Asian-Pacific Economic Literature最新文献

The role of the leader in economic development and in the formation of the developmental state is overlooked in the standard development economics literature. The developmental state is a state with adequate ‘state capacity’ to achieve successful policy design and implementation to reach developmental objectives. Developmental leaders have played an important role in the formation and administration of the developmental state, which has driven East Asian industrialisation and economic development. In contrast to standard political leaders, including populists, developmental leaders have envisioned, ignited and then administered successful economic development processes. In this study, we introduce and discuss the notion of the developmental leader (primarily in East Asia) through a selective theoretical and empirical analysis of developmental leaders.

There is a continuing interest in small and medium enterprises (SMEs)' e-commerce adoption, especially from South-east Asia, including Malaysia. The objective of this study is to examine the key determinants of SMEs embracing e-commerce in the retail and food and beverage sector in the Klang Valley. Using a Logit model, the findings show that organisational barriers are the most important barriers to SMEs' adoption of e-commerce, followed by environmental barriers. The findings imply that one-size-fits-all policies should not be used since the barriers are different between adopters and non-adopters and the scale of their operations. Analysis within variables between adopters and non-adopters using a decision-maker, technology, organisation-environment framework indicates that young leaders are important in adopting e-commerce. Importantly, technology is not everything when it comes to e-commerce adoption. It matters more to small firms. Therefore, policy needs to take firm heterogeneity.

We examine mothers' relative labour market outcomes around the first childbirth in South Korea, a country with the highest gender pay gaps and the lowest fertility rate among the OECD countries. Using an event study approach, we find that while fathers remain unaffected, mothers' earnings drop sharply by 66.2 per cent over the long run, mostly driven by a reduction in labour force participation. For women who continue to work, motherhood lowers the probability of entering male-dominated occupations and industries but increases the probability of working in female-dominated occupations and industries. Finally, we find that motherhood has a stronger negative effect on labour market outcomes for less-educated mothers, young mothers, mothers who first bear children within two years of marriage, and mothers with three or more children.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of the 2013 minimum wage reform in Thailand. The study employs a difference-in-difference (DID) estimation and utilises data drawn from comprehensive socioeconomic household surveys from 2009 to 2019. The findings suggest that the minimum wage reform significantly increased the average daily earnings, the number of paid days of employment, consumption expenditure per capita, and income per capita. However, the minimum wage reform had little impact on poor households. The results withstand different estimation techniques and a set of additional controls.

Zombie firms that rely on government subsidies and bank loans have seriously affected the healthy development of economies. This paper uses data from Chinese listed manufacturing enterprises from 2007 to 2017 to test and analyse the relationship between political connections and zombie enterprises. The study finds: (i) political connections are positively correlated with the ‘zombification’ of enterprises; (ii) credit subsidies play an intermediary role between political connections and ‘zombification’ of enterprises, with the acquisition of large credit subsidies the main path to the ‘zombification’ of politically connected enterprises; and (iii) firms that have political connections may use credit subsidies for inefficient over-investment. This study has value for other countries in clarifying the causes of zombie firms and preventing politically connected enterprises from becoming zombie firms.