Table of Content

15 December 2019, Volume 0 Issue 12

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Paid Maternity Leave and Female Wage Rate：An Empirical Study Based on the Provincial Late-Birth Maternity Leave Awarding Policies

JIA Nan, YANG Tian-chi

2019, 0(12):  1905. 

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By making use of the provincial late-birth maternity leave awarding policies after 1988 to construct instrumental variables, this paper empirically examines the causal relationship between paid maternity leave duration and female wage rate. The findings show that the paid maternity leave in China has significant differences before and after 1997, both the coverage rate and the average leave duration decreased dramatically after 1997. The intensifying competition in the labor market and the increasing non-public economic sectors brought about by marketization reform and economic transition have weakened the protection of paid maternity leave to female labors. The coverage rate and duration of paid maternity leave of female labors that have not received higher education or are not working in the governmental or public institutions but working in private sectors are much lower than those who have received higher education and are working in governmental or public institutions or state-owned enterprises. This phenomenon became much more significant after 1997. The paid maternity leave has significantly negative effects on the wage rate of female labors, and this effect still exists even the endogeneity and the sample selection bias are under control. An increase of one day of the paid maternity leave would reduce female wage rate by 2%, this effect is more significant since 1997. Such negative impact is especially obvious on the less educated females.

Human Capital Investment and Income Mobility of Rural Households

HUANG Hong-wei1, HU Hao-yu2

2019, 0(12):  1906. 

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Income mobility is an important index reflecting the solidification of income of all classes. By making use of the data from the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS) of 2010, 2012 and 2014, this paper selects a number of indicators to conduct a statistical analysis of the income mobility of rural households. From the four dimensions of schooling education, vocational training, health care, and labor mobility, it discusses respectively the impacts of different ways of human capital investment on the income mobility of rural households. The results show that the investment of human capital in rural households have increased significantly, but there are large differences between the eastern, central and western regions, that the income mobility of rural households has a declining tendency, and the higher-income groups and the lower-income groups are solidified and intensified, and that there are obvious differences in the impacts of the four main human capital investment modes on the income mobility of rural households, while schooling education is the most effective way of human capital investment.

Research on the Situation and Indexation Evaluation of the Construction of China’s Tax Law

XI Wei-qun, HU Fang

2019, 0(12):  1907. 

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The construction of the rule of tax law is an important part of governing the country according to law, and it plays an irreplaceable fundamental role in the construction of rule of law. Although the construction of the rule of tax law in China has achieved certain results, it lacks relative scientific indexation evaluation. Therefore, this paper uses the evaluation data from the internal and external expert team members and the mass questionnaire data to conduct an exponential assessment of the rule of tax law. The results show that China’s rule of tax law index is 67.73 points (50 is a passing score and 100 is a full score), indicating that there is still great room for improvement in the construction of tax law. Judging from the situation and indexation evaluation of the construction of China’s tax law, there still exist some problems in the construction of China’s rule of tax law, such as insufficient democracy of tax legislation, unreasonable age structure of tax inspectors, small number of tax administrative litigation cases, difficulty in realizing taxpayers’ appeals and serious tax evasion behaviors. It is suggested that public participation in tax legislation should be increased, the supervision of government expenditures of tax payment be strengthened, the taxpayers’ awareness of paying taxes according to law be enhanced, the reserve talent echelon of tax law enforcement agencies be built up, the tax collection and management be strengthened, and the independence of the courts be improved so as to promote judicial fairness in tax matters.

An Analysis of the Factors Influencing the Realization of the Fiscal Policy Function in Promoting the Transformation of Scientific and Technological Achievements: Multi Case Study Based on the Grounded Theory

SUN Long, LEI Liang-hai

2019, 0(12):  1908. 

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The lower rate of transformation of scientific and technological achievements can seriously restrict the development of science and technology in China. Through investigation done in enterprises, universities and intermediaries, and adopting the multi-case study method based on the grounded theory, this paper conducts an in-depth analysis of the dynamic process of the policy function realization and the factors influencing the implementation effects of different types of fiscal policies. The findings show that the complex diversity of policy objects and the level of policy operation means and technology would affect policy formulation. The pressure of innovation investment and the size of units can learn the willingness and ability respectively through affecting the policies, thus the different policies can learn the effects. The application cost and the approval system can affect the enthusiasm of units to apply, the development strategies and application conditions form the barriers to policy application, which jointly work on the policy application link. The speed of fund allocation and the supervision of projects are related to the implementation of policies, and the four different types of fiscal policies have different problems during the process of the function realization. Therefore, the government should pay attention to the differential designs of fiscal policies, coordination and cooperation between departments, the establishment of information channels, the application of policy mix and the clarification of the relationship between policy and law, so as to solve practical problems from the perspective of the realization of policy functions and to improve the efficiency of the transformation of scientific and technological achievements.

Two Ways to Understand Money: History and Evaluation

LI Xiu-hui

2019, 0(12):  1909. 

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The understanding of money has always puzzled thinkers of all ages. From the history of economic thought development, there are two ways of thinking: the mainstream way of thinking about money as a commodity and the non-mainstream way of thinking about money as credit. The mainstream understanding way regards currency as a commodity, with the transaction media function as the foundation to derive the value storage and value scale functions. Thus two analytical frameworks are formed based on the transaction media and value storage, but they have encountered fundamental problems that are difficult to solve. The non-mainstream understanding ideas have a similarly long history, but they also have insurmountable theoretical limitations in terms of argumentation foundation, theoretical construction, and policy recommendations. In view of the theoretical difficulties existing in both ideas, they can be integrated from the perspective of Marx’s duality so as to dialectically understand the multiple connotations of money and lay a realistic foundation for the development of monetary theory.

Whether Economic Policy Uncertainty Inhibit China’s Bank Credit

HE Fu-mei1，OUYANG Zhi-gang2，DOU Zhen-jiang2

2019, 0(12):  1910. 

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Bank credit is a“double-edged sword”; while providing important support for the funds needed for economic development, it is also an important factor influencing macroeconomic fluctuations. The findings of the empirical study based on TVP-FAVAR model show that the increase of uncertainty of China’s economic policies has inhibited the total amount of bank credit, and this suppression effect has obvious time-varying characteristics. Compared with the old normality, the suppression effect is more significant under the new normality. Through further analysis of the dual transmission path of credit supply and demand, it is also found that under the new normality, the uncertainty of economic policies would intensify the weakening of credit demands and result in the growing mood of banks to be tight in lending. The Chinese government should try to maintain the consistency and coherence of policies, formulate corresponding credit support policies, and minimize the“shrinking”effect of the rising economic policy uncertainty on credit demand and credit supply.

Business Environment, Relational Financing and Technological Innovation

XU Hao1, ZHANG Mei-sha2

2019, 0(12):  1911. 

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Financing availability is the key to enterprises’ technological innovation. Firstly, from the perspective of“economic politicians”, this paper analyzes the formation mechanism of relational financing in China and its crowding-out effect on enterprises’ technological innovation. Secondly, it analyzes the regulating effect of business environment on the relationship between the relational financing and enterprises’ technological innovation. Finally, it measures the credit ratio of the state-owned sector and conducts an empirical analysis with the data of 2644 companies during the period of 2008-2017 as the samples. The results show that: (1) relational financing has a significant crowding-out effect on enterprises’ technological innovation, and this effect is strongest in the western region and significantly declined after the 18th National Congress of CPC; (2) optimizing the business environment can weaken the crowding-out effect of relational financing on enterprises’ technological innovation, and this effect is strongest in the western region and more significant after the 18th National Congress of CPC; (3) the crowding-out effect of relational financing on enterprises’ technological innovation is more prominent in high-tech enterprises, and optimizing the business environment has a more significant adjustment effect on the relationship between the two.

Independent Directors with Media Background and Stock Price Crash Risks

ZHENG Yu-xin, XUE Ming-yuan, OU Peng

2019, 0(12):  1912. 

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From the perspectives of the features of media professionals and the quality of information disclosure, this paper conducts an empirical test of the inhibiting effect of independent directors with media background on stock price crash risks. Further study finds out that this effect is mainly realized through the supervision on company senior managers and improving the quality of internal and external information communication. Meanwhile, the independent directors with media background who are older or highly educated can be more able to inhibit the risks of stock price crash. Finally, independent directors with media background can replace the external governance mechanism to play a role of inhibiting stock price crash risks. This study is conducive to a deep understanding of the internal mechanism of independent directors to curb stock price crash risks and provides reference to the study of the governing effect of media professionals in capital markets.

The Belt and Road?Initiative and Corporate Investment Responses: An Exploratory Empirical Study Based on Questionnaire Data

SUN Ze-sheng1, WANG Yao-qing2

2019, 0(12):  1913. 

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On the basis of the cognition-influence-reaction analytical paradigm and the questionnaire data from enterprise researches, this paper explores the characteristics and mechanisms of enterprises’ investment response to the Belt and Road Initiative by means of distinguishing corporate characteristics and managerial heterogeneity. When the measurement index for managerial heterogeneity is given by using such methods as factor analysis, cluster analysis and variance analysis, it applies the regression model to conduct a study. The findings show that state-owned enterprises have higher cognition and willingness to invest than non-state-owned enterprises; however, the risk-averse managers have given birth to the function of a stabilizer for corporate cognition and investment response. The managers’ heterogeneity mainly acts on the outward reaction for the BRI environmental changes; investment experience does not affect the corporate cognition and investment willingness, and the size of enterprises does not affect corporate cognition to the Belt and Road Initiative. There is a positive interaction between the BRI enterprises’ cognition and the impact they received, the two jointly can promote the enterprises to make positive investment responses. With the classification model it also finds out that enterprise size has zero impact on investment facilitation, and being positively correlated to group investment, joint venture or host government’s willingness to sign contracts. The state-owned enterprises have stronger willingness for group investment, joint venture and M&A than non-state-owned enterprises. The response of enterprises mainly comes from the impact of external environment changes on enterprises, but enterprises can make independent investment and risk control reaction like M&A, joint venture, R&D, talent recruitment, etc., without relying on the strength of cognition.

Bilateral Political Relations and China’s Oil Import Security: An Empirical Analysis Based on PPML Model

LIU Jian1, FANG He-qin2

2019, 0(12):  1914. 

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Energy diplomacy is one of the important measures to ensure China’s energy security. As for the question that whether the improvement of bilateral political relations brought about by energy diplomacy has effectively promoted China’s petroleum trade security, this paper adopts the panel data from 37 countries during the period of 1993-2016 to conduct an empirical test based on the PPML method. It also explores in detail its periodical characteristics and state structural effects. The findings show that the bilateral political relations would significantly affect the depth and breadth of China’s oil imports, that is, the scale of imports and the possibility of expanding the source of imports, but the impact on the price of imported oil is not obvious. The improvement of bilateral political relations is conducive to safeguarding China’s oil imports security, while China’s oil import prices are also affected by the fundamentals of its supply and demand. To this end, China should further strengthen its energy diplomacy, give full play to the positive role of the Belt and Road Initiative, while at the same time reduce excessive dependence on specific oil importing countries, and comprehensively use diplomatic, economic and other means to ensure energy security.

Policy Burden, Information Transparency and Corporate Cost Stickiness

LIAO Fei-mei1, ZHU Qing-zhen2, YE Song-qin2

2019, 0(12):  1915. 

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Taking the A-share state-owned listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges during 2008-2017 as samples, this paper explores the relationship between policy burden, information transparency and the cost stickiness of state-owned enterprises. The findings show that the phenomenon of cost stickiness widely exists in state-owned enterprises. Under the conditions of asymmetric information, the heavier the policy burden on the state-owned enterprises, the stronger the cost stickiness will be; while under the conditions of different information transparency, the impacts of policy burden on the cost stickiness are significant different. To improve information transparency can reduce information asymmetry and the opportunistic behaviors of the management, which can effectively curb the negative impact of policy burdens on cost stickiness. Further analysis shows that the policy burden affects the cost stickiness of enterprises through the agency problem in the management.

Environmental Uncertainty, Comparability of Accounting Information and Equity Financing Costs

ZHANG Chun-hua

2019, 0(12):  1916. 

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The higher comparability of accounting information is conducive to the users of the reports to compare and identify the quality of accounting information of different enterprises in the same industry. Taking China’s non-financial listed companies from 2007 to 2014 as the research objects, this paper conducts an empirical test of the relationship between the comparability of accounting information and the cost of equity financing. The findings show that the comparability of accounting information is negatively correlated to the cost of equity financing, that is, the higher the comparability of accounting information of a company, the lower the cost of its equity financing. The environmental uncertainty will weaken the negative correlation between comparability and the cost of equity financing. Further research finds out that the comparability of accounting information affects the costs of corporate equity financing through the liquidity of the stock.

An Analysis of the Prospects of the Development of Media Economy in the New Media Era: Comment on Understanding Media Economics

JING Xu-yuan

2019, 0(12):  1917. 

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