Working Papers

Foreign direct investment has been important in the economic growth and global economic integration of developing countries over the last decades. Both Northeast and Southeast Asia, especially the lat…

This paper builds a theory of the shape of the distribution of total-factor productivity (TFP) across countries. The data on productivity suggests vast differences across countries, and arguably even…

The objective of this paper is twofold. First, against the background of existing empirical literature on the duration of trade which has found that international trade is often of strikingly short du…

A main component of custom unions is a common trade policy on imports from non-member countries. Trade policy covers both tariff and non-tariff barriers like trade procedures. We argue that since trad…

In this chapter we examine the role of the CFO in setting risk management strategy with respect to macroeconomic risk in particular, and we consider the information requirements for setting a strategy…

How should the world economy adapt to the increased demand for exhaustible resources from countries like China and India? To address that issue, this paper presents a dynamic model of the world econom…

A strategically minded CFO will realize that strategic corporate risk management is about finding the right balance between risk prevention and proactive value generation. Efficient risk and performan…

Incentive effects of performance-based compensation schemes for management may be weakened or biased by macroeconomic influences on remuneration. These influences can be seen as reflecting luck from t…

The tax laws of most developed countries are debt biased since firms can deduct interest on debt but not on equity. This bias is known to distort investment decisions. However, less is known about how…

North Korea is perceived by many as one of the most totalitarian societies of modern time. But in the wake of the economic collapse of the 1990s, North Korean totalitarianism has grappled with new con…

This paper uses affiliate level data from Swedish multinationals to examine the impact of tax treaties on both overall affiliate sales and the composition of those sales. In line with previous results…

In this paper, I investigate whether instead of strengthening home-based production, government R&D-subsidies can induce R&D-intensive firms to locate production abroad. Investigating firm-lev…

Many developing countries would like to increase the share of modern or formal sectors in their employment. One way to accomplish this goal may be to encourage the entrance of foreign firms. They are…

The recent literature on the duration of trade has predominantly analyzed the determinants of trade flow durations using Cox proportional hazards models. The purpose of this paper is to show why it is…

The literature on trade facilitation has mostly focused on implications for trade volumes. However, recent theoretical contributions have emphasized that trade costs – such as transaction costs relate…

This study compares average earnings and productivities for men and women employed in roughly 200,000 Chinese industrial enterprises. Women’s average wages lag behind men’s wages by 11%, and this resu…

This study examines how globalization of corporate governance practices influences the risk of European CEOs being dismissed. We argue that the harsh monitoring of the American corporate governance sy…

Private equity firms are an important part of the industrial restructuring process. We argue that the key is temporary ownership. Buying to sell induces aggressive restructuring since the equilibrium…

Political and legal institutions affect the extent to which the real exchange rates of oil-exporting countries co-move with the oil price. In a simple theoretical model, strong institutions insulate r…

We combine two empirical observations in a general equilibrium occupational choice model. The first is that entrepreneurs have more control than employees over the employment of and accruals from asse…

We develop a theory of commercialization mode (entry or sale) of entrepreneurial inventions into oligopoly, and show that an invention of higher quality is more likely to be sold (or licensed) to an i…

Since July 2007 the world economy has experienced a severe financial crisis originating in the U.S. housing market. The crisis has subsequently spread to the financial sectors in European and Asian ec…

The paper estimates the causal effect of trade liberalisation on aggregate productivity through mechanisms related to firm selection. The construction of a bridge in 2000 across the Öresund Strait lin…

This paper discusses allocation of burden of proof in environmental disputes in the WTO system. Besides laying down the natural principles that (i) the complainant carries the burden to (ii) make a pr…

This paper examines the role of the burden of proof (BoP) in National Treatment (NT) disputes under trade agreements. In the situation under study, imports may cause environmental damage, in which cas…

We construct a model where incumbents can either acquire basic innovations from entrepreneurs, or wait and acquire developed innovations from entrepreneurial firms supported by venture capitalists. We…

We use Swedish matched employer-employee data to analyze the impact of multinational activity and foreign acquisitions on the relative demand for different job tasks. We contribute to the literature b…

Traditional methods for evaluating corporate credit risk rarely consider the impact of the macro economy on corporate value and performance. We argue that lenders and management can obtain valuable in…

We propose a model of investments prior to corporate ownership changes. We derive conditions under which the selling of a firm triggers overinvestment by both the seller and the buyer prior to the ass…

In this paper we construct a model in which entrepreneurial innovations are sold into oligopolistic industries and where adverse selection problems between entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and incum…