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There are variations in religious social norms and legal environments around the world. In this paper, we aim to examine the interaction between variations in religious social norms and legal environments on real activities manipulations and expense misclassification using a global sample of 63 countries. Our inquiry is motivated by a paucity of research on the interaction between legal environment and religion on earnings management practices in an international setting.

This study draws on a global sample of 63 countries to examine the effect of variations in religious social norms and legal environments on the trade-off between expense misclassification and real activities earnings management practices. Firm-specific financial data come from Global Compustat. Religion data are obtained from World Values Surveys of the World Bank. We obtain legal environment scores from the International Country Risk Guide.

Findings suggest that the interaction between law and religion serves as constraints on both classification shifting and real activities manipulation around the world. We find that religion strengthens the weak legal environment and the strong legal environment strengthens the weak religious environment to decrease both real activities manipulation and classification shifting when law and religion interact in an international setting. Therefore, our results contradict Zang's (2012) earnings management trade-off evidence. Again, our results contradict Malikov et al.’s (2018) evidence that mandatory International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) adoption is associated with increased real activities manipulation.

The study is limited to 63 countries limiting the generalizability of the findings.

This study provides novel evidence and shows that there is a link between law and religion. The interaction between law and religion decreases expense misclassification and real activities manipulation. We contribute that the interaction between religion and law benefits firms and increases shareholder value as real activities manipulation decreases. Therefore, strengthening the legal environment will complement religion, IFRS and other monitoring mechanisms put in place to mitigate unethical expense misclassification and real activities earnings manipulation around the world.

The aim of this paper is to shed more light on the foreign direct investment (FDI) - income inequality nexus in the post-communist EU countries. Special attention is paid to the emergence of a new meritocratic elite related to foreign capital that tends to replace the old elite inherited from the transition period at the top end of the income distribution.

The macroeconomic model of the relationship between income inequality and FDI is estimated by using the generalized method of moments (GMM) technique. The sample includes 10 post-communist EU member states during the period 1993 to 2020.

The results suggest that the concentration of the highest level of human capital in foreign-owned enterprises, in the institutional environment under which foreign-owned enterprises are less numerous and pay a higher wage than domestic ones, contributes to the change of the effect of FDI and human capital on income distribution from an initial decrease to a later increase in income inequality.

This paper adds to the existing literature by exploring the distributive impacts of sectoral reallocation of FDI inflows from manufacturing to service sectors from the perspective of heterodox economics. It specifically examines how this shift has facilitated the emergence of a new meritocratic elite associated with foreign capital, which in turn diminishes the overall anti-inequality effect of FDI in the post-communist new EU countries.

This study proposed a theoretical framework to illustrate how governance can be instrumental in preventing the proliferation of HIV. It decomposed governance into six multidimensional facets and empirically examined their effects on HIV prevalence.

The study utilized panel data from 45 sub-Saharan African countries from 1996 to 2019. HIV prevalence, the dependent variable, was estimated based on the number of adults aged 15–49 years infected with HIV, irrespective of the progression to AIDS symptoms. The independent variables included governance and its six dimensions: voice and accountability, political stability, government effectiveness, regulatory quality, rule of law, and control of corruption. The analysis incorporated the random and fixed effects models while controlling for economic development, economic inequality, foreign aid, sanitation, and population.

The findings revealed a significant association between good governance and lower HIV prevalence. Improved governance quality in sub-Saharan African countries has led to a reduction in HIV prevalence among adults. Specifically, governance dimensions, such as voice and accountability, political stability, rule of law, and control of corruption, contributed to reducing HIV prevalence. Conversely, government effectiveness and regulatory quality did not show significant impacts on HIV prevalence.

This study underscores the significant role of good governance in effectively curbing the spread of epidemic diseases, highlighting its importance in controlling HIV in sub-Saharan African countries.