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We investigated the effect of foreign exchange rate in a correlation analysis of the Korean stock market using both random matrix theory and minimum spanning tree. We collected data sets which were divided into two types of stock price, the original stock price in Korean Won and the price converted into US dollars at contemporary foreign exchange rates. Comparing the random matrix theory based on the two different prices, a few particular sectors exhibited substantial differences while other sectors changed little. The particular sectors were closely related to economic circumstances and the influence of foreign financial markets during that period. The method introduced in this paper offers a way to pinpoint the effect of exchange rate on an emerging stock market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rise of neoliberalism and economic globalization is identified as a significant factor contributing to macroscale structural changes in the political economy of migration and education in Korea and Canada. In this paper the empirical focus of analysis is on how nation-states have played important roles in shaping the market conditions of the international education industry under the structural changes brought about by neoliberalization. I pay particular attention to how different public institutions have become actively engaged in profit-generating activities through promoting and selling Canadian education. In so doing, I reconsider the implications of neoliberalism for the political economy of migration and international education. Drawing upon empirical evidence collected from fieldwork in Seoul and Vancouver, this paper aims to explore the complexities and locally specific outcomes of neoliberal projects. In relation to the rise of international education, this paper adds to the burgeoning literature that acknowledges that taken-for-granted views on neoliberalism are problematic and further highlights the role of public institutions as active facilitators in the process of market expansion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic uncertainty and monetary uncertainty are said to affect public’s holding of money in either direction. In this paper, we consider the Korean demand for money, and after including two GARCH-based measures of output uncertainty and monetary uncertainty, we show that both measures exert significant effects on the demand for money in Korea in the short run. However, only the adverse effects of output uncertainty lasts into the long run. Indeed, including the two uncertainty measures yield a stable demand for money in Korea. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the demand function for gasoline in Korea using quarterly data covering the period 1991–2010. The long-run and short-run elasticities of demand with respect to gasoline price and national income are empirically examined using a co-integration and error correction model (ECM). Gasoline demand is relatively elastic to price and income change in both the long run and short run, and each elasticity is higher in the long run than in the short run. Moreover, gasoline demand response to price is higher than to income. This implies that a price demand-side management policy can be quite effective in Korea. Especially, the limitation of price change is important to the stabilization of gasoline demand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper has three objectives: i) to empirically examine labor market transitions in deindustrializing Asian economies; ii) to study the character of labor market risks and how these risks are shifting by gender, by education level, and by age in the transitional period; and iii) to rethink the commonly accepted assumptions that deindustrialization and globalization are the main causes of new labor market risks and, thus propose the possibility of institutional legacy as an important factor for such risk shifts. This study focuses on the labor market risks in the Republic of Korea, Japan, and Taiwan. Three steps are taken in this inquiry. First, this study commences by empirically examining the three labor market changes mentioned above. Second, it challenges the idea of the emergence of 'new risks,' arguing instead for the concept of 'risk shift': the feature of risk shifting to different demographic groups. Lastly, with the empirical evidence already used, this paper discusses whether deindustrialization or globalization is a sufficient cause for risk shifts in deindustrializing Asian economies, proposing that institutional legacy may be an important factor in risk shift. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the processes of bank and corporate restructuring in South Korea since the 1997–98 economic crisis, and seeks to highlight how the state has intervened in a highly dirigiste manner in order to expedite restructuring in both the commercial bank and corporate sectors. At the same time it demonstrates the clear neoliberal principles that have underpinned the state's attempts to promote restructuring. The state has shown a clear determination to take action against insolvent firms and financial institutions no matter how large or strategically important they may be, to impose hard budget constraints on key economic actors. Furthermore, the state has actively sought to engineer the sale of key domestic firms and banks to foreign investors. We argue that Korea's efforts to create a functioning neoliberal economy have been largely successful and are functional from the perspective of Korean capitalism, if not the perspective of individual Korean firms. Changes in the global economy in the two decades preceding the 1997–98 crisis imposed an increasingly inescapable pressure on the Korean state to effect a neoliberal transformation and Korea's future as a centre of capitalist accumulation has for some time been bound up with the success of the neoliberal project. In conclusion, this paper seeks to draw out the broader implications of this reading of the post-crisis restructuring programme for debates on global economic liberalization and the future of capitalist diversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper questions the conventional view that the Korean financial crisis of 1997 was simply the result of pervasive government intervention in the economy. While Korea has had a long history of state involvement, and while state policies did contribute to inefficient resource allocation and inefficiencies, the strategy of market liberalization introduced in the early 1990s hardly performed any better. In fact, this paper illustrates that, although not the immediate trigger of the Korea's financial and currency meltdown, the poorly sequenced and implemented financial liberalization contributed greatly to the scale and pace of the crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the changes in the structure of the household expenditure on telecommunications services and its relationships with other existing expenditures in South Korea employing the average household monthly expenditure from 1998.Q1 to 2014.4Q. The linear approximate Almost Ideal Demand System (LA/AIDS) is implemented in both short-run and long-run models. The short-run relationship is estimated using a seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) with first differenced series of data, and the long-run relationship is examined through a Vector Error Correction Model (VECM). Both sets of empirical results suggest that the household demand for telecommunications services is income inelastic over the whole analysis period, and the absolute value of the own price elasticity noticeably increased in the period of 2007.Q1–2014.Q4. Additionally, the estimations from the VECM LA/AIDS model suggest that the relationship between telecommunications services and other existing goods/services such as public transportations, cultural services, books and private education had a complementary relationship in the early period of the Internet and mobile services. However, a substitution relationship has tended to be reinforced after the Internet and mobile services came into widespread use. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Offering a family involvement program is a typical approach for helping students with or at-risk for emotional and behavioral disorders and other behaviors of concern. The present paper examines evidence-based parental involvement programs in the United States and Korea. Several differences exist between programs in the two countries including evaluation, collaboration, the support of the government and related institutions, differences in perception of administrators, and the professional staff. The authors suggested several recommendations including considering the requirements of guidance for developing effective programs, designing ways to evaluate programs, encouraging collaboration, preparing qualified professional staff, and developing culturally appropriate programs for children and youth with special needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper exploits an international bilateral data set over the period 1963-1998 to investigate the relationship between foreign direct investment (FDI) and foreign-educated labor in an FDI host country. Workers educated abroad acquire country-specific human capital that is more productive in the host country of study. A foreign subsidiary sharing a parent firm's technology will invest more if it has more foreign-educated labor, since it can utilize this labor more productively because of the country-specific human capital. Consistent with our predictions, our empirical findings show that foreign-educated labor accounted for a sizable portion of growth in FDI flows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

kwong e.w.-y., pang s.m.-c., choi p.-p. & wong t.k.-s. (2010) Influenza vaccine preference and uptake among older people in nine countries. Journal of Advanced Nursing 66(10), 2297–2308. Aim. This paper is a report of a study delineating factors that influence older people’s preferences and uptake of the influenza vaccine in nine countries. Background. Vaccination uptake for the aging population in many countries still remains below the World Health Organization recommended rate. Older people who perceive higher susceptibility to and severity of influenza, and more benefits from vaccination and action cues prompting vaccination, tend to accept the vaccine, but those with more perceived barriers to vaccination are less likely to accept it. Method. A total of 208 older people from China, Indonesia, Turkey, Korea, Greece, Canada, the United Kingdom, Brazil and Nigeria were recruited to 14 vaccinated and 12 unvaccinated focus groups. They shared their experiences of influenza, and influenza vaccination, and promotion of influenza vaccination in focus groups. The data were collected in 2007. Findings. We identified five themes and generated a hypothetical framework for in-depth understanding of vaccination behaviour among older people. Participants’ vaccine preferences were determined by their behavioural beliefs in vaccination, which were based on their probability calculation of susceptibility to and severity of influenza and vaccine effectiveness, and their utility calculation of vaccine, healthcare and social costs. Action cues prompting vaccination and vaccine access further affected the vaccine uptake of participants with vaccine preferences. Vaccination coverage was likely to be higher in the countries where normative beliefs in favour of vaccination had formed. Conclusion. The hypothetical framework can be used to guide healthcare providers in developing strategies to foster normative beliefs of older people in vaccination, provide effective action cues and promote vaccine access. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: There are many contingent valuation (CV) studies to estimate the economic benefits of cultural heritage, but few provided advice on the design of financial products for cultural heritage assets. This paper conducted conjoint and willingness-to-pay (WTP) analyses for providing the design implication of these financial products. We calculated WTP for each attribute. The result of conjoint analysis shows that people prefer a short period of investment, high-expected rate of return and small amount of money invested. Only the amount invested and the rate of return on investment are significant to estimate WTP for these financial products. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Korean lifelong learning in practice is gradually adapted by neo-liberals and the discourses of the economic market. Considering that the public foundation of Korean education is fragile to cope with the market challenge, the whole picture of Korean learning ecology is rapidly distorted towards the establishment of the learning market and the challenge it presents to public education. This paper attempts to grasp the evolution of the lifelong learning ecosystem in Korea and to explain the meaning of the learning market in this context. I am going to argue that (1) the emergence of the learning market changed the traditional learning ecosystem significantly; (2) the discourse of lifelong learning in this context also rapidly deconstructs the code of 'education' and replaces the learning system to fit to learning capitalism as a part of the knowledge economy; and (3) the Korean case clearly reveals the changes in the complex ecosystem of lifelong learning in this way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I analyze the nexus between economic crises, market oriented reforms, and democratization in Indonesia and Korea since the 1997/98 Asian financial crisis. I provide some support for the hypothesis that democracies are better able to survive economic crises than authoritarian regimes. In both countries democratization facilitated a crisis resolution strategy based on market oriented reforms. However, I assert that in the long run the social consequences of market-oriented reforms tend to undermine democratization partly because both are so closely linked and the majority of the population sees them as one. This process does not necessarily destroy democracies but it leaves them more vulnerable to possible external shocks in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This paper estimates the negative effects of monopolies in Korea by measuring welfare loss due to monopolies. The results of this analysis reveal the following policy implications: (1) Welfare loss caused by monopolization represented was 7.56% of the gross value of shipments of 1998. (2) Welfare loss is greater in a firm whose monopoly power is greater. This result supports Leibenstein''s research [Leibenstein, H. (1966). Allocative efficiency vs. X-efficiency. American Economic Review, 56(3), 391–415] that a firm with greater monopoly power will be more X-inefficiency. (3) Social cost for welfare loss in Korea is higher than that of the U.S. and Japan. In conclusion, it suggests that the government must implement stronger policies to regulate monopoly and promote competition. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper describes how Korea has been successfully carrying out the DUPIC project for the development of the nuclear fuel cycle. To enhance energy security, the DUPIC is a response to the challenge faced by Korea''s nuclear energy program. First of all, indigenous technological capabilities have played a significant role in finding an alternative technological trajectory for proliferation resistance as well as energy economics and in solving innovative and complex technological problems. While being supported by a long-lasting national commitment, the implementation of DUPIC has also depended upon the domestic techno-economic validity in association with energy security, market condition and the industrial demand of spent fuel management. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]