Browse Our Business and Economics Journals
Economics and business journals focus on publishing papers coming from the fields of applied economics, corporate finance, financial investments, markets, institutions, industrial organization, international trade, marketing and similar.
Business and Economics
This article concerns the changing conditions of fiscal sovereignty within the Eurozone in the context of the evolution of the EU's institutional crisis-management framework during the recent financial crisis. It begins with a method-of-difference approach to compare the dynamics and outcomes of the crisis in the Greek and Hungarian economies, on the basis of their similarly troubled fiscal positions and domestic political environments. On this basis, an argument is made that the outcomes in Greece (i.e. a breakdown in national fiscal sovereignty and severe economic losses) were not an inevitable product of the economic fundamentals, but at least partially attributable to uncertainty about the extent and expedience of financial assistance through the Eurozone's crises management institutions. The European Central Bank's (ECB) 2012 declaration of “unlimited support” for Eurozone governments has done much to calm markets, but has also created an institution with an ambiguous and self-imposed “dual-mandate”. This article concludes that the precedent established by the last crisis has created a fraught situation, leaving the Eurozone without viable options that are both economically efficacious and politically legitimate. Relying on either the ECB or the European Stability Mechanism to manage any future crisis could well provoke a backlash among the Eurozone member states as national fiscal sovereignty is eclipsed by ever-deeper ad hoc financial commitments on the part of the institutions of crisis management.
Editor's Note: This essay paper of Professor Kornai with an unusually provoking title consists of two parts. Part I is the slightly edited, non-abridged version of his writing published as an oped in The Financial Times (FT) on 11 July 2019, the world's leading global business publication (Kornai 2019a). Subsequently, the full text of this paper was published in the Hungarian weekly magazine Élet és Irodalom (Life and Literature; Kornai 2019b), which in turn generated a number of commenting articles published in the same weekly. Still in the month of July, the original essay was translated into Chinese by a Hong Kong newspaper and into Vietnamese. An influential multilingual Chinese newspaper gave an extensive summary of the FT essay (Street 2019). The latter one, according to our best knowledge, was disseminated only on the internet. Part II is the translated and slightly edited version of Kornai's second article, published in September this year on the same topic (Kornai 2019c). In this second essay he responded to his critiques both in Hungary and world-wide. This piece was published in its original form in Hungarian by the previous mentioned Hungarian weekly. 1 We, the Editors of Acta Oeconomica, are proud to publish the complete English translation of this second essay first time. We thank for the opportunity given to us by Professor Kornai to publish the Frankenstein-papers in an integrated form, together with all the necessary bibliographic references.
This paper addresses the hottest potato of economics today, namely why the profession seems to have been lulled into a sense of false security in spite of flourishing economic models as well as subfield-knowledge in various disciplines? The embarrassing question of the Queen of England ‘why did nobody see the crisis of 2008 coming’ emblematically signalled the failure of the collective imagination of the entire profession to understand the system and its emerging patterns. The present paper can be seen therefore as a clarion call for grounding a shift towards an economics barded with the lessons learnt in complexity science in shaping modern governance.
Have we reached the point where more spending on health care and other forms of social protection is not producing better health as measured by reductions in population mortality? Drawing on two decades of research and mortality statistics (1995–2015) for 17 OECD countries, our analysis confirms and builds on the observed relationship between the returns and investments in health and social welfare spending. First, the results suggest that there is a differential effect of socioeconomic, lifestyle and demography variables on total and cause-specific mortality rates. Second, the basic premise of an association between health care expenditure and mortality rates is reinforced in models that take into account public-only health expenditure and its impact on older age groups. Third, a strong protective effect of government-sponsored welfare expenditure on infant mortality was observed. This effect is weaker on other causes of death and suggests that older individuals, in this sample of developed countries, may have reached a stage of the epidemiological transition in which health improvement is indifferent to government assistance and depends largely on behavioural change.
Guarantees of origin are tradeable energy certificates defined by directives 2009/28/EC and 2018/2001/EU of the European Union. They serve the aim of informing final consumers on energy sources used for their electricity supply. They are also expected to encourage new investments in renewable electricity generation. This paper investigates how the use of guarantees of origin meets these expectations. A literature review, an analysis of related regulations and an evaluation of empirical data shows that there are regulatory failures both at national and the European Union levels. Furthermore, due to a contradiction between certain rules in European Union level regulation, consumers receive unreliable information on their electricity consumption mix. Therefore, although national rules should be improved, the problem of reliability cannot be resolved until the Union level framework is modified. Furthermore, the present framework does not incentivise investments in renewable energy technologies either. Accordingly, recommendations are formulated for policy makers to ensure reliable and sufficient operation of the certificate system.
There has been an increase in outward foreign direct investment (FDI) and in the number of locally-owned or controlled multinationals in the Czech Republic and Hungary. However, data problems hinder to determine accurately the underlying trends and the main factors behind the changes. Data on outward FDI contain investment realised by all locally operational firms, regardless of their ownership. We rely on newly available balance of payments manual 6 (BPM) data and on company case studies. We show that outward investment by Czech firms must be much higher than what balance of payments data show. Hungary's case is the opposite. The leading Czech and Hungarian foreign investor firms can be categorised as “virtual indirect” foreign investors: they are in majority foreign ownership, but under domestic control. The reason for this special type of firms dominating in outward foreign direct investments can be found in the privatisation technique applied in these countries during the transition process.
This paper deals with the possible existence of political budget cycles (PBCs) within the European Union (EU). I use panel data for 28 EU countries from 1995 to 2016 and provide estimates based on dynamic panel regressions. I employ a system-GMM estimator complemented by the Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to limit the number of instruments. The specifications include structural budget balances related to the potential GDP, thereby limiting the initial endogeneity. These measures capture the true motivation behind fiscal policies. The results suggest that the EU member states exhibit PBCs: (i) the intervention occurs in the year before elections and (ii) the structural budget balance to the potential GDP ratio is lower by −0.41 percentage points a year before elections. In addition, I have investigated the EU fragmentation in terms of the PBCs and selected 8 countries’ characteristics correlating to the existence of these cycles. These include lower GDP per capita, post-communist background, low tax burden, high perceived corruption, low levels of media freedom and internet usage, lower number of directly voted-in legislative officials, and a low parliamentary voter turnout.
The paper aims to analyse state-owned enterprises (SOEs) in 11 post-socialist Central-Eastern European (CEE) countries. Based on the individual data of large non-financial companies, we estimated the real state share in the years 2014 and 2015. We consider both direct and indirect state ownership and apply an explicit classification of companies as majority and minority state-owned, which is neglected in a lot of research. The countries with the highest values of the ‘Country SOE index’ were Slovenia and Latvia, while the lowest were Lithuania and Hungary. State ownership is dominant in transportation and storage and energy supply. The lower return on assets (ROA), return on equity (ROE) and return on capital employed (ROCE) ratios of SOEs imply that capital in this group of companies is used less efficiently. Furthermore, they are characterised by higher wage costs. At the same time, SOEs have higher earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) margins and better ability to turn operating revenue into cash than their privately-owned counterparts.
The length, the composition, the quality and the characteristics of value chains essentially determine the corporate as well as the macroeconomic performance of the economic sectors and industries. Hungary has a strong tradition in the pharmaceutical industry but its dynamising impact seems to be limited on the economy. The aim of this paper is to detect and reveal the specialties of the Hungarian pharmaceutical industry both in space and time by a value chain analysis. Our method is partly quantitative, we use an input-output analysis; and partly qualitative, relying on interviews with the representatives of pharmaceutical companies. We found that the Hungarian pharma value chain is really special, having relatively short backward and forward linkages with mainly indirect value-added contribution as well as high import content of exports. However, our company interviews revealed the fundamental differences between original and generic value chains – i.e. again a pharma industry-specific distinction. Having relatively little original and more substantial generic production in Hungary explains much of the value chain specialties, which leaves its mark on the limited impact of the industry on the national economy.
The paper aims to explore how factors of regional competitiveness are associated with the location of car manufacturing companies in the EU. Although the European automotive market can be characterized by an intense dynamics in terms of location choices, literature offers little empirical guidance on how regional factors influence the location of car manufacturers in the EU. This paper aims to fill this gap by combining regional competitiveness data on 276 EU regions with the actual location of all 269 production units of car manufacturing companies currently present in the EU. Logistic regression is used to discover significant relationships, while the comparative analysis of clusters of regions is meant to offer a more detailed understanding of the role of different location factors. Results of the analysis show that the most influential location factor is related to infrastructural development, but other competitiveness factors, such as regional innovation capabilities or labour market efficiency, might also play an important role.
The paper looks at the life situation of Czech and Slovak seniors between 2005 and 2016. The aim is to analyze data from the national standardized surveys (EU-SILC) and, based on the analyzed data, describe living conditions (an objectively measured standard of living and poverty rate) and subjective life satisfaction with an emphasis on seniors living in single-person households. The results show a large increase in the number of single-person households. The analysis of Czech households' income situation showed that the per-member monthly income for the whole population was similar to the average per-member income in households of seniors, while the group of the elderly living in single-person households appeared to be the most vulnerable one in terms of income. The differences between the seniors' incomes and expenditures indicated that about 40% of this data segment's members lived near the poverty line, while the most endangered segment members were seniors from single-person households.
In 2011 Hungary's water supply and sanitation sector was characterized by a multitude of utilities, a fragmented market with widely differing tariffs and no centralized regulation, resulting in often inefficient and unsustainable operational and market conditions. In 2011 the Hungarian government introduced the Act CCIX of 2011 on Water Utility Services which resulted in significant market consolidations. In this article we present the results of a qualitative survey carried out in 2015 to examine the opinion of top managers of utilities on the short and midterm effects of the realization of the objectives set by the Act. The interviews focused on examining the efficiency changes experienced by 15 CEOs of different water utility service provider companies since the integration. The paper also examines their expectations for the future across a multitude of technical and economic fields and factors. This qualitative research aimed to study whether the recent changes in policy and market structure led to economies of scale and to the perceptible increase of technical and economic efficiency levels. It was concluded that efficiency benefits of economies of scale prevailed in most cases, however, these were perceived only to a limited extent at the time of the survey, approximately midway through the ongoing integration processes.
When calculating different profitability measures for a life insurance company, one of the most important parameters to know is the probability of a policy being in force at any given time after the start of risk bearing. These probabilities are given by the survival function. In this paper, we examine data from a Hungarian insurance company, in order to build models for the survival functions of two life insurance products. For survival function estimation based on the unique parameters of a new policy, Cox regression is used. However, not all parameters of a new policy are relevant in estimating the survival function. Therefore, application of model selection algorithms is needed. Furthermore, if the exact effects of the policy parameters for the survival function can be determined, the insurance company can direct its sales team to acquire policies with positive technical results. When traditional model selection techniques proposed by the literature (such as best subset, stepwise and regularization methods) are applied on our data, we find that the effect of the selected predictors for survival cannot be determined, as there is a harmful degree of multicollinearity. In order to tackle this problem, we propose adding the hybrid metaheuristic from Láng et al. (2017) to the Cox regression in order to eliminate multicollinearity from the final model. On the test sets, performance of the models from the metaheuristic rivals those of the traditional algorithms with the use of noticeably less predictors. These predictors are not significantly correlated and are significant for survival, as well. It is shown in the paper that with the application of metaheuristics, we could produce a model with good predicting capabilities and interpretable predictor effects. These predictor effects can be used to direct the sales activities of the insurance company.
In the past few years in many countries people have experienced the erosion of trust in the main pillars of democracy, the voting and election systems. Many authors envisage the blockchain technology as a tool for restoration of trust (Tapscott 2016; Swislow 2016; Shin 2016). Our research is aimed at the potential use of blockchain technology in social systems for enhancing trust and increasing participation. We aim to explore whether the blockchain technology is suitable for voting or elections in large communities and the issues to be addressed for real world applications to leverage democratic rights. Our final conclusion is that there are both theoretical and practical obstacles in the way of such direct applications.
The study examines the possibilities of the digital transformation of the Hungarian banking industry through the “One Week Sprint” method, derived from general design thinking methodology. In our research, we cooperated with two domestic banks and focused on real estate related opportunities and SME offerings. The methodological focus was on how to use customer journeys and personas for supporting digital efforts, as design thinking places a great emphasis on these elements. The paper has two goals: 1) present the findings of this innovative project with the two banks using design thinking; 2) describe our experience with customer journeys and personas in consumer- and corporate-facing innovation projects in the two banks. To our knowledge, there is no practical experience in the literature regarding the usage of these tools. We found that the usage of customer journeys and personas are much easier and evident if the project tries to develop consumer products or solutions. If the solutions are for corporate use, personas lose the added value of empathy (without the human connection) and the creation of customer journeys needs deeper experience from consultants.
Technological innovations are inclining the world of business to restructure actual business processes at the threshold of the fourth industrial revolution. These circumstances create knowledge-intensive organizational, collective and personal learning environments in which ICT tools play a critical role. This paper investigates knowledge creation patterns inherent in the supply chain of companies that operate in a networked environment in the Székesfehérvár region of Hungary. ICT solutions applied in knowledge creation and collaboration with suppliers and customers in the supply chain were studied in this research. One of the main contributions of the paper is the study of knowledge creation patterns in three dimensions: the Socialization – Externalization – Combination – Internalization (SECI) framework, supply chain processes and ICT solutions, which is a unique approach compared with the frameworks from the relevant literature.
After a short historical perspective on the emergence of robo-advisors and an overview of how they manage other people's money, we evaluate the performance of five German robo-advisors in the period between May 2015 and December 2018. Performance tests are conducted using Sharpe's (1966) and Jensen's (1968) performance methodologies. We also employ the returns-based style analysis of Sharpe (1992) to determine the exposure of robo-advisors to different non-overlapping asset classes. We report the following findings: First, no robo-advisor was able to beat the benchmark before or after considering fees. Second, robo-advisor performance varies greatly in the sample period even for portfolios that should appeal to clients with similar risk preferences. Third, these performance differences remain unexplained after accounting for the different asset allocations.
The aim of the paper is to estimate cost efficiency and its determinants of the Czech and Slovak commercial banks within the period of 2005–2015. In this paper two-stage Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) is used. In the first stage, I estimate the relative cost efficiency applying the input-oriented model with variable return to scale and find that the Czech banks were more cost efficient than the Slovak banks. The main reason of cost inefficiency is the excess of clients' deposits in the banks' balance sheet. In the second stage, I use the panel data analysis and estimate the determinants of cost efficiency in the two countries. I choose 8 bank-specific and macroeconomic factors that influence cost efficiency. The results show that the larger banks with higher liquidity risk and with a lower value of the net interest margin were more efficient. It confirms the reason of inefficiency determined from the DEA model. Banks were highly cost efficient during the economic expansion with a lower value of the inflation rate.
In this paper we analyse the role of the traditional determinants of economic growth in the African countries in the period between 1950 and 2012. Due to the specificity and the single nature of each one of these countries, methods that take into account observed and unobserved heterogeneity are used. Results highlight the relevance of the growth rate of the capital stock to growth in the short-run, which is significant in all regressions. The growth rate of the government to GDP ratio is also important in all but one of the regressions in which it appears, and its growth is harmful for the growth of GDP per capita in the short-run. The variables related to public debt do not present any relationship with economic growth. Human capital has a positive relationship with economic growth in regressions that do not include public debt. The growth rate of real GDP per capita also depends (negatively) on its past value, i.e., the lower the real GDP per capita the higher will be its growth rate.
We compare the pre- and post-2010 Hungarian political regimes through the lens of pension policies. We label the pre-2010 regime as democratic populist because it was characterized by fiscally irresponsible policies, yet it maintained the system of checks and balances and the rule of law. In contrast, we call the post-2010 regime authoritarian populist as it has employed authoritarian political techniques while maintained popular legitimation through regular elections. To substantiate the difference between the two periods from an economic viewpoint, we compare pre- and post-2010 pension policies to find important differences as well as surprising similarities. In particular, we analysed the following five policy aspects: (a) reform and partial privatization of the government-run pension system, (b) policies on the statutory (normal) and the effective (average) pension age, (c) indexation, (d) progression in benefits calculations and progressivity in the personal income tax, and (e) contribution rates. Based on ideological preferences, we argue that one would expect the pension system to become financially more sustainable but less redistributive after 2010 in comparison to the preceding period. Yet, we find that although pro-poor redistribution through the pension system has indeed been curtailed, fiscal sustainability has not improved due to the erratic policies.
In this study, we challenge the problem of inadequate voluntary pension savings by exploring the micro-dataset of the Luxembourg Wealth Study (LWS) for three countries: Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States. The existing empirical literature usually focuses on the role of socio-demographic factors to understand this phenomenon, and theoretical studies additionally highlight the role of behavioural factors. However, empirical studies in this field are extremely scarce. The use of the LWS data enables us to fill this research gap. Separately for each country, we verify the role of individuals' risk attitudes and intertemporal choices in the demand for voluntary pension savings. To make the results more robust, we add a set of socio-demographic control variables to our regressions. Our findings clearly reveal that being more risk averse and being less forward looking negatively affect people's propensity to save for retirement. Furthermore, we confirm that age, gender and education are significant predictors of pension demand in each of the analysed countries. We argue that these conclusions have practical meaning to improve regulatory frameworks.
While recent research on family business succession has focused on examining the importance of individual and family characteristics, the role of macroeconomic conditions has been often neglected. This paper investigates the impacts of macroeconomic conditions on family business heir's career choice intention using individual level cross-country data of 18 European countries for the year 2013. We find that the level of economic development measured by GDP per capita, growth of GDP per capita, and youth rate of unemployment influence a family business heir's career choice intention. We also demonstrate that beyond the cross-country differences in macroeconomic conditions, individual characteristics of siblings, age, gender, work experience in family business, and start-up time play an important role. To mitigate succession failures, policies towards business succession with related firm survival should be specifically designed depending on different macroeconomic and youth labour market conditions.
For political and economic theory in general, libertarianism in particular, property rights are a pillar of central importance. One might describe the schools of political and economic thought solely by their approach to property rights, for example libertarianism as expansive and communism as constrained, with a fair degree of accuracy on the system as a whole.
Despite centuries of property rights philosophy, a fundamental weakness persists that can be most easily seen from a natural science perspective. Property classifications, such as between one's physical body, personal property, and other types of so-called private property, underlie much of the property rights theory, yet these classes are more of a result of technological limitations than philosophical or real economic distinctions.
We demonstrate through a lens of molecular and developmental biology how distinctions between types of property are misguided or illusory. Using the developing human embryo as the most basic example of property acquisition, we show that all subsequent examples of greater property acquisition and its use are fundamentally the same. The point is further developed with other biological examples.
Foundational concepts are of primary importance as their mistake persists through even the most elegant deductions. In order to defend itself from the political and economic attacks, the property rights ethic must be consistent and logical. For this, any artificial or contradictory concepts must be shed.
This study examines the effect of parental job loss on adolescents' school completion during the secondary school years and the moderating role of home environment in that effect. It uses rich survey data from Hungary on adolescents between 14 and 21 years of age, with detailed measures of parental employment and home environment. The study replicates the average negative effect found in the literature. No effect is found for families with a history of providing a cognitively stimulating home environment, but the negative effect is strong for other families. Home environment matters more than initial income in moderating the effect. The results highlight the protective nature of a cognitively stimulating home environment.
Many papers have analyzed the effects of foreign acquisition on firm productivity, articulating its positive impacts. However, an important issue remains: is there a general foreign acquisition effect, or is there any heterogeneity in the effects? This paper reports on the analysis of over 3,400 majority foreign acquisitions in Hungary. The main result (which exists in a propensity score matching sample as well) of the difference-in-differences analysis is that only acquirers from higher income countries foster labor productivity significantly — and this effect increases with the income gap between Hungary and the country of origin -, while acquirers from lower income countries do not induce statistically significant effects.
This paper examines the impact of medium- and short-term financial constraints on the probability of export participation of SMEs in 28 post-communist countries. The regression analysis conducted over the cross-sectional sample of SMEs taken from the BEEPS III-IV-V shows that the medium- and short-term financial constraints produce a significantly negative effect on the probability of exporting. Although there exist arguments for why the effects of medium- and short-term financial constraints can differ from each other, both the medium- and short-term financial constraints appear to reduce the probability of exporting equally by 25%. The regression results also suggest that more productive, innovative, and larger SMEs, and also SMEs with international quality certificates are more likely to export. When the regressions are separately estimated for the first-time and continuous exporters, it appears that only the probability of exporting of continuous exporters is significantly sensitive to the financial constraints. Furthermore, the regressions separately run for the direct and indirect exporters show that the financial constraints have a larger effect on the probability of exporting of indirect exporters. The heterogeneity analysis shows that there is a significant heterogeneity in the effects of medium- and short-term financial constraints on the likelihood of exporting across regions, industries, periods, and firm types.
Benford's Law is a useful tool for detecting fraud in financial statements. In this paper we test the financial item named ‘Work performed by the undertaking for its own purpose and capitalised’ applying this tool. The data are taken from the financial reports of all companies submitted to the Serbian Business Register Agency for the period of 2008–2013. Our conclusion shows that there is a very high probability that the frequency distribution of the second digit does not satisfy Benford's Law. In other words, it implies that certain manipulations have been usually done with the second digit of the aforementioned item in the financial statement. This research confirms our hypothesis that financial statement frauds are usually conducted using the second digit.
The paper tests the impact of gender diversity and educational attainment of owners and company directors on the performance of private firms in the Slovak economy. The paper demonstrates that in retail trade the gender diversity both in owners and company directors within a company leads to higher total factor productivity and partially lower propensity to fail. However, in other industries the companies with higher proportion of females in the ownership structure or among company directors tend to be less efficient and grow less. Although there is evidence that higher proportion of females self-select into lower risk sectors and occupations, our main results hold after controlling for it. In terms of educational attainment, the companies with higher proportions of owners or company directors with university education are more productive and grow more in terms of turnover, but there is no evidence that default of companies is related to educational attainment. We suggest that education is unique and superior resource and it generally benefits the companies by having higher proportion of educated owners and/or directors.
Trust in financial institutions can be seen as a foundation for loyalty and profits in the banking industry and is relevant for the macro economy as well. Young customers are more likely to lack trust due to their lack of personal experience in finance, although parental advice may lower their risk. In this paper the authors combine trust measures with intergenerational communication theory and test it on a large dyadic sample using Z-scores. The results show a strong, holistic intergenerational effect on institutional trust, but shed light on heterogeneity in the sample due to gender, financial independence and different communication styles.
Risk captured through the volatility of stock markets stands as the essential concern for financial investors. The financial crisis of 2008 demonstrated that stock markets are highly integrated. Slovakia, Hungary and Poland went through identical centralist economic arrangement, but nowadays operate under diverse stock markets, monetary system and tax structure. The study aims to measure the risk level of the Slovak Stock Market (SAX index), Budapest Stock Exchange (BUX index) and Poland Stock Market (WIG20 index) based on the portfolio diversification model. Results of the study provide information on the diversification benefits generated when SAX, BUX and WIG20 join their stock markets. The study considers that each stock index represents an independent portfolio. Portfolios are built to stand on the available companies that are listed on each stock index from 2007 till 2017. The results of the study show that BUX generates the lowest risk and highest weighted average return. In contrast, SAX is the riskiest portfolio but generates the lowest weighted average return. The results find that the stock prices of BUX have larger positive correlation than the stock prices of SAX. Moreover, the highest diversification benefits are realized when Portfolio SAX joins Portfolio BUX and the lowest diversification benefits are achieved when SAX joins WIG20.
This paper examines the paradox between high relative levels of job satisfaction and the characteristics of women's jobs compared to men's in Spain. Three hypothesis are considered: i) the existence of a selection bias when participating in the labour market; ii) of the presence of adaptive job satisfaction; and iii) the existence of differences related to preferences of different nature to strictly labour issues.
The study shows that, although having lower working conditions, women are more likely to be satisfied at work than men are. This paradox persists regardless of the inclusion of a great range of variables of different nature (objective and subjective), the age group and educational level under consideration. The Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition suggests that women's preferences are actually influencing the differences in job satisfaction. However, it is not demonstrated that these differences disappear as age decreases or educational level increases. The probable existence of a “glass ceiling” that prevents women from having access to posts of greater responsibility and higher wages could cause that women who actually reach them are more satisfied than their male colleagues. As the labour market and society become more equal, this paradox might dilute.
A basic principle of economics is that people always prefer a larger set of opportunities. Money illusion can be considered as the phenomenon when people may not correctly perceive their budget constraints, and may act in ways that run counter to this preference. In this interpretation, money illusion is a cognitive bias, worthwhile to overcome. Herein I argue that taking a view of human decision-making based on certain strands of cognitive psychology, one can reinterpret the evidence for money illusion in two ways. First, I claim that money illusion is inescapable to some extent, and saying that we suffer from it is similar to alleging that we experience optical illusions, only because we are unable to see, say, individual atoms. Second, taking a view on “preferences” different from the traditional one, I contend that it may bring little benefit to get rid of money illusion even in the cases where it is possible to do so. To follow up the visual analogy, even if we can improve our eyesight it is not obviously desirable. These arguments seem to lead to a Candidean disposition: there is no possible improvement on the state of affairs as far as “money illusion” is concerned. Nonetheless, I will make some positive proposals concerning economic policy and economics research.
The twenty-first century brought with it the proliferation of new media. We carry mobile devices and smartphones with us nearly everywhere we go. Constantly hooked up to the world by these tools, the bigger question is why we are sometimes not available. Our personal networks have partly migrated to online social networks, and new networks now penetrate our everyday lives in the digital sphere. In this online survey research, the authors searched for insights into how important smartphones and Facebook, the most popular social media site in Hungary, have become in people's lives. The kinds of attitudes that characterise the use of these tools were analysed, especially in the case of privacy and the use of personal data. The aim of this research — by establishing the actual situation — is to show how modern media, publicity, and privacy are linked, and how people reveal themselves by their constant media presence.
The global automotive industry has been exposed to an overproduction crisis for several decades. Under the pressure of restructuring, automotive companies renew both the geographical scope and the technological standardization of their production processes. We analyze the effects this restructuring had on the development of European economies in order to understand whether vertical specializations in the automotive value chain can lead to Central and Eastern European countries’ catching up to advanced economies, or whether such specializations reproduce new forms of core-periphery relations. In order to answer this question, we introduce a new methodological approach to understand vertical specialization in the global value chain from a semi-peripheral perspective. We combine the theory of global value chains with Vernon's product life-cycle theory. In the research we focus on the standardization of the production of electric engines behind the geographical relocation of production between core and periphery.
We set up an agent-based macro-model that focuses on the consumption-saving decision. Agents do not maximize utility, but their behaviour features certain “rational” aspects of human choice based on the idea of ecological rationality. Three qualitatively different saving strategies are defined: 1, buffer stock saving (prudent and forward looking); 2, permanent income saving (forward looking without prudence); and 3, myopic saving (caring only about immediate consumption). It is found that prudent saving behaviour becomes prevalent when the selection pressure is very high, but an economy comprising only prudent households tends to accumulate capital in excess of what is implied by the Golden Rule. Lowering the intensity of evolutionary forces results in more diversity in saver types, and, somewhat puzzlingly, may be socially beneficial in some sense.
In this contribution, we evaluate the performance of the Supreme Audit Office's (SAO) audit activity in the Visegrad Four (V4) countries. We focus on the analysis of the control activities of the SAO of the Slovak Republic and we compare the results with other countries. We focused on the SAO's function control, according to the number of controls undertaken over the period 2014–2016, and evaluated an auditors's burden (the number of controls performed by one inspector). We state the positives, but also the risks of expanding the area of control over the self-government bodies, and we put forward proposals to reduce these risks. Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland have the same or similar historical trajectories, cultural and intellectual values and they share common roots of religious traditions. Therefore we assume that they may display certain key similarities in institutional development, including in the area of public finance control. We review how these countries have worked in the area today, with a focus on the period between 2014 and 2016.
The paper presents the results of a research conducted in 2014–2016, aimed at characterising the milieu of the Polish academic economists with respect to their self-identification with modern schools of economic thought. Using econometric modelling, the social variables determining the theoretical choices made by the economists themselves were identified. We found that the largest group of the Polish academic economists identifies themselves with new institutional economics. Nearly half of the respondents declared their association with heterodox approaches, while only about a quarter of the respondents showed association with economic orthodoxy. Such a structure of self-identification of the Polish academic economists with schools of economic thought distinguishes it from the ones in other European countries, such as Italy and Germany.
Nowadays, global production networks (GPN) and global value chains (GVC) play an important role in the world economy intensifying the trade and production networks and resulting in products having value-added in different countries. The analysis of how many intermediate products a country imports in order to produce a product and of how many products a country exports to another country in order to produce new products draws the attention to value-added trade. In the present study, we compare the Hungarian and Polish value-added trade of chemicals and chemical products. We use the OECD-WTO data of value-added trade, which is based on an input-output table. By calculating numerous indices, we reveal that the domestic value-added of chemicals and chemical products in the two countries was relatively low and should be increased by adequate economic policy.
Can socioeconomic fluctuations explain variations in European Union suicide mortality? To answer this question, we investigate the effect of socioeconomic and demographic factors on (agespecific) male and female suicide rates using a fixed-effects technique and panel data for 15 EU countries, over a time period that leads up to, coincides with, and follows the recession of 2008. The findings show that suicide rates for young and working-age populations are more sensitive to general economic conditions than suicide rates for other age groups, and that male suicide behavior is more responsive than female behavior. In this setting, suicide rates are likely to be higher in countries with lower income, higher unemployment, higher divorce rates, and, most importantly, weaker systems of social protection. Our results, however, raise serious doubts about government involvement in crisis-related mental illness prevention and mental health promotion.
This paper examines the effects of Airbnb on the Norwegian hotel market, using correlational design and the difference-in-differences statistical method. The findings show that hotels in the regions of Norway where Airbnb is flourishing have more guests than the regions with less Airbnb activity. In addition, it seems that Airbnb has a positive effect on the hotel market in Norway. However, as the Airbnb expansion continues, and it diversifies into the ‘travel business’ and the ‘luxury accommodation’ segment, it will affect the hotel industry. How the hotel industry will respond to this threat remains to be seen, and will provide an interesting subject for future research.
What does ethics mean in human resource management (HRM)? In this paper, based on the results of action research projects conducted with the participation of 76 HR experts in five groups, we provide insights into two issues. First we identify the most common dilemma-patterns in HRM activities in present-day Hungary (dismissal, disciplinary actions, recruitment and organizational culture). Then, we move on to the reasons for moral silence as identified by HRM experts (among others, a lack of ethical knowledge, the lifelessness of the ethical institutional framework, ignorance and fear, power games and buck-passing).
The present study revolves around the question of the appropriateness of “the White Elephant syndrome” to characterise the nature of the planned trans-Baltic railway project Rail Baltica (RB) in terms of its initial financing, long-term profitability and symbolic importance. Whereas, in general, the expected outcome of the project goes well together with the EU Cohesion Policy goals, in its concrete application RB could serve as an example of the tendency of politicians and public servants to institutionally lock themselves into certain irrational choices about publicly financed mega-projects. This is what “the White Elephant syndrome” metaphor illustrates. Methodologically, this paper aims to analyse whether RB meets the common criteria of “the White Elephant syndrome” of public investments or if it can be seen as a sustainable and profitable long-term project after the initial investment.
After the serious effects of the international crisis of 2008 export activity – as a main form of internationalisation – proved to be an important element of survival and growth for small and medium sized enterprises. Recovery was especially difficult for the so-called peripheral countries, among them the Iberian, Baltic and Visegrád economies, on which this article concentrates. The observed period is between 2008 and 2016. First, a brief theoretical overview is given on SME internationalisation. Second, a literature review focuses on the export enhancing factors based on existing enterprise surveys and studies prepared after the crisis. These show that peripheral area SMEs are already similar to others regarding these stimuli, manager attitude and innovation being the most important ones. Third, statistical data are analysed to assess the significance of SMEs in employment, value added and exports. In this respect, SMEs and their pace of recovery are somewhat different in the three regions but not so distinct from the core countries. Finally, it is shown that in the post-crisis period, two main changes can be perceived: the temporary shift of exports towards non-EU markets and structural rearrangements in exporting enterprises.
In this article we rely on the concept of “international new ventures” (INV), and concentrate on the analysis of two research propositions in the case of selected Hungarian INVs, based on company interviews in two selected industries, biotechnology and information technology. First, we analyse the criteria of the selection of foreign markets in the internationalisation of these firms and second, the role of networks in the internationalisation process of selected Hungarian INVs. Our results highlight the typical internationalisation pattern of targeting the largest developed foreign markets globally. In terms of the role of networks in internationalisation, we found evidence of the decisive role of networks in all cases examined. The personal network of the founder(s) was emphasised, especially in winning early clients. The scalability of the personal network-based business model was, however, questioned. The management implications of our findings suggest Hungarian INVs need to intensify their involvement in international communities supporting the growth of such companies. Areas for potential future research include comparing our findings with empirical results from other countries in Central-Eastern Europe.
The study focuses on the analysis of a short term retail event. Its success is similar to Black Friday, but differs in underlying consumer motivations. Using a mixed methodology, phenomenological interviews provided in-depth understanding of the participants’ lived experiences followed by an online survey with a sample size of 761 respondents. Exploratory factor analyses has been used to differentiate three distinctive groups with hierarchical cluster analysis. By adopting the ANOVA method, clusters and hypothesis were further analysed. This study is the first to employ quantitative study for a shopper taxonomy of such an event. Our results contribute valuable insights into retail shopping orientation and shopper taxonomic scheme literatures. The finding that a short term retail event’s shoppers form distinct groups of consumers indicates a new way of customers embracing retail events. Our research has identified three distinct shopper clusters based on the different weight of task and social orientations: Loyalists, Enthusiasts, Newbies. Each group applies different strategies to satisfy personal goals. The present shopper taxonomy offers new strategic ways to increase retail performance by targeting the most valuable customers.
The incentive problem is a vital issue in all transition economies and China is not an exception. This paper summarises how China partially solved this problem at early stages of post-Mao reforms and why the Chinese solution is only transitory, which explains severe problems that China is facing now. The paper also discusses the incentive mechanisms in the judicial system and the effect of the soft budget constraint (SBC) syndrome on incentives, including the relationship between institutions and innovation.
