International Studies of Economics最新文献

When capital leaves a country and then flows back as foreign direct investment (FDI), we call it round-tripping FDI. It is widely suspected that China's official FDI statistics contain a substantial amount of round-tripping FDI. However, it is difficult to quantify the round-tripping FDI due to the lack of data. In this paper, we propose two methods to identify round-tripping FDI. The first one tracks capital flows at the firm level. If a firm in China invests in a foreign firm and this foreign firm makes an investment back to China shortly after, then we consider this investment to China as round-tripping FDI. Our second measure of round-tripping FDI adds to the first measure by including investments in China made by Chinese investors registered in tax havens. The first estimate of round-tripping FDI accounts for up to 3% of China's total FDI from 1999 to 2015, whereas the second estimate accounts for up to 70% in the period. Our firm-level analysis shows that industrial firms facing higher tax burdens are more likely to make round-tripping FDI. We also show that at the city level, adjusted FDI statistics by subtracting the estimated round-tripping FDI are better predictors of imports and exports. Finally, we show that provinces receiving higher shares of round-tripping FDI are more likely to be punished for illegal financial activities. Taken together, these findings suggest that our measures of round-tripping FDI, although noisy, are indicative of real transactions.

Mass shootings in the U.S. have been at the center of the public crisis debate for a long time. Combining information on mass shootings with background check reports from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, this study applies mass shootings as exogenous shocks and reveals that the demand for guns is especially strong in the month in which a shooting occurs, and it decays with time. In addition, results confirm a spatial spillover effect of mass shootings, in which a mass shooting in one state affects gun demand in other states. The magnitude of the effect depends on the distance between the states. Our analysis also explores the difference in the effects between states with loose regulations on handguns and long guns and those with strict regulations. In the former, gun demand increases significantly after mass shootings, whereas in the latter the increase is insignificant. Finally, this study shows that consumers respond heterogeneously given the different characteristics of mass shootings, such as the number of victims and location.

Digital technologies promote economic progress. The digital economy drives the development of manufacturing. This paper explores the impact of the digital economy on the high-quality development of manufacturing using panel data from the Yangtze River Economic Belt in China. Employing the entropy method, we first measure the level of the digital economy and the high-quality development of manufacturing. Then, we divide the digital economy into three dimensions: the digital foundation, the digital application, and the digital innovation, and investigate how each dimension influences the high-quality development of manufacturing. Results show that: (1) Both the digital economy level and the high-quality development level of manufacturing exhibit steady growth, while the overall value of the Yangtze River Economic Belt stays low. (2) Three dimensions of the digital economy positively affect the high-quality development of manufacturing, with the most noticeable effect of the digital innovation, followed by the digital application and the digital foundation. (3) Threshold effect tests demonstrate that both the digital foundation and the digital application exhibit a double threshold effect on the high-quality development of the manufacturing, but the digital innovation has a single threshold effect. (4) Last but not the least, the digital foundation positively affects the high-quality development of the manufacturing in downstream and upstream regions, but less apparently influences midstream regions by the heterogeneity analysis. Additionally, both the digital application and the digital innovation have significant effects on the high-quality development of the manufacturing across all regions.

The most of Sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries have been affected by climate change and food insecurity problems due to the reduction of production and productivity of cereal crops in the continent. The purpose of this research was to examine the short-run and long-run effects of climate change on agricultural productivity in 24 selected SSA countries. In the study, a systematic Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) Model was used with recent data from 24 SSA countries from 2001 to 2020. The panel regression result revealed that temperature and precipitation showed positive significant effects whereas carbon dioxide emission had negatively influenced the cereal crop productivity in the region. Specifically, the empirical result indicates that a one percent increase in precipitation increases cereal crop productivity by 0.27%. The empirical result of the GMM model revealed that political stability, temperature, GDP per capita, trade openness, carbon dioxide emission, fertilizer consumption, and precipitation have both short-run and long-run effects, while precipitation has only a short-run effect on agricultural productivity in the study area. A key implication of this work is the realization of the lagging effects of climate change in determining cereal crop production and productivity. This study was unable to include all SSA countries because the excluded countries did not have sufficient data on the selected variables in the study. Hence, adopting high-temperature and drought-resistant types of enhanced cereal crops is advised to combat the negative effects of climate change in the study area.

The 2011–2020 period is the final stage of poverty alleviation in China, which emphasizes regional development. Using county-level panel data from 2006 to 2015, we explore the impact of regional poverty alleviation policy on economic growth of contiguous destitute areas (CDAs) in China. The results show that since 2012, economy in CDAs has developed rapidly, that GDP per capita has significantly improved by 5.4% and that county GDP has significantly improved by 6.6%. The regional strategy enhances construction of infrastructure and ecological projects, and gives full play to exert synergy effect, which doubles economic growth. The impact of economic growth is heterogeneous in different regional scales, regional inequities, geographic locations, and population sizes, and lasting even if counties are lifted out of poverty. Our findings recommend regional collaboration and highlight the importance of ecological protection in poverty alleviation.

We apply machine learning models to a universe of 20,185 finance articles published between 1976 and 2015 on 17 finance journals, and objectively identify 38 research topics. The financial crisis, hedge/mutual fund, social network, and culture were the fastest growing topics, while market microstructure, initial public offering, and option pricing shrank most from 2006 to 2015. We also list each topic's most cited papers, and present the fastest-growing topics among the universe of 130,547 SSRN working papers. Moreover, we find a bibliometric regularity: the number of researchers covering n topics is about twice the number of researchers covering n + 1 topics.

Based on annual observations of heavily polluting enterprises of A-share listed companies from 2012 to 2019, this paper analyzes the impact of officials' preference for enterprises' investment in environmental protection in the officials' hometowns. It is found that when the Secretary of the municipal Party Committee takes office in his or her hometown, environmental protection investment by enterprises is higher, indicating that the preference of the municipal Party Secretary for their hometown has a positive promoting effect on enterprises' environmental governance behavior. At the same time, officials' hometown preferences promote environmental investment by strengthening environmental supervision. It is further found that the longer the municipal Party Secretary works in his or her hometown, the higher his or her education level, and the older he or she is, the greater the impact of his or her hometown preference on enterprises' environmental protection investment. Compared with female Party Secretaries, male Party Secretaries have more significant influence on corporate behavior. At the same time, corporate characteristics such as enterprise scale and regional characteristics such as economic development have a certain regulatory effect on this promoting effect.

First-class universities play an extremely important role in cultivating high-quality talents and technological innovation, serving as a significant indicator of a country's level of higher education development, developmental strength, and potential. However, there is little literature studying the long-term impact of first-class universities on a country's economic development. To better understand this long-term influence, our study examines the effect of first-class universities on per capita income based on cross-national samples, particularly their role in overcoming the “middle-income trap,” and analyzes whether general higher education can bring about equivalent effects. The main research conclusions are: First, both general higher education and first-class universities can significantly improve a country's per capita income, but compared to general higher education, first-class universities have greater marginal effects on national per capita income, and can more effectively enhance domestic average income levels and promote sustainable economic growth over time; Second, first-class universities have the greatest marginal effect on improving per capita income in middle-income countries, and compared to general higher education, first-class universities play a larger role in helping developing countries break through the “middle-income trap”; Third, both general higher education and first-class universities positively affect innovative activities, but first-class universities play a more significant role in promoting technological innovation, which can better facilitate high-quality economic development. Our study not only enhances the understanding of the effects and differences between general higher education and first-class universities on long-term economic development, but also contributes to the understanding of the economic miracle that China has created since its reform and opening up. It also provides clear policy implications.

Entrepreneurs and entrepreneurship are important for economic growth and development. Yet insufficient attention has been paid to psychological characteristics such as personality characteristics as factors for women entrepreneurship in emerging economies. This study aims to investigate the associations between women entrepreneurs' business intentions and their personality traits. This study utilizes binomial logistic regression for hypothesis testing using the unique data set from a survey of small and medium manufacturing enterprises located in nine cities and provinces from three main geographical regions of Vietnam. The findings show that personality factors can be important for women entrepreneurs' business intentions. Unlike some other studies, the personality trait conscientiousness is found negatively correlated with women's entrepreneurial intentions. External factors such as local institutional quality and business networks have been found to stimulate women entrepreneurial intentions. The finding also raises concerns over the undergraduate training programs that need to be improved to make future students more confident in planning their business intentions if entrepreneurship is their career choice. The findings provide a key contribution to the existing literature of entrepreneurship in the context of an emerging economy where studies on women's entrepreneurship are scarce.