This editorial introduction of the Special Issue of the International Review of Applied Economics on 'Public enterprises and quality of institutions: alternatives to privatisation' suggests some ...topics for a research agenda, and discusses how the papers included in the Special Issue contribute to the literature. The topics discussed in the Special Issue include new models of public ownership in energy industries, new trends of re-municipalisation of local public services (energy and water), regulation and public ownership, particularly in water supply, empirical evidence on productivity of public firms in electricity generation when the quality of government is good, internationalisation of government owned corporations in the telecommunication industry, the social benefits of public monopoly versus unbundling in network industries, and the role of intrinsic public service motivation of employees in governmental organisations at large. Some of these research issues are still in their infancy and potentially are important ingredients of a wider debate aiming at reviving public enterprise economics.
We examine whether Enterprise Resource Planning system (ERP) usage affects the stock price crash risk of Chinese firms, and whether the effect differs between state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and ...non-SOEs. We find that ERP usage is associated with lower stock price crash risk, but this pattern is largely concentrated in non-SOEs, consistent with our arguments that more acute shareholder-manager agency problem and more organizational rigidity can inhibit the successful assimilation of ERP. The results are further confirmed by a difference-in-differences analysis exploiting the privatization of SOEs as a negative shock to their shareholder-manager agency problem and organizational rigidity. Three channels help explain why ERP usage helps lower stock price crash risk: it improves the quality of internal control, reduces the chance of financial restatements, and mitigates information asymmetry, and all effects are concentrated in non-SOEs. Our study is among the first to examine how ERP usage affects stock price crash risk - an overall outcome measure of a firm's information environment. Using SOEs vs. non-SOEs as a powerful measure of the shareholder-manager agency problem and organizational rigidity, it also represents the first test of the moderating effect of agency problem and organizational rigidity on the effectiveness of ERP usage.
The literature on developmental states has built theories of growth-enhancing strategies through a mutually constitutive state–business relationship and institutionalised expertise through a ...professional bureaucracy. Whilst most evidence bears on the East Asian context, recent empirical work has focussed on state agency and new industrial policies in response to global market integration. Our paper contributes to this debate by exploring multiple patterns of state enterprise reforms that have enabled governments to generate competitive domestic firms. These reforms, then, lead to new theoretical insights as regards the diverse institutional arrangements co-constituting state–state relationships across countries and sectors. Overall, the paper views state-owned enterprises (SOEs) as complex organisations that bear new developmental capacities rather than vessels of rent-seeking interests.
Taxation serves as a crucial revenue stream for numerous nations, facilitating the financing of public expenditures. The imperative for digital transformation is underscored in enhancing the efficacy ...and equity of tax systems. This research delves into theperspectives of taxpayers regarding a novel digital tax return functionality, while also scrutinizing the determinants shaping technology acceptance. Indonesia is examined as a pertinent case study owing to its ongoing digitalization endeavours within itsfundamental tax administrative framework. Employing a mixed-method approach, this study offers an exhaustive descriptive analysis alongside employing an ordered logistic regression methodology utilizing survey data. The findings, indicating a 72.73% concurrence rate among taxpayers regarding their inclination to adopt thenew digital tax return feature, signify a moderate level of technological acceptance. This moderate acceptance is buttressed by similarly moderate levels of agreement concerning taxpayers' perceived utility and ease of use of the digitaltax return feature. Additionally, the outcomes unveil that taxpayer profiles, delineated as compliant taxpayers, state-owned enterprises, and multinational corporations, alongside perceptions of tax transparency, significantly influence the propensity to embrace new digital features. Such insights furnish tangible utility for tax authorities in formulating efficacious strategies for effectuating the digital transformation of core tax administrative systems, particularly concerning tax return applications.
PurposeThe purpose of this study is to examine how social disclosures are influenced by the adoption of integrated reporting (IR), focusing on the three social capitals in the international IR ...framework, namely, intellectual, human and social and relationship capital.Design/methodology/approachThis study takes the form of a single case study involving content analyses of annual reports and integrated reports from 2009 to 2017 (i.e. before and after IR adoption in 2013), as well as in-depth, semi-structured interviews with key preparers of the integrated report at New Zealand Post, to study changes in disclosures towards different stakeholder groups, from an internal organisation perspective. The empirical evidence is analysed through the lens of stakeholder theory.FindingsThis study provides empirical evidence that contributes to our understanding of IR’s influence on the disclosure of social information and enhanced stakeholder relations in a public sector context. The study shows that the IR framework promoted a materiality assessment approach with stakeholders, which led to a reduction in social disclosures, while the materiality focus led to the disclosure of social matters more relevant to stakeholders.Social implicationsIR led to meaningful stakeholder engagement, which led to social disclosure that are more relevant to stakeholders.Originality/valueThis study assesses the influence of IR on social disclosures. The findings will be of interest to organisations seeking to enhance stakeholder relations and/or undertake IR and/or social disclosures.
Investimentos em inovaçâo e sistemas de gestáo da qualidade ha muito tempo tem se apresentado como instrumentos impulsionadores do desempenho organizacional. No Brasil, pesquisas empíricas, ...sistemáticas e rigorosas que investiguem tais relaęóes ainda sáo pouco exploradas. Tendo em vista o panorama descrito, este estudo objetivou verificar, por meio de regressóes lineares múltiplas, como investimentos em inovaçâo, adoçâo da metodologia seis sigma e adoçâo da certificaçâo ISO 9001 impactam o desempenho financeiro, em termos de lucratividade das 101 empresas brasileiras de capital aberto que compuseram a amostra deste estudo no exercício de 2019. Os resultados das regressóes demonstram indicios de que as empresas brasileiras de capital aberto estáo obtendo pouco exito em termos de resultados financeiros através de seus esforços em Seis Sigma e que esforços em P&D e a certificaçâo ISO 9001 exercem impacto positivo e significante na lucratividade, por meio do índice ROA. Além disso, a interaçâo entre ISO 9001 e P&D chegou próximo da significancia, indicando um possível efeito sinergético a ser testado em estudos futuros. Além da contribuiçâo para o campo empresarial, auxiliando empresas a direcionarem seus esforços para iniciativas capazes de impactar positivamente a lucratividade, tais achados contribuem também para o avanço do conhecimento academico.
How do we calculate, and place at the center of the public conversation, the return on investment of spending to protect human health? What is the role of nonhealth policymaking in preserving and ...elevating health? How do we avoid repeating cycles of health-adverse policymaking? The 2013 article by Kondilis et al., documenting the impact of the late-aughts economic crisis and attendant economic restructuring on population health in Greece, pushes usto consider the persistent and perhaps heightened importance ofthese questions, 10years after the article was first published. Kondilis et al. documented changes in health in Greece between 2007 and 2011,1 The late-aughts global economic crisis severely affected the Greek economy, and Greece had to rely on loans from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to finance the country's debt. The IMF loans came with conditions, including privatization of public enterprises and limits on public spending in sectors like health and education. Data by Kondilis et al. show how, coincident with these changes, a broad range of health indicators in Greece deteriorated. Suicide and homicide mortality, mental disorders, substance abuse, and infectious disease morbidity all worsened, and use of public inpatient and primary care services rose. A decade ago, this was a sentinel analysis showing the relationship between austerity economic policies and health. The Greek data documented by Kondilis et al. are consistent with other data that illustrate how macro-level austerity economic policies are associated with poor health. Data from Russia, the Caribbean, and New York City show similar findings.2-4 Conversely, data from countries in Latin America that went through economic crises without succumbing to austerity economic measures show that these countries did not have a commensurate downturn in health,4,5 further suggesting a link between economic policies and health. That macro-level economic policies affect the health of populations is not in any way surprising. Any number of conceptualizations of the role of social determinants of health consider upstream factors like economic and social policies as foundational to population health6,7 Canonical reasoning in the field, including the work of Geoffrey Rose, suggests that policies set the foundations for the production of health and can shift the distribution of health in populations.8 Whereas investment in prohealth policies can result in improvements in health,9 policies that limit social and economic achievement can harm health.10 Revisiting this article by Kondilis et al. a decade after its writing is a reminder of the importance of documenting the consequences of economic changes on health, and of how little has changed in the past decade, despite knowing the impact of economic conditions on health. Their work highlights three important questions that may merit academic and public discussion, to the end of protecting human health from inevitable future economic crises.
ABSTRACT
China has stepped up its engagement of developing countries through both bilateral interactions and the establishment of more formal multilateral fora. To achieve this, China's leaders have ...established a clear state policy designed to secure much needed resources and to establish an identity as a new and different type of ‘great power’. China has also become a proactive provider of development aid which, when combined with other forms of economic engagement, have raised concerns in the West that China is undermining the promotion of a liberal global order. But we need to take care in considering who, or what, is driving Chinese policy. The institutional weakness of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs means that commercial and financial agencies have dominated the agenda; major state owned enterprises and increasingly large numbers of small, often private enterprises are pursuing their own commercial agendas overseas, which are often not controlled by Beijing. The result is a patchwork of different types of relationships with developing countries, more often driven by the commercial concerns of economic actors than by a coherent diplomatic strategy.
This paper presents firm-level estimates of how an increase in variable renewable energy (VRE) generation affects individual firms’ day-ahead available capacity and generation plans in a developing ...country, Turkey. In addition to having a fast growing energy demand, Turkey represents an understudied market case where the market leader, unlike the rest of the generators, is a public enterprise that potentially prioritizes political motives over economic efficiency. We first cluster firms in the Turkish day-ahead market based on their generation profiles using unsupervised machine learning and hourly data from years 2017 to 2019. Then, we estimate the short run marginal effects of the projected VRE generation on firms’ day-ahead available capacity and generation plans via panel data methods. Our results support the existing concerns that the public enterprise, especially during the times of financial turmoil, acts with the motivation to stabilize market prices. Additionally, we find that there is a substantial degree of heterogeneity in firms’ responses to VREs and individual responses significantly differ from the aggregate market response.
•This paper explores how VRE generation affects firm-level non-VRE generation.•The market leader is a state-owned enterprise that may engage in different strategies.•Hierarchical time series clustering and panel data methods are used to analyze firm-level data.•Results indicate that there is significant heterogeneity in firms’ responses to VREs.
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