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on Accounting |
| By: | Parto,Saeed (MERIT) |
| Abstract: | Policy formation is only one the three main components in the continuum of policy formation – policy implementation – policy evaluation – policy formation. To fully understand why policy outcomes often fall significantly short of policy intentions we need to examine the structuring factors, i.e., the institutions of governance, that shape the policy process. This paper focuses on the interplay between the policy process, governance, and institutions to articulate a framework for conducting institutionally sensitive policy analysis. A comparative study of the waste subsystems in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom reveals that each subsystem is the product of its “own” institutional landscape, and not directly and immediately subject to the whims of policy making at the EU scale of governance. Although there are signs of “Europeanization” in both cases, national problems, policies, and politics as manifest through the full spectrum of formal and informal institutions continue to play a major role in facilitating and curtailing change in each of the two waste subsystems. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of institutionally sensitive policy analysis for the current discourse on governance for sustainable development at the European scale. |
| Keywords: | Economics ; |
| Date: | 2005 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:umamer:2005001&r=acc |
| By: | Krug, B.; Zhu, Z.; Hendrischke, H. (Erasmus Research Institute of Management (ERIM), Erasmus University Rotterdam) |
| Abstract: | China like other transition economies needs to establish a tax regime compatible with a market economy. The paper singles out the general and China-specific features by which national legislation attempts to accompany economic transformation. Based on an empirical study in two provinces this paper shows that without including local government agencies and their budgets, China?s fiscal federalism cannot be analysed. This paper argues that China?s emerging tax regime depends on the institutional design that shapes the interaction between firms (as major tax payers at the local level), local government agencies, and the national tax administration. |
| Keywords: | Tax Regime;Fiscal Federalism;Tax Farming;China;Transition Economy; |
| Date: | 2005–01–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dgr:eureri:30001989&r=acc |
| By: | Theodore C. Bergstrom; John L. Hartman |
| Abstract: | The net present value of costs and benefits from a pay-as-you-go social security system are negative for young people and positive for the elderly. If people all vote their financial self-interest, there will be a pivotal age such that those who are younger favor smaller social security benefits and those who are older will favor larger benefits. For persons of each age and sex, we estimate the expected present value gained or lost from a small permanent increase in the amount of benefits, where the cost of these benefits is divided equally among the population of working age. Assuming that everyone votes his or her long run financial self-interest, and calculating the number of voters in the population of each age and sex, we can determine whether there is majority support for an increase or a decrease in social security benefits. We use statistics on the age distribution and mortality rates for the United States to explore the sensitivity of political support for social security to alternative assumptions about the discount rate, excess burden in taxation, voter participation rates, and birth, death, and migration rates. We find that a once-and-for-all decrease in benefits would be defeated by a majority of selfish voters under a wide range of parameters. We also study the predicted majority outcomes of votes on changing the retirement age. |
| JEL: | H53 |
| Date: | 2005 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_1378&r=acc |
| By: | Luis H. R. Alvarez; Erkki Koskela |
| Abstract: | We analyze the impact of progressive taxation on irreversible investment under uncertainty. We show that if tax exemption is lower than sunk cost, higher tax rate will decelerate optimal investment by increasing the optimal investment threshold, while if tax exemption exceeds sunk cost, three different regimes arise. For "small" volatilities the optimal investment threshold is a positive function of volatility, but independent of tax rate. For "medium" volatilities it is independent of both tax rate and volatility. Finally, for "high" volatilities the optimal investment threshold depends positively on volatility, but negatively on tax rate so that we have "tax paradox". |
| Keywords: | irreversible investments under uncertainty, progressive taxation |
| JEL: | D80 G31 H25 |
| Date: | 2005 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_1377&r=acc |
| By: | Ross Levine; Sergio L. Schmukler |
| Abstract: | By documenting the evolution of Tobin's "q" before, during, and after firms internationalize, this paper provides evidence on the bonding, segmentation, and market timing theories of internationalization. Using new data on 9,096 firms across 74 countries over the period 1989-2000, we find that Tobin's "q" does not rise after internationalization, even relative to firms that do not internationalize. Instead, "q" rises significantly one year before internationalization and during the internationalization year. But, then "q" falls sharply in the year after internationalization, relinquishing the increases of the previous two years. To account for these dynamics, we show that market capitalization rises one year before internationalization and remains high, while corporate assets increase during internationalization. The evidence supports models stressing that internationalization facilitates corporate expansion, but challenges models stressing that internationalization produces an enduring effect on "q" by bonding firms to a better corporate governance system. |
| JEL: | G15 F36 F20 |
| Date: | 2005–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11023&r=acc |
| By: | Ravi Jagannathan; Yong Wang |
| Abstract: | We demonstrate, using data for the period 1954-2003, that differences in exposure to consumption risk explains cross sectional differences in average excess returns (cost of equity capital) across the 25 benchmark equity portfolios constructed by Fama and French (1993). We use yearly returns on stocks to take into account well documented within year deterministic seasonal patterns in returns, measurement errors in the consumption data, and possible slow adjustment of consumption to changes in wealth due to habit and prior commitments. Consumption during the fourth quarter is likely to have a larger discretionary component. Further, given the availability of more leisure time during the holiday season and the ending of the tax year in December, investors are more likely to review their asset holdings and make trading decisions during the fourth quarter. We therefore match the growth rate in the fourth quarter consumption from one year to the next with the corresponding calendar year return when computing the latter's exposure to consumption risk. We find strong support for our consumption risk model specification in the data. |
| JEL: | G12 |
| Date: | 2005–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:11026&r=acc |
| By: | Rolf Aaberge (Research Department, Statistics Norway, Oslo, Norway); Ugo Colombino (Department of Economics, University of Turin, Italy) |
| Abstract: | In this contribution we illustrate various applications of a behavioural microsimulation model that we have been developing during the last years. Behavioural models are complex and costly tools to develop, use and maintain, but also very powerful ones as we wish to show through the examples that follow. In Section 1 we present the main features of the microeconometric model. In Section 2 we comment upon the labour supply elasticities implied by the estimates. In Section 3 we illustrate a simulation of the behavioural and welfare effects of some tax reform proposals. In Section 4 we report on an exercise where we look for the optimal tax system. In Section 5 we report on an on-going project aimed at integrating the microeconometric model and a Computable General Equilibrium model. Last, in Section 6, we show an out-of-sample test of the model, where we compare the predictions of a model estimated on 1994 data to the observed effects of a reform in 2001. |
| Keywords: | Tax reforms, Microeconometric models, Micro-Macro models |
| JEL: | D6 D7 H |
| Date: | 2005–01–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wpa:wuwppe:0501002&r=acc |