Does justice affect brand advocacy? Online brand advocacy behaviors as a response to hotel customers’ justice perceptions

This study focuses on customers' information-sharing behavior in the context of online brand advocacy behavior regarding hotel brands. We aim to explain hotel customers' online brand advocacy behavior through three-sided justice evaluations (i.e., justice for employees, justice for the self, and global belief in a just world), and their hotel satisfaction. Hypotheses are tested by using survey data acquired from 688 individuals on Amazon's Mechanical Turk (MTurk) through partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). The findings show that customers' perceptions of justice for the self positively affect their hotel satisfaction, perceptions of justice for employees and the global belief in a just world positively affect online brand advocacy behavior, and hotel satisfaction also positively affects online brand advocacy behavior. We expand current research efforts on online brand advocacy research and provide theoretical and managerial implications for the development of marketing and management research and practice.     

Socio-demographics,political attitudes and informal sector employment: A cross-country analysis

In this paper, we empirically investigate the relationship between informal sector employment and micro-level socio-demographic characteristics, political acts and attitudes, and individual norms. Using self-reported individual micro-level data from the World Values Survey for seven developing countries (China, Ecuador, Egypt, Mexico, Peru, South Africa and Yemen), our cross-country regressions and principal component analysis reveal that socio-demographic characteristics of individuals are strong predictors of their informal sector employment. Our estimations further document that individual preferences for an economically strong, interventionist and egalitarian state and confidence in state and political institutions are positively and significantly correlated with informal sector employment, whereas variables associated with confidence in free market institutions and support for competition are negatively and significantly correlated with informal sector employment. We also show that individuals who participate either actively or inactively in peaceful and lawful political processes are significantly less likely to work in the informal sector. Finally, we document that individual norms, such as religiosity and tax morale, are negatively correlated with informal sector employment. Throughout our analysis, instead of having to rely on ad-hoc informality categorizations of third parties, we base our measurement of informal sector employment directly on the self-evaluation of individuals, who have the best information on the degree of their informality.     

Financial development and economic growth in a microfounded small open economy model

The global financial crisis since 2008 revived the debate on whether or not and to what extent financial development contributes to economic growth. This paper reviews different theoretical schools of thought and empirical findings on this nexus, building on which we aim to develop a unified, microfounded model in a small open economy setting to accommodate various theoretical possibilities and empirical observations. The model is then calibrated to match some well-documented stylized facts. Numerical simulations show that, in the long run, the welfare-maximizing level of financial develop is lower than the growth-maximizing level. In the short run, the price channel (through world interest rate) dominates the quantity-channel (through financial productivity), suggesting a vital role of international cooperation in tackling systemic risk of the global financial system.     

A Note on a Framework for Valuation Ratios Based on Fundamentals*

Valuation ratios divide stock price by accounting metrics such as earnings, earnings growth, and book value. This study adapts the general valuation framework in Ohlson and Juettner-Nauroth (2005) and Ohlson (2005) to present a unified approach for developing valuation ratios based on fundamentals, referred to as fundamental valuation ratios. One starts with a valuation model that is driven by an accounting metric a and its abnormal growth, then divides the valuation model by a to get a fundamental valuation ratio. For any valuation ratio, one can find a corresponding fundamental valuation ratio, as long as the valuation model is based on the same metric a as the valuation ratio denominator.     

Farm size and productivity growth in the United States Corn Belt

In recent decades, agricultural production in the U.S. has continued to shift to large-scale operations, raising concerns about the economic viability of small and midsized farms. To understand whether economies of size provided an incentive for the consolidation of production, the study estimates the total factor productivity (TFP) of five size classes of grain-producing farms in the U.S. Heartland (Corn Belt) region. Using quinquennial Agricultural Census data from 1982 to 2012 the study also compares TFP growth rates across farm sizes to gain insight into whether observed productivity differences are likely to persist. The finding of a strong positive relationship between farm size and TFP suggests that consolidation of production has contributed to recent aggregate productivity growth in the crop sector. The study estimates the extent to which sectoral productivity growth can be attributed to structural change versus other factors including technological change. The study also explores some tradeoffs associated with policies that raise the productivity of small versus large farms.     

COVID-19, stock market and sectoral contagion in US: a time-frequency analysis

We assess the conditional relationship in the time-frequency domain between the return on S&P 500 and confirmed cases and deaths by COVID-19 in Hubei, China, countries with record deaths and the world, for the period from January 29 to June 30, 2020. Methodologically, we follow Aguiar-Conraria et al. (2018), by using partial coherencies, phase-difference diagrams, and gains. We also perform a parametric test for Granger-causality in quantiles developed by Troster (2018). We find that short-term cycles of deaths in Italy in the first days of March, and soon afterwards, cycles of deaths in the world are able to lead out-of-phase US stock market. We find that low frequency cycles of the US market index in the first half of April are useful to anticipate in an anti-phasic way the cycles of deaths in the US. We also explore sectoral contagion, based on dissimilarities, Granger causality and partial coherencies between S&P sector indices. Our findings, such as the strategic role of the energy sector, which first reacted to the pandemic, or the evidence about predictability of the Telecom cycles, are useful to tell the history of the pass-through of this recent health crises across the sectors of the US economy.     

Effects of pro-growth policies on employment: evidence of regional disparities

The main objective of our research is to study the direct impact of pro-growth economic policies on employment creation globally and regionally, as evidence has countered policy-makers’ expectation that output growth leads automatically to job creation. We innovate by using the ratio of employment to the population above 25 years as dependent variable instead of the customary employment elasticity. We apply generalized methods of moments’ econometrics on dynamic panel data models and find that growth stimulates employment creation on average across 76 countries. The policies promoting private sector credit, investments, openness, services, education spending, tertiary enrollment, and a fixed exchange rate are the ones that create employment. Larger government size undermines job creation, while policies promoting FDI and industrial development fail to stimulate employment. However, we establish that the effect of pro-growth policies on employment varies significantly across regions, with evidence of weaker links between economic policies and employment in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East.     

New development: China renews reform of central–local fiscal relations and provides for basic national public services

China’s reform on central–local fiscal reform has slowed down in recent years. The appointment of a new finance minister experienced in local government affairs is expected to renew the reform affirmed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) congress in late 2017. China has unprecedentedly identified a comprehensive list of 81 national basic public services as entitlements. Eighteen of them are subject to national and local standards, and co-financed by central and local governments. A new cost-sharing method for 10 of these services classifies sub-national jurisdictions into five tiers, in which the central government’s share declines from 80% to 10%. These measures, effective in 2019, aim at creating a ‘harmonious and moderately prosperous society’.     

Sources of Productivity Growth Dynamics: Is Japan Suffering From Baumol's Growth Disease?

This study examines the sources of labor productivity growth dynamics in Japan (1970–2010) and investigates the extent to which Japanese economic performance has been affected by Baumol's growth disease (BGD). We find that BGD silently undermines Japanese economic growth. However, the magnitude is miniscule, and consequently the aggregate labor productivity growth rate has not been decreasing monotonically. We also explore how BGD is arising and why it is small in the Japanese economy. BGD is weak because (1) the positive Baumol growth effect is also working in certain services sectors and (2) BGD is not a durable phenomenon: even if a sector begins to suffer from BGD, it is likely to recover quickly.