Search

El objetivo de esta investigación es identificar los determinantes que estimulan la inversión extranjera directa (IED) en Ecuador entre 2002 y 2017. Mediante estimaciones de mínimos cuadrados ordinarios y un modelo de vectores autorregresivos (VAR) se comprueba empíricamente que el grado de apertura de la economía y la productividad del trabajo se relacionan positivamente con la IED, lo que indica que las inversiones de las empresas transnacionales (ET) están orientadas a la estrategia de búsqueda de mercados y eficiencia. Mientras tanto, fueron menos importantes el producto interno bruto, la inflación el tipo de cambio real y el costo laboral.

This paper exploits a payroll tax reform in Norway and applies matched employer–employee register data on individual wages to study the incidence of payroll taxation. The contribution is to allow for heterogeneous wage effects of payroll tax cuts based on unobserved worker ability and firm productivity (measured by estimated worker and firm fixed effects, respectively). Using the difference-in-difference approach, the estimates show that on average, about 30% of the labor cost reduction is shifted to employees through higher wages and the degree of tax shifting increases gradually during the first 3 years after the reform. Among high-productivity firms, the degree of tax shifting is stable at 40–50% throughout the post-reform period. In low-productivity firms, none of the labor cost reduction is shifted to employees in the short term, but there is a delayed wage response in the medium term. On average, the wage effect of reduced payroll taxes is twice as large in high-productivity compared to low-productivity firms. The difference in wage response is mainly between firms, rather than between workers within firms, although low-ability workers in low-productivity firms miss out on the wage gain from the reduced labor costs. The analysis does not find any robust employment effect of the payroll tax cut, neither in low- nor in high-productivity firms.

Although numerous linear regressions have been conducted to identify driving forces of farmland investment, this study uses panel threshold techniques to explore the nonlinear effects of resource endowment, labor cost, and other potential influencing factors on China's investment in farmland in 40 foreign countries during the period 2008-2016. Results show that increased resource endowment promotes China's investment in overseas farmland, but the correlation gradually weakens in magnitude as levels increase. A lower labor cost attracts greater Chinese investment in farmland, but the degree of influence declines with the continued increase in labor cost. Further, host country corruption, infrastructure level, and urbanization ratio have significant negative impacts on investment, whereas an increase in China's overall economic power significantly increases overseas farmland investment. Policy implications are proposed with respect to implementing environmental responsibility in host countries, creating comprehensive risk assessments, and optimizing the structure of overseas investment portfolios.

Purpose The primary objectives of this study are to (1) highlight subsectors and industry groups of the construction sector that are most vulnerable to weather-related disasters (with highest labor cost escalation) and (2) analyze how immediate this labor wage escalation happens in different subsector of the construction sector. Design/methodology/approach The research methodology consists of three steps: (i) integrating various data sources to enable measurement of the county-level labor wage changes following large-scale weather-related disasters; (ii) measuring postdisaster labor wage changes at the county level; and (iii) comparing amount and timing of postdisaster labor wage changes among all sub-sectors (and industry groups) of the construction sector. Findings The results show that among the three construction subsectors (Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction subsector, Construction of Buildings subsector, and Specialty Trade Contractors sub-sector), Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction subsector is the most vulnerable to weather-related disasters. The industry groups under the Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction subsector showed the same vulnerability level; however, under the Construction of Buildings subsector, Industrial Building Construction industry group showed to be the most vulnerable; and under the Specialty Trade Contractors subsector, the Building Foundation and Exterior Contractors industry group is the most vulnerable. The results also showed that in approximately 75% of the damaged counties, there were increases in wages of all construction labors, over the following three quarter after the disasters. In average, labor wages in Construction of Buildings subsector and the Specialty Trade Contractors subsector decreased by 0.6% and 0.8%, respectively, in the quarter of disaster and gradually increased by 4.4% and 4.6%, respectively, in the following three quarters. On the other hand, Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction’s labor wages did not experience this decrease right after the disasters; wages increased immediately after disasters hit the counties and continually increased by 8.6% in three quarters after the disasters. It is expected that the results of this study will help policy makers, cost estimators and insurers to have a better understanding of the post-disaster construction labor wage fluctuations. Originality/value This study is unique in the way it used construction labor wage data. All data are location quotient, which makes the comparison among the affected counties (with different construction size) feasible.

This study examines the relationship between private equity investment and local employment growth. Using a sample of over 3,000 US counties, we estimate the effect of private equity investment volume and demographic determinants of employment growth (labor supply, labor quality, labor cost, unionization, agglomeration, industry concentration, and regional geography) on employment changes from 2011 to 2014. Controlling for these demographic factors, private equity investment shows a positive correlation with employment changes. TOPIC:Private equity Key Findings • The study finds a positive association between private equity investment and employment growth. Results indicate that for each $1 million in additional private equity investment, a little more than 1.3 new jobs are created. • Results imply that private equity investment could create positive externalities. Statistical tests using county-wide employment data suggest that company specific private equity investment job-creation effects spill over from the company receiving financing to the local economy.

Estrus synchronization and manipulation are a tool that has been used by producers to provide uniform lamb and kid meat production and dairy sheep and goat milk production, to concentrate work and labor cost, and to plan for the lambing and kidding time. Breeders can also use estrus synchronization to stimulate ewes and does to exhibit estrus and ovulate outside of the breeding season, although both the ovulation rate and pregnancy rate may be decreased. To increase the ovulation rate outside of the breeding season, a variety of estrus synchronization methods have been used.

The level of labor cost is the key to the innovation and development of small and medium-sized enterprises. In order to further locate the relationship between the two, an empirical analysis of labor cost and innovation investment intention of small and medium-sized enterprises is carried out. Taking the small and medium-sized enterprises as the research object, this paper investigates the labor cost of the employees in the enterprises, selects the effective employee information, and obtains the sample data. By setting independent variables and dependent variables, the structural equation model of SMEs' innovation investment intention is constructed. At the same time, based on SEM model, this paper tests the impact of labor cost on innovation investment intention from two aspects of internal and external factors. By using the multiple regression method, this paper analyzes the innovation investment intention of small and medium-sized enterprises, and completes the research on labor cost and innovation investment intention of small and medium-sized enterprises.

One way for policymakers to reduce labor costs and stimulate the recruitment of marginalized groups of labor in a highly unionized economy is to lower payroll taxes. However, the efficiency of this policy instrument has been questioned, and previous evaluations have mostly found small employment effects for such reforms. We investigate the effects of a payroll tax cut in Sweden that decreased firms’ labor costs in relation to the number of young employees that they had employed when the reform was implemented in 2007. We find that most firms received small labor cost savings as a result of the reform, but those that received larger cost savings increased their number of employees significantly more than firms that received no, or minor, labor cost savings. Our findings also suggest that the payroll tax cut increased the total wages paid to incumbent workers, but the wage effect was too small to offset the positive extensive-margin employment effect of the reform. In total, we find that the Swedish payroll tax reform created 18,100 jobs over the period 2006–2008; most of these jobs were within the targeted group of young employees. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10842-021-00356-6.

We show that an increase in the cost of unskilled labor leads to more labor-saving innovation. Larger minimum wage increases are associated with larger increases in automation patent applications and citations received by automation patents. These findings are stronger in states with a higher binding wage percentile, i.e., where the minimum wage increase has more ‘bite’. The increase in automation patents following minimum wage hikes contributes to poorer employment outcomes for unskilled workers employed in routine tasks. We conclude that minimum wage legislation spurs innovation that displaces the very same workers the legislation was designed to help.

On the basis of labor economics theories, we posit that adjustment in human capital accounts for a significant part of cost stickiness. Using the education level of employees as a measure of the quality of human capital, we find that labor cost changes driven by the adjustment of employee education level are sticky. This stickiness cannot be explained by the standard adjustment cost theory and is more salient during industry expansion. We further show that firms that actively adjust their employee quality during downturns experience improved future performance. Our findings are robust to alternative measures and specifications. Overall, this study extends the economic theory of sticky costs by showing that human capital adjustment drives cost stickiness. Moreover, such adjustments have long-term implications on the firm’s performance.

This study investigates the negative correlation between the feasibility of working from home and the probability of computerization in the future. Accordingly, this study finds that some tasks that could be technologically computerized remain dependent on their costs and other factors in the pre-COVID-19 era, especially in service sectors. However, the reluctance to adopt information technology at the workplace obstructs immediate responses to decreasing the consumption demand due to COVID-19. Delayed computerization became apparent in the difference in sales when the COVID-19 pandemic was prevalent because social distancing was suddenly required. The results indicate that firms in the eating and drinking business that invested more in software during the pre-COVID-19 era were less affected by the pandemic, using data from the United States, Canada, Europe, and Japan. Furthermore, computerization shifts skilled labor and results in a decrease in the number of non-regular employees, such as part-time and temporary workers.

Many studies have suggested that stringent labor protections and higher labor costs can limit foreign direct investment (FDI) in host countries. This would imply that the decisions of foreign firms are sensitive to the degree of flexibility in the labor market in the U.S. The U.S. has a steady stream of immigration, which has preserved the stability of the labor supply for the U.S. market. This makes the U.S. a good test case for the relationship between immigration and FDI because it is not only the largest host for FDI but also has the largest immigrant population in the world in absolute terms and is experiencing a significant reduction in labor supply and an increase in the minimum cost of labor. Utilizing a timeseries analysis of data from 1970 to 2016, this study suggests that expansive immigration policies directly increase FDI inflows in the U.S. and indirectly increase FDI inflows by lowering labor costs and securing a stable supply of labor.

Based on the actual demand, the semi-automatic concrete pipe cutting machine (CPCM) has been designed to improve performance of the conventional system. Firstly, a conceptual design is presented to describe the working principle of the CPCM. Then, mathematical modelling is calculated to obtain the equipment parameter. Next, The CPCM is fabricated to test the performance. The experimental results indicate that the proposed CPCM can work smoothly and safety. Moreover, it can reduce labor cost and increase the product quality. Therefore, the proposed CPCM is met the requirement of market.

Financial statement fraud is one of common means of false accounting. Authenticity and reliability of financial statements are doubted due to fraud. Recently, it is very frequent to see financial statement fraud of listed companies in China and there might be more frauds which have not been exposed yet. It is urgent to develop technologies for supervision of financial statements and recognition of financial statement fraud. Using new technologies to recognition of financial statement fraud will bring a fresh reform to the auditing industry. More importantly, using new technologies will surely improve auditing quality despite of decreasing labor cost and time cost.

Our paperwork seeks to analyze the difference between the labor cost and the net wage (representing labor tax wedge) in correlation with the unemployment rate and employment rate, as the idea that a high labor cost produces distortions in the labor market is widely accepted. With this purpose in mind, we used the hierarchical cluster analysis on a sample of 41 countries (being about OECD and EU countries). Following this analysis, we concluded that the countries can be divided in two big categories based on the unemployment rate, employment rate and the difference between the labor cost and the net wage (labor tax wedge). For countries characterized by a large gap between labor costs and net wage and which also present a high level of unemployment there is a need to adopt fiscal measures for reducing labor cost.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether sell-side equity analysts use labor cost information when forming expectations of future earnings. The availability of disaggregated earnings components will benefit financial statement users to the extent that the additional information released by a firm is useful to infer differential persistence of disaggregated earnings components. Design/methodology/approach This paper employs ordinary least squares, logit, and two-stage Heckman (1979) regressions which test whether analysts incorporate labor cost information into their earnings forecasts after controlling for a managerial self-selection to disclose labor costs, and further test whether a firm’s decision to voluntarily disclose labor costs improves analyst forecast accuracy. Findings This research finds that analysts incorporate labor cost information into their earnings forecasts after controlling for other earnings components. More importantly, this research shows that voluntary disclosure of labor cost information is positively associated with analyst forecast accuracy. Additional tests show that the benefit of voluntary labor cost information is more pronounced for firms with high information uncertainty and for analysts with less firm-specific experience and analysts affiliated with small brokerage houses. Originality/value This paper contributes to the literatures on the effect of labor cost on investors’ behavior and on analyst-specific factors in explaining analyst ability to predict future earnings.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impacts of the real exchange rate, the government deficit and other relevant variables on aggregate output in Slovenia. Few of the previous studies have applied the AD/AS model to examine the impacts of major macroeconomic variables on aggregate output. This paper makes contributions to the literature by applying a rigorous model to examine how real GDP is affected by the real exchange rate, fiscal policy and other related variables. The exponential GARCH model is applied in empirical work. The paper finds that real depreciation of the Euro may affect Slovenia’s aggregate output positively or negatively and that more central government deficit as a percent of GDP does not affect aggregate output. In addition, Slovenia’s aggregate output is positively associated with the real stock price, the real oil price and real total labor cost or wage and is negatively influenced by the real lending rate and the expected inflation rate. Recent real depreciation of the Euro would help Slovenia’s aggregate output whereas expansionary fiscal policy would not be effective in stimulating the economy.

This study examines the role of religion in explaining corporate labor decisions. In particular, we investigate whether local religiousness explains how firms respond to demand changes in terms of labor investment and whether it is associated with labor investment efficiency. Based on data from German private firms in the time period 2009 to 2015, we find that firms located in religious areas react less sensitive to economic upturns and more sensitive to economic downturns in terms of labor investment, which can be explained by a higher degree of conservatism and a stronger ethical sense. The results suggest that local religiousness reduces the typical tendency of managers to overinvest. Consistently, we find that firms located in religious areas are characterized by higher labor investment efficiency, enhancing productivity. However, this only holds in case of low unemployment at firm location. For high unemployment, local religiousness is unrelated to labor investment efficiency, underlining the relevance of business ethics in corporate decision-making. Our study contributes to research on religion and corporate investments by investigating the role of local religiousness in shaping firms’ investments in human capital as one type of managerial decisions characterized by a particularly high level of moral intensity.

It is shown in the present paper that embedded technology leads to higher economic growth. In other words, if the share of labor cost in value added is decreased then economic growth increases. It should be noted however that a decline in the share of labor cost in value added does not necessarily imply that the nominal wage is decreased, but instead it means that higher portion of technology is embedded in the value added. Statistics have shown that an increase in nominal labor costs is not the reason for a slow economic recovery, but the share of labor costs in the value added, which is the crux of the present article.

Within the framework of a model describing real-functioning association of three enterprises, numerical calculations of economic dynamics parameters considering fluctuating market demand for the goods were performed. A methodology was suggested for approximated consideration of both seasonal and random demand fluctuations at the market of textile garments, the main steps of the suggested methodology were described. The main exogenous random factors within this model include, as stated above, the volume of market demand for the goods produced by the enterprises of the group. The basic volume of market demand is considered at the average actual level according to the results of the enterprises&rsquo, analysis, and additionally we take into account the influence of non-price factors, such as random changes in the consumers&rsquo, tastes, consumers&rsquo, income, and other random factors on the market demand. By volume of market demand, we consider the total amount of goods produced by the enterprises of the group that all consumers are willing and able to purchase at a specific price in a marketplace. The calculations were made based on actual values of external economic parameters, such as labor cost, product prices, etc. Influence of the market demand fluctuations on the companies&rsquo, activity has been illustrated both numerically and graphically, allowing the analysis of the impact of exogenous parameters on the companies output and profits. The suggested approach creates a basis for further analysis of the impact of random factors of a similar nature, i.e., stochastic shocks related to the level of interest rates, shifts and turnabouts in the social environment, as well as the market transformations due to annual/seasonal epidemics.

After several decades of growth, Canada’s automotive industry reached peak levels of production and employment in 1999. The growth of the automotive industry in Canada was the result of innovative trade policies, labor cost, and productivity advantages vis-a-vis the US, and favorable currency exchange rates. However, these competitive advantages diminished, production and employment contracted, and Canada’s automotive industry underwent significant restructuring.

Strabismus is one of the most common vision diseases that would cause amblyopia and even permanent vision loss. Timely diagnosis is crucial for well treating strabismus. In contrast to manual diagnosis, automatic recognition can significantly reduce labor cost and increase diagnosis efficiency. This paper present a completely automatic strabismus detection system using face features. It is based on automatically analyze the degree of left and right symmetry of the patient face measurements. To achieve that was created a special model, using Active appearance model (AAM) algorithm that detected face landmarks that were used for calculation strabismus features slope differences.

This chapter presents facts about changes in the price-cost variables during the 1982–88 expansion and during preceding periods. If business cycle experts did the same for economic expansions, the 1982–1988 economic upswing in the United States would surely be called Methuselah. During the early part of the expansion of the 1980s, the gap was largest between 1984 and 1985 when productivity rose 1.4 percent, hourly compensation increased 4.2 percent, and unit labor costs advanced 2.8 percent. The economic consequences of annual productivity gains which were below compensation advances were sharp increases in labor costs per unit of output during the 1970s and early 1980s. An imbalance between labor cost increases and productivity improvements and the consequent push of unit production costs on prices is not a viable condition for prosperity without inflation. In August 1989, the expansion became the second longest in terms of the national bureau of economic research’s monthly chronology, which goes back to 1854.

We examine the impact of CEO overconfidence on labor investment efficiency (LIE). The findings suggest that firms with overconfident CEOs are more likely to have lower LIE. The findings are robust to alternative measures of CEO overconfidence and LIE and after accounting for endogeneity and CEO experience, age, managerial ability, high tech industry, and economic recession. Further analysis shows that: i) our findings are not due to the relation between net hiring and contemporaneous non-labor investments and the difference between high- and low-skilled labor, ii) firms with more analyst following, financially constrained firms, and firms located in states with wrongful discharge laws force CEOs to invest more efficiently in labor. In contrast, firms with dominant CEOs or facing high economic policy uncertainty are less efficient in labor investments, iii) firms with overconfident CEOs exhibit higher labor cost stickiness than those of non-overconfident CEOs, and iv) a lower LIE caused by CEO overconfidence has negative impacts on a firm's future profitability.

We examine the impact of CEO-director ties on labor investment efficiency. Using an aggregate measure of CEO-director ties we find that CEOs who have strong ties with independent board members are associated with inefficient labor investment. The effect is stronger in firms that rely more on skilled labor and those that are financially constrained, and that inefficient labor investment exacerbates labor cost stickiness. Our results are robust to selection bias, endogeneity concerns, and alternative explanations. Overall, the results are consistent with the view that stronger CEO ties to independent board members makes monitoring ineffective, which, in turn, aggravates the inefficient labor investment problem. Thus, we identify a potential channel through which CEO-director ties can be detrimental to shareholder value.

In this paper, we evaluate the effectiveness of place-based payroll taxes in stimulating local employment by exploiting a unique policy setting in Norway, where a system of geographically differentiated payroll taxes was suddenly abolished due to an EU regulation. The reform was enforced independently of the regional labor market developments, creating arguably exogenous variation in the payroll tax rates that firms in different local labor markets faced over time. We find evidence of partial shifting of payroll tax increases on to worker wages as well as a significant decline in local employment. These findings suggest that in settings with some degrees of wage rigidity, place-based payroll tax incentives can be effective in stimulating local employment.

The sharing economy has brought great challenges to the traditional employment mode of enterprises, and also provided important opportunities for their innovation. In this context, how to combine their own production and operation conditions to find a suitable employment model is an inevitable choice to optimize the labor cost. External conditions such as the optimization of the legal system, the support and guidance of the state in social security policies are also essential.

This paper investigates whether the disruption of political connections increases labor costs among Chinese listed firms. Using the Communist Party of China's Rule No. 18 as an exogenous shock that forces firms to lose their politically connected independent directors, we find that the disruption of political connections is associated with an increase in labor costs (both in terms of aggregate labor costs per firm and average labor costs per employee) and an increase in employee turnover. Such increases do not lead to labor productivity improvements, and cannot be attributed to changes in corporate policies or the composition of labor forces after Rule No. 18. We also find that firms with higher unemployment risk and skilled labor risk increase their labor costs to a larger extent. Our results are robust to alternative labor cost measures, controlling for potential confounding events, and alternative political connection channels. Our study shows an unintended labor market consequence—increases in labor costs—of political connection disruptions for firms that are adversely affected by such disruptions.

Plastering is the plasterwork which is done manually with the effort of human in most of the parts of the world by plasterboard because of this there is a huge demand of labor which increases labor cost and finally, increases the cost of Construction. The quality of plastering mainly depends upon skill of labor. Hence plaster surface may or may not be smooth and even. The solution for the same is automating the plastering technique so that the cost of construction can be saved and plaster surface will be smooth. The plastering machine can plaster the wall the wall automatically faster with greater surface finish. Due to this overall plastering time and cost are saved.

A controversial issue in the US is how to reduce the number of illegal immigrants and what effect this would have on the US economy. To answer this question we set up a two-country model with search in labor markets and featuring legal and illegal immigrants among the low skilled. We calibrate it to the US and Mexican economies during the 2000-2010 period. As immigrants - especially illegal ones - have a worse outside option than natives, their wages are lower. Hence, their presence reduces the labor cost of employers who, as a consequence, create more jobs per unemployed when there are more immigrants. Because of such effects our model shows increasing deportation rates and tightening border control weakens low-skilled labor markets, increasing unemployment of native low-skilled workers. Legalization, instead, decreases the unemployment rate of low-skilled natives and increases income per native. © 2015 Elsevier Inc. 18 792 821 792-821

We examine the effect of capital structure on managers’ labor cost management by focusing on the relations between leverage and hiring decisions. Consistent with the disciplining effect of debt, we find that firms with higher leverage hire fewer employees. We also find that leverage is negatively associated with total labor cost, which is the product of the number of employees and average employee wage, and that this effect is greater for firms with higher bankruptcy risk. Overall, our results provide evidence that the disciplining effect of debt on employee hiring outweighs the effect of debt on compensating wage documented in prior studies.

he law permits employers to pay tipped employees below the full minimum wage. I investigate a policy whereby income collected from tips is replaced by a higher minimum wage for tipped employees. In a fully-served market, this transition makes both employers and servers better off while consumers end up paying higher prices for the service. Under local monopolies, this transition may result in some loss of employment. Replacing tips with higher wages raises employers' artificially-low hourly labor cost to their actual levels thereby inducing employers to increase consumer prices. Simulations based on actual data are then used to test some of the model's predictions.

This chapter deals with the problem of setting prices and quality conventions among small-scale agro-food producers. Barbera, Dagnes, and Di Monaco first show how producers decide sales prices for their products and, more precisely, how relational mechanisms (e.g., imitation) mix with the moral economy (e.g., legitimate price thresholds) and economic fundamentals (e.g., labor cost, demand levels). They then show how different mechanisms bring about specific disputes and compromises within and between quality conventions on the producers’ side.

This paper examines the extent and consequences of Downward Nominal Wage Rigidity (DNWR) using administrative worker-firm linked data from the Longitudinal Employer Household Dynamics (LEHD) program for a large representative U.S. state. Prior to the Great Recession, only 7-8% of job stayers are paid the same nominal hourly wage rate as one year earlier - substantially less than previously found in survey-based data - and about 20% of job stayers experience a wage cut. During the Great Recession, the incidence of wage cuts increases to 30%, followed by a large rise in the proportion of wage freezes to 16% as the economy recovers. Total earnings of job stayers exhibit even fewer zero changes and a larger incidence of reductions than hourly wage rates, due to systematic variations in hours worked. The results are consistent with concurrent findings in the literature that reductions in base pay are exceedingly rare but that firms use different forms of non-base pay and variations in hours worked to flexibilize labor cost. We then exploit the worker-firm link of the LEHD and find that during the Great Recession, firms with indicators of DNWR reduced employment by about 1.2% more per year. This negative effect is driven by significantly lower hiring rates and persists into the recovery. Our results suggest that despite the relatively large incidence of wage cuts in the aggregate, DNWR has sizable allocative consequences.

Despite the great potential to save the labor cost of developers, automated bug triaging as a text classification problem has not been thoroughly investigated on long descriptions, which are informative but often noisy. In this paper an optimized bug triage technique is proposed to build a high quality set of bug data by removing the noisy and non-informative bug reports while ensuring the maximum accuracy of bug triaging with weights and binary constraints. The proposed technique is built upon three feature selection algorithms and four instances selection algorithms with intention to recommend the bug and to automatically assign it more accurately even with noisy bug descriptions. Several experiments are conducted and the experimental results show that the reduced training sets by the proposed approach can achieve better accuracy in several cases, about 4% on average better than the original ones.

Just-in-time scheduling has become ubiquitous in the service industries. Although effective in reducing staffing level, hence labor cost, the potential impact of just-in-time scheduling on workers’ productivity and the firm’s revenue is not well understood. Using a data set of 1,444,044 transactions from 25 stores of a full-service casual dining restaurant chain in the United States, we study how just-in-time scheduling impacts worker productivity. We consider two types of just-in-time schedules: (1) short-notice schedules that are assigned to servers shortly before the day of service (mostly two days in our data) and (2) real-time schedules that are assigned to servers on the day of service. We show that short-notice schedules do not harm server productivity overall, but real-time schedules do by 4.4%. Our analysis indicates this may be because servers reduce their up-selling and cross-selling efforts when working on real-time schedules. We then propose an analytical scheduling model that accounts for both the value of staffing flexibility created through just-in-time scheduling and its impact on server productivity to inform the firm how to use just-in-time scheduling to improve profitability. Through a case study, we demonstrate that with the 4.4% productivity loss during the real-time schedules, the managers should shift from the heavy use of real-time scheduling toward scheduling more servers with longer advance notice. Such a shift not only provides more predictable work schedules for the workers but can also improve restaurants’ expected profit by up to 1%, a significant number for the low-margin restaurant industry. This paper was accepted by Vishal Gaur, operations management.

International audience; With the development of artificial intelligence, more and more multimedia applications for various tasks have emerged in our daily life. Meanwhile, as one of the main information sources of the applications, a huge amount of video data has been being generated by portable or mounted cameras in daily basis for varying purposes including surveillance, in which case we may need computers to "watch" videos to save labor cost. However, most video coding standards are designed for the highest human perceptual quality given a bit rate by minimizing a fidelity cost function (e.g., mean squared error, MSE), assuming the content will be consumed by human beings. In view of the above considerations, this paper proposes a new rate-analytical-distortion optimization method (RADO) for video analysis. Specifically, we consider moving object detection as the analysis task. Accordingly, we develop a novel rate analytical distortion (RAD) model for video coding, where the analytical distortion is related to the object detection performance expressed in terms of F-measure. As shown in the experimental results, the performance of the video analysis task can be significantly improved (up to 40% reduction of analytical distortion) with a slight bit rate increase.

As modular method produces houses in factory, it is able to minimize works in construction sites resulting in reduction of labor cost and good quality of residential performance. Because of this characteristics, our country is also more and more getting interested in modular houses recently. Reduction of construction time, which is a strength of modular method, is a suitable construction method to provide temporary shelters to refugees who are damaged by disasters and this is also required to be researched for activation of modular houses. Although temporary residential house means ones to meet interim residential demand, their follow-up management has been required after their demands are expired. Given that there needs to develop temporary residential houses to meet temporary demands due to refugees, it's required to use those temporary houses continuously rather than disposing them after their initial intention is expired. This study is intended to propose design affording resident's areas by combining units in a way that applies modular method to temporary houses, and to produce test product and finally verify its construction method.

As an important starting point for optimizing the structure of agricultural products and implementing green production methods, the direction of orchard management development is directly related to the success of &ldquo, supply side&rdquo, reform in the fruit industry in China. However, in the context of the progressive rise of labor force, is the labor force still capable of the high labor intensity and fine cultivation management needed, such as for pruning? In this paper, based on the micro-production data of peach farmers in different provinces, we set up a decision model of fruit trees management to analyze the effects of changes in the labor cost on orchard management&rsquo, s input for farmers with different trading characteristics under the information asymmetry theory. The results show that with the increase of labor force cost, although the total labor investment of farmer households has somewhat reduced, significant differences exist in the distribution of labor investment between the different farmers due to the different labor demands from the various trading characteristics. By repeated transactions that transmit information of quality, farmers can get a high marginal price of fruit, and these relatively repeated transactions further increase the labor investment of fine management. Foreseeably, the rising of rural labor cost will have a negative impact on fine cultivation management in the fruit and nut industries, which have the same management methods for pruning and flower (fruit) thinning. Therefore, this paper offers relevant policy recommendations for the support of agriculture products brand, optimization of production tools, expansion of operation scale, and the establishment of networks of companies, aimed at sharing skilled labor for the execution of quality work, etc.

PurposeThe aim of this paper is to get an insight into the potential determinants of foreign direct investment (FDI) for a panel of ten OECD member countries over the period of 1985‐2009.Design/methodology/approachGranger causality tests have been implemented in the study to identify causalities, both in the short‐ and long‐run, between FDI and the variables that emerge as significant determinants of FDI during the regression analysis.FindingsThe fixed effects estimation indicates that market size, labor cost and quality of infrastructure yield significant coefficients in relation to FDI for the panel of countries under study. A bi‐directional short‐run relationship is established between market size and labor costs in the short‐run; whereas quality of infrastructure causes market size and labor costs in the short‐run. For the long‐run deviation of FDI from equilibrium, market size, labor costs and quality of infrastructure all bear the joint burden in the short‐run to re‐establish the equilibrium.Practical implicationsThe research findings have a number of policy implications for the OECD countries in specific and other developed economies in general. Labor costs seem to affect the FDI decision on the part of investors; therefore, the countries with low labor costs are preferred by investors in order to reduce the cost of their business and products. Policies should be devised to reduce the labor costs and improve the equality of infrastructure in the country in order to attract more FDI into the economy and for quick adjustment purposes in case of shock to the system.Originality/valueThis paper investigates the relationship and significance of nine potential determinants of FDI in ten OECD member nations using panel data methods. The practices that are undertaken in developed and established economies are of vast significance to the economies that are in transition stages. The paper uncovers some important factors influencing FDI in the ten countries under study and provide a guide‐map for other developed countries.

Many developing countries are successfully developing their animation industries which are already contributed to their economic growth. It is noted that these countries have the potentials to become hubs for working international quality animation products due to low labor cost. For the purpose of reviewing the prospects of these industries, in Bangladesh, the researchers visited some selected animation studios in the capital city. Data was collected from 16 animation and multimedia studios using direct interviews, telephone conversations, and website visits etc. The main purpose of this study is to find out the prospects and challenges of animation industries in Bangladesh.

The paper examines the policies and the structural adjustments went through in China to integrate the textiles sector with world trading system. Entry into WTO secured more opportunities for export growth and increased employment at home. The sector has witnessed many challenges in terms of negative growth and policy formulations as the world economy experienced financial crisis. Though the export growth of the sector was hit, yet it took steps to rejuvenate the sector by indulging in policy changes. The sector has received considerable state patronage and will retain its global competitiveness through productivity network and cheap labor cost.

There are index adjustment method and item adjustment method in estimation methods for price fluctuation rate of public constructions. A relevant regulation has put item adjustment method as a principle, but in most construction, contract sum adjustment has been made by index adjustment method. Hence, this study, by figuring out width and causes of the gap between index adjustment method and item adjustment method through direct comparative analysis, solved inequality caused by difference between them and suggested a rational way against irrationality of each method. For building operations of public housing construction, a detailed fluctuation rate by index adjustment method and item adjustment method of construction cost elements of the same construction, that is, direct material cost, direct labor cost and historical construction cost was estimated to analyze difference between two adjustments and establish its cause. Across the analysis, it was found that fluctuation rate by item adjustment method was estimated lower than that by index adjustment method and difference between methods for estimating fluctuation rate of quotation unit price and application of index unrelated to construction type and construction nature are main causes of the difference. This study has a significance in that, for smooth contract sum adjustment between contracting parties, it practically proved the real difference between adjustment methods by conducting comparative analysis of the difference in direct correspondence way.

This paper studies the determinants of China's inflation and finds that demand-pull factors have been more important than cost-push factors in driving the inflation in the past decade. Because China's economic growth will gradually moderate and because the adjustment of the prices of the factors of production is also underway, the cost-push factors may soon play a more significant role in driving future inflation. Thus the Keynesian-style demand-side policy will not be enough to control inflation. More attention must now be given to supply-side management—such as dismantling monopolies, boosting private investment, encouraging innovation, and improving productivity—to mitigate the medium- to long-term inflation pressure. © 2012 The Earth Institute at Columbia University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Economists have been arguing about the connection between unemployment and inflation for decades. Critics claim that the connection is unreliable and leads policymakers astray, while others argue that the relationship is useful for forecasting. We examine the more direct connections between elevated unemployment levels and the rate of increase in wage and labor costs, more generally. We find that wage and labor cost growth has declined markedly following recent recessions. It has again declined sharply in the most recent recession. We also find that compensation typically remains subdued during the initial phases of recent recoveries. This is again the case in the current recovery, making labor costs a significant restraining force on inflation going forward.

Thanks to the fast economic growth and quick demographic transition, long-term factors have dominated the Chinese labor market. Therefore, with a short-lived shock in employment due to the global financial crisis, the labor shortage reappeared in the spring of 2010. Taking advantage of the recent aggregated data, this paper predicts the potentials of employment demand in the coming years. Also, the impact of demographic transition is discussed. In addition to quantity shortage, the rising wages for migrant workers characterize the labor market in recent years. Using the national representative data, this paper discusses the trend of labor cost changes when the Chinese economy approaches the Lewis turning point. The implications of large-scale migration to inequality are explored by using 1% population sampling data. This paper also tries to clarify some misunderstandings incurred by misuses of data.

Since the adoption of the cross-strait relations between mainland China and Taiwan, the economies of the said countries have grown to two of the largest in the world. However, over the years, Taiwanese businessmen shifted to increase foreign direct investments and build manufacturing plantations in China because of the vast industrial lands available, lower labor cost and overhead costs, and language similarity to Taiwan. This resulted concern for Taiwan’s own development. In this study, issues concerning the industrial upgrading of Taiwan and increasing rates of unemployment, and export dependency to China will be analyzed. A survey questionnaire was handed to 50 respondents to determine the factors that prompt enterprises to invest overseas. The study also reviewed past literatures about the subject matter. Results showed that Foreign Direct Investments was directly proportional to Taiwan’s GDP and balance of payments. Also, Taiwan and China have mutually beneficial import and export trade rela...

The Uruguay Round (1987–95) signaled the end of the Multifiber Agreement for textiles and clothing. The quota regime, in place since 1974, was decided, according to the Agreement on Textiles and Clothing, to be gradually eliminated by the year 2005. As a result, prices of cotton-yarn in the world markets decreased, affecting producers in all cotton-yarn exporting countries, including Greece. At the same time, the labor cost in western industrialized countries remained high, or even increased, exerting further pressure on yarn producers. The present paper examines these changes for the cotton-yarn industry in Greece. We use a multi-market partial-equilibrium model which allows us to take into account simultaneous input and output price changes, relevant for the industry under study. Findings show that, after the implementation of the program for the gradual elimination of quotas, producers' welfare decreased whereas consumers noted substantial increases in welfare transfers.