The association between continuing professional education and financial performance of public accounting firms

This study investigates the relationship between continuing professional education (CPE), a mechanism of professional training, and financial performance of public accounting firms. Both training subject (partner and assistant) and training location (internal and external) are included. Public accounting firms are categorized as big, medium, and small-sized ones. Empirical data are obtained from the 1992–1995 Survey Report of Public Accounting Firms in Taiwan, published by the Financial Supervisory Commission, Executive Yuan, Taiwan, ROC. Univariate test and multiple-regression model are employed to examine the financial performance effects of CPE. Main results indicate that both professional training of assistants and external professional training are positively related to financial performance in big-sized firms. Next, we document a significantly positive association between internal training of assistants and financial performance in either big-, medium-, or small-sized firms. Finally, both external professional training of partners in big-sized firms and external professional training of assistants in small-sized firms are positively related to financial performance. Few prior studies investigate professional training of public accounting firms by a regression model due to availability of empirical data. Accordingly, evidences obtained in this study provide useful information to partners for decision-making in public accounting firms under the considerably competitive audit market.     

NPM merger mania Lessons from an early case

A central doctrine of NPM requires the adoption of commercial management techniques to address the espoused goals of saving money and improving collaboration and service co-ordination. This article examines the evidence base for NPM mergers and uses study data to explain how two ingrained features of professional work helped to produce unintended outcomes at an early UK case involving a specialist mental health provider and an acute trust. The emergence of a de facto mental health trust within the merged entity arose from senior professionals' capacity to ‘buffer’ the work of colleagues from the rationalizing spectre of the merger. The persistence of ‘loosely coupled’ practices and structures restricted improvements in collaboration and service co-ordination. It is argued that these two enduring characteristics of professional organization will shape the outcomes of future NPM mergers in mental health care e.g. the creation of social care trusts and mental health ‘super-trusts’) and in other fields such as higher education.     

Redefining Local Government Roles In Public Services

County officials in the seven-county metropolitan area of the State of Minnesota's Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St Paul were seeking to redefine county roles in service delivery. This article reports on a process model that was piloted on two services. The model was commissioned by officials; was based upon and informed by literature and comparative experience; began with an examination of functions performed; involved participants in focusing the study; was context-focused; and involved local stakeholders in projecting the implications of alternative county roles. These characteristics complicated the research management process because the process took more time, involved more actors, and required more coordination than traditional research. However, having stakeholders identify alternatives and bring factual material to the process was critical to the success of the model and including the comparative and contextual research both strengthened the policy conclusions and improved the probability of their adoption and implementation. A case of a Minnesota county that followed the model in an effort to reform water governance within the county illustrated adoption of the approach. The stakeholder analysis process was previously applied in Africa, China and Southeast Asia and the model should be applicable to a wide range of settings and problems.     

公共服务市场化：战略及对策

有效推行我国公共服务市场化，在战略上需要充分发挥政府、市场和公民社会三方面的作用，既要用足市场，又要充分发挥政府的有效性，更要培育公民社会分担服务职能，从而形成政府、市场和社会共治的互动体系；在实践中更需要合同承包，公私合营，民间投资和建立、健全相关法规等一套操作性强、行之有效的具体措施。     

马克思主义经济学与西方经济学关于公共物品的思想体系比较

逐步实现基本公共服务均等化已经成为我国新时期落实科学发展观的重要任务和战略主题。西方经济学学者研究公共物品理论以唯心主义"理性人"为假设前提,马克思主义经济学则以唯物主义的"社会人"假定展开分析。对公共物品的这两种思想体系进行比较分析,有助于把握公共物品思想的发展脉络和社会主义市场经济条件下公共物品的内涵、特征和本质,明确其范围和供给方式,进一步转变政府职能,促进我国基本公共服务均等化,构建社会主义和谐社会,实现社会公平。     

集体所有制经济的性质形式及其改革

本文分析了我国集体所有制产生和形式的多样性及其与集体所有制性质界定的矛盾；以及改革以来所暴露出来的传统的集体所有制不适应市场经济发展的制度缺陷；最后指出，建立社会主义市场经济，必须重新认识集体所有制，并提出了相应的改革路。     

Communicating culture change

Using a case study of a large public sector department the relationship between communication and change in a public sector department and the human resource implications of that relationship are considered. Senior administrators of the department signified their intention to change the culture from one that was considered to be bureaucratic, technically oriented and inward-looking to one more outward-looking, continually learning, more relationship-oriented internally and inclusive of broader ‘whole of government’ objectives such as commercialization, the environment, social justice and community relations. Findings from the research indicate that, despite an objective of shifting to a state of continual change with the mode of communication becoming two-way and dialogic, the communication mechanism has faltered due to a failure to address the need of lower-level staff for a set vision and stated future direction. Implications of these findings are drawn for public sector organizations in general.     

基于公共选择理论的行政成本控制研究

本文借鉴公共选择理论的宪政思想、有限政府主张、成本效益和竞争机制等观点,试图从政治体制改革、中央和地方政府事权与财权的联动改革、政务公开和监督制度建设方面等制度层面提出解决我国行政成本过高的根本措施。     

Public policy targets in EU broadband markets: The role of technological neutrality

The European Commission has recently sought to substantially revise how it regulates the telecommunication industry, with a key goal being to incentivise investment in high-speed broadband networks. Ambitious goals to incentivise investment in high-speed broadband networks have been set across the European Union, initially in the ‘Digital Agenda for Europe’ and more recently in its ‘Gigabit strategy’. These goals reflect the view of many that there are widespread and significant socio-economic benefits associated with broadband. Our analysis explores the consequence of target setting at a European level, in terms of encouraging investment and picking which technology should be adopted within the context of technological neutrality. We demonstrate that while public policy targets might implicitly favour specific technologies, especially when gigabit targets are defined, the technological choices that occur within individual Member States are shaped by the complex and dynamic interaction between a series of path dependencies that may vary significantly across as well as within Member States. Adopting an ecosystem perspective, we propose a conceptual framework that identifies the key factors associated with technological neutrality and informs a rational decision-making process.     

State appropriations and undergraduate borrowing: more debt,less money

When state appropriations decrease, public universities respond by raising tuition. Students borrow more in response to both tuition increases and appropriation cuts. This article investigates the feedback of how borrowing and tuition influence state appropriations. Using a panel data set of 450 four-year public universities from 1999 to 2012, we employ three-stage least squares techniques to control for the endogeneity between state appropriations, tuition and student borrowing. There is evidence that state policy-makers respond to increases in university tuition and student borrowing by decreasing future appropriation levels. After controlling for the effect of appropriations on tuition and borrowing, a one-dollar increase in student borrowing reduces state appropriations per student by $0.06, and a one-dollar increase in tuition results in a decrease of $0.45 in state appropriations per student. When universities increase tuition for reasons other than a reduction in state appropriations, policy-makers respond with a significant cut in future appropriations which could signal an incentive strategy.