Convergence of Energy Carbon Emission Efficiency: Evidence From Manufacturing Sub-sectors in China

With China's economy entering the stage of high-quality development, manufacturing energy carbon emission efficiency has become the focus of academic attention. Based on the panel data of China's manufacturing sub-sectors, this paper measures and analyzes the evolution trend of manufacturing energy carbon emission and its efficiency. On this basis, this paper uses coefficient of variation and convergence model to test the convergence of manufacturing energy carbon emission efficiency. The results show that China’s manufacturing energy carbon emissions and its efficiency show an increasing trend. The coal was the main source of manufacturing energy carbon emissions. The manufacturing energy carbon emission efficiency does not exist σ convergence, but exists β convergence, and its convergence exists industry heterogeneity. The manufacturing energy carbon emission efficiency exits scale effect and technology effect, but not the effect of opening to the outside world and institutional effect, and its effect exists industry heterogeneity. By reducing carbon emissions, adopting differentiated policies, adjusting the industry scale, and enhancing the industry technology intensity, China's manufacturing can improve the energy carbon emissions efficiency and promote high-quality economic development.

The institutional effect on leisure time and competitive sports at higher education colleges and universities in the Carpathian Basin

Background: ‪The objective of our study is to reveal the resources within colleges and universities that may influence the leisure-time and competitive sports done in the respective institutions. For the theoretical background of our research, the models examining the institutional effects were used. Strange [1] arranged the models into four categories. Material and methods: ‪In the course of our research, structured dialogues were carried out with PE teachers, sports leaders in the institutions of Eastern Hungary, in the Highlands, Voivodina, Transylvania and Partium. ATLAS.ti text analyzing software was used to analyze and process our findings. Results: ‪In accordance with our findings, the institutions were arranged into four categories: Competitive-sport oriented institutions, institutions using sport as a means of creating and reinforcing the community, institutions that minimize physical culture, and institutions that only deal with the required physical education classes. Conclusions: ‪At the section of our research related to leisure-time sport, we found that substantial financial resources, adequate infrastructural conditions, facilities, and a positive attitude of the leaders of the institution are very important. In connection with competitive sports, we may conclude that sport is highly prestigious, and competitive sport is used effectively to attract students to the university.

Housing wealth inequality in urban China: the transition from welfare allocation to market differentiation

The differentiation of housing assets is an important embodiment of wealth inequality and is also an important dimension of social stratification. The housing distribution in China has experienced a transition from welfare allocation to market distribution over the decades. This process has led to a change in the housing stratification mechanism and widened housing wealth inequality, which has evoked theoretical disputes about “market transition,” “power persistence,” and “power derivation.” Based on the 2017 Chinese Social Survey (CSS), this article examines the housing wealth inequality in urban China and probes the major drivers of housing stratification. The results suggest that with the progress of housing marketization, market mechanisms have replaced the original socialist redistribution mechanisms and have become the major drivers of housing wealth inequality. However, some of the original socialist institutional arrangements continue to have strong effects on housing wealth inequality. The persisting institutional effect may provide a new perspective for exploring housing wealth inequality in contemporary urban China.

R&D Disclosures and Capitalization under IAS 38—Evidence on the Interplay between National Institutional Regulations and IFRS Adoption

ABSTRACT Based on the notion that the effects of IFRS adoption are dependent on changes in the institutional environment, this paper analyzes the effects of one prominent feature of IFRS: the accounting for research and development (R&D) under IAS 38. In our setting, IFRS adoption is accompanied by a change in the national institutional environment of R&D disclosure in the management commentary. National disclosure regulations can make R&D capitalization more informative when investors are skeptical of capitalization due to reliability concerns. We find that firms with higher levels of R&D disclosures that are not suspect of earnings management generally have lower cost of capital and higher market values. Their cost of capital increase and market values decrease with higher R&D capitalization, indicating that capitalization introduces information uncertainty that cannot be resolved by better disclosure. The findings imply that the institutional effect of disclosure has a strong influence on IFRS informativeness. Data Availability: All data used in this paper are publicly available and retrieved from companies' annual reports, the Thomson Datastream database, Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S Estimates database, and Hoppenstedt stock guide database.

In Quest of Institutional Interpretation of TFP Change—The Case of China

This research note reiterates the productivity theory in the Solow growth accounting framework to explore an institutional interpretation of changes in total factor productivity. In theory, total factor productivity or TFP growth is a costless gain in output, which captures the effect of positive externalities caused by spillovers of technological and organizational changes in a perfect market system. This provides a yardstick to gauge institutional effect on output in an imperfect market system if all inputs are properly measured. Using the Chinese case, I show that an integrated approach a la Jorgenson and Griliches (1967. “The Explanation of Productivity Change.” Review of Economic Studies 34 (3): 249–283) that ensures a consistency between theory, methodology and measurement can facilitate empirical exercises even with data problems, and a so-constructed TFP index for China can satisfactorily reproduce China’s post-reform productivity path with institutional interpretations.

The Institutional Effect

This chapter addresses several issues, all with the underlying intention of refining and reorienting the nuclear-hardship debate. There is a need for such reorientation, as several indicators show that the long-term outcome of this process toward a society built upon nuclear households has not led to more hardship; quite the contrary. Nor would it be fair to claim that this outcome has to be entirely due to top-down provisions, and then in particular, to charity. In this chapter the authors stress the institutional diversity of the solutions for hardship and focus on one particular group in society, namely the elderly. They demonstrate that the elderly had more “agency” than is usually expected and that a combination of institutional arrangements in addition to the top-down provisions granted the elderly more options to deal with the supposed hardship of growing old in a nuclear family structure.

The efficiency of the institutional assurance of the agricultural business economic capacity development

The article substantiates the efficiency of the institutional assurance of the agricultural business economic capacity development. The ways and the institutional effect of the reformations in the agricultural sector have been defined. The aims of the state regulative policy under influence of the agricultural business have been revealed. The dynamics of the main rates changes of Ukraine’s agricultural business development efficiency has been analyzed.

REAL WAGE STAGNANCY: EVIDENCE FROM TAIWAN

This study examines how and why the gap between economic growth and real wage growth in Taiwan is widening, a phenomenon that contrasts sharply with South Korea, which has a similar industrial structure to that of Taiwan. We empirically demonstrate that, despite the continued growth of labor productivity, the benefits from economic growth allocated to workers have been falling, and that this process has accelerated following the 2008–2009 financial crisis. The labor market institutional effect contributed partially to the problem. Workers’ purchasing power, measured by the real consumption wage rate, has been declining for a relatively long period, implying significant deterioration of terms-of-trade, and cutting real wage growth by as much as 2.23% per year. The terms-of-trade effect is particularly prominent in the manufacturing sector, which is highly export-oriented. Moreover, we found cash wages to be very sensitive to the rise in the rate of unemployment, and to the changes in output performance of the industry in which the workers are employed. The latter factor significantly reduced the cash wages paid to workers in the manufacturing sector, which highlighted the waning of workers’ bargaining power regarding wages, as well as the negative impact of globalization on the labor market. We therefore conclude that the deterioration of terms-of-trade, increases in the aggregate unemployment rate, the adverse globalization effect and the institutional effect might be the main driving forces for real wage stagnancy in Taiwan.