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The research paper analyzes the connection between financial literacy among several target audiences and the dynamics of domestic economic activity within the Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania). Considerable attention is also paid to literature about financial literacy and domestic economic activity in a historical, crisis-ridden, and neoliberal perspective. By examining the relationship of financial literacy and domestic economic activity, a model based on the results of fuzzy Delphi method and an author-designed limited Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development/International Network on Financial Education core survey was carried out in the Baltic States by the author and has been elaborated and examined, concluding, that the relationship is weak, but trends that have been identified are clearly recognizable throughout iterations.

The lack of promotion and implementation of institutionalized targeted financial literacy activities in the Baltic States partially explains a positive association between financial knowledge and consumption behavior, although survey results show levels of financial literacy above 74% throughout the Baltics. The development and analysis of the model has been successful as well, even though the results are statistically only partially significant. The analysis of the model still is important in illuminating the most important factors that influence domestic economic activity in the Baltic States and the relations with key financial literacy indicators. Overall, the research paper encourages further analysis to be carried out in the Baltic States in order to assess the levels of financial literacy over time, as well as to perform an in-depth domestic economic activity analysis so as to develop a toolset for academics as well as policy makers.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the relationship between access to rural product markets and the extent and nature of child labor. It is built on the view that if physical markets can shape rural development through, for instance, influencing prices, household production decisions, and employment, the associated activity growth could increase child labor.

Using the Uganda National Household Survey, the author combines two methodological approaches: first, a probit model to estimate the probability of a child engaging in labor, and second, a double-hurdle model to analyze the hours of child work.

The author finds that children increase time in domestic work when local product markets are distant, while their time in economic activity declines. A similar pattern is observed for the incidence of child labor. The likelihood of child labor in domestic activity increases for each extra hour of travel to the market, while child labor in economic activity declines. This could reflect the possibility that households may switch child work from market-oriented activities to domestic work when they are remotely located from markets. Results confirm findings from earlier cross-country studies that access to product markets may be detrimental to children. Second, they demonstrate that the effect of the markets varies, depending on the age of children, as well as the nature of the work they engage in.

No part of this work has been published anywhere before.

The goals of the paper are to propose, measure, and empirically test the expectations model of economic nationalism. The model posits that economic nationalism is reflected in people's expectations of their government, domestic firms, and the general public, in terms of restricting the activities of foreign firms.

A confirmatory factor analysis is conducted to test the model, using the LISREL procedure.

Results show acceptable fit for the proposed model. Reliability of each of the three dimensions of economic nationalism is in the acceptable range. A nomological validity test showed that economic nationalism is related to other constructs not included in the model.

A limitation of the model is that it is based on a single sample. Future studies can test the generalizability of model with samples from different countries.

The implication of the study is that increasing globalization might lead to an increase in economic nationalism. Business executives, therefore, need to focus not only on the benefits that they will derive from entering a country, but also the benefits they will deliver to the domestic economy by entering the country.

The paper presents an expectations model of economic nationalism. The model is based on the premise that people's expectations of their government, domestic businesses, and the general public in terms of their role in restricting the activities of foreign firms are reflective of economic nationalism. The more people expect of these three players the more economically nationalistic they will be. The value of the paper is to researchers in international business and global marketing and to business executives involved in managing global operations.

This paper seeks to explore the factors behind the slow growth of economies with abundant oil and gas resources, despite the opportunities these resources potentially represent.

The building blocks of standard economic growth models and the implication of natural resource utilisation is the methodological and analytical approach adopted. A qualitative analysis of the impact of oil and gas activities on the growth of the Nigerian economy is carried out using relevant macroeconomic indicators.

The oil and gas sector is imbued with enormous linkage potentials that can stimulate other sectors to generate endogenous growth. Emphasis on the extraction and export of oil and gas subverts technological progress, stifles the revenue earning potential of the economy and stultifies the effectiveness of factors of production, thereby retarding economic growth.

Data on technological input into oil and gas activities could not be obtained, but the changing pattern of productive capacity, especially in the downstream sub‐sector, is used as a measure of technological change.

Oil‐ and gas‐abundant economies can exploit potential comparative advantage by creating favourable conditions in value‐adding oil and gas activities. Through spill‐over effects a wide range of economic activities evolves, with concomitant market expansions. Positive externalities for learning‐by‐doing arising from this process can lead to endogenous technological progress to drive sustainable economic growth.

The findings show that rather than reliance on foreign exchange revenues from oil and gas, creating the appropriate conditions for the effective domestic utilisation of oil and gas resources to bolster inter‐sectoral linkages is a more virile strategy for oil‐and‐gas driven economic growth.

The authors propose a strategic-balance approach to local content laws in which less developed economies in sub-Sahara Africa can develop investment incentive policies for attracting multinationals and direct foreign investment but, at the same time, have a structured and operational framework for the enforcement of local content laws. The purpose of the paper is to identify the elements involved in the equation: the incentives, the potential spillovers and the criteria for evaluation.

The approach involves a review of the literature and the operational details and limitations of local content laws in sub-Sahara Africa.

The paper develops a conceptual model for a holistic understanding and management of this dilemma by policymakers and development practitioners to maximize the benefits of natural resources to less developed countries in sub-Sahara Africa towards the fight against poverty and underdevelopment.

This paper provides the opportunity to influence policy direction in relation to the adoption of investment incentive policies and programs and the enforcement of local content policy guidelines and regulations in sub-Sahara Africa.

Multinational companies (MNCs) operating in less developed and emerging economies in sub-Sahara Africa should consider how their economic and corporate social responsibility activities can help develop the capabilities of the local workforce through training and development activities; develop domestic firms’ capabilities via enterprise development programs; and develop local firm’s absorptive capacities through knowledge transfers and innovation systems to support development activities.

Policymakers in less developed and emerging economies in sub-Sahara Africa need to strike a balance in adopting investment incentives policies towards attracting foreign investments and the enforcement of local content regulations to make sure they derive the maximum benefits from their strategic resources. It is important for policymakers to understand that the mere attraction of MNCs into an economy does not explicitly guarantee domestic job creation; rather, it depends on how MNCs respond to local content policy regulations through their business strategies. Linking investment incentives with local content policy regulations at a critical point could potentially support and strengthen industrial development in sub-Sahara Africa.

This paper is among the first to examine the challenges of both attracting foreign direct investment and enforcing local content laws and regulations in sub-Sahara Africa. This paper contributes to the understanding of this dilemma and how less developed economies can manage such a crucial and important issue using our proposed strategic-balance approach. The contribution of local content laws and the design and adoption of investment incentives policies and programs to attract foreign investment to promoting sustainable domestic growth and development must depend on the balance between the enforcement of local content policy guidelines and the provision of such investment incentive packages to attracting foreign investment.

The authors empirically aim to study the implications of uncertainty generated by oil price volatility on some key macroeconomic variables, including production, exchange rates and interest rates, of both oil-exporting and oil-importing countries. Using a block exogeneity structural Vector Auto Regression (VAR) model that mutes the effects of domestic variables on global factors and that is suitable for small open economies because of significant differences in the responses of domestic production in oil-importing countries will most likely decrease through reducing planning horizons, postponing investment projects and relocating resources more inefficiently.

The authors integrated into the structural vector autoregressive (SVAR) model the block exogeneity feature since all the countries in this study are small open economies that cannot influence the global economic variables. The block exogeneity feature imposes the restriction that the domestic variables have neither a contemporaneous nor a lagged impact on the global variables. This model has eight variables: oil price volatility, world demand and federal funds rate as the global variables; and domestic production, monetary aggregate, inflation rate, exchange rate and interest rate as domestic variables. The authors assemble the data for 12 developing countries for which the necessary data for the analysis are available: six oil exporting countries (Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Mexico and Colombia) and six oil importing countries (Turkey, India, Philippines, Poland, South Africa and Indonesia).

The results point out significant differences in the responses of macroeconomic variables to oil price volatility shocks between oil-exporting and oil-importing countries. Furthermore, the local currencies of these countries depreciate due to concerns about possible current account worsening. In response to the shock, domestic interest rates are reduced so as to alleviate the negative exposure of the shock on domestic economic activity. While domestic production in some oil-exporting countries (i.e. Russia, Saudi Arabia and Iran) increases during oil price uncertainty; in some other countries (i.e. Mexico, Kazakhstan and Colombia), domestic production decreases.

Several components of the study contribute to its novelty. One of them is the period under consideration. The time frame that encompasses the most significant geopolitical and financial events, such as the Middle East Spring and the global financial crisis of 2007–2008. The research was conducted using the block-exogeneity SVAR model, which includes 12 oil exporting and importing developing countries. With this model, the global dynamics, particularly the energy market, that these nations may influence and are influenced by, i.e. global and nonglobal factors can be constrained. This makes it easy to determine the various effects prices have on macroeconomic variables.

1. Oil prices and volatility still matter to the global economy

2. Monetary and fiscal policy interventions in response to oil price volatility create uncertainty and impede investment activity

3. The response of macroeconomic variables to volatility shocks in oil prices varies across oil importers and exporters

4. Interest rates help stabilize production in oil-importing economies that have well-functioning financial markets

Oil prices and volatility still matter to the global economy

Monetary and fiscal policy interventions in response to oil price volatility create uncertainty and impede investment activity

The response of macroeconomic variables to volatility shocks in oil prices varies across oil importers and exporters

Interest rates help stabilize production in oil-importing economies that have well-functioning financial markets

This study aims to explore potential paradigm shift in how “global economies” react to adverse macroeconomic conditions from key dominant economies such as the US and the Chinese economies. This is done by examining how economic activities within key economies around the world react to, or are impacted by, modeled adverse macroeconomic condition emanating from the Chinese and the US economies.

To verify potential paradigm shift in how external macroeconomic uncertainty impacts “global” industrial productivity and overall gross domestic product (GDP) growth within selected economies, this study opts for seemingly unrelated regression (SUR) model. Adoption of this method has been influenced by the potential for correlated error terms between modeled adverse macroeconomic condition, industrial productivity and GDP growth variables being tested in a two-equation system.

Empirical results based on SUR analysis find no evidence of this potential paradigm shift within the time frame examined in the study. Estimated results suggest that notwithstanding the recent growth surge of the Chinese economy, macroeconomic happenings within the US economy still exert significantly more influence on key economies around the world. For instance, this study finds that macroeconomic uncertainty associated with the US economy significantly constrains both industrial productivity and overall GDP growth within most of the economies tested, whereas the same condition emanating from the Chinese economy seems to rather have a weak positive impact on the same macroeconomic variables.

Research results are strictly limited to the focus time frame for this study; it is likely that expanded data involving more years beyond what was analyzed in this study could yield different results.

This study is an original research based on data from a reputable US federal institution.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of outward foreign direct investment (FDI) on economic growth.

Two econometric approaches are used: cross‐country regressions for a sample of 50 countries and time‐series estimators for the USA.

Both approaches tell the same story: outward FDI is positively associated with growth. This finding is robust to several model specifications, potential outliers, and different estimation techniques. In addition, Granger‐causality tests for the USA indicate that causality is bidirectional, suggesting that increased outward FDI is both a cause and a consequence of increased domestic output.

Previous studies have primarily examined the firm‐ and industry‐level effects of outward FDI – for example, on domestic investment, employment, and productivity. This paper, in contrast, deals with the effects of aggregate outward FDI on the economy as a whole.

We develop a model that characterizes all possible allocations of children's time between work and school, analyzing the relationship between market work, household chores, and Brazilian children's school enrollment. If pure market work is analyzed, we find that girls are less likely to work and more likely to exclusively attend relative to boys with similar characteristics. If the definition of work includes household chores, girls are less likely to be exclusively in school and more likely to work compared to boys. The results reveal that girls disproportionately carry out domestic responsibilities, which could hinder their school achievements. Furthermore, family structures with fewer preschool-aged siblings and with more adults present alleviate the pressure to displace girls’ time away from school and toward domestic activities.