bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Differences in increasing returns between technological sectors
Authors: Romero João P. , McCombie John S.L. 
Published: September 2016

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is twofold: to investigate the existence of different degrees of returns to scale in low-tech and high-tech manufacturing industries; and to examine whether the degrees of returns to scale change through time.Design/methodology/approachThe empirical investigation implemented in the paper uses data from the EU KLEMS Database, covering a sample of 12 manufacturing industries in 11 OECD countries over the period 1976-2006. The investigation employed two different estimation methods: instrumental variables and system GMM. The robustness of the results was assessed by employing two different specifications of Kaldor-Verdoorn’s Law, by using lags and five-year averages to smooth business-cycle fluctuations, and by dividing the sample into two time periods.FindingsThe results reported in the paper provide strong evidence in support of the hypothesis of substantial increasing returns to scale in manufacturing. The investigation suggests that high-tech manufacturing industries exhibit larger degrees of returns to scale than low-tech manufacturing industries. Finally, the analysis revealed also that the magnitude of the returns to scale in manufacturing have increased in the last decades, driven by increases in the magnitude of returns to scale observed in high-tech industries.Originality/valueNo previous work has assessed the hypothesis that increasing returns to scale vary according to the technological content of industries. Moreover, no previous work has used system GMM or data from EU KLEMS to test Kaldor-Verdoorn’s Law. Most importantly, the findings of the paper present new evidence on the degree of returns to scale in high-tech and low-tech manufacturing industries.
Active fiscal policy and macroeconomic stability
Authors: de Jesus Cleiton Silva , Correia Fernando Motta 
Published: September 2016

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether fiscal policy may be a complementary instrument to monetary policy in the macrostabilization process.

Design/methodology/approach
The authors developed a dynamic system with two linear differential equations in order to verify if an active fiscal policy can be compatible with macroeconomic equilibrium in three monetary policy regimes (conservative, alternative and hybrid). The authors also use numerical simulations because it is impossible to extract analytically full conclusions from the theoretical model.

Findings
The results suggest that fiscal policy can be a useful tool for macroeconomic stabilization; the counter-cyclical role of fiscal policy is compatible with dynamic equilibrium only if the monetary authority is not lenient towards inflation; and under an active fiscal policy a hybrid monetary regime is preferable to a conservative one.

Originality/value
This paper offers a theoretical contribution to explicate the macroeconomic implications of fiscal policy.
Theoretical approaches on the possible existence of a stabilising economic policy in Europe
Authors: Morselli Alessandro 
Published: September 2016

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether there is room for a stabilising fiscal policy, through an analysis of the supporters of the new classical economics and the supporters of the new Keynesian economics. There are no reliable results on the Keynesian and non-Keynesian effects of fiscal policies. As such, the policy-mix becomes a problem of theoretical approach, in the sense of a strategic game between monetary authorities and tax authorities (among them). This points to the problem of coordination between budgetary authorities as being the central debate within the Eurozone. The end-result is that without fiscal policy coordination, Eurozone member states are working on a series of non-cooperative games that are inefficient, because no player can improve its position by unilaterally changing its strategy.

Design/methodology/approach
The analysis starts from the experience of three countries in the 1980s, these are Denmark, Ireland and Sweden. In all three cases the adoption of restrictive budget policies has provoked a strong, rapid and enduring resizing of public debt, and growth did not weaken, moreover it accelerated. In all three cases the logic behind the policy-mix actions allowed the individualisation of the respective roles of fiscal and monetary policies. Fiscal policies were joining with fiscal instruments and reduction in public spending and furthermore monetary policy was accommodated in respect of the budget contraction.

Findings
First, the authors were not able to identify an analytical method that can ensure the success of a fiscal policy. Second, analysing fiscal policies within the Eurozone implies also that the authors reflect on the need for a coordination of these policies. In fact, the authors have shown how the possible coordination of economic policies in the Eurozone would result in major benefits for all member countries.

Originality/value
In the absence of fiscal policy coordination, member states are engaged in a series of non-cooperative games that prove inefficient, when no player is able to improve its position by unilaterally changing its fiscal policy. The coordination of national fiscal policies generates a collective advantage, bringing each state to consistently change its strategies.
Modeling China’s agriculture support policy effects
Authors: He Shuquan 
Published: September 2016

PurposeChina has shifted its agricultural policy from tax agriculture to support it. The purpose of this paper is to examine the agricultural policy changes of China in recent years, focussing on the support policy. China supports its agriculture sector through tax elimination, area payment and input subsidy. In this paper, the author intends to evaluate China’s agricultural support policy effect with a modified policy evaluation model (PEM).Design/methodology/approachThe author modifies PEM used by OECD to estimate the effects of these support policies on production and farmer’s income.FindingsThe main findings are input subsidy policy has more effect than area payment policy in general; input subsidy policy has more effects on production while area payment has more effects on farmer’s income; and the sensitivity analysis further indicates that input subsidy policy has more influence than area payment as regarding production impact ratio, while area payment has more influence on income impact ratios.Practical implicationsBased on these findings, when it comes to the support policy in terms of area payment and input subsidies only, the author puts forward the following policy implications: to increase input subsidy in budgets and expand the covering scope, and to continue implementing area payment policy with more budgets. However, support policies playing an important role in improving production efficiency and marketing support should be given priority.Originality/valueThe main contributions of this paper are modifying the OECD PEM to China’s conditions; and quantifying China’s agricultural policy effects.
Intangible-intensive profiles of companies: protection during the economic crisis of 2008-2009
Authors: Shakina Elena , Barajas Angel 
Published: September 2016

Purpose
This study explores the strategies adopted by companies during the economic crisis of 2008-2009. It investigates whether it is reasonable for companies to intensify their investment in intangibles during recession periods. The purpose of this paper is to find empirical evidence that companies with clear intangible-intensive profiles are likely to outperform those without a clear strategy.

Design/methodology/approach
This paper explores the intangible-intensive strategies of companies in terms of their dynamics during the pre-crisis, crisis and post-crisis periods. Through dummy regression applied to data from more than 1,600 European companies involved in the empirical analysis, the paper aims to show moderating effects from intangible-intensive strategies on company performance, expressed in terms of economic value added and market value added.

Findings
The results established in this study shed some light on the global economic crisis in 2008-2009. The findings of this study demonstrate that companies with a conservative profile towards intangibles outperform both those without a defined profile and those with an innovative one. However, an innovative profile enables faster recovery after a crisis.

Originality/value
This paper contributes to the literature on the strategic management of companies, and highlights the particular importance of intangible-intensiveness when markets experience systematic distresses. It is emphasized that lessons learned during the recent global economic crisis must be taken into account in the strategic vision of any company.
The effect of comparative advantage of host country’s industry on multinationals’ M&A vs greenfield FDI decisions
Authors: Lee Jaeho , Jang Yong Joon 
Published: September 2016

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to argue that comparative advantage of host country’s industry can be one of the significant determinants of the decision on mergers and acquisitions (M&A) or greenfield in foreign direct investment (FDI).Design/methodology/approachThe authors extract five-related properties of an industry with comparative advantage in a host nation from Bernardet al.’s (2007) international trade model with heterogeneous firms and attempt to empirically test their roles in a multinational enterprise’s (MNE) M&A or greenfield investment decision, using the inward FDI data set in Korea from 1999 to 2006.FindingsThe theoretical framework finds that the five properties derived from an industry with comparative advantage in a host country have mixed motives for M&A or greenfield. The empirical results show that selected conventional independent variables generally affect the M&A or greenfield entry mode decision with significance individually and that their impacts become more or less prominent when the authors employ interaction terms combining them with comparative advantages in the industries.Research limitations/implicationsThis implies that MNEs not only consider their own firm-specific advantages or other country-level factors for foreign market entries as the previous research generally found, but also seriously take into account industry-specific factors, especially industry-wide comparative advantages based on heterogeneous productivities of firms.Originality/valueThis paper reconciles multinationals’ strategic motives under an oligopolistic market with their efficiency gains under a monopolistic competitive market, which are considered as two main factors for cross-border M&A. Furthermore, this paper adds a new firm-level data set into entry mode research.
An approach to improve service trade account of Korea
Authors: Sul Sooyoung 
Published: September 2016

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to quantitatively confirm whether hosting the Winter Olympic Games can improve tourism balance or increase the number of inbound tourists, and to discuss how Korea could maximize this opportunity. It also attempts to identify other critical variables for improving tourism balances and further suggests that the certain characteristics of participating nation’s patterns of medal wins at the Games should be better understood to contribute to attracting more tourists.

Design/methodology/approach
For the quantitative analyses of the relationship between tourism balance and the Games, Newey-West Hac estimation is used to correct autoregression for seven host countries of the Winter Olympic Games in last 24 years. For the analyses of characteristics of specialization in medal wins, conventional revealed comparative advantage model is used and tobit estimation method is applied.

Findings
This research confirms the role of hosting the Winter Games in improving tourism balance and increasing the number of inbound tourists. The findings from analyses on country specialization in sports largely coincide with the existing literature, however, in addition to confirming the well-established significance of key variables determining country performance like population and GDP, this study also discloses the role of other variables like team size and population density.

Originality/value
Major contributions of this paper are two-fold: it analyzes the Winter Olympic Games which was rarely tackled; and relates hosting the mega-sport events with the service trade account. As the host country of the 2018 Winter Olympic Games, the Republic of Korea has great potential to overcome that chronic deficit by attracting more inbound tourists. This study indicates how country characteristics of specialization can be used to enhance effectiveness of promotion strategy to attract a large number of foreign tourists to the PyeongChang Winter Games and consequently improve tourism balance.
Provision of the European Union information in an acceding country
Authors: Faletar Tanacković Sanjica , Faletar Horvatić Ivana , Mičunović Milijana 
Published: September 2016

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to present an exploratory study whose aim was to investigate the role of public libraries in the provision of European Union (EU) information in an EU acceding country (Croatia).

Design/methodology/approach
Study was conducted via online questionnaire in public libraries across country.

Findings
The findings revealed that majority of respondents (83.7 percent) think it is an important task of public libraries to provide citizens with materials about the EU, and that almost all responding libraries (98 percent) have EU materials. In general, respondents think that provision of EU materials in their library does not compromise its role of politically neutral institution. The results also indicate that libraries quite rarely (10 percent) maintain links to relevant EU online sources on their websites. EU collections in responding libraries are promoted actively most frequently in the library itself and on its website, and very rarely in the local media.

Practical implications
Findings are expected to be of interest to European administration in charge of the development of effective communication policies, national authorities in EU candidate and acceding countries, and information professionals in general.

Originality/value
This is the first study to investigate the role of public libraries in EU information provision in an EU acceding country.
Academic technology confidence levels vs ability in first-year traditional and non-traditional undergraduates
Authors: Eichelberger Michelle , Imler Bonnie 
Published: September 2016

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine the technology confidence, skills, and post-skills-test emotions in traditional (younger than 24 years old) and non-traditional (24 and older) first-year college students at three undergraduate campuses in the Northeastern USA.

Design/methodology/approach
Totally, 39 college freshmen from three college campuses were recruited for the study. An online test environment and screen recording software were used to measure student proficiency in using PDFs, Microsoft Word, Microsoft PowerPoint, Microsoft Excel, Gmail, and Windows. Data were collected in September 2013.

Findings
The majority of the students struggled with at least one facet of academic software. Traditional students were more confident than non-traditional students in their technology skills, but they did not score any higher on the skills test. Students who placed at the high end and low end of the test results curve most accurately assessed their technology skills, and their post-test feelings were the most appropriate in light of their test results. A large percentage of the traditional aged students were overconfident about their skills and self-identified as “happy” or “wonderful” even after performing poorly on the test.

Originality/value
Having concrete data about student technology skills, rather than anecdotal data from Reference Desk interactions, can help librarians design improved instruction and tutorials that target areas of student technology weakness. In addition, there have been no studies that examine student immediate emotional response to test performance in this type of testing environment.
Web robot detection in scholarly Open Access institutional repositories
Authors: Greene Joseph W. 
Published: September 2016

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact and techniques for mitigating the effects of web robots on usage statistics collected by Open Access (OA) institutional repositories (IRs).

Design/methodology/approach
A close review of the literature provides a comprehensive list of web robot detection techniques. Reviews of system documentation and open source code are carried out along with personal interviews to provide a comparison of the robot detection techniques used in the major IR platforms. An empirical test based on a simple random sample of downloads with 96.20 per cent certainty is undertaken to measure the accuracy of an IR’s web robot detection at a large Irish University.

Findings
While web robot detection is not ignored in IRs, there are areas where the two main systems could be improved. The technique tested here is found to have successfully detected 94.18 per cent of web robots visiting the site over a two-year period (recall), with a precision of 98.92 per cent. Due to the high level of robot activity in repositories, correctly labelling more robots has an exponential effect on the accuracy of usage statistics.

Research limitations/implications
This study is performed on one repository using a single system. Future studies across multiple sites and platforms are needed to determine the accuracy of web robot detection in OA repositories generally.

Originality/value
This is the only study to date to have investigated web robot detection in IRs. It puts forward the first empirical benchmarking of accuracy in IR usage statistics.
Mobile app recommendations: travel apps
Authors: Anderson Kristen Julia 
Published: September 2016

Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to provide a list of various travel-themed mobile apps that librarians might recommend as a supplement to other print/digital resources. Summer is a time when many people take the chance to escape on a much-needed vacation. As a librarian, whether you work in a public or academic institution, chances are you will be asked at one point or another where the travel books in your library are located.

Design/methodology/approach
There is always the possibility that the travel books in need may already be checked out or that the patron will not have time to wait for an interlibrary loan request to arrive.

Findings
Planning a trip, from deciding where to go, where to stay and what to do, can be a simultaneously stressing and thrilling decision-making process.

Research limitations/implications
Whether someone is planning a trip to a familiar location or to a place they never imagined visiting, there are numerous mobile apps that can aid the most nascent to the most experienced traveler.

Originality/value
In addition to including up-to-date travel guide books in library collections, librarians can also further assist their patrons with travel needs by recommending mobile travel apps.
How weaknesses in home country location advantages can constrain EMNE growth
Authors: Narula Rajneesh , Kodiyat Tiju Prasad 
Published: September 2016

PurposeThis paper aims to discuss the opportunities and limitations that the location-specific advantages of the home country represent for infant multinational enterprises (MNEs). The systemic weaknesses of the home country can constrain the long-term competitiveness of its firms and, ultimately, the competitiveness of its MNEs. Many emerging countries have a constrained set of location-specific (L) assets from which their firms are able to develop ownership-specific assets.Design/methodology/approachThe authors examine data for the case of India, an economy regarded as having considerable potential to expand to knowledge-intensive sectors, using a “systems of innovation” framework, merged with an analysis of L advantages.FindingsAt the macro level, India’s performance is not different from countries of similar economic structure, and its current pockets of excellence are a reflection of its L assets. The analysis suggests that the failure to foster and upgrade the L assets of emerging economies is likely to stunt the growth of their domestic firms and, ultimately, any new MNE activity in the long-term.Research limitations/implicationsIn the case of India, systemic policy changes are needed to upgrade the knowledge infrastructure and institutions to support a shift in the competitive advantages to new sectors outside existing pockets of excellence. Indian firms are unlikely to be able to rely on the knowledge infrastructure of their home economy and will “exit” the Indian milieu because of weaknesses in L assets, as much as to seek markets and customers elsewhere. There will be few opportunities for new generations of firms to venture abroad from a position of strength, rather than as a means to overcome their home country disadvantages.Originality/valueThe evidence would suggest that – like other emerging economies – Indian firms are unlikely to be able to rely on the knowledge infrastructure of their home economy and are “exiting” the Indian milieu because of its weaknesses in L assets, as much as to seek markets and customers elsewhere. Most importantly, India faces a potential shortage of skilled human capital in the medium term.
Intensity and diversity of internationalization among small and medium-sized exporters in China
Authors: Mac Lancy , Evangelista Felicitas 
Published: September 2016

PurposeThis study aims to gauge the interactive effect of export intensity and diversity on export performance among exporters in an emerging economy and explore the moderating effect of export intermediaries on the internationalization–export performance relationship.Design/methodology/approachA survey was undertaken among a convenience sample of small and medium exporters located in Guangdong and Fujian Provinces in South China.FindingsThe results show that intensity and diversity interact negatively with export performance, whereas the use of export agents registered a positive effect. Exporters pursuing a strategy of high export intensity will achieve better performance provided that these exports are concentrated in a few countries. Using export agents can help in enhancing the intensity–performance relationship but not that for diversity–performance.Practical implicationsChinese exporters are advised not to blindly pursue international expansion without regard to their own resources and capabilities. They should try to strike a balance between intensity and diversity and employ external agents when needed.Originality/valueThis research seeks to address the void in the literature on how export intensity and diversity should be balanced to create a positive effect on the performance of exporting ventures in an emerging economy, which is under-addressed in the literature. It is also found that employment of export intermediaries is not always good for export performance.