Using 2005 firm level data for 26 ECA countries, this paper estimates performance gaps between male- and female-owned businesses, while controlling for their location by industry and country. We find that female entrepreneurs have significantly smaller scale of operations (as measured by sales...

This paper empirically investigates how Chinese executives and managers perceive and interpret corporate social responsibility (CSR), to what extent firms’ productive characteristics influence managers’ attitudes towards their CSR rating, and whether their values in favour of CSR are...

Poverty rates on Native American Indian reservations are triple the US average. Small business incubation programs, available elsewhere in the US, are sparse on the reservations. Small businesses are potent drivers of US economic growth. Some 25.5 million entrepreneurs generate more than 50% of...

Business groups, which are ubiquitous in emerging market economies, balance the advantages of characteristics such as internal capital markets with the disadvantages such as inefficient internal distribution of resources and suppression of technological and other forms of innovativeness. In this...

This paper presents theory and evidence showing that institutional reforms in developing countries can effectively expand their product varieties in export. Our model demonstrates that relaxing foreign ownership controls and improving contract enforcement can induce multinational companies to...

The firm's stock of human capital is an important determinant of its ability to innovate. As such, any increase in this stock through firm-sponsored training might lead to more innovation. We test this hypothesis using detailed data on firms' human capital investments and innovation performance,...

Die künftige Entwicklung am Arbeitsmarkt ist von drei Megatrends geprägt: Einer Verlagerung unternehmerischer Verantwortung und Risiken auf Arbeitnehmer, steigenden fachlichen Qualifikationsanforderungen und einem drastischen Rückgang des Erwerbspersonenpotentials infolge des demographischen...

The costs of vertical integration are analyzed within a game-theoretic signaling model. It is shown that a company when being vertically integrated with a supplier may well decide to buy certain components from this supplier even at a lower quality than that offered by external sources. When the...

We develop a product market theory that identifies determinants of worker turnover and explains why firms invest in general training of their workers. We consider a model where firms first decide whether to invest in general human capital, then make wage offers for each others trained employees...

This paper shows that increasing product market competition can have a direct impact on the employment relationship and on wage inequality. I develop a simple model in which an increase in product market competition increases returns to skill through the effect of competition on the sensitivity...