Models of static and dynamic technical efficiency of municipal libraries in the Czech Republic

This article deals with the modelling of the static and dynamic technical efficiency under conditions of municipal libraries of municipalities with 1000–5000 inhabitants. The aim of this article is to determine the level of the technical efficiency and the factors that influence the results of modelling of the static and dynamic technical efficiency of 34 selected municipal libraries for the years of 2011 and 2015. The first model tests the technical efficiency of conventional services of public libraries. The second model tests the technical efficiency of municipal libraries’ operation. The third model tests the technical efficiency of the key revenues and expenditures. The results in the static models estimate the average technical efficiency of municipal libraries in the interval (0.691–0.759) for the input-oriented models, and in the interval (1.413–2.005) for the output-oriented models. In the dynamic models, the majority of municipal libraries in 2015 showed lower technical efficiency and productivity in comparison with the year of 2011. The factors influencing the level of efficiency and its course include the inputs and the outputs, and their combinations within individual models.     

Modeling,analysis and mitigation of contagion in financial systems

Recent financial turmoil (e.g., the 2008–2009 global financial crisis) has resulted in financial contagion-induced instability becoming one of the major concerns in the fields of economics and finance. In this paper, we extend the network analysis of financial contagion from three perspectives. First, given that cross-holding of claims and obligations among financial institutions can be viewed as input-output linkages, we model the financial system and the contagion mechanism by introducing the classic Leontief input–output framework. Second, based on this modeling process, we propose a simple contagion algorithm to study how financial system heterogeneity influences its stability. Third, to mitigate financial contagion, we propose several concrete intervention policies based on two widely used prudential approaches—forced mergers and capital injections. The performance of these intervention policies is then evaluated by comprehensive numerical experiments. Our study has significant implications for financial regulation and supervision.     

Business characteristics and efficiency of rural tourism enterprises: an empirical study from China

The booming rural tourism (RT) has broadened ways for rural revitalization and poverty alleviation strategy in China. Rural tourism enterprises (RTEs), as the core operator and a hinge delivering its benefits to rural communities, play a critical role in the achievement of RT expectation on rural revitalization. To address the research gap in business characteristics and efficiency of RTEs, and make the theoretical contribution to rural business and tourism management, this study collected and analyzed the business data with investors or managers of 60 national-class RTEs in Jiangsu Province, north Yangtze River Delta of China. The results showed that business characteristics of RTEs varied with their property, business strategy, and rural industrial base. Flexible and sustainable business operation and comprehensive regional development have a profound influence on business efficiency that presented multi spatial disparity from inter-regional and intra-regional views, respectively. In addition, the political and practical implications on rural business and RTEs for research and practice were also discussed.     

Born Global,Made Local: Multinational Enterprise and Australia's Early Wireless Industry

This article analyses the evolution of multinational enterprise through a case study of the Australasian wireless company, AWA, in the first half of the twentieth century. Ownership, location, and internalisation advantages explain aspects of the industry's rapid internationalisation, but other factors, including restrictive domestic legislation and oligopolistic competition, are also important. The imperialism of the era encouraged globalisation while binding companies to host nations' strategic imperatives and coordinated policy frameworks. Location factors included government desires to control wireless, especially once broadcasting developed in the 1920s, and to expand local manufacturing capacity for the emerging consumer electrical economy.     

TARIFFS,SUBSIDIES, AND PROFITS: A RE‐ASSESSMENT OF STRUCTURAL CHANGE IN AUSTRALIA 1901–39

We re‐interpret the drivers of structural change in Australia from Federation to World War II. Manufacturing increased its relative share of output and employment, the farm sector and mining contracted. Conventional wisdom contends these shifts largely resulted from government policy, particularly increases in trade barriers. We contend that the connection between tariffs and increased profitability is conceptually weak and not supported by extant evidence. We argue that exogenous shifts in consumer preferences, the adoption of new technologies, changing factor proportions, and greater specialisation in manufacturing and services were responsible for manufacturing increasing its share of the economy's resources and output.     

VALUE CONTENT AND PRODUCTION NETWORKS IN SOUTHEAST ASIA: APPLICATION OF AFTA AND ASEAN‐PLUS‐ONE FTA FORMULAS

Rules of origin are an integral part of all trade rules. To be eligible for Common Effective Preferential Tariffs under the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) agreement, a product must satisfy the conditions relative to value content. The present paper seeks to calculate value content of industries in Southeast Asia, using the formula specified by the rules of origin in AFTA, the ASEAN–China FTA, the ASEAN–Korea FTA, and the ASEAN–Japan FTA. Moreover, the paper attempts to calculate true value content of industries by applying a simple technique of input–output analysis, and to estimate error margins (i.e., overestimates) in calculating value content. The paper also examines the relationship between value content and production networks. The paper finds that many industries exhibited declines in local content during the period 1990–2000, but that the geographical spread of production networks raised the proportion of inputs supplied by the neighboring ASEAN countries, so that the contribution of the cumulative rule of origin increased.     

Structural change in the United States: Social accounting estimates for 1982–1988

During the 1980's, extensive structural adjustments took place in the U.S. economy. This paper uses estimates of sectorally detailed social accounting matrices to evaluate the changes in receipt and expenditure patterns, including interindustry linkages, over the 1982–1988 period. Among other effects, our results reveal increasing service orientation, shifts in energy use, and increased import and foreign investment dependence. Detailed evidence on direct and indirect demand linkages indicates large shifts in the composition of government expenditure and private investment, the latter being intensified by declines in the rate of domestic capital formation.We would like to thank Greg Alward for the 1982 IMPLAN input-output data, Norman Bakka for the National Income and Product Account Data, Ken Hanson for helpful suggestions, Mark Planting for 1985 BEA input-output data, Valerie Personick for the activity output data, and two anonymous referees for helpful comments.     

Exploring the structural effects of the ICT sector in the Greek economy: A quantitative approach based on input-output and network analysis

The aim of this paper is to present a quantification approach for the calculation of the ICT sector's structural effects in the economy, focusing on the case of Greece. We construct a composite sector using a hypothetical extraction methodology based on the most recent Greek input-output table and structural business statistics at the national level. Our framework builds on the formal definition of the ICT sector provided by OECD and includes two distinct sub-components, ICT manufacturing and ICT services. In the second stage of this study, we explore the production linkages among ICT services, ICT manufacturing and the rest of the Greek industries using input-output-based and network analysis-based metrics that build on the intermediate transactions of an expanded input-output table of the Greek economy that includes the two sectors. Our empirical findings suggest that the total ICT sector has a major contribution to the Greek economy in terms of GDP and employment, but this is driven mainly by the ICT services component. We further identify that ICT services are more integrated in the Greek production network compared to ICT manufacturing, but their production linkages are underperforming in terms of meaningful contribution to the activity of the rest of the sectors. These results reflect the low integration of digital technologies and can be further embedded in a discussion on the ICT deficiencies of the Greek economy and the need for targeted regulatory and financial interventions.