The impact of multinational companies on inequality in Western Balkan countries

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Leonita Braha-Vokshi ◽  
Gadaf Rexhepi ◽  
Veland Ramadani ◽  
Hyrije Abazi-Alili ◽  
Arshian Sharif
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Income Distribution ◽  
Multinational Corporations ◽  
Multinational Enterprises ◽  
Random Effect ◽  
Multinational Companies ◽  
Critical Question ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Theoretical Contribution ◽  
The Impact

Purpose The purpose of this study is to investigate the impact on income distribution from foreign investment and open trade. The research highlights the impact of multinational enterprises (MNEs) on inequality in Western Balkan (WB) countries from 2007 to 2019. The study seeks to answer a critical question: how do multinational corporations affect income distribution? Design/methodology/approach The study uses different techniques such as two-stage least squared, fixed and random effect estimators and generalised method of moments (GMM). The data was gathered from the United Nations Development Programme, World Bank Indicators (WB) and Slot’s World Standardised Income Inequality Database. Findings The interaction of multinational companies through foreign direct investment (FDI) has a significant impact on income inequality. This research paper indicates that the effect of FDI on income inequality is significant and has a negative effect on income inequality within WB countries. The results from the GMM estimator, therefore, demonstrate the hypothesis that multinational companies have a positive effect in WBs countries on reducing inequality. Originality/value The theoretical contribution that this paper seeks to make is by the applying of incremental changing dimension or more specifically, through expanding existing knowledge. Based on a study of the prior articles, the authors found out that the majority of the papers discussed only income inequality or economic inequality or rarely education, but none of the papers examined all classifications of inequality in one paper. This paper’s second contribution is to calculate inequality not only by the Gini coefficient but also by the human development index. The study is unique in that it is the first to assess the impact of FDI on income distribution in WB countries. The research is unique in that it attempts to shed light on the impact of multinational corporations on inequality in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia. The findings of this study will help to develop new policies, new legislation, reducing inequity and support FDIs and MNEs for governments and policymakers.

Trade, FDI and income inequality: empirical evidence from CIS

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 88-108
Author(s):  
Imran Khan ◽  
Zuhaba Nawaz
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Income Distribution ◽  
Generalized Method Of Moments ◽  
School Enrollment ◽  
Annual Data ◽  
Social Infrastructure ◽  
Trade Theory ◽  
Critical Question ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Impact

Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between trade, foreign direct investment (FDI) and income inequality for Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), using annual data from 1990 to 2016. The study attempts to answer a critical question: does openness affect income distribution? Design/methodology/approach The analysis of the model involves the examination of likely non-linear effects of both trade and FDI on income distribution. Therefore, system-generalized method of moments (SYS-GMM) estimator was applied to mitigate the problem of non-linearity and possible endogeneity. In the second stage, the model was extended to test the impact of education on income inequality. The hypothesis is that secondary school enrollment speeds up the process of adoption of contemporary technology and decreases inequality. Findings Trade and FDI have significant effects on income inequality when interacted with Gini-index; in case of trade, an inverted U-shaped curve holds as purposed by the trade theory. The components-wise effect of trade was held, except imports from advanced countries was found insignificant. Moreover, results were not found significant in case of human development index. Different results were found when trade and FDI interacted with education, which represents an important channel through which inequality is affected. Research limitations/implications The study implies that CIS needs to re-design trade and FDI policies by encouraging trade and FDI inflows into industries and sectors aligned with structural adjustments, domestic industries uplift and investment in social infrastructure. Originality/value This is the first study that has examined the impact of openness of income distribution in case of CIS.

Income inequality and rural poverty in China

2015 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-85 ◽  
Author(s):  
Haitao Wu ◽  
Shijun Ding ◽  
Guanghua Wan
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Income Distribution ◽  
Decomposition Method ◽  
Rural Poverty ◽  
Poverty Level ◽  
Decomposition Approach ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Income Sources ◽  
Government Transfers ◽  
The Impact

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to apply a poverty level decomposition approach to decompose the poverty by income sources and investigate the impact of government transfers on income inequality and rural poverty. Design/methodology/approach – This paper uses the decomposition method of inequality and the decomposition method of poverty level by resource endowments to decompose the overall inequality and the overall poverty by income sources. Findings – It is found that unequal income distribution rather than income endowments is mainly responsible for the existence of poverty. Government transfers and relief income, aiming at the poor, help alleviate inequality and poverty, but are not targeting the poorest. Unequal distribution of production subsidies actually lead to higher poverty incidence. Research limitations/implications – This paper has revealed that the poverty issue cannot be resolved with economic development alone if the issues including the inequality in income distribution are not solved. It is important to make government transfers/subsidies pro-poor. Originality/value – A poverty level decomposition approach is first used to decompose the poverty by income sources in China.

The effects of debt restructurings on income inequality in the developing world

2021 ◽  
pp. 135406612110014
Author(s):  
Glen Biglaiser ◽  
Ronald J. McGauvran
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Panel Data ◽  
Income Inequality ◽  
Income Distribution ◽  
Government Spending ◽  
Tax Reform ◽  
Social Spending ◽  
The Poor ◽  
The Rich ◽  
The Impact

Developing countries, saddled with debts, often prefer investors absorb losses through debt restructurings. By not making full repayments, debtor governments could increase social spending, serving poorer constituents, and, in turn, lowering income inequality. Alternatively, debtor governments could reduce taxes and cut government spending, bolstering the assets of the rich at the expense of the poor. Using panel data for 71 developing countries from 1986 to 2016, we assess the effects of debt restructurings on societal income distribution. Specifically, we study the impact of debt restructurings on social spending, tax reform, and income inequality. We find that countries receiving debt restructurings tend to use their newly acquired economic flexibility to reduce taxes and lower social spending, worsening income inequality. The results are also robust to different model specifications. Our study contributes to the globalization and the poor debate, suggesting the economic harm caused to the less well-off following debt restructurings.

Is internal and external mechanism of governance enriching the performance of the banking sector of Pakistan?

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 629-642 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sundas Sohail ◽  
Farhat Rasul ◽  
Ummara Fatima
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Governance ◽  
Banking Sector ◽  
Good Governance ◽  
Random Effect ◽  
Random Effect Model ◽  
General Meeting ◽  
Governance Structure ◽  
Board Structure ◽  
Content Type ◽  
The Impact

Purpose The purpose of this study is to explore how governance mechanisms (internal and external) enhance the performance of the return on asset (ROA), return on equity (ROE), earning per share (EPS) and dividend payout ratios (DP) of the banks of Pakistan. The study incorporates not only the internal factors of governance (board size, out-ratio, annual general meeting, managerial ownership, institutional ownership, block holder stock ownership and financial transparency) but also the external factors (legal infrastructure and protection of minority shareholders, and the market for corporate control). Design/methodology/approach The sample size of the study consists of 30 banks (public, private and specialized) listed at the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSE) for the period 2008-2014. The panel data techniques (fixed or random effect model) have been used for the empirical analysis after verification by Hausman (1978) test. Findings The results revealed that not only do the internal mechanisms of governance enhance the performance of the banking sector of Pakistan but external governance also plays a substantial role in enriching the performance. The findings conclude that for a good governance structure, both internal and external mechanisms are equally important, to accelerate the performance of the banking sector. Research limitations/implications Internal and external mechanisms of corporate governance can also be checked by adding some more variables (ownership i.e. foreign, female and family as internal and auditor as external), but they are not added in this work due to data unavailability. Practical implications The study contributes to the literature and could be useful for the policy makers who need to force banks to mandate codes of governance through which they can create an efficient board structure and augment the performance. The investments from different forms of ownership can be accelerated if they follow the codes properly. Social implications The study facilitates the bankers in incorporating sound codes of corporate governance to enhance the performance of the banks. Originality/value This work is unique as no one has explored the impact of external mechanism of governance on the performance of the banking sector of Pakistan.

Mcdonald’s versus Vikram Bakshi

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 1-27
Author(s):  
Nitin Pangarkar ◽  
Neetu Yadav
Keyword(s):  
Emerging Markets ◽  
Multinational Corporations ◽  
Service Industry ◽  
Executive Development ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Academic Level ◽  
Quick Service ◽  
Term Performance ◽  
The Impact

Learning outcomes The case illustrates the challenges of managing JVs in emerging markets. specifically, after going through the case, students should be able to: i.Analyze the contexts in which firms need to form JVs and evaluate this need in the context of emerging markets such as India; ii.Understand how multinational corporations can achieve success in emerging markets, specifically the role of strategic (broader than the product) adaptation in success; iii.Evaluate the impact of conflict between partners on the short-term and long-term performance of a JV; and iv.Create alternatives, evaluate each alternative’s pros and cons, and recommend appropriate decisions to address the situation after a JV unravels and the organization is faced with quality and other challenges. Case overview/synopsis McDonald’s, the global giant in the quick service industry, entered India in 1993 and formed two JVs in 1995 one with Vikram Bakshi (Connaught Plaza Restaurants Ltd or CPRL) to own and operate stores in the northern and eastern zones, and another with Amit Jatia (Hardcastle Restaurants Private Limited or HRPL) to own and operate stores in the western and southern zones. Over the next 12 years, both the JVs made steady progress by opening new stores while also achieving better store-level metrics. Though CPRL was ahead of HRPL in terms of the number of stores and total revenues earned in 2008, the year marked the beginning of a long-running dispute between the two partners in CPRL, Bakshi and McDonald’s. Over the next 11 years, Bakshi and McDonald’s tried to block each other, filed court cases against each other and also exchanged recriminations in media. The feud hurt the performance of CPRL, which fell behind HRPL in terms of growth and other metrics. On May 9, 2019, the feuding partners reached an out-of-court settlement under which McDonald’s would buy out Bakshi’s shares in CPRL, thus making CPRL a subsidiary. Robert Hunghanfoo, who had been appointed head of CPRL after Bakshi’s exit, announced a temporary shutdown of McDonald’s stores to take stock of the current situation. He had to make a number of critical decisions that would impact the company’s performance in the long-term. Complexity academic level MBA, Executive MBA and executive development programs. Supplementary materials Teaching Notes are available for educators only. Subject code CSS 11: Strategy.

scholarly journals National Income Inequality and International Business Expansion

2018 ◽  
Vol 59 (8) ◽  
pp. 1630-1666 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathaniel C. Lupton ◽  
Guoliang Frank Jiang ◽  
Luis F. Escobar ◽  
Alfredo Jiménez
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Multinational Enterprises ◽  
National Income ◽  
Strategic Objectives ◽  
Expansion Strategy ◽  
Foreign Production ◽  
Local Actors ◽  
Security Costs ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Additional Monitoring

We examine the extent to which host country income inequality influences multinational enterprises’ (MNE) expansion strategy for foreign production investment, depending on their specific strategic objectives. Applying a transaction cost framework, we predict that national income inequality has an inverted U-shaped relationship with foreign production investment. As inequality increases, MNEs accrue lower transaction costs arising from interactions with various local actors, leading to higher probability of investment. As income inequality increases further, its effect on location attractiveness will become negative, as its attraction effect is increasingly offset by additional monitoring, bargaining, and security costs owing to the more fractious nature of high inequality societies. In addition, we suggest that the impact of income inequality is contingent on investment objectives: The inverted U-shaped relationship is stronger for efficiency-seeking investment but weaker for market-seeking and competence-enhancing investments. We find substantial support for our hypotheses through an analysis of 27 years (1986-2012) of data on Japanese MNEs’ overseas production entries.

scholarly journals Board and corporate social responsibility disclosure of multinational corporations

2019 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 77-98 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hanh Thi Song Pham ◽  
Hien Thi Tran
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Social Responsibility ◽  
Social Responsibility ◽  
Multinational Corporations ◽  
Board Independence ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Csr Reporting ◽  
The One ◽  
Csr Disclosure ◽  
Corporate Social ◽  
The Impact

Purpose This paper aims to investigate the effects of board model and board independence on corporate social responsibility (CSR) disclosure of multinational corporations (MNCs). Design/methodology/approach The authors developed an empirical model in which CSR disclosure is the dependent variable and board model (two-tier vs one-tier), board independence (a proportion of independent directors on a board) and the interaction variable of board model and board independence together with several variables conventionally used as control variables are independent variables. The authors collated the panel dataset of 244 Fortune World’s Most Admired (FWMA) corporations from 2005 to 2011 of which 117 MNCs use the one-tier board model, and 127 MNCs use the two-tier board model from 20 countries. They used the random-effect regression method to estimate the empirical models with the data they collated and also ran regressions on the alternative models for robustness check. Findings The authors found a significantly positive effect of a board model on CSR disclosure by MNCs. Two-tier MNCs tend to reveal more CSR information than one-tier MNCs. The results also confirm the significant moderating impact of board model on the effect of board independence on CSR disclosure. The effect of board independence on CSR disclosure in the two-tier board MNCs tends to be higher than that in the one-tier board MNCs. The results do not support the effect of board independence on CSR disclosure in general for all types of firms (one-tier and two-tier board). The impact of board independence on CSR disclosure is only significant in two-tier board MNCs and insignificant in one-tier board MNCs. Practical implications The authors advise the MNCs who wish to improve CSR reporting and transparency to consider the usage of two-tier board model and use a higher number of outside directors on board. They note that once a firm uses one-tier model, number of IDs on a board does not matter to the level of CSR disclosure. They advise regulators to enforce an application of two-tier board model to improve CSR reporting and transparency in MNCs. The authors also recommend regulators to continue mandating publicly traded companies to include more external members on their boards, especially for the two-tier board MNCs. Originality/value This paper is the first that investigates the role of board model on CSR disclosure of MNCs.

scholarly journals The impact of uptake of selected agricultural technologies on rice farmers’ income distribution in Ghana

2022 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Monica Addison ◽  
Kwasi Ohene-Yankyera ◽  
Patricia Pinamang Acheampong ◽  
Camillus Abawiera Wongnaa
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Income Distribution ◽  
Empirical Result ◽  
National Development ◽  
Farm Size ◽  
Rice Seed ◽  
Agricultural Technologies ◽  
Rice Farmers ◽  
Rural Income ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Background Government of Ghana’s effort to reduce income inequality consistently poses a major challenge to public policy formulation. The promotion and dissemination of agricultural technologies as a pathway out of income inequality in rural Ghana have received widespread support. Yet, knowledge about the impact of agricultural technologies on rural income inequality remains low. The objective of the study is to evaluate the link between the uptake of improved rice technologies and income distribution in the study area. Methods This paper uses a survey data from 917 smallholder rice producers in selected communities in Ghana. The study employs the Bourguignon, Fournier, and Gurgand (BFG) selection bias correction model, a two-stage model, to empirically analyse the role of agricultural technologies in rural income distribution. Results The empirical result shows that education, farm size, land ownership, participation in relevant extension training programmes enhance adoption, but gender (female) inhibits uptake of the selected technologies. The empirical result further shows that the uptake of the improved rice seed and fertilizer increases rice farmers’ net revenue significantly. The result further indicates that farmers’ choice of the selected agricultural technologies decreases the sample population income inequality, indicating the uptake of the technologies has an equalizing effect on rice farmers’ income distribution. Conclusion The study concludes that the use of the selected technologies has potential to fight rural poverty in Ghana. The findings have implications for National Development Planning Commission (NDPC) agenda of redistribution of wealth in Ghana.

scholarly journals Credit composition and income inequality in Vietnam: an empirical analysis

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Le Quoc Hoi ◽  
Hương Lan Trần
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Educational Level ◽  
Generalized Method Of Moments ◽  
Institutional Quality ◽  
Primary Data ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Private Credit ◽  
The Impact

PurposeThis paper aims to examine the 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 had adverse effects on income inequality. The authors also examine whether the impact of policy credit on income inequality is conditioned by the educational level and institutional quality.Design/methodology/approachThe 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.FindingsThe authors show that while commercial credit increases income inequality, policy credit contributes to reducing 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.Originality/valueThis is the first study that examines the links between the two components of credit and income inequality as well as 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.

scholarly journals Corporate Income Shifting in an Era of Tax Multilateralism: The Impact of Exchange-of-Information Agreements

2021 ◽  
Vol 69 (2) ◽  
pp. 357-389
Author(s):  
Devan Mescall ◽  
Paul Nielsen
Keyword(s):  
Multinational Corporations ◽  
Multinational Enterprises ◽  
Transfer Pricing ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Annual Reports ◽  
Income Shifting ◽  
Exchange Of Information ◽  
Pricing Rules ◽  
Using Data ◽  
The Impact

Using data from the annual reports of over 100,000 subsidiaries of multinational enterprises (MNEs) from 55 countries between 2003 and 2012, the authors of this article investigate the impact of exchange-of-information agreements ("EOI agreements") on tax-motivated income shifting. Transparency created by the signing of EOI agreements is expected to reduce the tax-motivated shifting of income by multinational corporations. Whether such agreements affect the income-shifting behaviour of multinational corporations is an unanswered question. The authors find evidence that, on average, EOI agreements do have an impact on tax-motivated income shifting. Additionally, they find that more advanced, modern EOI agreements are associated with a larger decrease in tax-motivated income shifting compared to the impact of early EOI agreements. This evidence challenges the prevalent assumption in empirical studies that EOI agreements are homogeneous. Supplemental analyses suggest that factors that affect the information asymmetry between MNEs and tax authorities, such as corporations with high levels of intangibles and tax authorities with strong transfer-pricing rules and enforcement, can diminish or enhance the effectiveness of EOI agreements in moderating tax-motivated income shifting. The evidence provided by this study shows that consideration of the tax authorities' information environment and the substance of an EOI agreement is essential when assessing the impact of such an agreement on the tax behaviour of sophisticated taxpayers such as multinational corporations.

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