Support of individual enterprises was an important part of anti-crisis policy of Russian government during 2008—2009. The officially declared goal of this support was maintaining sustainability of "systemically important", or strategic enterprises. Using regression analysis, the author seeks...

Using the regression discontinuity design of close gubernatorial elections in the U.S., we identify a significant and positive impact of the social networks of corporate directors and politicians on firm value. Firms connected to elected governors increase their value by 3.89%. Political...

This paper explores the relevance of soft budget constraints (SBC) to development studies by examining the parastatal sector. The political ingredient of the SBC is discussed by focusing on two examples: 1) religious and military foundations in Iran; and 2) Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It...

We use exogenous changes in Danish local municipality sizes to identify a large positive effect of political power on the profitability of firms related by family to local politicians. Our difference-in-differences estimate is consistent with a unitary elasticity of connected firms’...

This paper discusses the problems and issues on the political failures in Bangladesh as well as identifies some possible solutions. The approach here is analytical mostly reviewing current news, reports and other related materials. A comparative study is also done between the present and...

Government ownership of banks is very common in countries other than the United States. This paper provides cross-country, bank-level empirical evidence about political influences on these banks. It shows that government-owned banks increase their lending in election years relative to private...

It is a common notion that a significant conflict of interest exists between the state and the bureaucrats who control state-owned firms because the bureaucrats have essentially all the control rights but negligible cash flow rights in those firms. Yet, there is little systematic evidence on...

This paper examines political determinants of government banks' lending decisions using the prefecture-level panel data on Japan's government loans from 1975 to 1992. It finds that the size of government loans is positively correlated with two political factors: (1) the electoral vulnerability...

In March 2008, Malaysia’s political landscape was shaken by election results showing that the Barisan Nasional had won less than two thirds of the parliamentary seats and lost five states to the opposition. A two-thirds supermajority had been seen as a sacred threshold for the coalition to...