Search

With the development of the market economy, agricultural trade has become more and more significant for the development of the agricultural economy, which has triggered people's further thinking and exploration on the impact of agricultural trade on agricultural carbon emissions. This paper takes the measurement of trade implied carbon as the carbon dioxide emission index under the impact of agricultural trade and analyzes the impact of trade implied carbon and implied carbon balance on carbon emission. Taking the impact of Sino-US agricultural trade as an empirical background, this paper measures the impact of environmental changes in agricultural trade opening on China's agricultural development and its carbon emissions, so as to predict changes in China's regional agricultural carbon emissions performance. After calculation, it is found that the scale of China's exports has decreased by 0.089%, which is lower than the decline of 0.361% in the United States. The trade conflict has a significant impact on China's import and export structure. Under the scenario of mutual tariffs on agricultural products, China's exports to the United States are expected to decrease by 6.28%, while China's imports from the United States decreased by 13.02%. The Sino-US agricultural trade dispute will reduce China's carbon emissions by 0.013% and the United States' carbon emissions by 0.024%, which is related to the negative impact on the economy. Improving the performance of agricultural carbon emissions is not only the need for the green and sustainable development of the agricultural economy but also conducive to improving the international competitiveness of agricultural products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper assesses economics research and teaching frameworks in the United States by examining how knowledge is produced; the strengths and flaws of heterodox economic theory; and how students are trained, especially for careers in economic policy. We challenge the meaning of established terminology such as ‘heterodoxy’ and ‘mainstream.’ Three major reasons are suggested for the disappointing reality that pluralist economics among academic institutions, the broader public, and a new generation of economists has not happened: 1) neoclassical hegemony; 2) weakness in heterodox theory, and 3) rigidity of pedagogy and training in economics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The importance of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) and environmental policy stringency (EPS) in affecting environmental quality is gaining great attention in the literature. However, none of the existing studies has thought to investigate their combined effects on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. Additionally, the individual investigations into the nexuses EPU-emissions and EPS-emissions primarily took a symmetric assumption between these variables into consideration. The current paper is an early attempt to close these gaps by examining the combined effects of economic policy uncertainty and environmental policy stringency on CO2 emissions within asymmetric (nonlinear) frameworks in China and the United States (US). The empirical findings indicate that an improvement in EPU degrades the environmental quality in both countries. However, a negative shift in EPU decreases emissions in China while increasing them in the US. In terms of EPS, the estimates in the two nations led to similar results. A positive change in EPS is conducive to fewer emissions, whereas a negative change worsens environmental damage. These findings still hold with the sensitivity analysis using ecological footprint as an alternative gauge of environmental destruction. This study, therefore, suggests that both nations adopt stricter environmental policies. Additionally, Chinese policymakers should work to lessen uncertainty shocks, while the US government should promote more transparent economic policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates the economic impact of discretionary fiscal and monetary actions taken in the United States during 2020 and 2021. The fiscal actions are The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act, or the "CARES" Act, passed in March 2020; The Consolidated Appropriations Act, passed in December 2020; and The American Rescue Plan Act, passed in March 2021. The paper focuses on the impact of the "economic impact payments" that underlie these fiscal actions. The paper also examines discretionary monetary policy actions taken during the same period. The overall implication is that there is a need to return to policies that increase economic growth and stability, including rules-based fiscal and monetary policy, rather than to continue with these one-time discretionary actions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines whether returns on 49 different industry portfolios in the United States (US) expose significantly to the US economic policy uncertainty (EPU) even after controlling for the market and firm-specific risk factors. We find that the US EPU can load significantly against the returns of 15 industry portfolios which include stocks from heavy manufacturing and export dependent industries. However, further asset pricing tests show that the US EPU cannot improve the ability of a benchmark model to capture average industry returns. Additionally, the impact of EPU is time-dependent and significant only during specific periods which are different for each industry. Using a portfolio analysis, we also test whether EPU can forecast future returns. Results imply that the return-EPU relationship is almost flat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) on real estate investment trusts (REITs) ETFs in a quantile-based framework by employing the nonparametric causality test and the quantile autoregressive (QAR) model. Using data covering the returns of eight major United States (US) Real Estate Investment Trusts (REIT) exchange-traded funds (ETFs) over the period spanning 2 January 2012 to 28 February 2019, we find that there is a weak predictive power of EPU in REITs' returns and volatility. Our findings indicate that EPU has a leading effect on the real estate market returns at the mean level. However, we find no causality running from EPU to real estate markets volatility at all quantiles, indicating a weak influence of uncertainty on the real estate markets. Besides, our results report a significant impact of the EPU on the returns at the lower and upper quantiles. Yet, the impact is not symmetrical since the EPU shows a positive (negative) impact on the returns during the bearish (bullish) market condition. Moreover, the lagged EPU impacts the REITs negatively only during the normal and bullish market conditions, given all the estimated coefficients being negative and significant. Our results entail policy implications for investors, regulators, and asset managers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rates of mental illness have increased dramatically over the past 15 years in the United States [Products—Data Briefs—Number 283—August 2017. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/databriefs/db283.htm. Published August 15, 2017]. Additionally, life expectancy has fallen over the past several years due to increases in death from suicide, opioid overdose, and alcoholic liver cirrhosis as reported by Case and Deaton [Deaths of despair and the future of capitalism. Princeton University Press, 2020]. Over the last decade some have questioned whether these changes are due to neoliberal capitalist policies and ideologies. Neoliberal capitalism incorporates theories of eliminating all restrictions on the market and decreasing government assistance programs as reported by Harvey [A brief history of neoliberalism, Oxford University Press, 2005]. Since then these policies have led to income inequality, disempowerment of workers, outsourcing of manufacturing jobs, inadequate social services, mass incarceration and an expensive and ineffective healthcare system as reported by Case and Deaton [Deaths of despair and the future of capitalism. Princeton University Press, 2020] and Nkansah-Amankra et al. [International Journal of Health Services 43(2):217-240, 2013]. Studies have shown that the consequences of these policies and ideologies likely have a role in increasing rates of mental illness. This paper will discuss how these factors increase mental distress and postulate ways that mental health professionals can advocate for change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the COVID-19 outbreak, consumer behavior has been affected by the perceived threat of the pandemic and economic uncertainty. This paper aims to explore the dynamic effects of COVID-19, consumer sentiment, economic policy uncertainty, and fuel prices on travel behavior in the United States. Using updated daily trip data, the results show that consumer sentiment has a positive long-run impact on travel demand for air and auto, suggesting that a positive change in consumer sentiment can boost demand for these modes of transportation in the long term. Additionally, consumer sentiment has a favorable effect (1.34) on demand for long-distance trips, but it has a negative impact (−0.42) on the number of people staying at home. Economic and political shocks have a detrimental impact on demand for air and auto travel, suggesting that consumers reduce the frequency and cost of these transport services if they have pessimistic expectations about the future state of the economy and policy. However, in the short term, US travelers appear to be insensitive to shocks in consumer sentiment and economic policy uncertainty. Regarding the perceived threat of the pandemic, the results indicate that rising COVID-19 cases have a negative long-term effect on demand for air travel (−0.09) and public transit (−0.19), while they are positively associated with demand for auto travel (0.06). Similarly, the increasing number of deaths due to COVID-19 has led to a shift from shared-use mass transportation (air travel and public transit) to private autos and non-motorized travel, such as walking in the short term. • We examine changes in travel behavior and mode preferences during COVID-19. • Positive sentiment shocks boost travel demand for air and auto in the long run. • Economic and political shocks have an adverse effect on demand for air and auto. • COVID-19 cases are the main long-term determinant of demand for air and transit. • COVID-19 threat results in a modal shift from shared-use transport to personal transport. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper sets up a dynamic infinite-industry model to discuss the impact of factor endowments on technology choice and industrial upgrading. The model shows that at any time, the technologies in any industries should be adapted to the factor endowments structure. It further shows that as the economy develops, the industrial structure is unimodal with a leading industry, and with capital accumulation, each industry experiences technology upgrading from labor intensive to capital intensive and the leading industry shifts to more capital intensive as well. The model's implications are consistent with the stylized facts of manufacturing data from the United States and other countries. By incorporating various frictions and market failures, the model can discuss various policy issues in economic development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines if industries with higher economic policy uncertainty (EPU) sensitivity also respond differently to the evolution of COVID-19 pandemic. Initially, industries are allocated into decile portfolios according to their sensitivity to the US-EPU shocks, then portfolio returns are conditioned against changes in daily cases and deaths, respectively. After controlling for the standard risk-factors of equity returns, neither the cases nor deaths can load significantly against the returns of portfolio with the highest negative EPU exposure. However, industries which respond positively to the US-EPU shocks also respond positively to increases in cases and deaths. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A stochastic volatility estimation of VIX index's latent volatility is used for the United States of America, as a proxy for the adjustments in the levels of investors' uncertainty related to current and future economic policies. The impact of monetary policy stance on such measure is examined in the framework of the distributed lag non-linear models (DLNM). We place this analysis in the literature stream emphasizing the various sources of heterogeneity concerning investors' expectations. The main finding is that the monetary policy does impact non-linearly the adjustments in investors' predictions. While a tighter monetary policy does generally contribute to an increase in VIX's latent volatility, the shape of such effect varies across different GLM and GAM specifications of DLNM. This outcome remains robust, even if: (1) we control for the global price of Brent crude and consumers' confidence; (2) we use, instead of the stochastic framework, a Markov-switching GARCH-based estimator; or (3) we replace the monetary policy instrument with monetary policy uncertainty. We argue that accounting for its nonlinear effects on financial markets is of critical importance for the design of a monetary policy pursuing global financial stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The study examines the relationship between Economic Policy Uncertainty (EPU) and stock liquidity, and the mediating role of investor sentiment. Design/methodology/approach: This study draws on a sample of 4,620 firm-year observations covering nonfinancial firms in the United States from 2007 to 2020. We employ multiple regression analysis with panel data and path analysis with Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) to examine the impact of EPU on stock liquidity in detail. Findings: EPU significantly enhances stock liquidity. However, at elevated levels of EPU, this relationship reverses. The path analysis results indicate that EPU positively affects stock liquidity via the investor sentiment channel. This sentiment partially mediates the relationship between EPU and both trading volume and turnover rate, and fully mediates the relationship between EPU and both turnover price impact and illiquidity. Practical implications: Our findings underscore the importance of liquidity for investors, who may require higher returns for holding more illiquid stocks. Second, they can help the government understand the implications of changes in EPU, highlighting the need for clear communication and the implementation of appropriate capital market policies. Originality/value: While considerable research focuses on the relationship between EPU and stock market liquidity, the analysis of the channels through which EPU influences stock market liquidity remains largely unexplored. Our study highlights the importance of investor sentiment in explaining this relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to investigate the responsiveness of renewable energy production (REP) to fluctuations in geopolitical risks, oil prices and economic policy uncertainty (EPU). It applies a cross-quantilogram framework to examine monthly data of the US economy for the period of 1986–2022. The findings illustrate the asymmetric effect of historical geopolitical risk (GPRH) on REP under long memory. The findings also hold after different subcategories of GPRH, including geopolitical threats and geopolitical acts, are considered. A positive shock in GPRH has the most decisive positive impact on REP when the policies are driven by both energy security and environmental commitments. A positive shock in GPRH can negatively impact REP when policies are driven by energy security causes only. EPU exerts strong negative effects on REP in bearish and bullish states of the market under medium and long memory across different measures of EPU. Dynamic connectedness analysis applying TVP-VAR method between pairwise variables indicates that net REP is a volatility receiver to the changes in GPRH, its subcomponents, oil prices and different measures of EPU. [Display omitted] • Application of cross-quantilogram approach to US monthly data during 1986–2022. • Responsiveness of renewable energy production to historical geopolitical risk. • A positive shock in GPRH has asymmetric effects on REP in long memory. • This nexus is sensitive to the motivation of energy policies in US. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In light of the increasing investor interest in cryptocurrencies (CR) as alternative financial assets in financial markets, we sought to examine the connection between economic policy uncertainty (EPU) and cryptocurrencies. To do so, monthly data for Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), and Tether (THT) from January 2021 to April 2023 were employed. We utilized quantile regression and Granger causality analysis to investigate the relationship between EPU and cryptocurrencies. The initial results of this study suggest that EPU has little effect on the cryptocurrency market in the short-term. To enhance the strength and validity of these findings, we performed separate evaluations tailored to the unique contexts of the United States and China. The results revealed that the effects of EPU were adverse and statistically insignificant for China, while the situation differed slightly for the United States. Given that the United States has the most developed economy, its policies have a significant influence globally. As a result, cryptocurrencies have the potential to serve as efficient hedging tools. Furthermore, we incorporated nonlinear autoregressive distributed lag (NARDL) analysis to assess the asymmetric impact of EPU on cryptocurrencies by adopting both short-term and long-term perspectives. The outcomes demonstrated that both Bitcoin and Ethereum can serve as hedging tools in the short-term, although this utility diminishes in the long-term. Conversely, Tether displayed a positive association with EPU in the long-term. The findings of this study hold significance for policy-makers, offering valuable insights related to structuring efficient policies. The recommendations include fostering a rational framework for active participation from various stakeholders, including investors, governmental bodies, central banks, stock exchanges, and financial institutions. This collaborative effort aims to mitigate irrational fluctuations and enhance the acceptability of cryptocurrencies. In essence, this research underscores the potential of cryptocurrencies as a secure hedge against short-term EPU. However, we caution against assuming that any single cryptocurrency can consistently serve as a dependable investment haven. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Long-term Load Forecasting (LTLF) plays a vital role in the planning of electric utilities. In the long run, utilities face various uncertainties caused by economic and environmental factors. These uncertainties have made LTLF more complex and inaccurate, thus, amplifying financial risks of utilities. A potent contributor to such losses in LTLF accuracy is economic shocks. This study proposes two probabilistic Time-Varying (TV) approaches to capture such shocks in LTLF and minimise accuracy loss, namely TV-XGB-X and TV-PR, and their combinations considering economic policy uncertainty. Both eXtreme Gradient Boosting (XGB) and Polynomial Regression (PR) are extended to include the long-run TV effects of economic shocks as eXogeneous predictors in this paper. These models and their combinations are compared with various non-TV approaches through experiments on the monthly electricity consumption of eight energy-intensive states in the United States. The results reveal that the proposed combined approaches outperform stand-alone models on all datasets. The findings of this study can help utilities in hedging financial risks under shocks. • Proposed Time-Varying framework to detect and capture economic shocks for LTLF. • Framework includes probabilistic TV-PR, TV-XGB-X, their variants and combinations. • Compared the point and probabilistic accuracies of proposed and benchmark models. • Proposed models outperform existing benchmark models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Community development financial institutions (CDFIs) are an integral component of US community economic development policy. These organizations differ in structure and client base, but they all seek to promote sustainable and equitable growth at the local level. By injecting capital into under-served markets, CDFIs facilitate development that may not otherwise occur. Attempts to measure and evaluate CDFI performance have often yielded disparate results. A systematic review of the literature reveals that capacity constraints have resulted in CDFI evaluations with wide variance in scope and rigor. Making comparisons across these institutions is difficult because there are few standardized performance metrics that could inform evaluations. Major CDFI funders in the philanthropic and public sectors often have competing demands and do not consistently use evaluations to guide their decisions. To incrementally advance CDFI research and promote a more accurate understanding of their impact, we recommend a shift towards utilization-focused evaluations (UFEs). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on the antitrust policy reformers. It mentions the non-neo-Brandeisian perspective in which antitrust reform are necessary to bring under control market power and addresses some of the economic challenges in the global market, buyers and suppliers. It analysis the impact of the antitrust policy on the United States.

Copyright of Informacion Comercial Espanola Revista de Economia is the property of S.G.E.E.I.P.C., Secretaria de Estado de Comercio, Ministerio de Industria, Comercio y Turismo and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The events in the year 2020, especially the ravaging coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has further exposed the vulnerability and connectedness associated with human health and the global economy. In the United States, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the recent political polarization, especially the sharp divide between the Republican and Democrat party has further demonstrated the heightened partisan conflict in the country. From this basis, the current study examines the time-varying Granger causality between pandemic-related health emergency, partisan conflict, and economic policy uncertainty (EPU) in the United States over period January 1996 to June 2020. While there is an evidence of common time-varying Granger causality between August 2005 and September 2006 from pandemic-related health emergency to partisan, the evidence of Granger causality from partisan conflict to pandemic is common in the period of January to May 2009. In addition, the Granger causality between partisan conflict and EPU is obviously common between February and May 2020. As a policy concern, we are of the opinion that mechanism toward diffusing the heightened political divide in the United States is essential and be pursued for the country's economic and health sector challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Despite a growing literature on the impact of economic nationalism on public attitudes toward foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows, public attitudes toward U.S. FDI outflows have been overlooked. We examine U.S. residents' attitudes toward FDI outflows to two host countries viewed unfavorably by the American public, Mexico and China, and the extent to which providing accurate information on FDI flows between the United States and these countries affects the biases toward American investment in these countries. Methods: We implemented a vignette experiment on respondents from 11 southern states in the United States. Results: We find little support for the existence of bias toward Mexico or China as destinations for American investment, nor do we find that providing accurate information on bilateral FDI flows affects perceptions of U.S. FDI outflows to these countries. Instead, individuals' economic self‐interest and sociotropic concerns influence their attitudes toward FDI outflows. Conclusions: Individuals' preferences toward U.S. FDI outflows are not shaped by biases toward investment destinations but by their concerns regarding the economic and security consequences of American overseas investment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study evaluates how economic policy uncertainty (EPU) affects firm shareholder wealth. It further investigates the moderating roles of marketing, operations, and R&D capabilities in this relationship. Analysis of longitudinal data, collected from a large sample of firms across multiple industries in the United States, reveals a complex picture. Results show that although EPU lowers firm value (i.e., Tobin's Q and stock returns), it also reduces firm idiosyncratic risk. In addition, high marketing capability is observed to attenuate the loss in firm value arising from EPU, whereas high operations capability is seen to amplify this loss, with R&D capability not playing a significant moderating role. On the other hand, the reduction in idiosyncratic risk of firms facing EPU is marginally strengthened by operations and R&D capabilities, but not by marketing capability. Together, the conceptual framework and findings provide novel insight into the role of marketing capability in dealing with EPU. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The growth models perspective analyzes the role of social blocs in crafting countries' economic policies, but its treatment of business power as purely structural prevents it from addressing an important question in the politics of digital transformation: How have new sectors with miniscule economic footprints been able to influence economic policy? This article explores how tech and venture capital successfully lobbied for financial liberalization at the beginning of digital transformation in the United States. The article argues that explaining the role of social blocs in digital transformation requires incorporating discourse analysis and develops a conceptual framework around three causal mechanisms in the dynamics of social blocs: formation, influence, and endurance. This framework contributes to theory development in the growth models perspective and improves our understanding of the character of business power in digital transformation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A corpus of research on the effect of exposure to income inequality on citizens' economic policy preferences renders inconclusive results. At the same time, a distinct body of work demonstrates that ethnic fragmentation within a polity reduces government spending, presumably due to opposition among the public to spending believed to benefit stigmatized ethnic minorities. Focusing on the American context, this short article ties these two bodies of work together by arguing that the effect of routine exposure to income inequality should depend on the racial composition of the have-nots, with citizens being most likely to support liberal economic policies in the face of pronounced inequality only when potential beneficiaries are not a highly stigmatized minority group, such as Black Americans. Using geocoded survey data, we find that exposure to local economic inequality is only systematically associated with increased support for liberal economic policies when the respective have-nots are not Black. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effectiveness of government policies and economic stimuli during the 2007 financial crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic are compared in this study. While the 2007 financial crisis started in the real estate market and spread through the contagion effect to other sectors, the pandemic halted the all sectors of the global economy simultaneously. In the United States, where the social safety net is not as strong as other advanced economies, the unemployment rate skyrocketed and many families lost income. The federal government countered with various relief packages, which have been, unlike the rounds of quantitative easing prevalent after the 2007 financial crisis, direct payments to households and businesses. The Agent Instability Indicator and default elasticity coefficient are used to quantitatively assess the financial instability and default risk of subgroups of United States households classified by percentile of income and net worth. It turns out that the financial instability level of the United States household during the pandemic has not been as high as that during the 2007 crisis and the Great Recession. It is concluded that the direct handout of cash—so called helicopter money—is more effective at preventing financial collapse and stabilizing the economy than quantitative easing through asset purchase. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: External reference pricing (ERP) is used to set pharmaceutical prices to improve affordability, but its application may have negative consequences on patient access—thus, equity—across countries and on global innovation. With the United States contemplating ERP, negative effects could be magnified. Our aim: identify and quantify some major consequences of ERP. Research design, methods : Besides relying on databases and ERP modelling, we developed a heart failure case study. 4-step approach: 1) review ERP policies; 2) establish worldwide "price corridor"; 3) quantify patient access and health outcomes impact by ERP; 4) estimate ERP impact on innovation. Results: Our ERP referencing analysis highlights its perverse effects especially in lower-income countries. As counterstrategies to protect their revenues, manufacturers often implement tight list price corridors or launch avoidance/delays. Consequences include suboptimal patient access—hence, worse outcomes—illustrated by our case study: 500,000 + QALYs health loss. Additionally, the ensuing revenue reduction would likely cause innovation loss by one additional medicine that would have benefitted future patients. Conclusion: This research provides key insights on potential unintentional consequences of medicine price setting by ERP worldwide and under a new proposal for the United States. Our results can inform stakeholder discussions to improve patient access to innovative medicines globally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large corporations dominate economic and social life in the United States and around the globe. The mainstream corporate governance ideology of "shareholder primacy" claims that the exclusive purpose of a corporation is to generate returns for shareholders, which means that governance decisions should be exclusively in their hands. However, shareholder primacy lacks a theory of how companies innovate, and instead focuses solely on allocation of corporate profits, misunderstanding the relationship of shareholders to the twenty-first-century corporation. The theory of the corporation as an innovative enterprise—engaged in productive innovation by producing higher-quality goods and services for lower unit costs—is an accurate way to understand what makes corporations successful producers. Stakeholder theory from progressive legal scholarship illustrates specific corporate governance institutions that can assist innovation, including fiduciary duty, stakeholder participation in decision making, and equity ownership. This article contributes to the growing literature refuting shareholder primacy by utilizing the theories of the innovative enterprise and multi-stakeholder governance to propose reshaping US corporate governance to better to serve innovation in production and a balance of power in distributional decision making. JEL classification: B50, D21, G30, G35, K22 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the effect of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) on the financial reporting quality of US firms over 1999–2015. We use accruals-based earnings management as a proxy for financial reporting quality and the index of Baker et al. (Quart J Econ 131:1539–1636, 2016) as an EPU measure to show that they exhibit a positive and significant association. We also find a causal effect by employing three political polarization instruments for EPU. In a cross-sectional analysis, we further show that the positive relationship between EPU and earnings management strengthens for firms operating in politically sensitive industries, for firms in more financial distress, and during recessionary periods. We also provide evidence that increased financial constraints facilitate the positive relationship between EPU and earnings management. These findings are robust to the use of alternative measures of economic policy uncertainty and when we employ real earnings management as a dependent variable. These results indicate that managers aim to provide outsiders with an improved financial position of the company when EPU is high. Our findings suggest that investors, analysts, creditors, and regulators should be wary of firms' financial reporting quality in periods of high economic policy uncertainty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Informacion Comercial Espanola Revista de Economia is the property of S.G.E.E.I.P.C., Secretaria de Estado de Comercio, Ministerio de Industria, Comercio y Turismo and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

An estimated 7.8 million people live and work in the United States without authorized status. We examined the extent to which legal status makes them vulnerable to employment discrimination despite technically being protected under labor laws. We used three decades of data from the nationally representative National Agricultural Workers Survey, which provides four categories of self-reported legal status. We first investigated how legal status affected the wages and income of Mexican immigrant farmworkers using linear regression analyses. Then, we used Blinder-Oaxaca models to decompose the wage and income gap across the 1989 to 2016 period, categorized into five eras. Unauthorized farmworkers earned significantly lower wages and income compared to those with citizen status, though the gap narrowed over time. Approximately 57% of the wage gap across the entire period was unexplained by compositional characteristics. While the unauthorized/citizen wage gap narrowed across eras, the unexplained proportion increased substantially—from approximately 52% to 93%. That the unexplained proportion expanded during eras with increased immigration enforcement and greater migrant selectivity supports claims that unauthorized status functions as a defining social position. This evidence points to the need for immigration reform that better supports fair labor practices for immigrants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The environmental degradation and the concern for sustainable development have garnered extensive attention from researchers to evaluate the prospects of green bonds over other traditional assets. Against this backdrop, the current study measures the asymmetric relationship between green bonds, U.S. economic policy uncertainty (EPU), and bitcoins by employing the Nonlinear Autoregressive Distribution Lag (NARDL) estimation technique recently developed by Shin et al. The outcome of the empirical analysis confirms an asymmetric cointegration between EPU, bitcoins, the clean energy index, oil prices, and green bonds. The NARDL estimation substantiates that positive shock in EPU exerts a negative impact on green bonds, whereas a negative shock in EPU increases the performance of green bonds. It implies, in the long run, a 1 percent increase (decrease) in EPU decreases (increases) the performance of green bonds by 0.22 percent and 0.11 percent, respectively. Likewise, the study also confirms a bidirectional relationship between bitcoins and green bonds. A positive shock in bitcoin increases the performance of green bonds and vice versa. In addition, our study also reveals a direct co-movement between clean energy, oil prices, and green bonds. This outcome implies that green bonds are not a different asset class, and they mirror the performance of other asset classes, such as clean energy, oil prices, and bitcoins. The findings offer several implications to understand the hedging and diversification properties of bitcoins, and assist in understanding the role of U.S. economic policy uncertainty on green bonds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]