Academic Journal of Economic Studies

9-19

Authors: Manik Kumar, Rahul Ranjan

This paper investigates broad empirical picture of wage differential between informal and formal wage worker across different sector, gender, industry, education, social group and state as well as informal and formal sector in India with the 55th (1999-2000) and 66th round (2009-2010) household survey on employment and unemployment conducted by National Sample Survey Office (NSSO). This studyshows informal worker earns approximately two times less then formal worker in both informal as well as formal sector. Wage difference is sharp in case of skilled labour as compared to unskilled and semi-skilled labour. Compound annual growth of wage is very sluggish in all categories of labour. Formal worker earn two to three times more than informal labour in informal as well as in formal sector.

37-44

Authors: Alexandru Manole

This paper presents several applications of data analysis software in the insurance brokerage activity, particularly in matters related to the decision-making process. The study is based on a dataset loaded in a data warehouse, and several analysis procedures are presented, from the viewpoint of the managers of such company.

54-66

Authors: Isichei Ejikeme Emmanuel, Godwin Ukandi Damachi

The study investigated employee’s participation in decision making and the hospitality industry in Nigeria, a study of selected hotels in the federal capital territory in Abuja. To guide the study, research questions and hypotheses were designed. An in-depth review of related literature was carried out. Primary data method was used for the study and the instrument used was a questionnaire survey designed using the Likert scale questionnaire format and administered to sixty respondents. Test of reliability of research instrument showed a result of .874 using Cronbach Alpha. Content method was used for validity of the research instrument. Two Hypotheses was postulated in line with the objectives and research question to test the significance of the research problems. The study used linear correlation and regression for analysis of data obtained from research instrument, which proved the alternate hypothesis significant in the two hypotheses tested. Findings in the study showed that employee’s participation in decision making impacts on the performance of hotels in Nigeria. The study concludes there is a positive relationship between extent of employee’s participation in decision making and organisational performance. The study recommends among others that participation of employees’ should not just be partial but holistic to give them a sense of belonging.

80-90

Authors: Raluca Ivan

The main purpose of this research is to realize an analysis from an internal audit perspective of European Corporate Governance Codes, in regards with Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development – OECD Principles of Corporate Governance. The research methodology used a classification of countries by legal regime, trying to obtain a global view over the differences between the European corporate governance codes and the OECD Principles provisions, from internal audit’s perspective. The findings suggest that the specificities of internal audit function when studying the differences between European Corporate Governance Codes and OECD Principles lead to different treatment.

103-118

Authors: Sorin Adrian Ciupitu

Corruption level is symptomatic of the economic, political and general social development and its manifestation is harmful to ethics and morals and undermines public confidence in the rule of law. In Romania we are witnessing a penetration of corruption in areas that should support the country’s economic development. Companies from more and more zones of activity are pushed into gear economy. The immediate effect of this situation is reflected in a vicious circle in which endemic corruption is leading to lower revenues and public investment and weakens the credibility of the rule of law. It also generates negative changes in the economic development through inefficient transactions, sometimes lacking rationality, altering capital accumulation and its productivity, government revenues and the quality of public infrastructure.

9–26

Authors: Aiwanehi Barbara Ofuani, Owolabi Lateef Kuye, Ogundeji Jolaosinmi Kayode Ogundele

This study examines Business, Government and Society interrelationships. It eventually narrowed down to assessing the efficiency of government regulatory agencies, in fulfilling the role of government in protecting consumers from unscrupulous practices of businesses. The National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC) was chosen for the study. Since the expectations of the consumers are paramount here, the stakeholder approach method was used for assessing the efficiency of NAFDAC. Literature and previous empirical studies on the topic were examined. For representativeness, data was collected utilizing the survey research design through Questionnaire distributed to 200 respondents in some areas of Lagos Mainland in Lagos state, using the convenience sampling method. 187 copies of the questionnaire representing 93.5% were returned and usable. Descriptive statistics was used to analyze the responses to questions regarding the efficiency of NAFDAC and a hypothesis tested using a one-sample T-test. The findings ran contrary to results from some previous studies. Instead, consumer awareness of the existence of NAFDAC as a regulatory agency and its functions were established, along with a high rate of consumer education. The assessment of its efficiency also showed a high rating. Recommendations were made that the study be replicated in other states of Nigeria and further studies carried out to evaluate its efficiency under previous and current directors for improvement purposes.

38–64

Authors: Samuel F. Johnson-Rokosu

Fraud and forensic accounting education is a necessity in very corrupt corporate and government institutions across the globe. Accounting educators have been pressured to make changes to the accounting curriculum and to include courses in forensic accounting and fraud examination by professional organizations and legislators as fraud cases have mounted and academic were criticized for not preparing their students for this professional environment. Accounting graduate trained under the existing curriculum exhibit lesser knowledge, skills and abilities in fraud detection, prevention and deterrence. This study therefore examined the philosophical beliefs, behavioural science concepts and approaches that can be adopted in integrating a fraud/forensic accounting (FFA) into existing accounting curriculum. The study adopted mixed research methods, content analysis and quantitative method of data analysis was employed. This paper basically made use of the content analysis in analyzing the content of the existing accounting curriculum in Nigeria universities. This study involved selected universities in South West region of Nigeria using survey research method. Findings in this study revealed that most respondents would prefer integrating fraud/forensic accounting education into accounting curriculum by offering a separate fraud/forensic accounting courses. Also, the study revealed that fraud/ forensic accounting education has positive impact on student expertise, skepticism and fraud judgment. The study identified the following consideration that Accounting course developers need to consider before, during and after curriculum revision. Involvement of faculty; consider stakeholders opinion; accreditation agencies’ and governmental requirements; resources available; need for change; among others.

79–87

Authors: M. Rashid Malik, Rekha Prasad

This paper aims to examine the constraints and opportunities emerged for the Micro, small and medium enterprises in carpet industry after trade liberalization. The survey method was selected for this study. A structured questionnaire, containing both close and open ended questions was used for data collection. 65 carpet firms of Bhadohi District of Uttar Pradesh registered with All India Carpet Manufacture Association (AICMA) were surveyed. Liberalization has brought many opportunities for carpet industry apart from challenges. Findings of the present study show that liberalization gave access to new markets and increased demand of products. Increased cost of raw material, difficulty in ‘export facilitation’ and ‘legal-regulatory framework and difficulty in procuring funds from local financial institutions were identified as the major constraints for the carpet industry.

105–114

Authors: Adrian Anica-Popa, Ionut-Florin Anica-Popa, Liana-Elena Anica-Popa

Respecting the European Union normative regarding the average weight of carcasses processed in the slaughter-houses, as well as the quality of the delivered meat, impose the search for the optimum variants for pig breeding. The present study aims at the identification of the correlations between the fodder receipts and the performances of the pig breeding farms through the pursuit of the effects of different fodder variants on the daily weight increase, on the moment when the optimum sacrifice weight is reached, and on the probability to reach a certain level of increase in weight. There are presented several considerations regarding the performance expressed with the help of the profit, the commercial profitability ratio, the profitability ratio of the consumed resources. Based on the results of the research, several conclusions are presented, regarding the influences of the fodder receipts on the production cost and of the performances of the pig breeding farms, as well as future research directions.

126–147

Authors: İzlem Gözükara, Osman Yildirim

Affective commitment refers to the psychological attachment of an individual to an organization. It is the desire reflecting the extent to which an individual wants to be involved in an organization. It includes a sense of belonging and connection. Affective commitment influences employee/customer behaviors. In the context of higher education, affective commitment levels of students may determine student retention and affect prospective students. The objective of this study is to determine the variables that can influence the university students’ affective commitment to their university. Therefore, the present study investigates affective commitment and corporate reputation based on the effects of attitude toward advertising and trust among undergraduate students in a foundation university. The study sample included 288 university students and the study data was collected using questionnaires. A structural equation model (LISREL) was used to analyze the relationships between affective commitment, corporate reputation, attitude toward advertising and trust. The study results demonstrated that all one-side relations seen in the proposed model were statistically significant and all hypotheses were confirmed with a statistical significance for all variables.

9-23

Authors: Manoj Kumar

The increasing fragmentation of land holdings due to increasing population has put doubt on agriculture to provide employment to growing rural labour force. This has led to migration of rural people towards urban areas in search of employment which cannot be considered as a solution as it creates several other problems. Rural non-farm employment (RNFL) can be an alternate option as it provides productive employment in the rural areas itself. Its share has been increasing very fast particularly in 2000s and this increase is more pronounced for male workers than female workers throughout the period. The growth of RNFL has been relatively higher in Uttar Pradesh than all India level. At sub-sectoral level secondary sector led by construction has contributed substantially in the increased share of non-farm employment. At regional level, southern and western regions have relatively higher non-farm employment. In case of status of non-farm employment, the share of casual workers has been significantly higher than regular and self-employed workers. And the roles of push factors were more apparent than pull factors for employment diversification particularly for southern region.

44-55

Authors: Cristian – Marian Barbu

Price can be considered a source of messages, set up in clues relating to the characteristics of the product it targets. How these messages are received, coded and interpreted by consumers should be a major preoccupation for decision-makers. If it knows the perception of the price, the enterprise can harness its psychological potential. In justification of the decisions, the enterprise should adopt a proactive vision enabling anticipation of competition or customers at the prices charged by it. Strategic marketing planning must act in such a way to effectively manage the uncertainty that governs decisions concerning the price. The provider should focus on the value offered to consumers, the concept around which should gravitate the marketing strategy of the enterprise. Priority orientation towards costs at the expense of focus on the market does not allow for proactive price management. In this context, the need to consider the concept of value before anything else.

69-78

Authors: Adel Shakeeb Mohsen

This study investigated the role of oil and non-oil exports in the Syrian economic over the period 1975-2010. The ADF unit root test, Johansen cointegration test, Granger causality test, impulse response functions (IRF), and variance decomposition (VD) analysis were used in this study. The cointegration test indicates that GDP is positively and significantly related to oil and non-oil exports. The Granger causality test indicates bidirectional short-run causality relationships between GDP, oil exports and non-oil exports. There are also bidirectional long-run causality relationship between non-oil exports and GDP, and unidirectional long-run causality relationship running from oil exports to GDP. The study result indicates that oil exports have the biggest effect on the GDP, thus we suggest encouraging non-oil export and increase its diversity.

93-119

Authors: Luca Giordano , Antonio Lopes

Economists have long debated the relationships between market structure of banking sector and the profitability. General consensus asserts that more concentrated market i associated with higher profitability: banks with higher market share generally achieve higher profits. This empirical evidence can however hinge on two opposite explanations: in the first case banks increase their market share (via mergers and acquisitions) in order to exploit the resulting stronger market power and impose higher prices to their clients; the second explanation tells that more cost-efficient banks are able to lower the prices applied to their clients and therefore to gain new clients and finally enlarge their market share. In both cases there is a positive link between market share and profitability, but in the former what actually plays a crucial role is a non-competitive force (Relative Market Power Hypothesis, henceforth RMP), in the latter the relationship is driven by the greater efficiency of banks which enlarge their market share by reducing prices (X-Efficiency Hypothesis, ESX). We run a 4-years panel data analysis (2008-2011) in order to disentangle the above alternatives hypothesis (RMP versus ESX) for the Italian market. First we estimate the cost efficiency for a sample of more than 200 banks by applying the Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA). In the second step we regress bank spreads on efficiency scores and market structure variables in order to identify which process leads the price setting of Italian banks. Difference in the legal organization of bank (mutual, cooperative, and commercial banks) and type of business relationships established are controlled for.

132-150

Authors: Jonas da Silva Oliveira, Graça Maria do Carmo Azevedo, Marta José Ferreira Oliveira, Sandra Gabi Marques de Almeida

This study examines the quantitative impact of the first-time adoption of the Portuguese Accounting Standardization System on individual annual reports of Portuguese unlisted companies in the cork and olive tree culture sector. Findings indicate that the items which showed significant changes in the transition from the previous accounting frame of reference to the Portuguese Accounting Standardization System are mainly those regarding to biological assets, inventories, liabilities, current ratio, and return on assets. The adoption of the Portuguese Accounting Standardization System has led generally to less conservative accounting practices, indicating that characteristics of code-law countries such as cultural aspects and country enforcement regimes did not influence the adoption of IAS/IFRS-based accounting standards by Portuguese unlisted companies in the cork and olive tree culture sectors.

5-21

Authors: Mohammad Abasi Niko, Mohammad Hussein Askarinia, Ali Akbar Khalafi, Ehsan Namdar Joyami

The current study attempts to investigate the effect of the relationship marketing tactics on the customer’s loyalty. The present study has applied objective, is descriptive in nature, and is a survey. To analyze the data SPSS 19 and LISREL 8/8 software were used. The target population was the staff of the State University of Ilam, which has a population of 4620 people. The number of sample is equal to 353 according to Krejcie- Morgan Table. (Cronbach’s alpha for the entire equation was .906). Considering the influence of independent variants (quality of service, price perception, brand perception, value proposition, consumers’ trust, and customers’ satisfaction) on customer loyalty, ten hypotheses were formed, all of which were approved by average to high confidence. The more the level of relationship marketing tactics, the more the quality of relations with customers, which ultimately leads to customer loyalty.

35-44

Authors: Mihaela Simionescu, Mirela Niculae

The main goal of this research is to model and predict the fiscal pressure indicator and the real GDP rate in the European Union during 1996-2013 using the vectorial autoregressive approach. According to Granger test for causality, only the real GDP rate is a cause of the weight tax in GDP, the relationship not being reciprocal. The fiscal pressure volatility is due mainly to the evolution of this indicator, but the influence decreases in time, not descending under 82%. More than 41% of the variation in real growth is explained by the fiscal pressure volatility starting with the 6th lag. The static and deterministic simulation generated the best predictions of the fiscal pressure indicator on the horizon 2011-2013.

65-81

Authors: Mehdi Abzari, Vahid Kabiripour, Adeleh Saeidi

Business ethical values are considered as one of the important and comprehensive issues in the world nowadays. Disputing about these values and ignoring ethical principles in workplaces influence employee’s job attitude and provide backgrounds of turnover for employees, and because of this, many costs are put on organizations. Therefore, this study seeks to examine types and levels of business ethical values effects on turnover intention and also concentrates on mediating the role of person-organization fit dimensions. The statistical population of this study includes active teachers of public schools in Isfahan and Yazd. In order to select sample members, classification sampling method has been used. Then, the questionnaire is used to gathering the data. The results of this study indicated that business ethical values influence employee’s turnover intention directly and indirectly, and level of these indirect effects was stronger than direct ones. Also, the results indicate that different dimensions of person-organization fit have low correlation with each one of other variables, and these dimensions are mediators in the relationship between business ethical values and turnover intention.

91-104

Authors: Gastón Milanesi, Gabriela Pesce, Emilio El Alabi

The valuation of real assets is a complex problem which influences the strategic decision making in companies, such as decisions to differing or selling a project. Uncertainty takes over the manager when defining the attributes of the density function representing values that could assume the asset in the future. In this issue, we include not only its mean and variance, but also stochastic higher moments of this function (asymmetry and kurtosis). This paper proposes to valuate this type of entrepreneurships using real options theory making adjustments that allow us to abandon the assumption of normal returns in continuous time. This technique permits the expansion’s coefficient to depend also on the higher moments, either the original distribution or the approach one. Therefore, we obtained theoretical solutions to asset valuations that would have been impossible to solve.

118-129

Authors: Adel Shakeeb Mohsen

This study attempts to investigate the effect of oil price, external debt and population on the government investment in Syria over the period 1970-2010. The Johansen cointegration test showed that oil price, external debt and population have a positive and significant long run relationship with government investment. The Granger causality test indicates bidirectional long-run causality relationships between oil price, external debt, population, and government investment. There are also unidirectional short-run causality relationships running from oil price and population to government investment, and bidirectional short-run causality relationship between external debt and government investment. The study result indicates that, external debt have the biggest effect on the government investment, as well oil price and population can play an important role in supporting the government investment in the country.