Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Analysis of Coordinated Development of Energy and Environment in China’s Manufacturing Industry under Environmental Regulation: A Comparative Study of Sub-Industries

In order to explore the impact of environmental regulation on the coordinated development of energy and the environment with the background of governance transition, we propose a three-stage integrated approach and use the panel data of China’s manufacturing industry 27 sub-sectors during the period of 2006–2015. In the first stage, according to the environmental pollution intensity, the manufacturing industry is divided into heavily polluting industry, moderately polluting industry, and lightly polluting industry. The second stage is employed the slacks-based measure (SBM)-undesirable method to study the sub-industries’ green energy-environmental efficiency under different environmental pollution intensities. Besides, the dynamic changes of technical innovation and efficiency among different industries are analyzed through the Malmquist productivity index. For the purpose of investigating the transmission mechanism of the Porter’s hypothesis and exploring the compound effects of environmental regulation and governance transition on green development, in the third stage, we use the panel data analysis to conduct more in-depth research on the relationship between environmental regulation, governance transition, and technical innovation. Results show that the highest average green energy-environmental efficiency is lightly polluting industry, which is 0.52, followed by the heavily polluting industry at 0.40, and the lowest is the moderately polluting industry, which is 0.32. By decomposing total factor productivity, heavily polluting industry is at the forefront of technical innovation. Panel data analysis results indicate that investment in research and development and governance transition could promote the growth of total factor productivity for manufacturing.
Impact of Vegetation on Perceived Safety and Preference in City Parks

The aim of this study was to determine the impact of safety-related environmental characteristics in a city park on users’ preferences and whether this impact can be explained by perceived safety. The factors examined were physical and visual accessibility as well as the effectiveness of concealment created by plants in various spatial systems. We used 112 photographs taken in city parks for the study. Studies have shown that visual and physical accessibility varies in terms of impact on preferences and safety—as a result, we tested only visual accessibility and effectiveness. Correlation and regression analyses confirmed that vegetation in a park that obstructs views and can offer concealment reduces our sense of safety. In addition, such vegetation has a negative effect on preference. However, mediation analysis showed that this sense of safety or danger means that dense vegetation (low visual accessibility yet highly effective in offering concealment) is less preferred as a landscape feature. After excluding the impact brought to bear by the sense of safety, the studied features of vegetation had no significant impact on preferences. This means that plants and vegetation layouts of varying densities can be used in completely safe parks and this will probably not adversely affect the feelings of the users.
Entrepreneurs, fluctuations and dynamics within the wealth distribution

There has been substantial interest in inequality and the distribution of wealth for centuries. After changes beginning in the 1980’s, rising income and wealth inequality at the top has become an important item on the policy agenda and in public discussion. This thesis develops the study of wealth inequality in two key directions firstly, the study and use of mobility in wealth amongst households to understand and discriminate between the mechanisms and theories purporting to explain the highly concentrated distribution of wealth in the upper tail. Secondly, the study of interactions between entrepreneurship, which is prominent amongst the wealthy, and aggregate shocks to the economy. In Chapter One, I investigate wealth data in the UK find that there is substantial mobility amongst the wealthy and large changes in wealth. In Chapter Two, I use these findings to estimate a model incorporating multiple theories of the upper wealth distribution and identify that heterogeneity in returns has the best fit to the data. In Chapter Three I turn to entrepreneurship, examining the impact of entrepreneurial constraints on the economy when responding to aggregate shocks. I find evidence of increased dispersion amongst businesses during recessions and use this to calibrate uncertaintyand mobilityincreasing ‘turbulence shocks amongst entrepreneurs. I find that entrepreneurial behaviour amplifies TFP-style shocks and symmetric turbulence shocks have rich effects, changing the distribution of wealth and delivering medium term decreased output and a spell of longer term increased output through slow capital reallocation. I conclude that the study of the top of the wealth distribution and entrepreneurship has significant implications, in terms of understanding the mechanisms behind inequality and the mechanisms that drive patterns in the business cycle.
When is One Plus One More than Two? Theory and Evidence of Merger Motivations

We devise a neoclassical economic model that reveals the underlying motivations for mergers, without resorting to distorted firm decisions or stock market inefficiency. Using empirical analyses to verify the model's predictions, we discover that mergers are more likely in economic booms than in recessions. Furthermore, we assert that a firm with insufficient physical capital is likely a bidder in a merger, whereas a firm with large physical capital is likely a target. Our findings are largely consistent with the waves of mergers during economic booms and the theory on operational synergies.
Race and the Yugoslav Region: Postsocialist, Post-conflict, Postcolonial?

Popescu, G. 2012. Bordering and Ordering the TwentyFirst Century: Understanding Borders. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield. Zolberg, Aristide R. 2003. “The Achaeology of ‘Remote Control. ’” Pp. 195–222 in Migration Control in the North Atlantic World: The Evolution of State Practices in Europe and the United States from the French Revolution to the Inter-war Period, edited by A. Fahrmeir, O. Faron, and P. Weil. New York: Berghahn.
The Effect of the Adoption of International Accounting Standards No. 12 (IAS No.12) for Firms Reporting Losses: Evidence from Korea

This study examines the effects of the adoption of International Accounting Standards No. 12, Income Taxes (IAS No.12) on the incremental information about future profitability for firms reporting losses compared to Korean Generally Accepted Accounting No.16, Accounting for Income Taxes (K-GAAP No.16). Specifically, this paper shows that whether the IAS No.12 affects the information of deferred tax assets (DTAs) regarding loss persistence which implies the ability to predict earnings sustainability. Using a sample of 2,905 observations from Korean listed firms that reported a loss between 2007 and 2014, we divide loss firm-years into categories of ‘good news’ (GN) or ‘bad news’ (BN) based on whether management appears to report an increase in DTAs. We find that our tax categories have incremental information about the probability of loss reversal under K-GAAP No. 16, but under IAS No.12 the incremental effects of a deferred tax balance disappear. Also, we find that investors underweight the informativeness of DTAs under K-GAAP, and after the adoption of IAS No.12, investors cannot obtain buy-and-hold returns by buying GN firm-years and selling BN firms-years. However, this is not because investors understand the information of DTAs, but because the informativeness of DTAs deteriorates after the relaxation in the recognition threshold of DTAs.
Audit quality and real earnings management: evidence from the UK manufacturing sector

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether audit quality is associated with real earnings management in the UK. Design/methodology/approach The authors apply the panel fixed effects method that controls for heterogeneity across firms to investigate whether audit quality is related to real earnings management for a large sample of UK manufacturing companies for the period 2010–2013. The authors utilized three proxies to measure real earnings management and two proxies to measure audit quality. Findings The results provide evidence that audit fees are negatively related to abnormal operating cash flows. Conversely, audit fees are positively related to abnormal discretionary expenses. Besides, audit quality proxies show insignificant relationship with abnormal production costs and real earnings management index. Overall, the study finds partial evidence of significant relationship between audit quality and real earnings management. Research limitations/implications These results are important subject to the adequacy of the indicators of real earnings management and audit quality. Like previous research works that mostly focus on upward earnings management, the authors do not address the question of whether and how firms take real actions to manage earnings downwards in certain contexts. Practical implications The findings inform monitoring bodies that the imposition of higher levels of audit quality may result in unintended consequences. Therefore, monitoring bodies, such as audit committees, should consider the implication of imposing higher quality auditing, which may drive firms to potentially value-decreasing real earnings management practices. Managers should curtail real earnings management practices, especially abnormal operating cash flow, because attempt to use higher-quality auditors to mitigate such practice may destroy firm value. Also, managers’ employment may be threatened due to the potential deterioration of firm value caused by using higher-quality auditors to mitigate managers’ real earnings management practices. Moreover, shareholders are informed of the potential detrimental effects of imposing higher levels of audit quality which may lower the value of their investments. Originality/value The paper extends previous research on earnings management in several ways. First, while earlier studies usually use accruals methods to measure earnings management, the authors use the real earnings management approach as managers can switch from accruals to real earnings management when facing more scrutiny from auditors and/or more constrained regulations or standards that may limit their capability to use discretionary accruals. Second, this study reports new findings, as the authors find partial evidence of a significant relationship between audit quality and real earnings management. Third, it is one of the few studies to use a real earnings management index to measure earnings management and its link to audit quality.
The Multiplicity of (Un-)Thought: Badiou, Deleuze, Event

ABSTRACT This essay investigates thought as an event of “multiplicity. ” French philosophers Gilles Deleuze and Alain Badiou pose this as a concept of change (political and otherwise). Both philosophers propose that multiplicity means thinking happens as an event by engaging a theoretical impasse, or “un-thought. ” Un-thought opens up and changes ideas into complex varieties or multiplicities. This dynamic is examined through the example of May ‘68, an actual event that gives context to how multiplicity expresses “radical change. ” The aim of this article is to see how both thinkers’ theories overlap. For Badiou, multiplicities are “truths” that happen whilst making a decision, engaging a notion of “point. ” For Deleuze, multiplicities are concepts that happen materially in life as metaphysical forces, or “lines. ” Multiplicity is critically approached as a complex variety of ideas that change in the forms of art, politics, and science.
Determinants of Work-Life Balance: A Cross-Cultural Review of Selected Asian Countries

Work-life balance has been recently viewed as one of the critical issues about organisational policies across different cultures and regions. The earlier studies of work-life balance have focused predominantly in the Western and developed nations with slight attention to the experience of work-life balance among Asian countries. Researchers have also paid little attention to examine work-life balance from a cross-cultural perspective, especially in Asian countries. The principal purpose of the present study is to analyse the available literature on the work-life balance among selected Asian countries. The focus of the present study is to identify the determinants of work-life balance and scrutinise the highly significant determinants of work-life balance across different cultures and regions. Based on identified determinants, it will suggest suitable measures to improve the most prevailing determinant of work-life balance among Asian countries. Further, the current study will also identify the current state of work-life balance focusing on theory, logic and methodology. The methods of the study involve secondary data to find out determinants of work-life balance conducted in India, Pakistan, Malaysia, Singapore and China; and it will compare the effectiveness of determinants of work-life balance to these regions. The data will help to describe how employees perceive work-life balance and why they engage in paid work, and what approaches are being adopted by these countries to balance work life in the context of varying economic, political, cultural, social and family conditions. The findings of present research and analyses will provide scholars with a complete understanding of the state of cross-cultural work-life balance and offer recommendations for future research that will undoubtedly facilitate theoretical advancement.
The Enhancement of Work Motivation in Agrarian Affair Office of Makassar City, South Sulawesi, Indonesia

The employees’ motivation is considered low because employees do not comply with applicable regulations. Even though in terms of income and benefits provided considered quite adequate, the low level of motivation of course will affect the work results of employees. The purpose of this study is to provide an overview of increased work motivation at the Agrarian Affair Office of Makassar city. This research is quantitative research with explanatory objectives, namely to explain the causal relationship (influence) of variables increasing work motivation at the Agrarian Affair Office of Makassar city. To measure the variables in this study, questionnaires are used. The results showed that work motivation at the Agrarian Affair Office of Makassar city was in a fairly good category. The implications of this research are to increase work motivation at the Agrarian Affair Office of Makassar city.
Essays on labour economics in developing countries and the role of the public sector

This thesis presents a study of the internal functions of public-sector organisations in developing countries and how public-sector hiring policies interact with the wider economy, using Ethiopia as a case study. The first chapter introduces the thesis. The second chapter provides empirical evidence on how public-sector hiring policies impact education choices and private-sector productivity. I study the expansion of universities in Ethiopia and find that it leads to an increase in public-sector productivity but a decrease in private-sector productivity. The findings are rationalised by the following labour-market conditions, consistent with most developing country contexts: (i) entry into public employment is favoured towards those with a tertiary education; (ii) the public sector provides a large wage premium; (iii) entry into public employment requires costly search effort. The third chapter uses novel survey instruments and administrative data to measure the individual-level information that bureaucrats have on local conditions and a field experiment to provide exogenous variation in information access. Civil servants make large errors and information acquisition is consistent with classical theoretical predictions. Bureaucrats have better information when: there are low costs of acquiring information; they are delegated authority over decision-making; there are organisational incentives to use operating information. The fourth chapter analyses the introduction of a management-information system, which provides civil servants better access to information on their local environment, in the education sector. I find that the intervention significantly improves certain service delivery outcomes (enrolment), while other outcomes (schooling conditions) significantly worsen, consistent with the existence of multitasking in the bureaucracy. The fifth chapter studies performance evaluations in the civil service. I use the dual-evaluation system in the Ethiopian civil service to measure supervisor bias and analyse its effects on service delivery, showing that supervisor bias is associated with efficiency losses in the public sector. The final chapter concludes.
Optimal level of capital in the Polish banking sector

This study presents estimates of the optimal level of aggregate Tier 1 capital ratio in the Polish banking sector. The analysis takes into account macroeconomic benefits of raising Tier 1 capital ratio and macroeconomic costs related to it. The main macroeconomic benefit from a higher capital captured in the study is a higher resilience of the banking sector and consequently a reduction in the likelihood of a banking crisis. The benefit of higher capital ratios is expressed as the product of a decrease in the likelihood of a crisis and the expected cost of a crisis. The latter was calibrated based on the literature review. The probabilities of crisis for different levels of capital were calculated based on probit models estimated on macro data and a simulation model reflecting some of the main features of the banking sector in Poland. The SVAR model estimated on data for the Polish economy was used to assess the scale of the slowdown in GDP growth due to a rise of capital ratios. The net effect of an increase of capital ratios, expressed as a percentage of GDP, reflects the difference between their expected benefits due to the reduction in the probability of a crisis and their economic costs in the form of a decrease in the expected GDP growth rate. The level of Tier 1 ratio, at which the net effect, i.e. the difference between benefits and costs of raising capital ratios, is the largest, is called optimal from a macroeconomic perspective. The results indicate that the optimal level of aggregate Tier 1 ratio is in the range of 11%-23% with the expected value derived from this analysis and the literature at the level of 18%.
Behavior, welfare, production and bioenergetics of laying hens in alternative housing systems

Transitioning of egg production systems from conventional cage to alternative housing (e.g., enriched colony, aviary cage-free) is increasingly occurring in various parts of the world, especially in Europe and the United States, to meet animal welfare requirements or legislations. This dissertation had the central goal of providing scientific knowledge or discoveries related to behavior, welfare, production, and bioenergetics of laying hens in alternative housing systems. It covers five experiments that were conducted in controlled environment and commercial settings with the following specific objectives: 1) Develop and validate a UHF RFID system able to evaluate nesting and feeding behaviors of laying hens in an Enriched Colony Housing (ECH) (Chapter 2); 2) Evaluate the impact of feeder space on feeding behavior of individual hens in an ECH (Chapter 3); 3) Investigate nesting behavior and nesting patterns of individual hens in an ECH (Chapter 4); 4) Assess the impact of managing litter floor access and using experienced hens on floor eggs, air quality and welfare of hens in an aviary system (Chapter 5); and 5) Quantify building ventilation rate (VR) and laying-hen bioenergetics in a fully-open aviary house (Chapter 6). The research described in this dissertation contain the following discoveries: The UHF RFID system was successfully developed and validated. The system allows for assessing the impacts of housing design and/or management practices on behaviors of individual laying hens (Chapter 2). Laying hens (W-36 breed) in the ECH showed similar feeding behaviors when provided a feeder space of 12 or 9.5 cm/hen, and not all hens choose to feed simultaneously (Chapter 3). Hens spent approximately one hour in the nest box during a 16-hr daily light period. However, nesting time during the 6-hr laying period
Financial well‐being amongst elderly Australians: the role of consumption patterns and financial literacy

Consumption behaviour and financial literacy are primary factors in determining the financial well-being of retirees. This paper uses an existing financial literacy index to examine how financial literacy directly, and via an interaction with consumption patterns, affects elderly Australians’ financial well-being. We find that most elderly Australians hold an optimistic attitude towards their financial situation, and those who are relatively older, more educated, healthier and outright homeowners are more likely to report higher levels of financial well-being. Financial literacy significantly improves financial well-being. It also helps strengthen the positive effects of meeting more of non-essential consumption needs on financial well-being.
Umwelt und Herrschaft in der DDR

sparen die analysierten rungsgeschichten wusstsein. So bleibt der Eindruck, es sei am Ende eben doch vordergründig darum gegangen, den eigenen Hals aus der Schlinge zu ziehen. Trotz dieses Einwands ist es das Verdienst Hanne Leßaus, das etablierte Deutungsnarrativ vom Scheitern der politischen Überprüfung ehemals Belasteter anhand der von ihr ebenso anschaulich wie konzise dargestellten systematisch hinterfragt und ein Stück weit aufgebrochen zu haben. Der schwedische Literat Stig Dagerman wohnte für seine 1946 verfassten Reportagen über den Deutschen Herbst verschiedenen Spruchkammersitzungen in der amerikanischen Besatzungszone bei – in der britischen Zone waren die-
Global Uncertainty and Firm Investment: Empirical Assessment

Using firm-level data from 36 countries, we estimate the effect of global uncertainty on corporate investment and financial decisions. Eleven global uncertainty measures that encompass macro, micro, and higher-order dimensions of uncertainty are employed. We find that while Economic Policy Uncertainty (EPU) measures negatively affect investment, non-EPU measures have positive effects. In 2010s, EPU and non-EPU measures exhibit notably different behaviors which appear to considerably influence our results. We also explore how firm- and country-specific characteristics affect the relationship between uncertainty and investment. The negative effects of EPU measures on investment are stronger for firms with high investment irreversibility and high leverage, but no such effect is observed from non-EPU measures. In countries with deeper credit markets, investment decisions are less sensitive to uncertainty. Regarding financial decisions, (1) increased EPU measures lead to increased cash holdings, while an increase in most other uncertainty measures reduces them and (2) except for Global EPU, most uncertainty measures are negatively associated with dividend payouts. Overall, our results reveal that contrary to a substantial body of recent scholarly work, the uncertainty-investment relation is sensitive to uncertainty measures and sample periods and different uncertainty measures have differential effects on cash holdings and dividend payouts.