Journal of Business Economics and Management

Business education, innovation skills as predictors of entrepreneurial self-efficacy in university students

Marbelith Laydes — 2024-08-08

Considering the importance of entrepreneurship education in the social and economic sphere, the objective of this study was to examine how entrepreneurship education influences the development of innovative skills and entrepreneurial confidence of university students. To do this, it was necessary to adopt a quantitative methodological perspective to understand the relationship between the study variables. Through the application of confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and the development of the structural equation model (SEM), it was possible to know and confirm the effect and statistical relationship between the variables. The participants of this research were made up of a total of 701 students under quota sampling selection. Entrepreneurship education has been found to significantly influence the promotion of innovative skills and the development of entrepreneurial self-efficacy. Furthermore, the study reveals that the acquisition of innovation competencies is a prerequisite for students to perform well in the business environment. These competencies not only enable them to adapt to changing environments but also foster creativity, systems thinking, and effective problem-solving. This study provides empirical evidence that entrepreneurship education is a relevant factor in strengthening and developing students’ innovation competencies and entrepreneurial self-efficacy.

Effectiveness of fiscal policy measures in different public debt regimes

Rodica Gherghina — 2024-08-29

The aim of the research is to illustrate how the degree of effectiveness of fiscal policy measures varies depending on the level of public debt within a group of Central and Eastern European (CEE) states. To this end, a T-SVAR (Threshold Structural Vector Autoregressive) model was implemented, based on two regimes, calibrated as a function of the evolution of public debt. The results illustrate that, in most of the countries analysed, increasing government expenditure generates a stronger increase in economic growth under the low public debt regime in comparison with the situation at the level of the high public debt regime. Thus, the effectiveness of fiscal policy measures declines as the level of government debt rises. Another result obtained within the analysis highlights that the positive effect of public debt reduction on economic growth is more strongly felt in the higher public debt regime than under a low public debt regime. On the basis of these results, it is recommended that the CEE countries continue their efforts to reduce public debt in order to increase the effectiveness of fiscal policy measures.

Microfinance and poverty in Indonesia: the macro impact of people’s credit bank

Munawar Ismail — 2024-08-29

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of people’s credit banks (BPRs), a predominant form of microfinance in Indonesia, in mitigating poverty. Using panel data from 31 provinces in Indonesia, this study employs static panel and panel models with instrument variables. Our findings substantiate that BPR credit significantly contributes to poverty reduction across various indices, including headcount poverty, poverty gap, and poverty severity measures. The empirical results offer valuable insights into the efficacy of targeted microfinance as a potent tool for poverty alleviation in developing economies.

Model of environmental perceptions on value of recyclable products and its effects on consumers behaviour

Viktor Koval — 2024-08-29

The massive consumption of conventional recyclable products causes environmental pollution, so it is very important to raise public awareness about the use of green plastics. This study assessed a comprehensive understanding of the behavioural intention model of green plastic products from the perspective of the new generation. This study uses data collected from 551 new-generation customers of environmentally friendly recyclable plastic products in Indonesia. Data analysis employing partial least squares reveals that the behavioural intention model, including perceived quality, perceived value, trust, and satisfaction as determinants, is a fit across these generation cohorts. Further, this study claims that customer satisfaction is the main driver of behavioural intention, while trust is the main determinant of satisfaction with green plastic products for both generations. Finally, this study shows that millennial satisfaction is driven by perceived value, whereas new-generation satisfaction is determined by perceived quality. The study only considered behavioural intention, including quality, value, trust, and satisfaction as the drivers, meanwhile, other potential factors could influence the intention significantly as well. These findings specifically apply to green plastic products but not to other kinds of green products. In addition, the government can devise better policies supporting green products by offering tax incentives for recyclable products.

How does the digital economy affect corporate business credit supply?

Xiaohui Chen — 2024-09-03

Business credit supply entails a firm providing credit to its customers as a means to gain a competitive edge. The advent of the digital economy has brought about profound changes in business practices. In this context, it becomes crucial to examine how the digital economy impacts the business credit supply of enterprises. This study employs a theoretical framework to derive insights and carries out an empirical analysis using the City Digital Economy Development Index spanning from 2008 to 2021, along with data from A-share listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen. The objective is to explore the influence of the digital economy on corporate business credit supply and its underlying mechanisms. The findings reveal that the digital economy can enhance corporate business credit supply by reducing the incidence of bad debt, thus enabling companies to extend more credit to their customers. This research contributes empirical evidence for understanding the microeconomic impact of the digital economy, while also providing theoretical insights to advance the development of the digital economy and optimize the allocation of financial resources, thereby alleviating corporate financing constraints.

Determinants of bank profitability in Vietnam: a focus on financial and COVID-19 crises

Phan Dinh Nguyen — 2024-09-04

This research examines the determinants of banks’ profit by employing the GLS, GMM and SEM regression method for 574 observations obtaining from 35 banks functioning in Vietnam between 2005 and 2022. Our evidence indicates that non-performing loans, deposit, loan, capital, operating cost, provisions, bank size, Covid-19 pandemic, inflation, economic growth, deposit rate, credit risk, exchange rate and ownership are key factors affecting bank profitability. Our findings show that the global crises are negatively associated with ROA and NIM while they are negatively related to ROE. The COVID-19 has a stronger effect than the financial crisis. Both crises play a moderating role in bank profitability. This research expands the existing literature by analyzing the impact of crises and the moderating effects, crisis comparison, and ownership effect which have not been done so far, to our best knowledge. This research also extends the literature by offering additional understandings about the determinants of bank profitability in emerging economies. Different from the previous studies, our dataset including foreign banks helps us analyze all banks. The investigation of factors affecting profitability also assists banks in regulating and supporting prudential supervisions carefully.

Quantitative study of the causal relationships among the EFQM model 2020 criteria in the Greek public sector context

Dimitra Mitsiou — 2024-09-05

This study aims to apply the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) Model 2020 in the Greek Public Sector context and investigate the causal relationships between the model’s criteria. The research uses a structured questionnaire based on the self-assessment tool and the guidelines on the concept and structure of the EFQM Model 2020, translated from English into Greek using forward-backward translation. Two focus groups and a pilot study were conducted to ensure the validity and reliability of the questionnaire. Subsequently, a large-scale quantitative research was conducted using Partial Least Square Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) to test the research hypotheses on a national sample of 177 managers from public administrative services. The study results indicate that the EFQM Model 2020 is indeed a reliable and valid framework for the study of the public sector and reveal significant relationships between the model’s criteria. The study is one of the first comprehensive investigations of the relationships between the EFQM Model 2020 criteria in Europe and, therefore, provides insights into the understanding of the model. As this research was geographically limited, the findings should be treated and generalised with caution, and further research should be conducted in different contexts.

Determining the criticality profile of manufacturing SMEs under the influence of internal and external factors on performance

Veronica Grosu — 2024-09-05

Recent economic instability has heightened the need for companies to be aware of the threats in their internal and external environments and the impact these have on their performance capacity. Thus, this paper aims to identify the most impactful factors on the performance of small and medium-sized enterprises engaged in manufacturing activities in Romania, by conducting empirical questionnaire-based research, resulting in a database with primary data to be processed. A 5-point Likert scale was used to determine the frequency of occurrence and intensity of impact of the selected factors, the level of criticality of these factors being calculated using the mean value method. The results highlight the prevalence of external factors among the top critical factors, those with the most significant impact on the performance being the high cost of raw materials, lack of professionals and specialists, fluctuations in market demand, fluctuations in government policies and legislative regulations. The usefulness of the results obtained lies in the fact that they create a risk or criticality profile of the analyzed production sector, which makes it possible to address its critical points with the most optimal solutions in the given context, on the part of both management and government, thus ensuring increased performance.

Tourism business management in the aspect of earnings management by travel agencies in times disease threats – evidence from Poland

Iwona Franczak — 2024-09-05

This study examines the existence of earnings management by travel agencies operating in Poland at the time of global disease threats over the last decade. To measure earnings management the estimation of total discretionary accruals was used constituting some changes in the working capital. Among the available research methods, hypothesis verification procedures based on panel models have been selected. It is found, that in the times of economic prosperity, the phenomenon of earnings management does not occur as it is not necessary. In tough years, when the actual financial result becomes unsatisfactory, shaping the result is used as a tool for its correction. Interpretation of the results requires caution due to their sensitivity to the adopted research methodology. They should be treated as an incentive to a thorough analysis of the content of financial statements and to research into the earnings management of tourism businesses.

Working capital and performance: Europe’s challenge to crises

Ercilio Zanolla — 2024-09-09

This paper explores the relationship between working capital management (WCM) strategies and business performance during the COVID-19 crisis. Data from 1,067 non-financial European firms from 33 countries distributed across 6 economic sectors in the period from 2015 to 2021, feed Ordinary Least Squares model (OLS), robust and quantile pooled regression. COVID-19 crisis seems to have negatively influenced only median-low-range performance firms in Europe, showing that crisis coming from productive capacity hibernation do not impact nor impose tough slow recovery, transversal to all firms, as occurred on other financial crises. As for WCM, only median-top-range performance firms had significant statistical evidence for negative impact, that become positive for median-range performance firms during COVID-19. For Eurozone firms, there was an additional positive influence of the WCM on performance during COVID-19. Median-range performance firms seems to benefit from conservative WCM strategies mitigating firms’ performance negative effect raised by COVID-19 crisis. Relation between COVID-19 and WCM seems to be sensitive to different levels of firms’ performance and to different business’ economic sector. Contrary to knowledge on WCM, performance and financial crises in Europe, for COVID-19 alike crises, performance benefits from higher cash conversion cycles and thus encourage conservative WCM strategies. Liquidity should not be pushed by adopting aggressive WCM strategies.

Sustainable development through eco-innovation. Empirical evidence from the EU-27 member states

Gabriela Lucia Sipos — 2024-09-12

Increasing concerns for ensuring a sustainable future generated an imperative need to shift toward a circular economy and sustainable innovations. In this framework, eco-innovation becomes essential for achieving sustainable development. The main purpose of this paper is to focus on a more in-depth, original revealing of the influence of eco-innovation on countries’ sustainable development. Thus, five eco-innovation dimensions, components of the Eco-Innovation Index, are considered for a complete approach. This paper first explores the interaction of the five dimensions within the Eco-Innovation Index. Further, the paper analyses the cumulative effects of the five Eco-Innovation Index dimensions on the 17 Sustainable Development Goals components defined by the United Nations. Considering a panel data set of 189 values for the EU27 Member States for seven years and applying the Structural Equation Model (SEM), this paper emphasizes that only three out of five dimensions perform significantly in the Eco-Innovation Index. Moreover, it proved that the Eco-Innovation Index dimensions contribute to achieving 11 of the 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs). Also, the results highlight that significant relationships were revealed only between certain Eco-Innovation Index dimensions and some SDG components. This paper’s conclusions contribute to a deeper understanding of gaining sustainable development through eco-innovation.