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NE of the stylized facts that characterize an economy over the business cycle is the movement of prices with real output. In the literature on the demand and real theories of business cycles, the two main theories state that if movements of output result from demand shocks, prices are expected to be procyclical; by contrast, if shocks originate from the supply side then prices are expected to be countercyclical. Lucas provided evidence in support of a positive correlation between prices and real output [24][25]. Olson also argues that newclassical as well as Keynesian economics agree on the positive correlation between the variables in relevance [28]. The same holds in Mankiw [26]. Cooley and Ohanian confirm the price countercyclicality for the United States [11], and Backus and Kehoe confirm it for other countries [1]. By contrast, other studies have reached the opposite conclusions (Bernanke [2]). The pioneering works of Kydland and Prescott [20] and Long and Plosser [23] initiated an attempt to explain certain stylized facts of U.S. business cycle behavior. This attempt—the so-called real business cycle theory—considered that what is responsible for the presence of business cycle phenomena are exogenous technological shocks and the accompanying propagation mechanism generated by the behavior of economic agents to optimize their behavior within an environment characterized by rational expectations and market-clearing conditions. These business cycle models attempt to explain the fluctuations in macroeconomic aggregates via the technological or any other “real” channel supporting the presence of an inverse relationship between prices and output. Mankiw has criticized real business cycle models on the grounds that they show that prices are not procyclical [26]. Countercyclicality of prices connotes that prices and output are negatively correlated. Moreover, the countercyclical behavior of prices suggests that real output

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the performance implications of two major mechanisms for organizational learning (i.e. exploration and exploitation). Exploration refers to firm activities that explore new and novel knowledge, whereas exploitation reflects the extent to which a firm reuses its existing knowledge. The authors predict curvilinear (i.e. an inverted U-shape) relationships between exploration/exploitation and firm performance, respectively. That is, firm performance first increases with exploration/exploitation at a decreasing rate; then, firm performance decreases at an increasing rate after firm performance reaches a maximum point. Furthermore, the authors examine whether the curvilinear relationships are moderated by two types of firm–stakeholder relationships (i.e. firm–employee and firm–customer relationships).Design/methodology/approachUsing the data from National Bureau of Economic Research, US Patent Citations Data File, KLD Research and Analytics Inc. and Compustat series, the authors construct an unbalanced panel data set of 3,070 observations in 554 firms from 1991 to 2006. To test the hypotheses, feasible generalized least squares regression is used.FindingsIn consistent with the prediction, the authors find inverted U-shape relationships between exploration/exploitation and firm performance. The authors also find that the curvilinear relationships are moderated by firm–employee relationships. The relationships between exploration/exploitation and firm performance become stronger when firms have better relationships with employees.Research limitations/implicationsThe study provides empirical evidence that better firm–employee relationships can strengthen the curvilinear relationships between exploration/exploitation and firm performance. The authors argue that future studies should extend to other stakeholder relationships, using more refined measures, and incorporating the concept of ambidexterity.Practical implicationsThe findings suggest that managers should design innovation strategy based on performance implications of exploration/exploitation and that managers should also realize that stakeholder relationships can influence the relationships between exploration/exploitation and firm performance. First, the study shows that although exploration and exploitation can improve firm performance, too much exploration or exploitation is not good for firm performance. Therefore, managers should consider seriously the maximum point of performance that exploration and exploitation can reach and avoid too much exploration or exploitation. Second, firms can invest in firm–employee relationships to gain better performance implications from exploration/exploitation. The study shows that, as firms develop better firm–employee relationship, the relationships between exploration/exploitation and firm performance are stronger and firm performance is likely to reach a higher apex.Originality/valueThe authors find the inverted U-shape relationships between exploration/exploitation and firm performance, moreover, the authors add two contingent factors associated with stakeholders that can help exploration and exploitation contribute more to firm performance.

Considers the immediate impact of taxes, transfers, and subsidies—core components of fiscal policy—on the amount of money households have and the prices they face. An analysis of 94 economies across all regions and income levels shows that taken together, taxes, transfers, and subsidies reduce (1) inequality in all economies and (2) finance spending on security, health, education, and investments for growth and poverty reduction. Although high-income economies effectively ensure that they do not reduce the income of poor households while they finance long-run spending, in two-thirds of low- and middle-income economies, the income of poor households proves lower. In each income group, some economies did more to reduce both inequality and poverty even before COVID-19; however, the pattern across income categories highlights that, although good and bad policy choices exist, raising revenues without lowering the incomes of poor households when an economy has a large informal sector and limited safety net coverage remains a challenge.

This paper investigates the impact of capital structure on firm performance using a sample of 3,122 observations of 446 non-financial listed companies on the Vietnam stock market during 2011-2017. Using firm performance measures, namely ROE and Tobin Q, we examined if higher leveraged firms are more efficient or less in their performance. We employed the fixed effect model to prove that there is an inverse U-shaped relationship between leverage and ROE, and then we can find a preferred capital structure for Vietnam non-financial firms. To deal with endogeneity problem of the leverage variable, we employ two stage least squares (2SLS) regression with instrument variable estimators, which helps us strengthen the above results. Keywords Capital structure, firm performance, leverage, efficiency, instrument variable estimator, agency cost theory References [1] J. Abor, The effect of capital structure on profitability: an empirical analysis of listed firms in Ghana, Journal of Risk Finance. 6 (2005) 438-447.[2] M. Baker, J. Wurgler, The Determinants of Capital Structure: Capital Market-Oriented versus Bank-Oriented Institutions, Journal of Financial and Quantitative Analysis. 43 (2002) 59-92.[3] A.N. Berger, E. Bonaccorsi di Patti, Capital structure and firm performance: A new approach to testing agency theory and an application to the banking industry, Journal of Banking and Finance. 30 (2006) 1065-1102.[4] J. Berk, P. DeMarzo, J. Harford, Fundamentals of Corporate Finance, second edition, Prentice Hall, 2012.[5] A.A. Berle, G.C. Means, The Modern Corporation and Private Property, New York: The Macmillan Company, 1932.[6] V. Dawar, Agency theory, capital structure and firm performance: Some Indian evidence. Managerial Finance. 40(12) (2014) Số trang.[7] T.H.V. Duong, A study of the factors affecting the capital structure of the companies listed on Vietnam stock market, Doctoral thesis - National Economics University, 2014.[8] S.J. Grossman, O.D. Hart, Corporate financial structure and managerial incentives, In M. J.J., The economics of information and uncertainy, University of Chicago Press, 1982.[9] M. Jensen, Agency cost of free cash flow, corporate finance and takeovers, American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings. 76 (1986) 323-329.[10] J.C. Jensen, W.H. Meckling, Theory of the firm: managerial behavior, agency costs and ownership structure. Journal of Financial Economics. 3 (1976) 305-360.[11] A. Kraus, R.H. Litzenberger, A State-Preference Model of Optimal Financial Leverage, Journal of Finance. Tập (1973) 911-922.[12] D. Margaritis, M. Psillaki, Capital structure and firm efficiency, Journal of Business Finance and Accounting. 34 (2007) 1447-1469.[13] D. Margaritis, M. Psillaki, Capital structure, equity ownership and firm performance, Journal of Banking and Finance. 34 (2010) 621-632.[14] F. Modigliani, M. Miller, The cost of capital, corporation finance, and the theory of investment, American Economic Review. 48 (1958) 655-669.[15] F. Modigliani, M. Miller, Corporate income taxes and the cost of capital: A correction, American economic Review. Tập (1963) 433-443.[16] S.C. Myer, Determinants of corporate borrowing, Journal of Financial Economics. Tập (1977) 147-175.[17] S.C. Myers, N.S. Majluf, Corporate Financing and Investment Decisions When firms have information that investors do not have, Journal of financial economics. 13 (1984) 187-221.[18] B. Seetanah, K. Seetah, K. Appadu, K. Padachi, Capital structure and firm performance: evidence from an emerging economy, The Business and Management Review. 4 (2014) 185-196.[19] S. Titman, R. Wessels, The determinants of capital structure choice. Journal of Finance. 43(1) (1988) 1-19.[20] L. Weill, Leverage and Corporate Performance: Does Institutional Environment matter? Small Business Economics. 30 (2008) 251-265.[21] J. Williams, Perquisites, risk and capital structure, Journal of Finance. 42 (1987) 29-49.[22] R. Zeitun, M.M. Haq, Debt maturity, financial crisis and corporate performance in GCC countries: a dynamic-GMM approach, Afro-Asian J. Finance and Accounting. 5 (2015) 231-247.

This paper reexamines some of the themes of the incomplete contracts literature—in particular, the hold-up problem and asset ownership—through a new theoretical lens, the idea that contracts serve as reference points (see Hart and Moore [2008]). We consider a buyer and seller who are involved in a (long-term) economic relationship where the buyer’s value and seller’s cost are initially uncertain. For the relationship to work out, the parties need to cooperate in ways that cannot be specified in an initial contract. Suppose that the parties write a rigid contract that fixes price. Such a contract works well in “normal” times because there is nothing to argue about: we assume that, in the absence of argument, the parties are willing to cooperate. However, if value or cost falls outside the normal range, one party will have an incentive to threaten to withhold cooperation unless the contract is renegotiated; that is, the party will engage in hold-up. For example, if value is unusually high, the seller will hold up the buyer to get a higher price, whereas if cost is unusually low, the buyer will hold up the seller to get a lower price. We suppose that hold-up transforms a friendly relationship into a hostile one. The consequence is that the parties withhold cooperation: they operate within the letter, rather than the spirit, of their (renegotiated) ∗ I am grateful to John Moore for discussions of some of the elements of this paper and to Bob Gibbons and Birger Wernerfelt for many helpful conversations. I would also like to thank Ronen Avraham, Mathias Dewatripont, Florian Englmaier, Rob Gertner, Victor Goldberg, Louis Kaplow, Josh Lerner, Bentley MacLeod, Jeremy Stein, Sasha Volokh, Abe Wickelgren, and Christian Zehnder for useful comments, and Georgy Egorov for excellent research assistance. Four referees, an editor (Larry Katz), and a second editor provided highly constructive input. Financial support from the U.S. National Science Foundation through the National Bureau of Economic Research is gratefully acknowledged.

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The article presents a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model (DSGE-model) for the Russian economy. The model describes the behavior of the following macroeconomic agents: households, real sector, banking sector, Central Bank, as well as the interactions between them and the world. Household modeling uses the external habit formation approach to account for the inertia of preferences. To model the real sector, we abandoned the most common approach which assumes that the decision on investments is made by the households as the owners of production factors. Instead, we took the firm-specific capital approach which assumes that the decision on investment is made by the firms themselves. The study also considers that in Russia, fixed assets are mostly invested from the firms' own funds. To account for the investment inertia in the fixed asset in a real sector model, the expenditures are transferred to the commissioning of new facilities, the Calvo model is applied to describe the price setting under the monopolistic competition. A banking sector which defines the loan and debt interest rates to the key Central Bank interest rate is chosen to be a link between the households and firms in the model. The Taylor equation is used to describe the monetary policy of the Bank of Russia under the inflation targeting, while an inertia factor is included into the equation with the uncovered interest parity for the budget rule which regulates the purchases (or sales) of the currency by the National Welfare Fund. The final linearized model is a system of 23 difference equations with rational expectations. Based on the proposed model, calculations were made and key macroeconomic indicators were forecasted for 2020–2021 on a quarterly basis for the Russian economy. The calculations account for the relevant recessionary factors: oil price fall, oil production cut in OPEC+ deals, quarantine measures aimed to prevent the spread of the corona virus infection, anti-recessionary measures of the RF Government. The findings show that the economic downturn in 2020 can be from 5 to 7% under COVID-19 pandemic. Growth in 2021 is estimated to be within 3–5%. The developed model can be used for scenario projecting for the Russian economy, upgrading the monetary policy of the Bank of Russia, and for developing applied quarterly projection models (QPM). The model could be further modified by including more elements: decomposing the household sector into the Ricardian and non-Ricardian ones, identifying the resources industries and industries in the real sector which manufacture the invested goods, including the key taxes and budget expenses into the model. One more promising area is to analyze the equilibrium of the interest rates when large firms could accumulate their own financial resources. This prerequisite decreases the demand for the bank loans from the real sector and, thus, leads to lower, including the negative, interest rates. The proposed approach enhances the quality of a DSGE model as a predictive tool for making the political and managerial decisions.

Discusses how the COVID-19 pandemic destroyed human capital at critical moments in the life cycle—early adulthood (15–24 years)—and how policies could reverse these human capital losses by building agile, resilient, and adaptive human development systems for future shocks. The pandemic led to sharp reductions in critical inputs for child development. Lengthy school closures affected human capital by leading to deep learning losses, as little learning occurred while schools were closed, despite widespread remote-learning efforts. Some children did not return to school even after schools reopened. And those most affected—people younger than 25 today—will make up 90 percent of the prime-age workforce in 2050. The pandemic also revealed systemic weaknesses in how governments integrate efforts across sectors to address the multidimensional nature of human capital deficits. A human development system should build on existing sector-specific systems and individual programs to take a look at coordinating human capital investments and exploiting their complementarities for growth.

A key open question for theories of reference-dependent preferences is: what determines the reference point? One candidate is expectations: what people expect could affect how they feel about what actually occurs. In a real-effort experiment, we manipulate the rational expectations of subjects and check whether this manipulation influences their effort provision. We find that effort provision is significantly different between treatments in the way predicted by models of expectation-based, reference-dependent preferences: if expectations are high, subjects work longer and earn more money than if expectations are low. (JEL D12, D84, J22)

Empirical work on the causes and effects of inventive activity has had difficulty in finding measures that can indicate when and where changes in either inventive inputs or inventive output have occurred. The recent computerization of the U.S. Patent Office's data base may prove helpful in this context, but there is the problem that a priori we do not know the relationships between patent applications and economically meaningful measures of these inputs and outputs. To help solve this problem, this paper investigates the dynamic relationships among the number of successful patent applications of firms, a measure of the firm's investment in inventive activity (its R & D expenditures),\tand an indicator of its inventive output (the stock market value of the firm).

Institutions, ownership, and finance: the determinants of profit reinvestment among Chinese firms

We examine how managers use strategic reference points (SRPs) or benchmarks to guide their strategic decision making with regard to human resource (HR) issues and how these benchmarks can affect the performance-based consequences of such decisions. After describing the reference points that are relevant to the HR system, we develop propositions regarding the likely configuration of such reference points and their impact on the nature of HR policies and practices. We also explain how the management of SRP fit and consensus can reduce the likelihood that HR policies and practices will have a negative effect on a firm's performance. Organizationwide implications are discussed.

Customer service plays an essential role in firm performance. In this perspective, customer service process should be constantly improved to meet the expectations of customers. Despite the essence of customer satisfaction and its relations to organizational performance firms still fails to satisfy its entire customer segments. This study examines how the interaction between service innovation and total quality management can contribute to customer satisfaction. The study proposes a framework that seeks to aid firms on how to develop and implement quality customer service for its customers. This model takes into consideration the perceived expectation of customers in relation to value and quality.