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Mature market economies steadily raise full-benefit retirement ages and add flexible (or variable) retirement age: early/late retirement is punished/rewarded to neutralize the budgetary impact of free choice within wide age limits. New EU member states also raise full-benefit retirement ages, but typically restrict downward flexibility, conditioning it on long enough length of contribution (e.g., Czechia) but sometimes even forsake the deduction (Females40 scheme in Hungary). In this paper, we shall study the costs of removing restrictions on flexibility. In our dynamic model, we show that even if early retirement is duly punished, diminishing the effective retirement age by 1 year raises the first year's and the total expenditures during transition by 8% and 70% of the original annual expenditures, respectively.

I take a Bayesian approach to estimate and forecast the effects of fiscal stimulus in various versions of the model by Smets and Wouters (2007) for the US economy. Specifically, I proxy various simpler DSGE sub-models by imposing a tight prior on a single parameter or a combination of tight priors on multiple parameters in the Smets-Wouters model. I find that the present-value government spending multipliers obtained are all in a reasonable range. Moreover, I forecast the effect of fiscal stimulus in a scenario similar to the 2008/2009 recession in the US, where the public expects a large and temporary increase in government spending to stimulate a fragile economy. The forecasts, generated individually by a group of representative models, are weighted averaging by means of the posterior model probabilities that are computed on the basis of their corresponding marginal data densities. According to the Diebold-Mariano test, I find that the forecast error of the combination forecast, computed via Bayesian model averaging (BMA), is statistically larger than the individual forecast, obtained only from the one that has the best fit among those DSGE models.

Over the last two decades, the current accounts in the European Union (EU) have diverged substantially. This divergence has raised concerns about the sustainability of the core countries' current account surpluses since the peripheral countries' financing of their significantly rising levels of current deficits depends on them. In this study, by applying both linear and nonlinear unit root tests and taking into account structural breaks in the data-generating process, we examine the current account sustainability of the main core countries with large external surpluses. We find that the current accounts of Austria, Denmark and Germany are not on sustainable paths, which suggests that the core economies might not continue to run surpluses to finance the peripheral countries' external deficits. The results of this study imply that the policymakers in peripheral countries might take proactive measures against possible borrowing problems and capital outflow risk in the future.

This paper focuses on national support for export and examines whether, following the OECD arrangement, long-term financial sustainability is assured without sustained fiscal help. Rules on permitted state support in this area are stated by the OECD Consensus, which is meant to guarantee a level playing field for all exporters, to encourage competition among exporters based on the quality and prices of goods, and at the same time, not distort the free market. The main objective is that every export credit agency (ECA) should be self-sustainable with no need for state subsidies. However, this may not be achieved. This research proves inadequacy of minimum premium rates (MPR) due to insured interest. This issue arises mainly from the application of MPRs to the principal value of the insured loan with no correspondence to the insured interest amount. As many ECAs are publicly owned, all systematic losses must be covered by state budgets, which is against OECD agreements and is not allowed.

The implementation of the Common Consolidated Corporate Tax Base (hereinafter CCCTB) in the European Union will probably have an impact on tax revenues of the concerned states since the distribution of the group tax base shall reflect the capacity to earn income by individual group members. This is secured by the employing of the allocation formula containing three factors that shall reflect the profit generating process of individual companies. The paper analyses the explanatory power of the proposed CCCTB formula on the data sample of group companies with a link to the Czech Republic - either parent or subsidiary company in the group covered in dataset is tax resident of the Czech Republic. The obtained results are evaluated on the level of individual economic sector with the aim to verify if the proposed CCCTB formula is the most suitable for them, where the sufficiency of the explanatory power of the allocation formula was indicated based on the assigned change of distributed profit to the respective economic sector.

The main objective of this paper is to find the determinants of the international competitiveness of the manufacturing sectors of the Czech economy, using the database of 13 manufacturing sub-sectors in 1995-2011, with the aid of ECM model. The authors research the question of how much foreign and domestic demand, the level of labour costs, the level of sector innovation intensity, the level of sector openness to foreign markets as well as sectoral labour productivity influence the changes in their trade balance. The results of the analysis conducted show substantial differences in the roles particular variables play in explaining the net exports in individual sectors. The results of the analysis indicate mostly a greater impact of the researched factors on net exports in long rather than short term.

In this paper, we propose a model that demonstrates the influence of household ecological preferences on their acceptance of spending on renewable energy. The model discusses the production of energy from both non-renewable and renewable sources, the quality of the natural environment, pollution emissions, and utility maximization. If households choose to reduce pollutant emissions, they should reduce their levels of consumption. The main aspect that distinguishes the proposed model is the assumption of complementarity between physical capital and energy. This complementarity exists due to the fact that non-renewable natural resources are the main energy source throughout the world. The presented model is solved and analysed in detail. Our analysis of the model leads to the conclusion that maximizing the utility share of the total production spent on renewable energy generation depends on the relation of both preference parameters, not on each individual preference parameter. Since the presented model helps to explain several economic mechanisms, it may become incorporated into a larger model.

This paper provides a general equilibrium theoretical model of alcohol taxation and empirically estimates the model. For this purpose, we use a model determined by both externality corrections and fiscal considerations as the tax increase is assumed to immediately change other governmental policies such as labour taxation or medical expenditures. The results of our analysis show that under most parametric scenarios, the current Czech tax rate on beer and wine is below its optimal level and that the fiscal component has a significant impact on the optimal level of tax.

This study uses data from the 2012 China Labour-Force Dynamics Survey and 2010-2012 China Family Panel Studies to investigate job satisfaction and job expectations, as well as the association between job satisfaction and job turnover by gender among employees aged 16-65. We find not only that job satisfaction levels are relatively low, with only 46% of workers explicitly satisfied, but also that worker expectations differ significantly from what their jobs actually provide. In particular, many jobs are less interesting than expected, which prevents workers from realizing their perceived potential. This expectation gap is thus a strong determinant of job satisfaction. Men and women have similar levels of job satisfaction, yet based on observables, one would expect women's job satisfaction to be lower than it actually is, thereby lending support to the gender-job-satisfaction paradox encountered in Western studies. In contrast to Western research, we find no link between job satisfaction and job change, an observation we attribute to China's unique Confucian-based work ethic.

Based on OECD country experiences over the period from 1990 to 2015, this research rigorously investigates: (1) how fiscal autonomy effects economic growth; (2) whether there is an optimal level of decentralization; and (3) whether and how other factors influence economic performance in a decentralized economy. We find that revenue decentralization does not affect economic performance. The expenditure decentralization dividend in terms of an enhanced economic growth rate can be achieved only when the initial share of local government expenditure is smaller than the growth-maximizing degree through along with tax collection and trade openness.

The aim of the article is to present a model of sentiment analysis tool application for planning directions of city development. The study presents a model of using sentiment analysis to build city development strategies as well as realization of projects related to it. The presented model is a part of a larger work on developing the concept of the Regional Spatial Business Community (RSBC). The RSBC is created on the basis of electronic communities built by stakeholders involved in the development of a given city. On the basis of surveys, a six-stage city development procedure is proposed. Using the aforementioned procedure, we describe potential data sources, the goals of sentiment analysis application and expected effects. Analyses of the applicability of sentiment analysis are made on the basis of observation of available tools. The obtained model is applicable; however, its implementation requires certain conditions to be met.

This study is a contribution to research into the relationship between commuting and life satisfaction. Our focus is on high school students. The research is based on a questionnaire survey among students in three countries: the Czech Republic, Italy and Slovenia. The analysis is conducted using six OLS regression models: three countries and both boys and girls in each country. The results show significant variance between the countries as far as the relation between commuting time and life satisfaction is concerned. A strong relation has been found only in the case of the Czech Republic. Possible reasons for this disparity include differences in the way various modes of transportation affect one's commuting experience, the role of climate and cultural aspects. In addition, variance has been found between the way boys and girls approach as well as experience commuting. Finally, our results confirm that commuting is a highly underestimated factor of happiness among students.

Global economic policy uncertainty (GEPU) is one of important phenomena in the global economy; it can impact on the overall economic performance and stock market per-formance, regardless of the status of the world economy. Thus, this paper empirically investigates the impact of global economic policy uncertainty on the Malaysian stock market over the period from 10:2003 to 2017:03. Using the GARCH model, the study demonstrates that global policy uncertainty affects the Malaysian stock market negatively. Similarly, the SVAR model also shows results consistent with the GARCH estimation. Nevertheless, the Markov switching estimation uncovers that global policy uncertainty has negative impacts on stock market performance in both low and high volatile market states. The impact is, however, greater during the high volatile state. Hence, the relationship between global economic policy uncertainty and stock market returns tends to be asymmetric. The overall empirical results infer that global economic policy uncertainty has some implications for asset pricing.

In this article, corruption is treated as an expression of human entrepreneurship, which does not fully fit in the commonly accepted moral and legal standards. Despite being negatively perceived, it is persistently present in the public, economic and political life of every country as evidenced by a number of press releases on corruption.
Research literature analysis reveals the existence of two conflicting opinions with regard to the way in which corruption affects innovative activity of companies and economic growth. The more morally correct theory, which can be dubbed the sand-the-wheels theory, assumes that corruption negatively influences innovative activity and economic growth. Whereas, the grease-the-wheels theory, which is inconsistent with the principles of social responsibility of business, argues for the positive influence of corruption on innovative activity of companies and economic growth. This article is a voice in that discussion.

The aim of this article consists in the analysis of the beta coefficient presented in different areas for three types of financial institutions: banks, investment banks and life insurance companies. In the final evaluation, we analyse whether the beta coefficient has a high tendency to reach number one and whether there is a relatively stabilized position of the beta coefficient different from one for a certain period and a certain financial institution on a certain market and whether it is possible to avoid a relatively complicated process of beta coefficient identification in income valuation. For that reason, the analysis of the five-year beta coefficient in the years 2000-2014 was performed for the USA, developed European, emerging European, developed Asian and emerging Asian regions. The analysis proved that the beta coefficient values are lower than the "magic one", meaning that using a beta coefficient equal to one is possible only in some specific cases. Also, stability of the beta coefficient with some permitted deviation was identified only for some financial institutions and for some markets, for example 0.6 for banks on the developed Asian market and 0.35 on the US market.

This paper investigates the influence of foreign direct investment on innovation by em-ploying the panel cointegration method incorporating multiple structural breaks and a dynamic common correlated estimation for 34 countries over the period 1991-2016. Our findings indicate that the series of innovation and foreign direct investment are stationary after considering the potential structural breaks and that the external shock is mainly from country-specific shocks. Our results also suggest that a long-run co-integrated relationship exists with one break between foreign direct investment and innovation. Furthermore, the estimation based on the dynamic common correlated estimation shows that foreign direct investment has a long-run significant positive influence on technological innovation. Our findings shed light on the importance of accounting for structural breaks when discussing the relationship between foreign direct investment and technological innovation.

In this paper, we analyse the key determinants of bank fee and commission income in the European Union with a special emphasis on market concentration. On a sample of 258 EU banks during the 2007–2014 period, we apply System Generalized Method of Moments. First, we argue that the banks facing higher competition tend to expand more aggressively into non-traditional activities, and therefore they report a higher share of fee income in total income. Second, we found that a higher equity to assets ratio is related with higher shares of fee income since the bank needs more capital to prevent or manage the potential risks of the non-traditional activities. Finally, a high deposits to assets ratio tends to increase the fee income share, which may be possibly attributed to relatively high switching costs and to close depositor-bank relationship in the EU banks.

Random forest models have recently gained popularity for economic forecasting. Earlier studies demonstrated their potential to provide early warnings of recession and serve as a competitive method to older prediction models. This study offers the first evaluation of the random forest forecast for the Czech economy. The one-step-ahead forecasting results show high accuracy on the Czech data and are proven to outperform forecasts from the Czech Ministry of Finance and the Czech National Bank. The following multi-step random forest forecast, estimated for the next four quarters, shows results similar to those from the central institutions. The main difference stems from the household and industrial confidence variables, which significantly impact on the random forest forecast. The variable-importance analysis further emphasizes the soft variables as valuable determinants for Czech forecasting. Overall, the findings motivate other forecasters to exercise this method.

This paper is a case study on the influence of students working during their studies and its impacts on their employability after graduation. Data for this research were collected at a private business university in Prague, the Czech Republic. The aim of the paper is to identify approaches of business university graduates to employment during their study and to evaluate the role of students' employment in their future career. A partial aim is to evaluate relations between student employment and future job position. The data were obtained through primary research: a questionnaire survey, two in-depth interviews and four focus groups. The results show that practical training during studies does affect applicability of study results, but graduates are not promoted immediately after their university graduation regardless of their gender. The only disadvantages mentioned re- garded demands on time. In the qualitative research, graduates most often reported de-mands on family support, time, problem coping and necessity of such behaviour.

The influence of foreign banks on a host country's lending depends on several factors, including the policy of the parent bank, the strategy of entry, economic cycles in the home country and abroad, growth prospects, the indebtedness of commitments and the capital adequacy of the parent bank. During the most recent economic crisis, the credit supply of foreign banks in the 10 new European Union (EU) Member States has not remained stable in the crisis. More specifically, we find evidence that foreign banks have cut the credit supply slightly in the new EU Member States.

Subsidy to less favoured area (LFA) farms is central to rural development policy in the European Union. Here, three categories of LFA support are assessed: farm competitiveness measures, LFA measures, and agri-environment measures. These categories of measures are complementary to safeguarding land management and delivering ecosystem benefits. Based on historical data for the Czech Republic, this paper endeavours to illustrate potential methods for assessing the LFA subsidies. In sum, rigorous methods to evaluate LFA evidence are still at their very starting point, even as they are necessary in order to ascertain the Community's capability, alongside the local, regional, or national institutional capability. A positive trend has been identified with regard to  stabilizing the available rural development budget for the policy priority "Restoring, preserving and enhancing agroecosystems".

Analysing papers that reveal by decomposing territorial inequalities in the EU that the share of disparities attributed to the NUTS 3 level has increased over the last 20 years, this paper aims to examine to what extent the financial support in 2000-2006 from ERDF and CF, which are the main regional policy tools but mainly are directed to address the issues arising at the NUTS 2 level, contributed to supporting convergence at the NUTS 3 level. Our re-search strategy relies on combining a conditional β-convergence model and a difference-in-differences (DiD) estimator. Estimations are generated for four alternative post-policy periods, two ways to measure policy intervention and for different funds as well as different expenditure categories. Our research results bring to light the question of potential negative outcomes of the EU's existing regional policy since the policy that is focused on the NUTS 2 level is enlarging imbalances within these regions, i.e., among NUTS 3 regions.

We use a gravity model that accounts for multilateral resistance terms (MRT) to examine the impact of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) on a country's export. Empirical analysis based on data from 20 countries that traded with one another (creating 380 pairs of importing-exporting countries) over the period 2002-2016 shows that the export of a country is negatively associated with the EPU of its corresponding importing country, but not with the EPU of the exporting country itself. This effect remains qualitatively unchanged regardless whether the exporting country is a developed or a developing economy and whether it focuses on commodities or non-commodities, but the effect is smaller for commodity exporters. Furthermore, the observed negative effect is more pronounced when the unemployment rate in the importing country is high, whilst GDP growth in the importing country does not influence the focal relationship. These findings advance the literature by highlighting the importance of accounting for the differential effects of policy uncertainty in importing and exporting countries and of taking into consideration country and product heterogeneity when analysing the effects of EPU on exports.

An ageing European population and, therefore, a rising dependency ratio of retirees to the working population, strongly suggests that a pension funding gap will be a key social issue in future. Yet many older people have significant real estate assets that they could access using equity release products. They could sell their assets in exchange for lifelong or temporary monthly payments. Equity release products are relatively new to Poland, but are not yet offered by commercial banks in Czechia and Slovakia. This paper estimates the potential benefits of marriage reverse annuity, and reverse mortgage contracts, using the Svensson model function, and empirical property data from selected Czech, Slovak and Polish cities. The results are also compared to the average pension of inhabitants in the selected cities. It is shown that there is substantial scope for boosting retirement income in all the cases considered, though the precise size of the increase depends on factors such as contract buyers' age and life expectancy, the value of their assets, the payment consequences of a spouse's death, and contract suppliers' pricing policies.

We model the probabilistic structure and cash flows arising from marriage reverse annuity contracts in the case of the joint-life status and the last surviving status. In contrast to the classical approach, we take into consideration that future lifetimes between spouses are dependent. The structure of dependence of the length of spouses' lives is modelled using copulas. The term structure of interest rate is modelled using a time-dependent function. The numerical results are based on actual Polish data covering both the structure of the probabilistic model and the interest rate.

It is believed that in many countries export activities could enhance countries' capabilities. It is also believed that trade liberalization or common currency could be an export driver. This paper examines the impact of trade liberalization and common currency on EU countries' export growth. The methodology applied in this research is constructed using specifics of the data that arise from a natural experiment. We examined how exogenous events like joining the EU, WTO, EFTA or becoming a member of Eurozone change the environment, in which countries trade. The results using an unbalanced panel data consisting of 28 EU countries for the period 1995-2015 revealed that membership in WTO instantly increases export by 12.5-13.5%, but has no extra effect in longer period; membership in the EU and EFTA has effect on export with a time lag and common currency did not affect export growth at all.

This paper establishes a two-stage Hotelling model to identify the implications of the upgrades of durable goods produced by a spatial monopoly. The major findings indicate that, due to the positive effects on profits of the upgrading of products, the monopoly has the motivation to launch upgraded versions with high quality instead of solely producing products with low quality. The monopoly, meanwhile, would not make a commitment to either the high-quality products or the low-quality ones. In addition, the price of the low-quality products decreases as upgraded ones appear on the market in a second stage, since no consumers would store the low-quality products for future consumption.

The aim of this paper is to develop subjective synthetic indicators that quantify the quality of life in the different countries of the EU-28, with data from the 2016 European Quality of Life Survey (EQLS). We add other indicators to the general synthetic ones in order to quantify the different dimensions of quality life due to its multidimensional nature. The successive but unchained application of the principal component analysis and the Mazziota-Pareto analysis allows us to classify 5 dimensions of quality of life: subjective component of governance, public services, environment, general satisfaction with life, and socioeconomic issues. We verify that countries with the lowest or highest positions in the general index usually keep that position in most dimensions. The spatial perspective is fundamental to study of regional development. For this reason, the next objective is the analysis of differences by spatial location using the variance analysis. The general indicator shows significant differences between EU countries but it does not show differences in the quality of life of European citizens in urban and rural areas.

In the context of increasing concerns about the demographic decline of Europe and the lack of sustainable policies to fight against it, the main purpose of this study is to estimate the migration intention of the Romanian students in economics and business administration and the influence of the determinant factors. Data are collected from a questionnaire survey applied to a sample of 1,155 students at the Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iasi. We have applied a multinomial logistic regression model with both simple effects and interactions. The results have brought strong arguments proving the importance of personal value recognition, beliefs and attitudes, family background, as well as interactions between genders, attitude towards competition and active search for a job or between parental severity and migration legacy, as determinant factors of the students' intention to migrate to Western Europe. These results may serve regional, national and even community-based sustainable development policies for the conservation of human resources and mostly of higher-educated individuals.

This study explores whether companies´ experience benefits when the firm's CEO and owner are both women. It employs data from the 2009-2014 World Bank Enterprise Surveys (WBES) to measure firms' performance through growth in sales and productivity. Potential endogeneity was corrected by using the UN Gender Development Index and the average fertility rate as they comply with the exclusion restrictions. The paper uses the Control Function method with a Probit first stage estimation and an OLS main equation. The findings suggest that a female owner strengthens the female CEO's business skills and leads to better firm performance than when the CEO is a woman and the owner is a man.