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Recent studies have shown that the contribution of small firms to employment and GDP is increasing. A large amount of work has also established the significance of social and economic variables for entrepreneurial decisions. Very little is known, however, about how government policies and programs influence entrepreneurial activity, and whether these effects are consistent across countries. Using original data from a representative sample of 10,000 individuals and from more than 300 open-ended interviews in 10 countries, this article provides some suggestive evidence that government intervention aimed at enhancing the underlying environment of entrepreneurial decisions may be more effective than intervention designed to provide safety nets.

The purpose of this paper is to examine whether cross-country differences in pensionable age explain such differences in economic activity of people at near-retirement age.

The empirical study uses regression models for macro-panel encompassing 21 European countries in the period 2008–2014.

Empirical results indicate that pensionable age is a determinant of cross-country differences in employment rate in the near-retirement age group, and less a factor differentiating average effective retirement age. It turns out that other factors matter, including salaries and wages as percentage of GDP (treated as a proxy for the occupational composition of populations across the countries studied), self-employment, participation in education and training, or self-perceived health.

The problem of economic activity at the near-retirement age is complex and cannot be limited to legal regulations concerning pensionable age. The policy aiming at stimulating the economic activity of the near-elderly should include actions on many sides including labour market, pension system, education, training, or health care.

The results complement studies based on the single-country approach and demonstrate that pensionable age does not account for cross-country differences in terms of average effective age of retirement when controlling for other factors. Moreover, factors differentiating effective retirement age and employments rates across countries studied are not similar.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of cross-country characteristics on acquirers' target status choice in cross-border mergers and acquisitions across 41 emerging markets.

The paper first reviews the existing literature and develops the related hypotheses, in conjunction with the objectives of this paper. We then describe the data employed, variable measurement and examine the effects of cross-country characteristics on the acquirers' target status choice in cross-border mergers and acquisitions while controlling for firm-level and deal-specific characteristics. The paper continues to conduct the robustness check on cross-country determinants of target status choices using the difference independent variables rather than target country-level variables only.

This research found that the likelihood of a public firm acquired relative to private one is higher if the target firm is located in countries with stronger government quality, weaker economic freedom, better financial market development and lower cultural distance between the host and home countries. The results suggest that bidders actively assess cross-country characteristics as part of their acquisition planning.

Rather than commonly analysed determinants in the previous research such as firm- and deal-specific attributes, value creation and shareholder protection, this paper indicates that institutional environments and economic conditions are closely associated with acquisition risks and benefits and have direct influences on bidder firms' acquisition bidding planning and target choice decision-making.

National cultures significantly explain cross-country differences in the relation between asset growth and stock returns. Motivated by the notion that managers in individualistic and low uncertainty-avoiding cultures have a higher tendency to overinvest, this study aims to show that the negative relation between asset growth and stock returns is stronger in countries with such cultural features. Once the researchers control for cultural dimensions, proxies associated with the q-theory, limits-to-arbitrage, corporate governance, investor protection and accounting quality provide no incremental power for the relation between asset growth and stock returns across countries. Evidence of this study highlights the importance of the overinvestment hypothesis in explaining the asset growth anomaly around the world.

This study aims to investigate the dynamic interconnectedness of economic policy uncertainty (EPU), fiscal policy uncertainty (FPU) and monetary policy uncertainty (MPU) in four nations, the USA, Japan, Greece and South Korea, between 1998 and 2021.

To comprehend the cross-category/cross-country evolution of uncertainty connectedness, the authors use the conditional connectedness approach. By using an inclusive network, this strategy lessens the bias caused by omitted variables. The TVP-VAR method is advantageous as it eliminates outliers that may potentially skew the results and reduces the bias caused by picking arbitrary rolling windows.

Based on the findings, aggregate EPU is a net transmitter of policy uncertainties across all countries when conditional-country connectedness is used. MPU receives significantly more spillovers than FPU does across all countries, even though both are primarily recipients of uncertainties. The USA appears to be a transmitter of categorical spillovers before COVID-19, while Greece appears to be a net receiver of all category spillovers in terms of category-specific connectedness. The existence of extreme global events is also seen to cause an increase in category-specific and country-specific connectedness. Additionally, the authors report that conditional country-specific connectedness is greater than conditional category-specific connectedness.

This study expands existing literature in several ways. Firstly, the authors use a novel conditional connectedness approach, which has not been used to untangle cross-category/cross-country policy uncertainty connectedness. Secondly, they use the TVP-VAR approach which does not depend on rolling windows to understand dynamic connectedness. Thirdly, they use an expanded number of countries in their analysis, a departure from existing studies that have in most cases used two countries to understand categorical EPU connectedness.

This paper seeks to determine whether family ties and structure correlate with the ethical and moral values that are important underpinnings of economic activities.

The analysis uses data from the World Values Survey (WVS). Given the multilevel nature of the data in a cross-country setting, the paper utilizes a multilevel linear mixed-effects model with maximum likelihood estimation.

Families with strong ties and those with traditional family structures are less tolerant of unethical conduct and have more restrictive moral values than households where ties are weak and the household is not married. There also appears to be a bi-causal relationship in the data.

This paper considers a broad array of values in a cross-country setting and utilizes a multilevel modeling approach that has not been done in studies linking both family ties and structure.

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/IJSE-12-2021-0730.

Due to the young age of proptech, little is known about the dynamics of its expansion. In particular, there is limited agreement about a definition of “proptech,” while different categorizations are popping up. A severe lack of information emerges for the proptech scenario in Italy. The goal of this paper is to systematize multiple proptech maps in the attempt to create a framework for comparison of country-specific trends and an overarching definition of proptech. The research examines the evolutionary stage of the Italian digital real estate sector and compares it to the international context.

An in-depth analysis of 12 proptech maps at both national and international level was conducted based on online research. A list of Italian proptech companies was composed through multiple methods. A map was built for a cross-country comparison.

Each country or organization tends to develop its own categorization. This creates a multifaceted context where comparison and analysis are challenging. The Italian proptech sector seems underdeveloped compared to neighboring countries. Big room for improving the proptech business in this country still exists.

The results are valuable for proptech start-ups, business investors and well-established real estate actors to build on new entrepreneurial initiatives. The opportunity to advance proptech mapping and categorization emerges as a prospect for future research.

This research adds an overview of cross-country proptech categories and proposes the first analysis of Italian proptech. This will contribute to support entrepreneurial opportunities.

This paper aims to investigate the relation between gender and accounting conservatism in banking industry using cross-countries study.

The study use cross-country data in banking industry. Sample of the study consists of 202 banks from 24 countries in the period 2016–2017.

The result of the study indicates that banks that operate in high masculine society are less conservative than banks that operate in low masculine society (feminine).

This research suggests that investors could consider investing in a country that has low masculinity (feminine) because it is more concerned with the protection of other society members through conservative choice as a protection from misleading decisions made based on too optimistic financial report.

The purpose of this paper is to represent the first empirical attempt to explore global-local consumer identities as drivers of global digital brand usage. Specifically, this study considers a unique category of digital products, social networking sites (SNS), and develops a set of hypotheses to assess the mechanism through which location-based identities influence the actual usage of global SNS (Facebook and Instagram). Moreover, cross-country variations are investigated under the lens of developed vs developing countries.

Cross-country surveys in a developed (Austria) and a developing country (Thailand) were conducted. Data collected from 425 young adults were analyzed using SEM techniques in order to test a set of hypotheses.

Results show that in Thailand, users with a global identity enjoy participating in global SNS more than their counterparts in Austria. In addition, consumers with a local identity in Thailand demonstrate less pleasure when participating in global SNS than their counterparts in Austria, and consequently are less inclined to use global SNS.

Findings provide digital marketers with useful insights into important strategic decisions regarding the selection and potential adaptation of global digital brands according to the country context.

This research is the first to extend the location-based identity research in the context of global digital brands, explain how global-local identities predict SNS usage through an engagement mechanism and investigate cross-country variations of this mechanism.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether religion or national culture can explain previously observed cross-country variation in trade credit.

Using the firm-level SME data from 35 European countries, religion and cultural factors of Hofstede and Schwartz, the authors provide new evidence on the determinants of the cross-country variation in trade credit.

The results indicate that religion and national culture are associated with trade credit. The authors find that the levels of trade credit are higher in Catholic countries than in Protestant ones and that peoples’ religiousness has an impact on trade credit only in Catholic countries. The authors also find that Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, such as power distance and uncertainty avoidance, are positively associated with trade credit.

Overall, authors’ findings indicate that religion and national culture are important determinants of trade credit management, and that the association between commonly used cultural values and trade credit depends on the religious, legal, and financial environment.

To the best of authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to research the relationship between national culture and trade credit.