Primary commodity prices and macroeconomic variables : a long run relationship

In recent years, fluctuations in such macroeconomic variables as interest rates and exchange rates appear to have significantly affected primary commodity prices. This paper studies the relationship between commodity prices and various macroeconomic variables. It focuses particularly on interest rates because of the important role they play in the portfolio adjustment model, in which investors move between commodities, bonds and money as interest rates change. The paper concludes that there is a long run quantifiable relationship between real interest rates and real commodity prices, but not between real commodity prices and either consumer prices or the money supply. Commodity prices in nominal terms strongly affect consumer prices but not the reverse - and some groups of commodity prices can be reliable indicators of movements in consumerprices. Changes in the money supply affect commodity prices, but not the reverse, and the relationship is not quantifiable.Insurance&Risk Mitigation,Economic Theory&Research,Markets and Market Access,Access to Markets,Environmental Economics&Policies

The impact of socio-economic inputs on rtd, innovativeness, and competitiveness of european and east asian smes: comparative analysis and policy suggestions for regional convergence

This paper presents state-of-the-art conceptual and empirical output of recent research work on the identification of the factors that determine the innovativeness and competitiveness of SMEs in Europe and East Asian countries. In the context of globalisation, new technology and learning-based production, and in the direction of the European regional convergence and social cohesion, our research obtained insights of the links between economic performance and socio-technological inputs. More specifically, on the basis of cross-national and cross-industry comparisons, the ways that regional/national innovation systems influence firm performance and growth are analysed.innovativeness and competitiveness, SMEs, learning-based production, innovation systems

Regional innovation systems in the global information technology industry: the non-internationalisation of greek smes

Economic competitiveness is today, more than ever, related to business innovation capacity. Given this fact, the present paper offers an insight into the contemporary pattern of innovativeness of small and medium size enterprises (SMEs), which often represent the most dynamic actors in national economies. The findings presented here, and the related theoretical notions, are discussed from the aspect of regional diversity in the context of a globalised sector: the information technology (IT) industry. The strategies of Greek SMEs are compared to those of their IT counterparts in three European countries (U.K., Italy, Israel) and two East Asian countries (Taiwan, Korea). Furthermore, an in-depth analysis of the Greek IT SMEs, based on a qualitative survey , is also presented.regional innovation systems, embeddedness, SMEs competitiveness, IT industry

Is there excess co-movement of primary commodity prices? A co-integration test

It is a common perception that primary commodity prices tend to move together. This perception is especially common among commodity traders who may justify an increase in the price of one commodity because the prices of other commodities have increased. This commodity price co-movement can be identified among commodities that seem unrelated in terms of production or consumption substitutability or complementarity. But there is no reason for believing that prices of unrelated commodities should move together, except for macroeconomic shocks affecting commodity markets in general. For example, in a recession commodity prices decline across the board because demand declines; and in periods of generalinflation commodity prices rise, partly because commodities provide a hedge against inflation. However, after accounting for macroeconomic shocks, is co-movement among prices still evident? In this paper, the authors test for co-movement and excess co-movement of primary commodity prices using the econometric tests of co-integration in time series and the resulting error-correction models (ECM). The ECMs will be used to examine the existence of short-run excess co-movement between commodity prices, taking into consideration the long-run relationship between them.Crops&Crop Management Systems,Environmental Economics&Policies,Montreal Protocol,Markets and Market Access,Access to Markets

Performance – effectiveness – efficiency measurement methods in public sector: international and greek experience

A plethora of performance – effectiveness – efficiency measurement methods have been developed and implemented to public organizations since the mid-nineteenth century. However, the ’60s have been considered a milestone for the measurement methods embraced by the public sector, initially in the United States and later in most of the OECD countries, when sophisticated accounting and financial performance methods were developed. During the first era, of the ’60s and ’70s, the public administration became process-oriented and adopted output assessment methods. The second era of measurement methods’ implementation to public organizations started in very early ’80s and continues today. During the second period, the public administration’s strategy started becoming extroverted focusing on the outcomes assessment rather than the output, shifting from financial performance assessment methods to those of efficiency, effectiveness and performance. The main goals set for the second period are expenses squeeze for public organizations, efficiency and effectiveness attainment, transparency and accountability. The implementation of performance – effectiveness – efficiency measurement methods within public organizations is a condition for measuring and assessing the output and outcome of the administrative units, and for establishing operational optimization plans, though, it is not adequate to ensure the accomplishment of the aforementioned goals. Political and managerial commitment to the implementation and handling of measurement methods, the application of the proposed methods’ reforms to the operational units, personnel experience to the usage of measurement methods, and readiness for change are considered vital prerequisites for success. It has been established that the more sophisticated the method, the more demanding it turns to be. As a consequence, the failure rate is greater for the performance assessment methods (i.e., for the Balanced Scorecard) than the straight financial performance ones or the efficiency measurement methods. Given the drawbacks of most of the existing performance – effectiveness –efficiency measurement methods, which are already adopted by public organizations, and the attributes of public administration, we have developed a comparative effectiveness measurement method called Quality-driven – Efficiency-adjusted Data Envelopment Analysis (QE-DEA). This method introduces synchronous analysis of operational efficiency and citizen satisfaction for a group of homogeneous operational/administrative units. It’s not demanding in terms of data collection, imputation, elaboration and report, hence, skilled personnel are not required. Nevertheless, similar to the rest of the performance – effectiveness – efficiency measurement methods, QE-DEA goal attainment depends on political and managerial commitment to restructuring the assessed public organizations according to a road-map provided in order to improve their effectiveness.Efficiency; Effectiveness; Performance; Public Management; Greek Public Sector Reform; QE-DEA

Entrepreneurial competitiveness in the knowledge economy: factors defining the innovativeness of small and medium size enterprises

The present paper is based on state-of-the-art research in European and Asian labour-intensive and technology-intensive industries, concerning the competitiveness of small and medium size enterprises in the context of knowledge-economy. Cross-country and cross-industry econometric analysis of the primary qualitative and quantitative information establishes that firm economic performance depends on technological and innovation capacity. The deviation in the technological capabilities and competitiveness of firms and industrial agglomerations is strongly related to different structural, as well as functional and institutional configurations of business milieux. The identification of the factors determining innovativeness suggests that firm innovative and competitive capacity depend heavily rather on the endogenously developed technology, than on exogenous technological inputs. Moreover, embeddedness within international networks of technological transactions enhances the entrepreneurial technological and economic performance.ανταγωνιστικότητα μικρομεσαίων επιχειρήσεων, οικονομία της γνώσης, οικονομετρική ανάλυση ποιοτικών και ποσοτικών πληροφοριών, διεθνής τεχνολογική δικτύωση

Regional business competitiveness : medium and low-technology production systems in Northern Greece

Successful regional integration in global competitive networks depends more than ever before on regional capacities for technological absorption and diffusion. Regional development inequalities are the outcome of different levels of technological adjustment and innovativeness in the regional business sector. This paper explores the technological adjustment capacity of the industrial regions of Northern Greece, which are characterised by traditional manufacturing specialisation – for long now declining due to global competition and currently, due to the recent crisis. The determinants of regional business competitiveness and economic performance are explored. The analysis substantiates that even in industrial agglomerations of traditional specialisation, competitiveness lies in technological advancement and not in labour cost compression.peer-reviewe

EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE AND MACHIAVELLIANISM: A META-ANALYSIS

Emotional intelligence has gained great interest over the last decades for its promising applications in life, work, and education. Research has mainly focused on the positive effects of emotional intelligence, although the appraisal, control and regulation of emotions can potentially lead to negative outcomes followed by the adoption of non-cooperative behavioral strategies, such as Machiavellianism. The main goal of the present paper is to examine whether negative correlation exists between emotional intelligence and Machiavellianism. To determine whether high EI levels are associated with low Machiavellianism levels, a systematic review and meta-analysis was conducted by combining the results of multiple scientific studies reported in the literature concerning the relationship of emotional intelligence with Machiavellianism. Correlation coefficients were considered as the effect size of examination. Of the publications identified, a total of 29 studies from 17 published papers met the inclusion criteria according to the meta-analysis methodology. Study characteristics and reported results revealed high heterogeneity across the studies included. Estimates of r = -.267 and r =-.250 in the meta-analysis process with fixed effect and random effects models, respectively, confirmed the negative relationship between emotional intelligence and Machiavellianism

Εφαρμογή μετρήσεων απόδοσης – αποτελεσματικότητας - αποδοτικότητας στη δημόσια διοίκηση: διεθνής και ελληνική εμπειρία

A plethora of performance – effectiveness – efficiency measurement methods have been developed and implemented to public organizations since the mid-nineteenth century. However, the ’60s have been considered a milestone for the measurement methods embraced by the public sector, initially in the United States and later in most of the OECD countries, when sophisticated accounting and financial performance methods were developed. During the first era, of the ’60s and ’70s, the public administration became process-oriented and adopted output assessment methods. The second era of measurement methods’ implementation to public organizations started in very early ’80s and continues today. During the second period, the public administration’s strategy started becoming extroverted focusing on the outcomes assessment rather than the output, shifting from financial performance assessment methods to those of efficiency, effectiveness and performance. The main goals set for the second period are expenses squeeze for public organizations, efficiency and effectiveness attainment, transparency and accountability. The implementation of performance – effectiveness – efficiency measurement methods within public organizations is a condition for measuring and assessing the output and outcome of the administrative units, and for establishing operational optimization plans, though, it is not adequate to ensure the accomplishment of the aforementioned goals. Political and managerial commitment to the implementation and handling of measurement methods, the application of the proposed methods’ reforms to the operational units, personnel experience to the usage of measurement methods, and readiness for change are considered vital prerequisites for success. It has been established that the more sophisticated the method, the more demanding it turns to be. As a consequence, the failure rate is greater for the performance assessment methods (i.e., for the Balanced Scorecard) than the straight financial performance ones or the efficiency measurement methods. Given the drawbacks of most of the existing performance – effectiveness –efficiency measurement methods, which are already adopted by public organizations, and the attributes of public administration, we have developed a comparative effectiveness measurement method called Quality-driven – Efficiency-adjusted Data Envelopment Analysis (QE-DEA). This method introduces synchronous analysis of operational efficiency and citizen satisfaction for a group of homogeneous operational/administrative units. It’s not demanding in terms of data collection, imputation, elaboration and report, hence, skilled personnel are not required. Nevertheless, similar to the rest of the performance – effectiveness – efficiency measurement methods, QE-DEA goal attainment depends on political and managerial commitment to restructuring the assessed public organizations according to a road-map provided in order to improve their effectiveness

Η επιχειρηματική ανταγωνιστικότητα στην οικονομία της γνώσης: προσδιοριστικοί παράγοντες της καινοτομικότητας των μικρομεσαίων επιχειρήσεων

The present paper is based on state-of-the-art research in European and Asian labour-intensive and technology-intensive industries, concerning the competitiveness of small and medium size enterprises in the context of knowledge-economy. Cross-country and cross-industry econometric analysis of the primary qualitative and quantitative information establishes that firm economic performance depends on technological and innovation capacity. The deviation in the technological capabilities and competitiveness of firms and industrial agglomerations is strongly related to different structural, as well as functional and institutional configurations of business milieux. The identification of the factors determining innovativeness suggests that firm innovative and competitive capacity depend heavily rather on the endogenously developed technology, than on exogenous technological inputs. Moreover, embeddedness within international networks of technological transactions enhances the entrepreneurial technological and economic performance