Human resource management practices and voluntary turnover: a study of internal workforce and external labor market contingencies

We tested relationships between employee quit rates and two bundles of human resource (HR) practices that reflect the different interests of the two parties involved in the employment relationship. To understand the boundary conditions for these effects, we examined an external contingency proposed to influence the exchange-based effects of HR practices on subsequent quit rates – the local industry-specific unemployment rate – and an internal contingency proposed to shape employees’ conceptualization of their exchange relationship – their employment status (i.e. full-time, part-time and temporary employment). Analyses of lagged data from over 200 Canadian establishments show that inducement HR practices (e.g. extensive benefits) and performance expectation HR practices (e.g. performance-based bonuses) had different effects on quit rates, and the former effect was moderated by unemployment rate. The effects of HR practices on quit rates did not differ between FT and PT employees, but a different pattern of main and interactive effects was found among temporary workers. These findings suggest that employees’ exchange-based decisions to leave may be less affected by the number of hours they expect to work each week, and more by the number of weeks they expect to work.     

Is it U.S. GAAP or IFRS? Understanding how R&D costs affect ratio analysis

While financial reporting standards under U.S. GAAP and IFRS are fundamentally similar, differences do exist that may affect our analysis of company financial statements. This is particularly true when comparing a U.S. company following U.S. GAAP to a firm that uses IFRS. To illustrate, we compare research and development (R&D) accounting methods under both sets of standards and illustrate how they affect the analysis of financial results of firms in a specific industry—automotive manufacturers. Our results provide insight into settings in which differences in R&D accounting may have the greatest impact on financial analysis.     

Commemorating the 50‐Year Anniversary of Ball and Brown (1968): The Evolution of Capital Market Research over the Past 50 Years

We commemorate the 50th anniversary of Ball and Brown [1968] by chronicling its impact on capital market research in accounting. We trace the evolution of various research paths that post–Ball and Brown [1968] researchers took as they sought to build on the foundation laid by Ball and Brown [1968] to create a body of research on the usefulness, timeliness, and other properties of accounting numbers. We discuss how those paths often link back to the groundwork laid and questions originally posed in Ball and Brown [1968].     

Foreign inflows and economic growth: An emiprical study of the SAARC region

The study examines and highlights the impact of selected foreign inflows (aid, trade, FDI, debt and remittances) on the economic growth of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries. The existent literature lacks a comprehensive analysis of the SAARC countries as countries like Afghanistan, Bhutan and the Maldives have largely been ignored due to the shorter time periods of available data. The study is empirical in nature and utilizes panel data techniques on macroeconomic data for the period 2008–2015. Foreign aid and foreign direct investment are found to impact economic growth positively. Foreign debt and trade flows are found to adversely affect economic growth. No relationship is established between the flow of remittances and the economic growth of these countries. The obtained results are robust to different proxy variables and the addition of macroeconomic variables. For the first time, the study provides policy implications based on the data of all SAARC countries. The study recommends focusing on increasing the inflows of resources in the form of aid and foreign direct investment (FDI) from the developed world to achieve higher economic growth.     

Twenty-Five Years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall: An Empirical Revisit of West German Consumers' Attitudes Toward Products and Brands from Former East Germany

More than 25 years after the German reunification, data show that products/brands from the eastern regions of Germany (“Neue Länder”) still do not have significant shares in the country's western part (“Alte Länder”). To analyze potential reasons for this phenomenon, our current study replicates a previous study that investigated selected attitudes of Alte Länder consumers toward products/brands from the Neue Länder. It is shown that factors such as consumer ethnocentrism, product judgment, willingness to buy, and economic animosity continue to influence consumer behavior and as such our study offers potential explanation for the failure of Neue Länder products/brands in the western regions of Germany.     

Trade networks and economic fluctuations in Asian countries

The paper presents a new methodology, based on tensor decomposition, to map dynamic trade networks and to assess its strength in forecasting economic fluctuations at different periods of time in Asia. Using the monthly merchandise import and export data across 33 Asian economies, together with the US, EU and UK, we detect the community structure of the evolving network and we identify clusters and central nodes inside each of them. Our findings show that data are well represented by two communities, in which People's Republic of China and Japan play the major role. We then analyze the synchronisation between GDP growth and trade. Furthermore we apply our model to the prediction of economic fluctuations. Our findings show that the model leads to an increase in predictive accuracy, as higher order interactions between countries are taken into account.     

China and international market integration: Evidence from the law of one price in the Middle East and Africa

We model market integration in the Middle East and Africa by analyzing price dispersion and testing the law of one price (LOP) on highly-comparable actual local retail prices of 135 goods and services across 23 countries in the region over the period of 1990–2016. Second-generation panel estimators are applied to four price benchmarks: Regional average, South Africa, China, and US prices. Cross-regional price dispersion diminishes considerably over time up to 2008, particularly for non-tradeables around China price. The test of LOP indicates the percentage of convergent prices is highest in China price benchmark, followed by US, South Africa, and regional average benchmarks. Direct estimation of the convergence speed confirms this order. Overall, the results show evidence of increasing market integration in Middle East and Africa but it appears to be driven by global forces and, especially, the rise of China as a new economic power. The results show that some emerging market economies, such as China, can step up and promote integration while traditional economic powerhouses, such as the USA and UK, disengage from international economic relations.     

Ownership discrimination and private firms financing in China

This study examines the financing/funding of private firms in China. Our results show that private firms are significantly less funded through formal financing channels such as bank loans than state-owned firms, and hence have to resort to alternative financing such as trade credit. Consistent with the theoretical expectation and literature, there is a substitution effect between trade credit and bank loans for private firms, but this effect is much weaker compared to that of state-owned firms. Moreover, while the univariate comparisons indicate that private firms obtain more notes payable than state-owned firms, the multivariate regression analyses show that the relation between bank loan and notes payable is positive and indifferent between private and state-owned firms.     

Why will Trump lose the trade war?

ABSTRACT

The escalating U.S.–China trade conflicts have increasingly shadowed the outlook of the world economy. The Trump administration aims to achieve its strategic goals including reducing current account deficits, promoting the U.S. manufacturing sector, and curbing Chinese high-tech industries by waging the trade war against China. This paper argues that the current account deficits and the declining manufacturing sector in the U.S. are mainly driven by its internal structural factors, such as low saving rates, high labor costs, and rising service sector, rather than by the import competition from China. Moreover, the trade war further deteriorates the U.S. current account deficits and erode its comparative advantage, and it forces China to invest more in technological innovation and human capital, and thus promote its progress in high-tech industries. Thus, the U.S. will not be able to achieve its strategical goals and eventually lose the trade war.     

中国零售业自营与联营问题的流通经济学分析

零售业自营与联营之争由来已久，在当前供给侧结构性改革、完善促进消费体制机制以及零售业寻求创新发展的背景下，有必要对这一问题展开进一步的理论探讨。文章结合马克思流通经济理论指出，自营和联营的本质区别在于是商业资本还是产业资本承担商品流通职能，自营和联营并不是非此即彼的互斥关系，但如果零售业完全倚重其中一种模式并在全社会推向极端，则需要反思商业资本和产业资本是否各得其所和高效分工。在中国流通体制变革中，虽然联营模式在特定历史时期帮助众多零售企业渡过生存危机并推进内资零售快速扩张，但发展至今，已呈现零售业普遍联营的情况，使零售业整体面临着制约创新发展的新问题。数字经济为零售业回归自营提供了有利契机，零售企业应充分利用新技术摆脱联营制的路径依赖，依托数字化开展深度自营并全面提升流通效率。