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Ecologically unequal exchange and uneven development patterns along global value chains
Full text linkThe ecologically unequal exchange (EUE) literature has provided ample empirical evidence for asymmetric transfer of material and energy resources from low-income to high-income
countries. However, research has not been able to clearly specify the causal mechanisms driving these processes. This paper relates participation in global value chains (GVCs) to development patterns and ecologically unequal exchange. We conduct a principal components analysis and a clustering analysis along six dimensions (GVC participation, GVC value capture, investment, socioeconomic development, domestic environmental impact and international environmental
balance) for 133 countries between 1995 and 2015. We find three social, ecological, productive development and GVC insertion patterns: “curse of GVC marginalization”, “ecologically perverse upgrading” and “reproduction of the core”. While our results confirm the asymmetry in ecological degradation between high-income and low-income economies shown by EUE, they support the existence of alternative mechanisms to account for it. We argue that environmental asymmetries are driven in large part by differences in how countries articulate within GVCs, and therefore cannot be ascribed to relations of ecologically unequal exchange,
alone. Countries with a higher capacity to capture value from GVC participation (“reproduction of the core”) are able to displace environmental impacts to countries facing a trade-off between the positive socio-economic impacts of rapid GVC integration and ecological degradation (“ecologically perverse upgrading”). GVC marginalization, in turn, constitutes a barrier to socio-economic benefits and to imported ecological degradation. However, the lack of diffusion of more ecologically-efficient processes through GVCs has a negative impact on domestic ecological degradation for countries of the “curse of GVC marginalization” group.Series: Ecological Economic Paper
You Have Been Terminated: Robot Taxation and the Welfare State
Full text linkWe present a three sector OLG model with a homogenous output good that is produced with traditional or robot technology. The traditional sector produces with labor and capital, whereas the modern sector employs robots instead of labor. We find that little can prevent the ascent of a modern economy. In particular, whilst robots are perfect substitutes to labor in our model, it is only the ratio of robot to capital taxes that can influence the speed of transition. The robotics sector produces robots using the homogeneous output good. We find that wages fall with a relative increase in productivity in the modern sector and a decrease in market power of robot suppliers. Falling wages imply that consumption will fall through generations, and a utilitarian government would feel inclined to intervene. We present several welfare policies, from wage subsidies, unemployment benefits, pensions, to a universal basic income. We also show under which conditions, as the economy becomes fully roboterized, it will switch from an exogenous growth model based on TFP to an endogenous growth model due to constant returns with respect to reproducible factors of production.Series: WU International Taxation Research Paper Serie
Ambivalent (In)Visibility: Commercial Cleaning Work during the Covid-19 Crisis in Austria
Full text linkIn light of the Covid-19 pandemic, some jobs became publicly highlighted as "essential" or "key" work. In German-speaking countries, this discourse focuses on the so-called "system-relevant" work (see also Grenz/Günster and Dudley
in this volume). Even if the terms differ, they basically refer to jobs that are indispensable for basic human needs and the functioning of society. Among them are jobs in care and medicine, schools and teaching, and critical infrastructure such as public transport and waste disposal. Cleaning is another of these system-relevant professions. Cleaning work is necessary for the functioning of a society and its economy.
What, then, does the new attention to key work in the context of the pandemic mean for cleaning work? What does it imply for the working conditions
of cleaners during the pandemic and in the future? How is the cleaning sector faring in the crisis? In this paper, I will take a closer look at these questions. The objective is to shed light on work in a sector that often remains invisible (Sardadvar 2019) and has particularly bad employment conditions (see section
2 in this paper), and to see how the pandemic has affected it
Die Landschaft von Firmenzentralen in Österreich: Internationale Firmenzentralen
Full text linkÖsterreich beherbergt einige internationale Firmenzentralen großer multinationaler Unternehmen. Mit dieser Studie tauchen wir tiefer in die Landschaft von internationalen Firmenzentralen in Österreich ein und untersuchen ihre Zusammensetzung sowie Merkmale in Bezug auf Art, Standort, Größe, Sektor und Herkunft der internationalen Firmenzentralen. Dieser Bericht ist eine Ergänzung zu unserem bereits veröffentlichten Bericht „Die Landschaft von Firmenzentralen in Österreich: Ein Überblick“ (2022) und konzentriert sich ausschließlich auf die Population von internationalen Firmenzentralen in Österreich, was nur einen Teil der ursprünglichen Datenbank von Firmenzentralen in Österreich darstellt. Aus der Studie geht hervor, dass Österreich und insbesondere die Hauptstadt Wien der Sitz verschiedenartiger, internationaler Firmenzentralen ist. Dies umfasst sowohl divisionale als auch regionale Firmensitzstrukturen. Die Länder, die Österreich am häufigsten als Firmensitz wählen, sind die benachbarten DACH-Länder (d.h. Deutschland und die Schweiz) und die USA. Insgesamt ist die Zahl der internationalen Firmenzentralen zwar deutlich geringer als die der inländischen Firmenzentralen, aber internationale Firmenzentralen (mit einem durchschnittlichen Umsatz von mehr als 10 Mrd. €) sind in der Regel deutlich größer als ihre inländischen Pendants. Dies unterstreicht die Bedeutung der internationalen Firmenzentralen für die österreichische Wirtschaft
Multi-mode standardization under extreme time-pressure – the case of COVID-19 contact-tracing apps
Full text linkThe present study investigates the standardization process of contact tracing apps during the COVID-19 pandemic. Due to the epidemiological urgency, and differing from classical examples in the literature, this process is characterized by a compressed timeframe. In this setting, we investigate the role of different standard-setting modes and their interaction through the lens of multi-mode standardization. We find that the processes of standard setting through market competition or inclusive multi-stakeholder committees proved time-consuming and inefficient in addressing the immediate needs during this major global health crisis. Multi-mode standardization between committees, market players, and governments equally proved unable to coordinate a standard. Ultimately, a so far neglected actor, namely platform owners, proved to be pivotal in coordinating a widely-adopted standard. Our research extends multi-mode standardization with platform owners as a further standardization actor of proliferating importance given the increasing pervasiveness of platforms in numerous contexts. The present article provides implications for the interplay between different modes of standard setting in general, and the setting of technological standards in crises in particular
Random Sampling from the Watson Distribution
Full text linkIn this paper we present and discuss two methods for efficient sampling from the Watson distribution.
The first approach adapts the rejection sampling algorithm from Kent et al. (2018), which originally
samples Bingham distribution using angular central Gaussian envelopes. We show that for the
case of the Watson distribution, this allows for a closed form expression for the parameters that
maximize the efficiency of the sampling procedure, which is then further investigated and bounded
by derived asymptotic results. What is more, we present a sampling algorithm that removes the
curse of dimensionality by a smart matrix inversion, which allows for fast runtimes even for complex
problems with high dimension. The second method relates to Saw (1978), and simulates from a
projected distribution using adaptive rejection sampling. Also for this sampling procedure, the derived
algorithm offers fast sampling for large dimension. This is not the case for similar algorithms in the
field, which usually require an expensive rotation of the sampled results using a QR-decomposition.
Finally, we propose some simple generators for the trivial cases and compare the two main methods
in a simulation study.Series: Research Report Series / Department of Statistics and Mathematic
Headquarters Landscape in Austria: An Overview.
Full text linkHeadquarters (HQs) of multinational corporations (MNCs) play an important role in the economy of a country, since they perform high value-adding activities, employ highly qualified personnel, and yield corporate and tax income. Thanks to its position at the heart of Europe and other characteristics that contribute to make the country particularly attractive for MNCs, Austria is home to several domestic and foreign HQs. With this descriptive report, we aim at providing a comprehensive and detailed overview of the HQ landscape in Austria. Drawing on a database created in 2021 by triangulating data retrieved from “Orbis” (Bureau van Dijk) with other publicly available data from companies’ annual reports and previous reports, we identified 1,439 HQs in Austria. An analysis of the types of HQs, their location, size, sector, and origin unveils interesting findings. First, Austria is home to many domestic corporate HQs, but it also hosts many intermediary HQs of large corporations from foreign countries in Europe (e.g., Germany) and from abroad (e.g., USA). Many of these countries choose Austria to access its neighboring countries, such as Germany and Eastern European countries. Moreover, the HQ landscape in Austria is characterized by a variety of industries and HQ sizes, although small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) dominate the scene. Finally, Vienna is clearly the center of Austria’s HQ economy, with 569 HQs located in the capital city
Fostering operational management “Best Practices” in subsidiary plants in the Western Balkans: The role of MNC home-country environment and resource allocation.
Full text linkWe investigate the adoption of operational management “best practices” in multinational cor-poration (MNC) subsidiary plants in the Western Balkans. Building on the Practice-Based View (PBV), we suggest that subsidiary plants are more likely to operate according to widely recog-nized best practices, if these practices are already common in the MNC home country. We also examine the degree to which the MNC can facilitate best practices in their plants by allocating organizational and human resources. We test our hypotheses using survey data from subsidiary managers and secondary company data (n=129), supplemented with manager interviews (n=14), collected from European, U.S., and Asian MNCs with subsidiary plants in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia, and North Macedonia. Results indicate that the subsidiary plants adopt practices that are common in the MNC home country. They do so to a greater extent when the MNC commits organizational resources to the plants, such as codified written procedures and trainings. Contrary to our expectations, there is no benefit to allocating human resources, such as expatriates and business travelers. We provide insights into the transfer and implementation of best practices in the Western Balkan context, enhance our understanding of the PBV by presenting a specific application of this theoretical perspective, and provide practically relevant results for managers and policymakers
Contours of Workplace Antisemitism: Initial Thoughts and a Research Agenda
Full text linkIn the context of the rising tide of antisemitism worldwide, we wish to draw the contours of
workplace organizational antisemitism,ahitherto ignored topic in contemporary scholarship, by presenting a framework for its study. In particular, we propose an interdisciplinary
understanding of antisemitism in the workplace, drawing on theories and evidence from
economics, management, and business. To contextually embed our propositions, we
focus our discussion on two countries: Germany and Austria. We argue that given the
deep-rooted, widespread antisemitic attitudes prevalent in both countries—in spite of
their miniscule Jewish populations—it would be prudent for organizations and the people
who work in them to be aware of and concerned with antisemitism. We offer two theoretical
lenses explicating the underlying motivation for antisemitic conduct-primed goal pursuits
(Goal Setting Theory) and mortality salience instigation and/or perceived violation of key
worldview precepts (Terror Management Theory). These theories provide the dynamic element for our model on its four currents: Jewish “presence” (real and imaginary), implicit
discrimination, Jewish identity, and grassroots cultural antisemitism. Highlighting selective
issues of relevance to organizations and management, we end with suggestions for a research agenda
On the significance of borders: the emergence of endogenous dynamics
Full text linkWe propose a prototype model of market dynamics in which all functional relationships are linear. We take into account three borders, defined by linear functions, that are intrinsic to the economic reasoning: non-negativity of prices; downward rigidity of capacity (depreciation); and a capacity constraint for the production decision. Given the linear specification, the borders are the only source for the emerging of cyclical and more complex dynamics. In particular, we discuss centre bifurcations, border collision bifurcations and degenerate flip bifurcations—dynamic phenomena the occurrence of which are intimately related to the existence of borders