Transnational Corporations Review最新文献

The reduction of income inequality between poor and rich constitutes one of the goals of governments and policymakers across the world. Financial development remains one way to cope with income inequality but its influence on income inequality is mixed. Thus, this paper explores the direct and indirect transmission mechanisms through which financial development can affect income inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The study utilises data from the Standardised World Income Inequality Database (SWIID) for income inequality and World Development Indicators (WDI) for financial development over the period 1995 to 2015. Analysing the data using the System Generalised Method of Moments (SGMM), the results show that financial development solely increases income inequality but its interaction with GDP per capita has a negative and significant effect on income inequality. These findings suggest that the financial development need a good economic growth to reduce income inequality.

According to the stylized facts of the empirical real business cycle literature, investment is a procyclical variable, i.e. it co-moves with business cycles. Consequently, foreign direct investment's procyclical behavior is hypothesized and tested in this paper. A big sample of 74 (and 65 in the extended model) countries is used, and the hypothesis is tested on quarterly data with an average length of 90 periods, i.e. 22 years. Business cycles are identified by the Hodrick-Prescott filter, and the use of high-frequency data makes the results more precise and reliable. Using fixed effect regressions first the procyclicality of domestic investment is demonstrated, then the cyclical behavior of foreign direct investment is tested. Data shows that FDI is also procyclical. This result is robust, as it takes into account potential confounding variables. The paper's conclusion is that there is significant co-movement between foreign direct investment inflows and the recipient countries' business cycles.

This study examines the connection between higher education and economic growth in the BRICS countries. This study used the gross enrolment ratio (GER) to gauge the extent of higher education in the BRICS countries, while gross domestic product (GDP) was used to estimate economic growth. The study includes both time series and panel data analysis for all BRICS countries. The vector error correction model (VECM) and the vector autoregressive model (VAR) were applied to time series data to explain the causal relationship between GDP and GER. Panel data were analyzed using the panel vector auto-regression (PVAR) model. The time series analysis revealed that there is both a bi-directional and a unidirectional causal link between economic development and higher education. However, panel data analysis revealed that the causal influence of higher education was more pronounced than economic growth.

This paper examines the moderating role of governance in the effect of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) on poverty using simultaneous equations models for sub-Saharan African, Asian, Latin American and Eastern European countries over the period 1996–2017. The main objective of this study is to examine the role of governance as a moderator of the FDI effect on poverty. Our analyses support a positive significant impact of FDI on poverty reduction in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America but a negative effect in Eastern Europe, while it is not significant in Asian economies. In addition, we detect a positive conjoint impact of FDI and governance quality on poverty in all African, Latin American and Eastern European economic communities. However, this interactive effect is negative and not significant in Asia. This means that FDI reduces poverty in the presence of governance quality. Our results support that in the poorest countries (sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America), poverty is more sensitive to interactions between governance and FDIs than in the richest countries (ASIA). As policy implications of this study, governments in less developed regions must give great importance to improving the quality of governance. In this way, it becomes possible to attract foreign direct investment and increase household consumption reducing poverty as main purpose of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for 2030.

This study investigates the impact of the arbitration cases under the Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) scheme on cross-border direct investment in the form of merger and acquisition deals. The initiation of ISDS claims has significant and negative effects on direct investment from the claimant home country to the developing or weak-institution responding country. Indirect expropriation claims often have stronger effects than direct expropriation claims. The investor-win arbitration cases produce a significant substantiation effect by reducing merger flows, while the state-win cases produce an acquittal effect that encourages the subsequent capital inflow to the respondent state. Both effects are more striking in weak-institution or less developed target countries. We also detect some spillover effects of ISDS arbitration.

The paper investigates the impact of the Moroccan diaspora in host countries on attracting foreign direct investment from Moroccan Multinational Enterprises. Utilizing cross-sectional data encompassing outward FDI to 46 countries hosting Moroccan migrants, the Robust Weighted Least Squares estimation method reveals a positive association between the size of the Moroccan diaspora and outward FDI. These results affirm the central hypothesis, highlighting the significant role of social networks, such as diaspora, in fostering connectivity between the MNE and its subsidiaries, mitigating foreignness liabilities and psychic distance. Moreover, the study unveils a nuanced perspective: technological capabilities and institutional quality act as negative moderators, shaping a multifaceted relationship. These findings enrich our comprehension of diaspora-driven FDI dynamics, providing fresh insights into the moderating influences of technological capabilities and institutional quality in the realm of outward FDI from Morocco.

This study examines whether foreign direct investment (FDI) to SSA contributes to inclusive growth in the region. The study further investigates whether SSA's institutional fabric moderates the effect of FDI on inclusive growth in SSA. To this end, we draw data on 42 SSA countries for the period 1996–2020 for the analysis. The empirical evidence, which is based on the GMM estimator, shows that: (1) FDI impedes inclusive growth in SSA, and (2) the region's weak institutional fabric amplifies the shared growth-deteriorating effect of FDI. Nonetheless, the optimism, which we provide by way of threshold analysis, shows that efforts aimed at improving regulatory efficiency enhance inclusive growth from the short-term through to the long-term. The study concludes that robust structures for regulatory efficiency and corruption control are critical for moderating FDI to promote inclusive growth in SSA. A few policy recommendations are discussed in the end.

This paper investigates the role of institutional quality in terms of governance on the impact of Chinese foreign direct investments and human capital development on the macroeconomic performance of the CEMAC zone between 2003 and 2020. The data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and the Correlated Panels Corrected Standard Errors (PCSEs) Approach. The findings indicated that poor governance performance in the CEMAC zone deteriorates the effects of Chinese foreign direct investments and human capital development on the macroeconomic performance of the CEMAC zone. At the same time, poor governance performance also deteriorates the impact of foreign aid and personal remittances received on the macroeconomic performance of the CEMAC zone. This study strongly recommends measures to improve institutional quality such as increased training on ethical thinking in all forms of education, meritocratic recruitment to the civil service, and auditing of public finances and services.

In the last few decades, the majority of least-developed countries have failed to achieve the structural transformation theme. The concern of achieving structural transformation is further aggravated by the lack of technology, low level of literacy, poor institutional qualities, and low development level of the manufacturing sub-sector in these countries. To examine the role of FDI augmented with governance and human capital on structural transformation, the study used panel data for four Sub-Saharan African (SSA) and three East Asian and Pacific (EAP) countries across 31 years. The auto-regressive Distributed Lag with Pooled Mean Group technique was employed for analysis after checking the possible assumptions. The model for the full panels suggests that FDI inflows, especially when supplemented with good governance and better literacy, promote structural transformation. Moreover, across regions, in the short run, the interactive effect of FDI with governance and literacy had a positive effect for EAP and a negative effect for SSA countries. Finally, the government of the least developed countries that endeavors to achieve structural transformation should focus on improving the quality of governance and literacy rate and then engage in attracting massive inflows of FDI, among others.

This paper aims to identify determinants and channels of tax avoidance through passive flows to tax havens using harmful tax competition, considering the effect of changes in withholding tax regulations. For the empirical analysis, we exploit the data of 110 ​907 nonresidents from 134 countries that gain passive flows paid by Polish taxpayers. We utilise data from IFT-2R returns on withholding tax (WHT) for 2012–2019. We use a two-stage Arellano-Bond estimator of the Generalised Method of Moments (GMM) with instrumental variables for dynamic panel data and the difference-in-differences method. We show that the amendment to the withholding tax legislation, preceded by a no-avoidance clause in 2017, reduced passive flows overall and separately from the manufacturing and service sectors, primarily profit-shifting through interest, royalties and intangible services payments. Moreover, our results confirm that the tax system tightening against aggressive tax competition has reduced passive income transfers from service companies, not manufacturing companies. Instead, the latter make higher transfers to tax havens included in both Polish and the E.U. list of countries applying harmful tax competition.