Equality as a driver of inequality? Universalistic welfare,generalised creditworthiness and financialised housing markets

Abstract

Scandinavian countries are known for their universalistic welfare states, corporatist coordination, strong economic performances and egalitarian outcomes, an institutional combination often referred to as the ‘Nordic model’. However, these countries also possess volatile and increasingly vulnerable housing markets characterised by periods of sharp increases in prices and rents and some of the highest debt to income ratios in the world. The combination of a universalistic welfare state and housing market dynamics sets off a self-reinforcing process of increased stratification and re-familialisation. How did these orderly, egalitarian and welfare-oriented societies end up with housing markets that expose their citizens to increasing risk while driving inequality? The key lies in the effect the Nordic welfare state has on financialised housing markets. Successful decommodification of human lives leads to generalised creditworthiness which stimulates asset price inflation and new wealth and risk inequalities.     

青少年文本和视觉资料中的全球化因素(续完)

第三类:"性别暗示性"(正文有全球化因素,背页没有,20个样本) 在14-17岁学生中,这一类占子样本的21%:比较而言,这一类中女生比例多于男生(25%比15%).一种说明是,虽然这些文本中有全球化因素,主要的话语实际上是一种性别化的.以下是这类文本中的三个个案.     

Public Pensions and Collective Bargaining Rights: Evidence from State and Local Governments

An aging workforce and increasing retirement benefits are ongoing problems for states and municipalities. Unions are often blamed for governments offering too generous pension benefits. This contributes to budgetary pressures in some state and municipal governments. This article analyzes the impact of collective bargaining on pension benefit generosity under different economic conditions. The study finds that the impact of collective bargaining on pension benefits is not consistent over time or across pension plans. Collective bargaining has a positive effect on pension benefits under worsening economic conditions. Additionally, unions indirectly influence pension benefit generosity through campaign donations and unionization intensity. The findings suggest mixed impacts of collective bargaining on different groups of public employees regarding pension contributions. The article concludes with implications for the role of unions in public financial performance and strategic human resource management during fiscal austerity.     

The EU’s preferential trade agreements with Singapore and Vietnam. Market vs. normative imperatives†

By negotiating Free Trade Agreements the EU aspires both to increase the competitiveness of its industry and contribute to sustainable development in the partner country. It pursues a flexible approach to norm promotion which aims at supporting developing countries in their attempt to adjust to international standards. Ideational and institutionalist scholars interpreted this approach as a manifestation of its normative power. We show that in the negotiations with Singapore and Vietnam the positions of the EU were not consistent with its declared goals, since they put stronger pressures upon Vietnam to adjust to regulatory standards. We explain this lack of consistency as the result of different patterns of interest group mobilization in the two negotiations. Those patterns, in turn, depend upon the bargaining power the EU has with single trade partners, competition between the EU and third countries, especially the US, and the structure of the economy of the trade partners.     

Spatial Spillover Effects from Foreign Direct Investment in Vietnam

This paper investigates the role of inter-firm interaction and geographical proximity in the determination of productivity spillover effects from foreign to domestic firms. We developed an estimation approach using the Spatial Durbin model and applied this to a firm-level dataset from Vietnam from 2000–2005. We found that productivity spillovers diminished when the distance between foreign and domestic firms increases and that interactions among local firms amplify the spillovers. Within short distances, the presence of foreign firms creates positive backward, negative forward and horizontal spillovers. Based on the findings, several implications are extracted regarding promotion policy for foreign direct investment in developing countries.     

Determinants of foreign direct investment in Southern Central Coast of Vietnam: a spatial econometric analysis

Economic Change and Restructuring - This paper examines the determinants of foreign direct investment in the Southern Central Coast (SCC) region of Vietnam over the period 2007–2016 by a...     

An empirical analysis of municipal efficiency and local resident satisfaction by council type in Victorian local government

Although a voluminous empirical literature has examined local government efficiency, much less attention has focused on municipal effectiveness and almost no effort has been directed at the relationship between efficiency and effectiveness. In this paper, we seek to add to the latter nascent literature by investigating the relationship between operational efficiency and local resident satisfaction for three different municipal categories (metropolitan, regional, and rural councils) in the Victorian local government system over the period 2014–2015 to 2017–2018 using data envelopment analysis and an advanced regression model. We find that although a strong relationship exists between efficiency and satisfaction for metropolitan and regional councils, the same is not true of rural councils.     

Turning science into business in developing countries: the case of vaccine production in Vietnam

Turning scientific discoveries into business opportunities is a difficult process, particularly in high-tech related area such as bioscience and biotechnology. In developing countries, where research conditions are much less favorable than in the industrialized world, there are many additional constraints in terms of finance, investment, and human resources. However, the production of vaccines on the basis of research and technology transfer in Vietnam shows that this is possible provided the right policy and right people are available. Relying on transfer of technology from overseas, plus a combination of domestic efforts and international cooperation on R&D, Vietnamese research institutes have turned their research into business operations and turned some scientists into a businessmen and women. This in turn, has contributed to the eradication of certain diseases and Vietnam’s self-reliance of key vaccines.