’ to an African agriculture-based economy, exemplified by Madagascar, we propose the concept of Moderate Prosperity. As a case study, we use detailed data from 508 households in the 2008 Itasy Observatory. We stratify them using four distinguishing socio-economic factors: household income quintile, head of household’s education level, income structure and land tenure. We describe four Moderate Prosperity clusters that reflect the agro-economic diversity of the Itasy region: a vulnerable group of agriculturally diversified households in the third income quintile with locally issued land title; an emerging group of skilled, polyculture farmers belonging to both the lowest and highest quintiles; a traditional group of uneducated rice farmers in the fourth quintile with traditional land ownership; and an upper group of educated livestock farmers, non-agricultural independents and workers, belonging to the top income quintile with locally issued land title.     

Aspirations and entrepreneurial motivations of middle-class consumers in emerging markets: The case of India

The world is eyeing emerging markets where increasing numbers of consumers are entering into a new segment called the middle class. In emerging markets, this new segment of the population, as it moves up the economic ladder and seeks a better life, is considered the backbone of the economy. In this study, India is chosen because its economic progress, and changing cultural and demographics shifts, have set the stage for fundamental change of the country's middle class consumers, who are exhibiting new life-aspirations and entrepreneurial pursuits. While India's middle class continues to grow in size and importance, the existing research fails to fully address questions regarding their aspirations or life goals, entrepreneurial motivations, and demographic characteristics.This study attempts to fill the void by focusing on life goals, attitudes, and behaviors of the middle class consumers. Specifically, this study focuses on their aspirations and entrepreneurial motivations. The data collected from India reveals interesting insights about this important segment of India's people. Their demographic profiles suggest that they are well-educated, employed full-time and own assets. Furthermore, these middle class consumers express their confidence in attaining life aspirations such as financial success and personal growth. They tend to seek more opportunities for accomplishing life goals and display entrepreneurial motivations.     

A contingent approach to country-of-origin effects on foreign products evaluation: Interaction of facets of country image with product classes

This study investigates the effect of country-of-origin image on consumers’ evaluations of foreign products and disaggregates the effects across facets of country image and across product classes. We disentangle country image into cognitive and affective dimensions, and additionally disaggregate the cognitive dimension into geographic and human aspects. We posit that country-of-origin effects will vary across distinct facets of country image and that the effect of each facet of country image will vary across different classes of products. By means of an online survey, data were collected from French consumers regarding their perceptions of cognitive and affective aspects of two countries – Brazil and Germany – and their evaluation of three product classes – utilitarian nature-based, utilitarian industrialized and hedonic industrialized – which were represented respectively by fruits, home appliances and clothes. Empirical results partially corroborate the hypothesized contingent impacts.     

The influence of personality traits on airport public transport access mode choice: A hybrid latent class choice modeling approach

Many objective and subjective factors affect individual tendencies. Such subjective factors include personality traits, attitudes, identities, perceptions, and feelings. The choice of transportation mode is an individual tendency that is considered important in policy-making decisions, and it can affect sustainable transportation, particularly in metropolitan areas. The present study’s main aim is to determine the impact of the Big Five Personality Factors on individual preferences toward public transportation modes. We use data from a survey conducted in January and February of 2015 at Imam Khomeini International Airport (IKIA). Passengers were asked to indicate their preferred mode of transportation to access the IKIA and to respond to questions on the NEO Five-Factor Inventory. Based on 557 valid responses, hybrid discrete latent class modeling was conducted to understand the heterogeneity in the respondents’ individual preferences regarding the Big Five Personality Factors and their preferences toward public modes of transportation. The results indicated that individuals who display neuroticism were more likely than the others to be concerned about carrying heavy luggage and about inclement weather conditions when using public transportation. In addition, interesting results indicated that conscientious individuals likely paid more attention to travel cost than to any other attribute of public transportation, and the model of the conscientious latent personality trait was a better fit to the data. Finally, this paper examined the taste heterogeneity of each personality trait and the results indicate the usefulness of considering personality traits in mode choice models for richer insights toward sustainable transportation.     

Property-level assessment of change in forest clearing patterns: The need for tailoring policy in the Amazon

Once driven by large-scale clearings, Amazon deforestation now occurs mostly in small increments. Did this result from the emergence of a new group of agents or from a strategic adaptation in the behavior of those who led deforestation in the past? We address this question using georeferenced data on private rural properties and deforestation. We cross property-level and forest clearing data in an empirical setting designed to detect shifts toward clearing patches that were knowingly invisible to the monitoring system. We are therefore able to assess not only whether deforesters were responding strategically to stricter monitoring of deforestation, but also how this response differed across actor types. Results suggest that centralized policy efforts introduced starting in the mid-2000s inhibited medium- and large-scale deforestation, but had heterogeneous effects on small-scale deforestation. Although the relative participation of small deforestation polygons increased in both sample states, the relative participation of smallholders in total state deforestation increased in Pará, while remaining constant in Mato Grosso. We interpret these results as suggestive — albeit not causal — evidence that landholders strategically responded to the monitoring system by adapting their forest clearings practices to elude monitoring in both Mato Grosso and Pará. In the latter, however, the increase in smallholders’ share of annual deforestation suggests that their clearing practices were relatively less affected by what effectively contained deforestation in large properties. The apparent similarity in scale of deforestation across states conceals relevant baseline differences between the agents engaging in forest clearing in each locality. Tailoring policy to account for such differences could strengthen Brazilian conservation policy.