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Purpose – The primary purpose of this study is to explore the effect of technical changes on provincial-level income inequality in Vietnam. The authors also investigate whether the quality of institutions and human capital level moderate this relationship. Design/methodology/approach – This research applies the fixed-effect and random-effect models on a balanced panel data set of 63 Vietnamese provinces/cities from 2010 to 2020. Findings – The study’s empirical results show that technical improvement has a nonlinear influence on income disparity in Vietnamese localities. When the local level of technology is limited, technological change can mitigate income disparity. However, as local technological levels increase, inequality tends to rise. Moreover, the study also reveals that the quality of a province’s institutions and the level of human resources are factors that moderate the correlation between technological change and income inequality. For provinces with better institutional quality and/or better human resources, inequality tends to decline under the impact of technological change. Practical implications – The results of this study suggest that while encouraging technology advancement, localities should also ensure sustainable development, reduce income inequality and focus on improving institutional quality and human resources development. Originality/value – There are increasing concerns about the impact of technical change on inequality in income distribution; however, empirical evidence on this relationship in developing countries remains scarce. This study is among the few attempts to examine this issue at the provincial level of a developing country considering the moderation effect of institutional quality and human capital level.

AbstractThis study analyzes the effects of foreign direct investment (FDI) on wage inequality in Vietnam by utilizing panel data from 63 provinces over the period 2010–2018. The spatial autocorrelation model is used in the study. Empirical results from the spatial econometric model reveal that FDI tends to increase wage inequality in localities and has direct and spatial effects. Economic growth has led to a reduction in the wage inequality between skilled and unskilled labor. The increase in the proportion of the skilled labor force reduces wage inequality in provinces with high human capital and developed education systems. The study results imply that the policy on attracting and utilizing FDI needs to be aligned with training and human capital development to ensure sustainable development. It is also necessary to emphasize professional training for the workforce to attract FDI.

Purpose – This paper examines credit composition and income inequality reduction in Vietnam. In particular, the authors focus on the distinction between policy and commercial credits and investigate whether these two types of credit adversely affect on income inequality. The authors also examine whether the educational level and institutional quality condition the impact of policy credit on income inequality. Design/methodology/approach – The authors use the primary data set, which contains a panel of 60 provinces collected from the General Statistics Office of Vietnam from 2002 to 2016. The authors employ the generalized method of moments to solve the endogenous problem. Findings – The authors show that while commercial credit increases income inequality, policy credit reduces income inequality in Vietnam. In addition, we provide evidence that the institutional quality and educational level condition the impact of policy credit on income inequality. Based on the findings, the paper implies that it was not the size of the private credit but its composition that mattered in reducing income inequality due to the asymmetric effects of different types of credit. Practical implication – The government should focus on credit for the poor by helping them to exit poverty through investing in human capital, health and micro enterprises activities. Originality/value – This is the first study that examines the links between the two components of credit and income inequality as well as the constraints of the links. The authors argue that analyzing the separate effects of commercial and policy credits is more important for explaining the role of credit in income inequality than the size of total credit.

This article attempts to examine the factors that affect the mechanism of mobilizing and utilizing financial resources in building new countryside in Vietnam. Based on the primary data gathered from 480 inhabitants, managers and enterprises in Nghe An province and through exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and linear regression, the findings show that viewpoint, orientations and objectives of socio-economic development are the most influential factors to the mechanism of the mobilization and utilization of financial resources for new countryside building, followed by structural organization and technical facilities, participating individual’s perception, socio-economic environment and, lastly, specific characteristics of building new countryside.

This paper examines the determinants of technology transfer through international trade in Vietnam by using provincial level data. The paper investigates the similarities and differences between the adoption of technology from OECD and non-OECD countries. The empirical finding shows that the skills of labor force and openness to trade are the most robust determinants of technology adoption at the provincial level. Furthermore, provinces with higher levels of R&D expenditure adopt more technology from OECD countries than do other provinces.

This paper examines how initial inequality and poverty rate are related to subsequent economic growth in the provincial level of Vietnam. The results show a robust negative relationship between initial poverty rate and subsequent economic growth. However, there is no link between initial inequality and subsequent economic growth. The results also show that lower inequality leads to lower poverty rate and poverty reduction could help to reduce inequality. Other determinants of inequality and poverty reduction include human capital, investment, gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate and trade openness. The main policy implication that emerges from this paper is that concentrating on poverty elimination will help us build a more equitable society without sacrificing economic growth.

This study aims at investigating the impact of globalization on CO2 emission in Vietnam. Empirical analysis is performed by employing autoregressed distributed lag approach on time series data for the period of 1990 to 2016. The paper tested the stationary, cointegration of time series data and utilized autoregressed distributed lag modeling technique to determine the short run and long run relationship among CO2 emission, globalization, foreign direct investment, exports, coal consumption per capita and fossil fuels electricity generation. The results show that globalization increases CO2 emission in Vietnam and thus globalization is not beneficial for the long-term environmental health. Exports lowers CO2 emissions in both short run and long run whereas coal consumption per capita and fossil fuels electricity generation raise CO2 emissions. The study further shows that foreign direct investment did not affect CO2 emissions directly in short run as well as in long run.

This paper examines the production efficiency and its determinants of 3301 rice farms in Vietnam. Our empirical results from data envelopment analysis (DEA) technique show that rice farms perform on average level of efficiency. There are differences in production of each farm related to some demographic factors and educational level. Results from Tobit model indicate that education played an important role in helping farmer improve their efficiency. In addition, policies on increasing the cultivation area may also promote the farm efficiency.

The ownership - efficiency relationship in a firm has always been an important topic. In this paper, we focus on the state owned versus non-state-owned status of Vietnamese manufacturing firms, to shed light into the relationship between these two variables when using a more state-of-the-art method as a stochastic meta-frontier method. Applying the method for two periods: one during the global economic crisis and the other after the end of the crisis, the study determines that in both periods, there was a strong evidence that non-state-owned firms performed much better than state owned counterpart. We also found that the difference became even larger during the harsh time and sub-industries with non-state-owned firms could outperform the state-owned firms, significantly.

Nexus between financial depth and economic growth has been studied for long time and still attracts great attention from policymakers. This research examines the relationship among ASEAN+3 countries from 2000 to 2014 based on Cobb-Douglas theoretical framework. The results show that fi-nancial depths measured by domestic credit to private sector, M3 and stock market capitalisation all have significant effects on economic growth. The paper also gives policy recommendations to promote financial development for purposes of long-term economic growth in ASEAN+3 countries.

inancial inclusion is considered as a critical factor that contributes to the reduction of income imbalance. This paper uses a two-stage least squares (2SLS) model and two different financial inclusion index to examine the impact of financial inclusion on income inequality in 22 transition economies over 11 years from 2005 to 2015. The paper finds that there was a negative relationship between the financial inclusion index and the GINI coefficient. The paper also suggests some policy recommendations to reduce income inequality through developing financial inclusion.

Foreign direct investments (FDI) is an important determinant of economic growth. FDI does not only contribute to the growth and economic development but also affects income through contributing to economic development and the impact on employment and salary structure of developing countries. The aim of this paper is to analyze the impact of FDI on income inequality in Vietnam. This study is the first attempt to examine the impact of FDI on income inequality under the constraints of the institution and education levels. To address the potential endogeneity problem, this study adopts Genernalized Method of Moment (GMM) model to conduct the estimation. A two-step GMM model with robust standard errors is used in the study. Empirical results show that FDI tends to increase income inequality in Vietnam and the existence of a non-linearity relationship between FDI and income inequality is also validated. Moreover, the study finds that the effects of FDI on income inequality are different depending on the level of education and institutions of the host provinces in Vietnam. The results of this study imply that, in order to ensure sustainable development, Vietnam’s policies should focus on improving the quality of economic governance and the administrative reform efforts of the government of the provinces and cities. Besides, policies should focus on increasing investment in public education and improving human capital, which not only can reduce income inequality but also can attract more FDI inflows.

Farmers’ associations play an important role to help members increase their access to supports of information, capital, and technology; bring benefits to members; and partly promote production, enhance productivity, and increase income. This paper systematizes the theoretical foundation and empirical evidence on income difference between the member and non-member farmers and identifies factors that affect their decisions to join associations. By comparing specific characteristics between the member and non-member farmers, the paper examines the impact of joining farmers’ associations on the income of tea farmers in Vietnam by using the data from the survey of 742 farms. In our sample, 376 respondents are members and 366 non-members of associations in the four largest tea-producing areas, which cover 30 provinces in Vietnam. The paper uses OLS regression model to identify the factors that influence the decision of tea farms to join farmers’ organizations and tobit model to assess more detailed impacts of membership on income. The findings show that the farmers, who are members of an association, are more helpful in the ability to access better market services and more tea prices, and are more likely to earn a higher average income than those are non-members. Moreover, their memberships result in an increase of 0.166 unit of income. The research results also show that other factors, including labor, tea price, share of tea sold, farmer age, tea area, ability to access extension services, and credit services, affect the farmer’s income.

In this study, we analyze the spatial effect of foreign direct investment (FDI) on poverty reduction in Vietnam. This study uses the provincial-level panel data and the fixed-effects regression and the spatial econometric model to investigate empirically the impact of FDI on poverty reduction in Vietnam. The study finds that FDI has contributed to poverty reduction not only directly but also indirectly through human capital. However, FDI has indirectly worsened poverty through international trade. In addition, empirical results from the spatial econometric model show that FDI tends to decrease poverty in provinces. Finally, the study has some policy implications to decrease the negative effects of FDI on poverty reduction in Vietnam. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Brand is considered a valuable asset that a business wants to create and maintain growth throughout its business cycle. This paper examines the impact of corporate brand equity on employees' opportunistic behavior. The paper uses quantitative research methods, through linear SEM (Structural Equation Modelling) analysis of structural model with a scale of 609 samples of employees of enterprises in Vietnam. The research results show that corporate brand equity has a negative impact on employees' opportunistic behavior. In the relationship between these two factors, trust and emotional engagement act as intermediate factors. Additionally, the research demonstrates that trust has a positive effect on all three components of employee engagement, including emotional engagement, computational engagement, and standards-based engagement. On that basis, the research suggests a number of recommendations to minimize the opportunistic behavior of employees in the enterprise. The findings of this study have shown the importance and impact of brand equity on employee opportunistic behavior. These are meaningful contributions in both theory and practice to help businesses gain deeper insight into brand equity and the need to pay attention to building and developing durable brand equity for businesses. At the same time, it is an important basis for the next research projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Job satisfaction has been an essential element for the success of any organization, which has drawn the attention of several recent studies and policymakers. The aim of the current study was to investigate the impact of physical activities, self-efficacy and self-esteem on job satisfaction in manufacturing companies in Vietnam. The mediating impact of self-efficacy and self-esteem among physical activities and job satisfaction was also investigated. As a novel element, the study also examined the moderating impact of stress management among physical activities and job satisfaction in manufacturing companies in Vietnam. Methods: The study used survey questionnaires to gather the primary data from the selected employees of leading manufacturing companies of Vietnam. Using the PLS-SEM and Smart-PLS packages, the study analyzed the linkages among all variables. Results: The results revealed that physical activities, self-efficacy and self-esteem have a positive linkage with job satisfaction in manufacturing companies in Vietnam. The findings also exposed that self-efficacy and self-esteem significantly mediate among physical activities and job satisfaction. Conclusion: The findings also expressed that stress management significantly moderated between physical activities and job satisfaction. These findings will provide useful guidance and assistance to the strategists and policy makers to design policies related to job satisfaction using self-efficacy, stress management and self-esteem.