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The globalisation of supply chains has contributed to modern slavery by degrading labour standards and work practices. The inherent difficulties involved in monitoring extremely fragmented production processes also render workers in and from developing countries vulnerable to labour exploitation. This research adopts a benchmark methodology that will help examine the inherent modern slavery challenges.

This study examines how the benchmark model, including governance, risk assessment, purchasing practice, recruitment and remedy of victims, addresses supply chain modern slavery challenges. The proposed hypotheses are tested based on the reoccurring issues of modern slavery in global supply chains.

Estimations suggest that modern slavery is a growing and increasingly prominent international problem, indicating that it is the second largest and fastest growing criminal enterprise worldwide except for narcotics trafficking. These social issues in global supply chains have drawn attention to the importance of verifying, monitoring and mapping supply chains, especially in lengthy and complex supply chains. However, the advent of digital technologies and benchmarking methodologies has become one of the existing key performance indicators (KPIs) for measuring the effectiveness of modern slavery initiatives in supply chains.

This review provides an understanding of the current situation of global supply chains concerning the growing social issue of modern slavery. However, this includes various individual specialities relating to global supply chains, modern slavery, socially sustainable supply chain management (SCM), logistic social responsibility, corporate social responsibility and digitalisation. Furthermore, the review provided important implications for researchers examining the activities on benchmarking the effectiveness of the existing initiatives to prevent modern slavery in the supply chains.

The International Labour Organization (ILO) has emphasized advancing decent employment in global supply chains. Supply chains (SC) are responsible for the growth of any economy and are positively correlated with job creation. However, studies show that decent working conditions are becoming a major concern. Hence, this study is a modest attempt to examine the shortcomings that result in a lack of decent working conditions in global SCs' and further discuss what kind of guidelines, programs, policies, initiatives or principles are necessary to stimulate decent jobs and/or make it easier to enhance decent working conditions in SC.

The present paper first applied the systematic literature review and second used the TCM (Theory-Context-Methods), which is a framework-based review, further reporting the analysis of 59 journal research articles/papers listed in the Scopus database.

The most commonly used theories in the selected studies are institutional theory. As per these theories, governance, rules and regulations play a crucial role in stopping forced labour, child labour practices and social injustice among workers. The findings of this study comply with SDG eight, which states the significance of decent working conditions. Further, the topic modeling reveals four themes: (1) Nature of working conditions (2) Corporate legitimacy (3) Corporate governance mechanisms and (4) Corporate social responsibility, sustainability and ethics in firms. Lastly, we proposed a research framework that shows all the leading factors that influence working conditions in the supply chain.

Managers must focus on integrating decent working conditions in SC activities in their respective organizations and factories. Managers must realize and shoulder this responsibility with other top officials in the organization that improving the SC working conditions is the need of the hour. Consultation with Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) five (gender equality) (emphasize gender equality); and SDG eight (decent work and economic growth) (promote sustainable economic growth) is also recommended for managers. Lastly, managers need to develop suitable strategies keeping in mind the interplay between the leading factors (such as top management support, organizational culture, SA 8000 certification, occupational health and safety, stop forced labour and child labour practices, ethics training, enforce modern slavery act, global compliance regimes, buyer-supplier joint auditing, social responsible sourcing, stoppage of unauthorized sub-contracting, maintain SC transparency and CSR disclosure).

Using systematic literature review and TCM approach has provided some good takeaway points for managers. The study provides a valuable framework and fourteen research propositions which can be tested in the future.

COVID-19 has had various effects on women’s labour supply worldwide. This study investigates how women’s labour market outcomes in the MENA region have been affected by the stringency of governments’ COVID-19 responses and school closures. We examine whether women, particularly those with children at young age, reduced their labour supply to take care of their families during the pandemic.

To investigate whether having a family results in an extra penalty to women’s labour market outcomes, we compare single women to married women and mothers. Using the ERF COVID-19 MENA Monitor Household Surveys, we analyse the key conditions underlying women’s labour market outcomes: (1) wage earnings and labour market status including remaining formally employed, informally, unpaid or self-employed, unemployed or out of the labour force and (2) becoming permanently terminated, being suspended, seeing a reduction in the hours worked or wages, or seeing a delay in one’s wage payments because of COVID-19. Ordered probit and multinomial logit are employed in the case of categorical outcomes, and linear models for wage earnings.

Women, regardless of whether they have children or not, appear to join the labour market out of necessity to help their families in the times of crisis. Child-caring women who are economically inactive are also more likely to enter the labour market. There is little difference between the negative experiences of women with children and child-free women in regard to their monthly pay reduction or delay, or contract termination, but women with children were more likely to experience reduction in hours worked throughout the pandemic.

These findings may not have causal interpretation facilitating accurate inference. This is because of potential omitted variables such as endogenous motivation of women in different circumstances, latent changes in the division of domestic work between care-giving and other household members, or selective sample attrition.

Our analysis explores the multiple channels in which the pandemic has affected the labour outcomes of MENA-region women. Our findings highlight the challenges that hamper the labour market participation of women, and suggest that public policy should strive to balance the share of unpaid care work between men and women and increase men’s involvement, through measures that support child-bearing age women’s engagement in the private sector during crises, invest in childcare services and support decent job creation for all.

This paper is a dedication to Professor Ngo Van Long who introduced the idea of Kant–Nash equilibrium. The author extends this analysis to the study of adult and child labor markets.

This is a game theoretic analysis of the market for adult and child workers when some firms behave in the neoclassical Nashian way and some firms follow a Kantian social norm.

The presence of Kantian firms in the output market in addition to Nashian lowers industry output and labor demand. This raises the possibility that Kantian behavior in the output market could lower wages sufficiently and increase the incidence of child labor. If firms engage in Kantian behavior in the labor market by not hiring child workers, adult wage rises but could lower child wage as children if they work can only work for Nashian firms. When labor demand is sufficiently high, more Kantians could raise adult wage above subsistence and eliminate child labor supply.

This is the first paper to apply Kant–Nash equilibrium to the labor market. The result that Kantian behavior could have an unintended negative spillover effect in other markets is new. The paper keeps alive the ideas of Professor Long, which hopefully will stimulate further work and build on his ideas.

This study is to examine and develop sector skills strategies and action plans for the textile and apparel (T&A) sector.

The paper used a participatory action qualitative method anchored on the Skills for Trade and Economic Diversification (STED) framework, utilising the workshop-based approach with 24 key stakeholders of the sector. Content analysis was used with the help of Nvivo software.

The findings revealed that there are skills shortages, skills gaps, skills mismatches and skills diversification programmes available through higher education and work-based learning. Further, there are labour supply challenges such as national skills policy and strategy, government and stakeholder coordination, funding, relevance of curriculum and qualifications, access to practicals and the absence of a clear national vision for the sector.

This study possesses an inherent limitation in terms of generalising the findings derived from qualitative research.

This research is among the first of its kind to assess skills needs and gaps through the lens of STED framework, which has been overlooked in previous literature. Importantly, this study provides vocational insights into skill needs in the sector.

This paper seeks to explore the sensitivity of these parameters and their impact on fiscal policy outcomes. We use the existing literature to establish possible ranges for each parameter, and we examine how changes within these ranges can alter the outcomes of fiscal policy. In this way, we aim to highlight the importance of these parameters in the formulation and evaluation of fiscal policy.

The role of fiscal policy, its effects and multipliers continues to be a subject of intense debate in macroeconomics. Despite adopting a New Keynesian approach within a macroeconomic model, the reactions of macroeconomic variables to fiscal shocks can vary across different contexts and theoretical frameworks. This paper aims to investigate these diverse reactions by conducting a sensitivity analysis of parameters. Specifically, the study examines how key variables respond to fiscal shocks under different parameter settings. By analyzing the behavioral dynamics of these variables, this research contributes to the ongoing discussion on fiscal policy. The findings offer valuable insights to enrich the understanding of the complex relationship between fiscal shocks and macroeconomic outcomes, thus facilitating informed policy debates.

This paper aims to investigate key elements of New Keynesian Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium (DSGE) models. The focus is on the calibration of parameters and their impact on macroeconomic variables, such as output and inflation. The study also examines how different parameter settings affect the response of monetary policy to fiscal measures. In conclusion, this study has relied on theoretical exploration and a comprehensive review of existing literature. The parameters and their relationships have been analyzed within a robust theoretical framework, offering valuable insights for further research on how these factors influence model forecasts and inform policy recommendations derived from New Keynesian DSGE models. Moving forward, it is recommended that future work includes empirical analyses to test the reliability and effectiveness of parameter calibrations in real-world conditions. This will contribute to enhancing the accuracy and relevance of DSGE models for economic policy decision-making.

This study is motivated by the aim to provide a deeper understanding of the roles macroeconomic model parameters play concerning responses to expansionary fiscal policies and the subsequent reactions of monetary authorities. Comprehensive reviews that encompass this breadth of relationships within a single text are rare in the literature, making this work a valuable contribution to stimulating discussions on macroeconomic policies.

This study aims to explain the effect of research and development (R&D) incentives on economic growth, focusing on the case of Türkiye. A one-sector endogenous growth model has been constructed. The model includes three actors: firm, consumer and government. The consumer derives utility from consumption, supplies human capital and engages in saving. The representative firm invests in R&D to maximize the current value of profit flows by choosing how much input it will use and how much R&D it will undertake. The public sector provides incentives for labor and capital used in R&D production. R&D has been defined as a function that endogenously increases total factor productivity (TFP).

In line with the stated purpose, this study presents a dynamic general equilibrium model. Then, this study calibrates the model parameters with Türkiye's data.

The results imply that incentives for R&D personnel instead of physical capital have a stronger impact on economic growth.

The findings of this study point to an important conclusion on how to distribute R&D incentives across the two main factors in R&D production, labor and capital. Incentives given to R&D personnel are more effective in Türkiye.

This study shows that the R&D incentives provided by the public sector can be important in emerging countries where many firms have just started their R&D activities. In this study, the authors worked on Türkiye as an emerging country. This study discusses policies on how the R&D incentives will be more effective on economic growth in Türkiye. This study considers that these policies may apply to all emerging countries, due to similar R&D activities in countries that cannot export technology and mostly import technology.

本研究擬以土耳其的實例為焦點, 探討研究與開發 (研發) 的激勵如何影響經濟的增長;具體地說, 研究旨在探討透過不同生產要素所提供的研發激勵所產生的影響存在著什麼差異。

為達研究目的, 研究人員構建了一部門內生增長模型。模型內有三個參與者: 公司、消費者和政府。消費者從消費中得到他們所需要的, 提供人力資本, 並參與儲蓄的活動。為了要把利潤的現值儘量提高, 代表公司透過調控投入的數量和研發的承擔, 投資在研發上。公共部門會為研發生產上使用的勞工和資本提供激勵。研究與開發被解釋為一個以內生方式增加全要素生產率的功能。構建的模型是因應土耳其的經濟狀況而調整出來的, 當中也進行了仿真模擬。

研究結果暗示, 為研發人員提供的激勵, 而不是物質資本, 更能推動經濟增長。

研究結果, 就如何於研發生產的兩個主要因素之間, 即勞工與資本之間, 分配研發激勵的問題上, 提供了重要的結論;就土耳其而言, 分配給研發人員的激勵是更為有效的。

我們展示了在新興國家裏, 公共部門提供的研發激勵是重要的, 而在這些國家裏, 剛開始進行研發活動的公司為數不少。在本研究裏, 我們把土耳其當作新興國家看待。我們討論了若要在土耳其使研發激勵更有效地幫助推動經濟增長, 什麼政策是最合適的呢? 因為那些不能把技術出口到其它地方, 而主要靠引進技術的國家均進行相似的研發活動, 所以我們認為討論得來的政策是可應用於所有新興國家的。

On the basis of labor economics theories, this study examines how adjustment in human capital accounts for labor cost stickiness.

This study makes use of employee education level as a measure of the quality of human capital and relies on data from Chinese public firms to conduct the empirical test. This study focuses on two important components of labor cost changes: one corresponding to the adjustment in the number of employees (capacity adjustment) and another corresponding to the adjustment in the mix of employee education levels (quality adjustment).

This study reveals that labor cost changes driven by the adjustment of employee education level are sticky. This stickiness cannot be explained by the standard adjustment cost theory. This further shows that firms that actively adjust their employee quality during downturns experience improved future performance. The findings are robust to alternative measures and specifications.

This study provides new evidence for and insights into the cost behavior literature. Previous studies treat input resources in a homogenous way and focus on the effect of capacity adjustment. This study considers the heterogeneity of resources and examines three dimensions of salary cost adjustment: capacity, structure, and unit cost. In line with the economic theory of sticky costs proposed by Banker et al. (2013a), the study’s evidence sheds light on the additional underlying economic mechanisms driving cost stickiness behavior. Specifically, managers asymmetrically adjust both employee structure and average salaries, in addition to employee number. This study also adds to the existing knowledge of the consequences of managers' actions regarding cost behavior.

The main aim of this paper is to establish a reasonable and scientific evaluation index system to assess the high quality and full employment (HQaFE).

This paper uses a novel Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) multi-criteria framework to evaluate the quality and quantity of employment, wherein the integrated weights of attributes are determined by the combined the Criteria Importance Through Inter-criteria Correlation (CRITIC) and entropy approaches.

Firstly, the gap in the Yangtze River Delta in employment quality is narrowing year by year; secondly, employment skills as well as employment supply and demand are the primary indicators that determine the HQaFE; finally, the evaluation scores are clearly hierarchical, in the order of Shanghai, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Anhui.

A scientific and reasonable evaluation index system is constructed. A novel CRITIC-entropy-TOPSIS evaluation is proposed to make the results more objective. Some policy recommendations that can promote the achievement of HQaFE are proposed.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how three core elements of critical management studies (CMSs), “de-naturalisation”, “reflexivity” and “(non)-performative intent”, can help expand the current debate in the supply chain management (SCM) field.

The authors used a systematic literature review to select 103 articles published in 12 high-ranking journals in the SCM field based on the Academic Journal Guide of the Chartered Association of Business Schools.

The findings of this study suggest that SCM studies can be narrowed down into four major CMSs themes: “power”, “ethics and environmental issues”, “diversity” and “working conditions”, but even these themes are still under-discussed and undertheorized in SCM. The literature the authors reviewed is more concerned with explaining these phenomena than questioning them and proposing new agendas. This paper, therefore, will discuss how these three core elements of CMS can help transform the “hidden” issues of SCM, which it will do by illustrating it in the context of buyer–supplier relationships and lean manufacturing.

This research will encourage SCM scholars who are interested in conducting more critical studies and teaching the harmful effects of global supply chains.

This paper highlights that a combination of SCM and CMS approaches is important when we decide to adopt a more critical “constructive” view of supply chain challenges and engage practical and critical views, respectively, to generate knowledge that not only increases (corporate) performance but also highlights social needs and values.