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MINNA-MAARI H. KARVONEN [*] Traditional neoclassical production theory analyzes the relationship in a production process between inputs and outputs which have a positive market value for the producer. The externalities [...]

The healthcare sector is one of the largest industries in most countries. It is also an outstanding case for a multi-tier system of the participating parties' incentives and their conflicting interests. This paper focuses on a few of the multifactorial interrelationships between the different actors in healthcare services. The novel approach of this paper is the assumption of double-information asymmetry between the transacting parties that describes the actors' relationships more realistically than the traditional principal-agent models. It will be shown that any system of incentivization may only apply perverse incentives in this case. Notably, efficient, high-quality healthcare units will be punished while less efficient and lower quality ones will be rewarded for their accomplishment. The theoretical analysis is supported by facts regarding Central and Eastern-European countries. Some symptoms and causes of the current decline can also be found in advanced West European countries and even in the United States. They are closely related to the ill-designed regulatory systems of publicly funded healthcare in these countries. Keywords Asymmetric information in healthcare * Incentive theory * Two-sided information asymmetry JEL C73-D82-I11, Introduction The health care sector has become one of the largest industries in most of the advanced and medium-developed countries. It is also an outstanding case for a complex multi-tier [...]

This paper investigates the relationship between carbon dioxide emissions and gross domestic product in the Middle East and North Africa region using World Bank data covering the period 1980 to 2010 on the eve of the Arab Spring. Unlike extant studies using parametric models, the results provide evidence against the postulated inverted-U shaped relationship between pollution and the level of economic development. Using a non-parametric model, new evidence is found against the existence of a carbon Environmental Kuznets Curve in contrast to previous studies on the region. The paper provides a cautionary note against the use of parametric models to draw policy implications about the trade-off (or lack thereof) between environmental quality and the level of economic development. Keywords Carbon emissions * Environmental Kuznets curve * Non-parametric regression JEL Classification C14 * C23 * Q54, Introduction The relationship between pollution levels and economic development has been a contentious issue within the economics literature. The discussion was typically examined using the so-called Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) [...]

While Joseph A. Schumpeter is classified as a pioneer of evolutionary economics in a wide sense and of entrepreneurship and innovation management in a narrower sense, Schumpeter is less known for his contributions in the area of scientific methodology and history of science. The paper deals with methodological premises in Schumpeter's scientific positioning. In 1908, in his Das Wesen und der Hauptinhalt der theoretischen Nationalokonomie, Schumpeter developed and pioneered his methodological individualism which is very much acknowledged. However, comparing these early positions with methodological writings in his History of Economic Analysis (1954) shows that he has not really shifted from methodological individualism to an institutional perspective that addresses the academic interplay and sees economic action rooted in historical predispositions, paths and social constraints. Keywords Methodological individualism * Institutional economics * Joseph A. Schumpeter * Economic methodology JEL B25 * B30 * B41 * F14 * F01 * F20 * O10, Introduction The paper deals with Joseph A. Schumpeter and his efforts to treat economics methodologically. Some authors argue that Schumpeter maintained his principal scientific positions over the course of his [...]

The paper focuses on tax expenditures of individuals, which are one of the fiscal tools of the state. In the Czech Republic they are primarily aimed at housing policy, pension policy, and philanthropy, and the question is the extent to which tax expenditures can influence the preferences of tax payers. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the effect of tax expenditures of individuals in the form of tax deductions for social policy, housing support and retirement savings. We also evaluate whether these tax deductions fulfill the fiscal functions for which they were introduced and the extent to which taxpayers use them. Methodically, the research is based on the analysis of secondary statistical data of the Financial Administration of the Czech Republic and results from aggregated tax returns filed for the period 2005-2015. The effect of tax deductions was decreased by abolition of the progressive rate of personal income taxes and by introduction of a uniform tax rate of 15%. Tax deductions for retirement savings do not have a sufficiently strong motivational impact and do not affect taxpayers in the context of public policy. Deductions for mortgage interest can be regarded as a form of major housing support, but are related to taxpayer income and favor those with higher incomes. Keywords Tax policy * Tax deductions * Individuals * Mortgage interest * Life insurance * Retirement contributions JEL Classification H2 * D14 * E62, Introduction Tax expenditures are one of the state's primary fiscal tools for allocating private funds to preferred areas. The principle of tax incentives concerns the extent to which expenditures are [...]

In this paper, we investigate the extent of monetary independence in a group of ten Asian countries: China, Malaysia, Japan, India, Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, Korea, Singapore, and Hong Kong. While the traditional investigation has considered only the bivariate relationship between the home interest rate and the base rate, we employ both single-equation and vector autoregressive representations of the bivariate and the trivariate relationship including the desired (or optimal) interest rate. We find in most countries, that the ranking of monetary independence is relatively consistent across the models and methodologies although model specifications produce important differences for some countries such as Japan, Indonesia, and India. Trilemma suggests that a country cannot accomplish all three policy objectives: monetary independence, exchange rate stability, and free capital mobility. To increase monetary independence a country must choose between greater exchange rate flexibility or a lower degree of capital mobility. The fact that China and Malaysia, the two countries that are known to have imposed the strictest capital controls, consistently rank high in various scenarios while Hong Kong, which has maintained nearly the freest regime in capital markets, is lowest in monetary independence, indicates that perhaps capital controls may play a more important role than does exchange rate flexibility in securing independence in monetary policy making. On the other hand, countries that maintain greater exchange rate stability do not necessarily rank low, unless it is combined with greater capital mobility as in the case of Hong Kong. Keywords Trilemma * Monetary independence * Capital controls * Exchange rate flexibility This paper has been written with a generous support from The A P J Kalam India Studies Research Program. We have benefitted from very useful and constructive comments from two referees. JEL Classification F3 F4, Introduction In an open economy, a monetary authority is subject to the trilemma, which states that it is impossible to have all three policy objectives of (a) unrestricted capital movement, [...]

This paper contributes to the sparse literature on inequality convergence by empirically testing convergence across states in the U.S. This sample period encompasses a series of different periods that the existing literature discusses--the Great Depression (1929-1944), the Great Compression (1945-1979), the Great Divergence (1980-present), the Great Moderation (1982-2007), and the Great Recession (2007-2009). This paper implements the relatively new method of panel convergence testing, recommended by Phillips and Sul (2007). This method examines the club convergence hypothesis, which argues that certain countries, states, sectors, or regions belong to a club that moves from disequilibrium positions to their club-specific steady-state positions. We find strong support for convergence through the late 1970s and early 1980s, and then evidence of divergence. The divergence, however, moves the dispersion of inequality measures across states only a fraction of the way back to their levels in the early part of the twentieth century. Keywords Club convergence * Inequality measures * Panel data * U.S. JEL Classification C22 * D63, Introduction Dew-Becker and Gordon (2005) show that from 1966 to 2001, only the top 10% of the income distribution in the U.S. gained real income equal to the growth in [...]

Several studies identified a positive relationship between a firm's knowledge assets and its productivity. Knowledge assets are usually considered as the level of human and technological capital of the firm. Knowledge assets of the firm may also increase by the so-called spillover effect, especially in less developed host economies of foreign direct investment, which means diffusion of the technology, knowledge and managerial skills from foreign companies to local ones. Beyond the impact of the human and technological capital of firms, this paper also examines the effect of spillover of knowledge on the firms' performance in Hungary within a linear regression model. The model is based on individual data of Hungarian enterprises, examining the change in performance as the difference of the variables between 1996 and 2014. The paper shows that knowledge assets (concerning human capital) basically determine the firms' production in Hungary from 2000. The effect of research and development activity was not significant in the investigated period. Foreign shares in the industries' total equity (proxy for spillover effect) have a weak and, after 2005, a negative influence on performance. The spillover effect in the Hungarian economy was not demonstrated by the regression model. Keywords Human capital * Spillover effect * Hungary * FDI * Productivity * Knowledge asset JEL classification F20 * G30, Introduction Productivity can be regarded as a measure of outputs that are obtained by a combination of inputs. In total factor productivity all inputs are considered, which generally include physical [...]

In this paper, we develop a theoretical framework to investigate the impact of adopting a strategy of know-how trading on the degree of research and development (R&D) cooperation. We show that the consequences of cooperation in know-how sharing under the conditions of the model are similar to a policy of cooperation in R&D investments in areas with large spillovers. An industry-wide policy of cooperation among competitors with respect to R&D investment and sharing would simply result in maximal joint profits. This cooperative R&D outcome could be generalized to any degree of spillover other than 100%. In this paper, the commitment to a policy of know-how trading by the participants in an industry is explained by the firm's attempt to induce the equilibrium of a single industry-wide cooperative research joint venture. In a repeated game framework, we show that pre-commitments by non-cooperative firms to disclose their own know-how to the industry can be effective in inducing cooperative R&D investments by the participants. Keywords Cooperative R&D * Repeated games * Know-how trading * Policy JEL Classifications L13 * 031 * 033, Introduction Innovation originates from a network of firms interacting in a variety of ways, and adopting various external technology sourcing strategies that move beyond traditional research and development (R&D) contracting. [...]

The paper considers a monetary union composed of two representative countries characterized by different inflation aversions. The model derives Nash equilibria after a country-specific shock in which the countries have a costly option to abandon the common currency. The main results are that the higher the inflation aversion of the country affected by the shock, the lower its exit probability. The higher the inflation aversion in both countries, the lower the probability that the country not directly hit also abandons the monetary union (contagion). Keywords Monetary unions * Contagion * Nash equilibria * Inflation aversion JEL Classification F30 * F31 * F41 * G01, Introduction This is a very short stylized paper focused on assessing the stability of a monetary union. The paper aims to analyze the role played by heterogeneous inflation aversions of [...]

Abstract This paper analyzes strategic interactions and contagion effects in the peripheral countries of a monetary union. Using game theory and cost-benefit analysis, the paper determines the set of equilibrium [...]

Using an autoregressive distributed lag model, this paper examines the factors that influence the credit risk of the Bulgarian banking system over the decade 2001-2010, as measured by non-performing loans. Recent papers aim to identify the determinants of non-performing loans using a cross-country modelling framework. As the South East European region (SEE) is non-homogeneous, our analysis is country-specific and captures the timeline between the bank privatisation era up to the global financial crisis and the ensuing Greek crisis. The contribution of our paper is twofold: it uses the ARDL modelling framework that is scarcely employed in related studies but also investigates spillover effects from the Greek crisis in view of the material presence of Greek banks in Bulgaria. In accordance with previous studies, the findings suggest that the credit risk determinants of Bulgarian banks should be sought endogenously in macroeconomic variables and industry-specific factors but also in exogenous factors. We evidence a pronounced role of the global financial crisis and the country's bank regulatory framework. The Greek debt crisis appears to play an immaterial role indicating that Greek banks have not been a Trojan horse in the Bulgarian banking system. Keywords Credit risk * Non-performing loans * Bulgarian banking system * Greek crisis JEL Classification C10 * G20 * O57, Introduction Before the global financial crisis, the countries in the SEE region relied to a large extend in foreign funding. The region had seen a stunningly high credit expansion with [...]

Abstract This paper assesses an investment model for firms making decisions on interconnected assets. Introducing heterogeneity and interconnections implies new considerations about investment decision drivers. The paper also analyzes the [...]

This paper empirically tests the law of one price by applying unit root tests to three panels consisting of data on 90 consumer price indices for the EU-25, the EU-15 and the 10 new EU member countries that joined the EU in 2004. The four major findings of this paper are: (1) panel unit root tests find evidence of price convergence for about 70% of all product groups, (2) the results are sensitive to the choice of the numeraire country implying that any conclusions must be based on all bilateral combinations, (3) the average half life across all product groups is 2.0 years, (4) the overall evidence for the law of one price is weaker in the 10 new EU member countries than in the EU-15. Keywords Law of one price * Panel unit root test * Mean reversion * Speed of adjustment JEL classification F3 * F31, Introduction According to the law of one price (LOOP), identical goods sold at different geographical locations should sell for the same price when prices are expressed in the same currency. [...]

Abstract This paper provides new insights in understanding the adjustments of the labor market to trade liberalization policies in an economy producing tradeables and nontradeables. The results of the paper [...]

Abstract This paper examines the relationship between long-run growth and business cycles in the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The model in the paper specifically assumes that the [...]

Abstract This paper analyzes whether international monetary policy coordination is the best response to economic interdependence. The paper develops a macroeconomic model in which countries show different preferences regarding objectives [...]

The paper considers an open rural region of a developed country with two sectors, an environmentally sensitive agricultural industry and locally operated tourism that generates pollution. We find that if [...]

This paper discusses the determinants of a Non-Fiat Anonymous Digital Payment Method's (N-FAD) value and illustrates a relationship between N-FAD transactions, economic growth, and inflation. The relationship raises a heretofore unmentioned issue concerning the ability of monetary authorities to operate effectively, which justifies regulatory concerns over bitcoin and other N-FADs. Our method of analysis allows for empirical estimates that characterize the magnitude of the concern, as it relates to the use of bitcoin. Finally, we are able to identify the stylized features of bitcoin that complicate monetary policy, comment on how they relate to the value of N-FADs more generally, and provide suggestions for future research. Keywords Crypto currency * Bitcoin * Quantity equation, Introduction In economics, the value of an item is defined by its opportunity cost - the next best alternative forgone. To facilitate comparisons of value, it is standard practice to [...]

This paper discusses a reason for volatility in oil prices. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries' (OPEC's) revenues are positively correlated with macroeconomic activity. Being procyclic, volatility would not seem to benefit OPEC. However, using instruments to sort out endogeneity of OPEC's revenues with respect to macroeconomic activity, volatility originating with oil prices is countercyclical in the U.S. and Europe, and OPEC, therefore, can command a risk premium. The risk premium may incentivize OPEC to destabilize prices, which lowers macroeconomic output because of the asymmetric effects of oil prices on the macroeconomy. While variation in OPEC's revenues originating with the macroeconomy was positively correlated with the macroeconomy, OPEC's revenues are extremely insensitive to macroeconomic activity. As a result, in any conventional model of risk, OPEC can also command a risk premium when volatility originates with the macroeconomy. Keywords OPEC * Risk premium * Volatility * Crude oil * Asymmetric JEL Classification Q43, Introduction Why do oil price shocks occur? One reason is offered here, though there are others. Since 1973, during what has been termed the 'OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries) [...]

Standard Phillips curve models of price inflation suggest that the United States should have experienced an episode of deflation during the Great Recession and the subsequent sluggish recovery. Although inflation reached very low levels, prices continued to rise rather than fall. More recently, many observers have argued that inflation should have increased as the unemployment rate declined and labor markets tightened, but inflation has remained below the Federal Reserve's policy target. This paper confirms that the slope of the Phillips curve has declined over the past 50 years and is very close to zero today. The Phillips curve was modified to allow its slope to vary over time consistent with theories of price-setting behavior by firms when prices are costly to adjust and when information is costly to obtain or process. Adapting the Phillips curve to allow for time-variation in its slope helps explain the pattern of inflation, not only during and after the Great Recession, but also over the previous four decades. Keywords Inflation * Phillips curve * Great recession JEL E30-E31, Introduction Standard models relating price inflation to measures of slack in the economy suggest that the United States should have experienced an episode of deflation during the Great Recession of [...]

This paper examines the link between changes in the sentiment tone with respect to the European Central Bank's (ECB) announcements and stock returns. The analysis constructs a new index that describes the tone of the sentiment derived from these announcements, spanning the period January 2002 to June 2016. The novelty of this work relies on the development of a unique sentiment index associated with the messages conveyed by the ECB's activities and the effect of this index on both the mean and the volatility of certain major international stock markets. In this context, the sentiment index is present in both the conditional mean and the volatility equations. The findings indicate a significant impact on both the mean and the volatility of returns, whereas the news sentiment/stock returns association increases in strength during the crisis period. The findings survive a robustness check based on the characteristics of the ECB governor's personality. Keywords Changes in the tone of sentiment wire news * ECB announcements * Stock prices * International stock markets JEL Classification G01*E58, Introduction Public news provides early warnings of the current situation of the stock market, whereas media reports influence the beliefs of market participants and induce investors either to enter or [...]

This paper contributes to nonparametric forecasting techniques by developing three local nonparametric forecasting methods for the nonparametric exclusion-from-core inflation persistence model that are capable of utilizing revised real-time personal consumption expenditure and core personal consumption expenditure for 62 vintages. Local nonparametric forecasting provides forecasters with a way of parsing the data by permitting a low inflation measure to be included in other low inflationary time periods and vice versa. Furthermore, when examining real-time data, policy-makers can use the nonparametric models to help identify outliers and potential abnormal economic events and problems with the data such as an underlying change in volatility. The most efficient nonparametric forecasting method is the third model, which uses the flexibility of nonparametrics by making forecasts conditional on the forecasted value, which can be used for counterfactual analysis. Keywords Inflation persistence * Real-time data * Monetary policy * Nonparametrics * Forecasting JEL Classification E52 * C14 * C53, Introduction Financial data and some economic time series data, such as inflation, tend to be from fat-tailed distributions, which should be taken into account in forecasting. Using the kernel-weighted least [...]

This paper shows the development of a common pool permit market formulated as a dynamic gross pool market for trading emission discharge permits. The pollutant modeled is a persistent pollutant. The common pool dynamic gross pool market formulation is derived with health risk specifications along with the general set of marginal-cost pricing rules based on the model's shadow prices and developed numerical simulations to demonstrate the working of the model in different scenarios. In the first simulation, no regional environmental quality constraints were imposed, but the same limit for emission discharge permits were introduced in both trading periods. The total number of EDPs to be sold was exactly equal to the number of emission discharge permits to be purchased in each trading period. The EDP price paid or received for each permit was the same. In the trading period 2, the price paid or received for each permit was the same, but different than the price in period one. The emission discharge permit limits were the same for both trading periods, but regional environmental quality constraints were added to the common pool trading model for period 2. The regional environmental quality constraints were binding and there was a surplus of emission discharge permits. In addition, each trader paid or received a different marginal cost price. The next set of simulations included the health-risk parameters in the common pool model. Including the health-risk parameters and increasing the health-risk level led to an increase in the total surplus of emission discharge permits for the two-period formulation. Keywords Environmental pollution policies * Air pollution * Permit trading * Dynamic permit trading models * Health risk * Common pool permit markets JEL Classification Q50 * Q53 * Q58, Introduction The cap and trade policy, used in countries such as the United States to manage air quality, is based on a property rights approach, where the typical property right [...]

The forest transition describes a reversal or turnaround in long-run land-use trends for a country or region from a period of net forest area loss to net gain. Following North, this paper constructs a model to show that effective institutions may impose additional costs on a representative economic agent converting forests to agriculture in a tropical developing country. The main outcome to emerge from the model is that an improvement in institutions accelerates the onset of a forest transition. This hypothesis is tested by examining the probability of a forest transition occurring for 101 tropical developing countries over 1990 to 2015. The empirical results suggest that the hypothesis cannot be fully rejected. However, not all the institutional indicators analyzed affect the likelihood of the forest transition, and one economy-wide indicator appears to delay the transition. Nevertheless, the results illustrate the importance of understanding how institutional indicators affect the decisions of economic agents concerning land clearing as well as forest management practices and policies. Keywords Developing countries * Forestpolicy * Forest transition * Tropical deforestation JEL Classification Q23 * Q24 * O13, Introduction The forest transition describes a reversal or turnaround in long-run land use trends for a country or region from a period of net forest area loss to net gain [...]

Economic history, particularly the history of the Eurozone, is full of cases of countries experiencing severe economic crises. These crises may have different causes and effects and may be transmitted differently among the affected countries. However, the type of crisis that has the most widely spread political, economic, and social impact is the recession crisis. As a rule of thumb, a recession crisis is the result of a separate crisis, such as a country's debt crisis (e.g. Greece, Portugal and Spain), a financial and banking crisis, or a crisis due to various bubbles (e.g. the real estate crisis in the United States). The main purpose of this paper is to study the course of a series of countries, which were or currently are in a crisis and a supervised adjustment program, in terms of managing the exit from the crisis, the implementation of macroeconomic and reform policies, the policy applied for attracting foreign direct investments, and the impact of such policy on the countries that were affected by the crisis. Keywords Economic crisis * Economic growth * Foreign direct investments * Eurozone JEL Classification F30 * G15 O10, Introduction The recent economic crisis in the Eurozone and similar economic events since the early twentieth century can be shown, despite their differing causes and characteristics, to have direct and [...]

This paper examines a remittance multiplier based on the short-run Keynesian equilibrium approach and shows how income may be affected by remittance inflows. We explore this through the equilibrium in the goods and money markets, where remittances can affect both consumption and the demand for real money balances. We present this simple theoretical model utilizing a standard Keynesian framework. The short-run Keynesian equilibrium approach provides insight into how remittances affect output and income, and its potential multiplier effects. The model used is indicative of a positive relationship between the marginal propensity to consume out of remittances and the multiplier. The framework also shows that remittances will have a greater impact if its marginal propensity to consume is greater than that for standard disposable income. Keywords Remittances * IS-LM model * Keynesian equilibrium * National income JEL Classification E00 * E20 * F20 * O10, Introduction The inflow of remittances to developing countries is an area of growing interest as we see an increase in globalization and development financing. Remittances to low- and middle-income countries [...]

In this paper, we show that successful policy aimed at enhancing economic growth in the long run must be based on policies which improve human capital and technological progress. This is applied to Slovenia, a small open economy in the European Union and the Euro Area. In particular, we investigate how fiscal policies should be designed to support economic growth without violating the European Union Stability and Growth Pact. Using the SLOPOL10 model, an econometric model of the Slovenian economy, we analyse the effects of different fiscal policies in Slovenia over the next few years by means of simulations. The fiscal policy multipliers of the Slovenian economy are small and short-lived, which renders demand-side expansionary fiscal policies inappropriate as a means of achieving higher growth. However, if an increase in government expenditures directly related to technological progress is implemented (such as better funding for tertiary education or subsidies for firms' investments in research and development), this can trigger a path of output which is permanently higher than that of the baseline simulation. Reducing income taxes and social security contributions has strong positive effects on employment. This result shows that the key to prosperity and sustained growth is investment in human capital and technology, also for a small open economy like Slovenia. Keywords Macroeconomics * Stabilization policy * Fiscal policy * Tax policy * Public expenditures * Demand management * Supply side policies * Slovenia * Public debt Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s11294-018-9678-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. JEL Classification E62 * E17 * E37, Motivation The Great Recession, the financial and economic crisis from 2008 to 2010, and the ensuing 'Euro crisis' in the European Union (EU) have left most European economies with significantly [...]

This paper examines the pattern of settlements, investor wins and state wins in investor-state dispute settlement cases, focusing on the impact of arbitration rules, the resources and experience of the litigants, the type of treaty breach under investigation, and the pattern of state intervention. Logistic regression results show that settlements are more likely when investors do not disclose their allegations publicly, when the host state has been involved in a greater number of past cases, and when the respondent state has a higher control-of-corruption rating. Panel awards to investors are more likely in cases of alleged direct expropriation and less likely for indirect expropriation. Panel decisions favoring the state increase with higher per capita income and rule-of-law ratings. Keywords Foreign direct investment x Investor arbitration x International investment agreements JEL Classification F01 * F20 * K00, Introduction The mutual benefits of foreign direct investment (FDI) to both investor and host country imply the benefits of global agreements to facilitate FDI proliferation. Yet recent anxieties over globalization [...]

This paper aims at establishing empirical facts on the fundamental determinants of real estate prices. It contributes to the literature by analysing a unique panel dataset covering a wide range of real estate market data and other economic variables for nearly 100 German cities. Several robust fundamental determinants are identified, among them the supply-side factors of construction activity and housing stock as well as the demand-side factors of apartment rents, market size, age structure, local infrastructure and rental prices. Results suggest that these factors are robustly linked to fundamental real estate prices and thus can be used to detect misalignments of market prices. Keywords Real estate market * Fundamental prices * Regional data * Panel study JEL R21 * R31, Introduction In recent times, much discussion in economic research and economic policy has revolved around the question of the role of asset prices for macroeconomic policy. A particular asset class [...]

Investment-linked insurance products exhibit a series of advantages versus direct investments, such as accumulation of retirement funds, tax benefits, and waiver of premiums in the case of disability. However, they are perceived as more complex and difficult compared to plain investments. Consequently, there is a need for disclosures, so that retail investors - insured can make well-informed decisions. Such disclosures have so far been uncoordinated. The EU has identified the need for uniform transparency rules in the packaged retail and insurance-based investment products market. The EU made an effort to enhance protection for investors - insured via a regulation effective in 2017. Such an effort is expected to restore retail investor confidence lost in the aftermath of the crisis. In this paper we attempt to quantify the effect of the existing transparency rules in the various member states to have an indication of what to expect as soon as the new uniform rules are implemented. We use customer satisfaction and trust so as to measure the effect of transparency. We find that increased transparency positively affects both measures. Keywords customer satisfaction * key information documents * Packaged Retail Insurance-based Investment Products * transparency * trust JEL Classification G10 * G15 * G20 * G30 * J10, Introduction Each industry is governed by its own particular characteristics. Two of the features that distinguish the insurance industry are the simplified nature and broad scope within which it operates. [...]

This paper will discuss the operation of the currency board arrangement in Estonia and some future prospects. The main objectives of this paper are to: 1) discuss advantages and disadvantages [...]

This paper presents and analyzes the main results of the special interview survey of Estonian manufacturing firms undertaken in 1998. The main objectives of the paper were: 1) to describe [...]

BLANCA SANCHEZ-ROBLES [*] This paper intends to carry out some empirical investigation about the link between sectoral structure and real convergence for the case of Spain. First, this paper pursues [...]

Some important issues in developing the legal and institutional environment in a small transition economy, such as Estonia, are discussed in this paper. The main objective of this paper is [...]

Abstract The paper examines the perception of a sample of Kuwaiti external auditors about the importance of various factors that may affect external audit fees. A questionnaire was distributed to [...]

Abstract The objectives of this paper are twofold. Aggregate labor force participation rates in the United States are described focusing on educational attainment. A model is developed for decomposing aggregate [...]

Abstract Using panel estimates and a sample including all 28 European Union (EU) countries, this paper seeks to improve upon the existing literature with empirical evidence on the role that [...]

Abstract This paper presents the contributions of Francesco Forte to the measurement of art and cultural goods and services, as I worked with him as his co-author. These contributions range [...]

Abstract Francesco Forte has made major contributions to many areas of economics with the result that his theoretical work and applications have opened new areas of inquiry. This paper connects [...]

Abstract In this paper, we analyse the sustainability of Italian public debt using a unique database, reconstructed by Forte (2011), which covers the years 1862-2013. The study focuses on empirical [...]

Abstract This paper presents indirect evidence that absolute purchasing power parity (PPP) may hold in the long-run between Mexico and the U.S., but due to data limitations, the relationship could [...]

Abstract In this paper, a hybrid system combining neural networks and genetic training is designed to forecast future oil prices. The architectural design is that of the multilayer back propagation [...]

JEL D80 * H50 * L60 * 053 The goal of this paper is to empirically evaluate the impact of a modern and popular medium, the Internet, on public spending [...]

Abstract This paper highlights issues in the theory of voluntary provision of public goods, building on the investigation by Peacock in connection with the contributions by Coase and Buchanan. Our [...]

Abstract The term remittances refers to proceeds from the migration of labor that are sent to aid individuals remaining in the migrants' home communities. In this paper, we investigate whether [...]

Abstract This paper investigates gender pay inequality in the labor market of a developing country. Our empirical investigation uses data derived from a sample of employees in the Lebanese banking [...]

Abstract This paper contributes to empirical investigation of the causality relationships between real gross domestic product (GDP) growth and the growth of three debt categories, namely public, foreign and private [...]

Abstract This paper investigates the impact of telecommunications infrastructure in Sub-Saharan Africa. We use the World Development Indicators database and apply the instrumental variable-generalized method of moments to a panel [...]

Abstract This paper applies data envelopment analysis (DEA) to assess technical efficiency in a big public university. Particular attention has been paid to two main activities, teaching and research, and [...]