Financial efficiency and accounting quality: The impact of institutional micro-factors on FDI

In this paper, we explore whether factors such as financial markets and accounting qualities contribute to foreign direct investment (FDI). We use a unique data source: the survey data from World Economic Forum, to measure the efficiency of the financial markets and the quality of accounting standards. With this unique data, we demonstrate that financial markets and accounting quality are important factors of FDI inflow into a country. In particular, FDI is positively correlated with the strength of financial audits and reporting standards and venture capital availability for all countries. We also show that accounting quality measures are more important for developing and emerging countries than for developed countries. On the other hand, financial market measures, especially the access to venture capital, have a bigger impact in attracting FDI flow into developed countries. These results support the hypothesis that local financial markets and accounting quality affect FDI. The results have strong policy implications for governmental regulatory agencies.     

小约瑟夫·奈、罗伯特·基欧汉与跨国关系研究

随着跨国交往和相互依赖的加深,非国家行为体的作用日益突出。奈和基欧汉通过对跨国关系的研究阐述了国家间互动、跨国互动、跨政府间互动对世界政治产生的影响,这从理论上冲击着传统的“国家中心”范式,促使国际政治研究向世界政治研究的“多中心”范式转变,因而奈和基欧汉的跨国关系研究具有里程碑式的意义。     

An expectational view of consumer spending prospects

While the path of the economy clearly depends on a lot more than the behavior of consumers, the latter is surely one of the key influences on the former. After all, consumer spending counts for about two-thirds of the total (more if consumer investments in owner-occupied housing are included), and postwar business cycle movements in the U.S. have typically been foreshadowed by significant changes in consumer spending, particularly for automobiles and houses. Thus, whether the economy will be proceeding along at reasonably satisfactory growth rates, sliding into recession, or accelerating into renewed expansion will be heavily influenced by what consumers do.     

沙角C厂的智能远程监测I/O系统

主要介绍沙角Ｃ厂智能远程监测Ｉ／Ｏ的工作原理、应用特点和在沙角Ｃ厂出现的问题．希望能使日益推广的智能远程监测Ｉ／Ｏ的应用得到借鉴．     

Growth impact of climate change and response policies: The advanced climate change long-term (ACCL) model

This paper provides a tool to build climate change scenarios to forecast Gross Domestic Product (GDP), modelling both GDP damage due to climate change and the GDP impact of mitigating measures. It adopts a supply-side, long-term view, with 2060 and 2100 horizons. It is a global projection tool (30 countries/regions), with assumptions and results both at the world and the country/regional level. Five different types of energy inputs are taken into account according to their CO₂ emission factors. Full calibration is possible at each stage, with estimated or literature-based default parameters. Compared to other models, it provides a comprehensive modelisation of Total Factor Productivity (TFP), which is the most significant determinant of the GDP projected path. We present simulation results of different energy policy scenarios. They illustrate both the “tragedy of the horizon” and the “tragedy of the commons”, which call for a policy framework that adequately integrates a long run perspective, through a low-enough discount rate and an effective intergenerational solidarity as well as international cooperation.     

朦胧的星火——对《啊,拓荒者!》的生态后现代主义解读

美国作家威拉·凯瑟的早期作品<啊,拓荒者!>中蕴含的生态思想与美国著名生态女权主义理论家查伦·斯普瑞特奈克的生态后现代主义理论不谋而合.小说中的伊瓦、亚历山德拉和卡尔等人热爱土地,爱护动物.虽然他们的思想中拓荒和征服自然仍然占主导,但已具有了朦胧的生态意识.     

Fertility decisions when infant survival is endogenous

There is evidence that fertility is positively correlated with infant mortality, and that a child‘s chance of surviving to maturity increases with the level of nutrition, medical care, etc. received in the early stages of life. By modelling parental decisions as a problem of choice under uncertainty, the paper shows that fertility and infant mortality are most likely to move in opposite directions if, as implicitly assumed by existing economic theories, parents believe that there is nothing they can do to improve the survival chances of their own children. By contrast, if parents realize that those chances improve with the amount they spend for the health, nutrition, etc. of each child that they put into the world, then fertility and infant mortality may move in the same direction. Under such an assumption, the model has the strong policy implication that directly death-reducing public expenditures are most effective, but stimulate population growth, at low levels of development. By contrast, at high levels of development, such expenditures tend to crowd out parental expenditures, and are a factor in fertility decline. Received: 14 October 1996 / Accepted: 28 July 1997     

Immigration,assimilation and growth

This paper analyzes the welfare effects of immigration and its subsequent effect on ethnic diversity in a model featuring human capital spillovers which depend on the degree of ethnic heterogeneity, variation rates of time preference across individuals and endogenous levels of immigration and assimilation. In the model, an increase in ethnic diversity reduces the spillovers effect for the majority. Nonetheless, immigration can be welfare improving for the majority ethnic group even if it increases the degree of diversity as long as it raises the average human capital level and/or growth rate by increasing the proportion of people with low rates of time preference. However, if an economy is too homogenous, it will not be able to attract immigrants. Finally, if the level of immigration is not too high, then immigration also raises the net benefits to assimilation which leads to a more homogenous economy. Received: 18 February 1997 / Accepted: 16 July 1997