Socioemotional Wealth and Networking in the Internationalisation of Family SMEs

In internationalisation processes, international expansion exposes family SMEs to external networking and the risks such expansion entails, and perceived threats to their socioemotional wealth (SEW) might restrain their willingness to take these actions. However, very few studies measure SEW and associate it with internationalisation. Considering SEW preservation’s prominence in family SMEs and SMEs’ heavy dependence on networking during internationalisation, we hypothesise that SEW preservation has a negative association and networking has a positive association with the family SMEs’ degree of internationalisation (DOI). We reconstruct four SEW constructs that carry significance for family…

Evaluation of Deadweight Spending in Regional Enterprise Financing

Tokila A. and Haapanen M. Evaluation of deadweight spending in regional enterprise financing, Regional Studies. The problem of deadweight spending has been previously studied using diverse methods. However, regional variations in deadweight spending have not yet been considered. An evaluation of regional business subsidies in Finland during 2000–2003 is conducted. The analysis reveals regional differences in deadweight spending in proportional and, particularly, in monetary terms. Deadweight spending is dependent on many firm-, project- and regional-level factors, which also largely account for regional differences. However, there seems to be some regional variation in deadweight spending t…

The effect of polytechnic reform on migration

This paper examines the effect of the polytechnic reform on geographical mobility. A polytechnic, higher education reform took place in Finland in the 1990s. It gradually transformed former vocational colleges into polytechnics and also brought higher education to regions that did not have a university before. This expansion of higher education provides exogenous variation in the regional supply of higher education. The reform raised the mobility of high school graduates across local labour markets in the years after they had completed their secondary studies, which indicated increased mobility between high school and post-secondary education. We estimate that the reform enhanced the annual…

Supplemental Material, MigrFinSwe-2020-3-17-supplement - Regional concentration of university graduates: The role of high school grades and parental background

Supplemental Material, MigrFinSwe-2020-3-17-supplement for Regional concentration of university graduates: The role of high school grades and parental background by Kent Eliasson, Mika Haapanen and Olle Westerlund in European Urban and Regional Studies

Prescription opioid use and employment : A nationwide Finnish register study

Background: The secular decline in labor market participation and the concurrent increase in opioid use in many developed countries have sparked a policy debate on the possible connection between these two trends. We examined whether the use of prescription opioids was connected to labor market outcomes relating to participation, employment and unemployment among the Finnish population. Methods: The working-age population (aged 19–64 years) living in Finland during the period 1995–2016 was used in the analyses (consisting of 67 903 701 person-year observations). Lagged values of prescription opioid use per capita were used as the exposure. Instrumental variables (IV) estimation method was u…

Configurations of High Corporate Environmental Responsibility with Regard to Business Legitimacy:A Cross-National Approach

The effect of education on migration: evidence from school reform

A polytechnic, higher education reform took place in Finland in the 1990s. It gradually transformed former vocational colleges into polytechnics and expanded higher education to all Finnish regions. We implement instrumental variables estimators that exploit the exogenous variation in the regional availability of polytechnic education together with matriculation exam scores. Our IV results show that polytechnic graduates have a higher migration probability than those of vocational college graduates. However, a master’s degree did not increase migration propensity in comparison with a polytechnic degree. We also find that an increase in the availability of polytechnic education did not reduc…

Self-employment duration in urban and rural locations

Previous research has shown that local environment is important for self-employment. Self-employment dynamics varies between areas characterized by different labour market conditions, entrepreneurial tradition and other structural factors. Alternation between different labour market states (self-employment, paid-employment, non-employment) is also likely to increase if employment opportunities remain low in local labour market markets. This paper analyses the factors influencing the duration of self-employment spells in Finland with a large registered-based data set from the period of 1987-2002. It is evident that rates of exit out of self-employment and the length of self-employment spells…

More educated, more mobile? Evidence from post-secondary education reform

More educated, more mobile? Evidence from post-secondary education reform. Spatial Economic Analysis. This paper examines the causal impact of the level of education on within-country migration. To account for biases resulting from selection into post-secondary education, it uses a large-scale reform within the higher education system that gradually transformed former vocational colleges into polytechnics in Finland in the 1990s. This reform created quasi-exogenous variation in the supply of higher education over time and across regions. The results based on multinomial treatment effects models and population register data show that, overall, polytechnic graduates have a significantly highe…

The nature of self-employment: how does gender matter?

This paper analyses female and male entrepreneurship and the differences between them in Finland. The female self-employment rate is clearly lower than that of male self-employment in Finland. The paper shows that differing behaviour accounts for differing rates of self-employment between females and males. The predicted earnings differential between self-employment and paid employment has a divergent effect on the probabilities of self-employment. For males, it is positive (as expected). For females, it has no effect, which accentuates the other motives they have for self-employment. Both spouse and family are found to have bigger effects on female self-employment than on male self-employm…

Labour migration and wages

The Effects of the Value-Added Tax on Revenue and Inequality

This paper examines the impact of the introduction of the value-added tax on inequality and government revenues using newly released macro data. We present both conventional country fixed effect regressions and instrumental variable analyses, where VAT adoption is instrumented using the previous values of neighbouring countries’ VAT systems as an instrument. The results reveal – in contrast to earlier work – that the revenue consequences of the VAT have not been positive. The results indicate that income-based inequality has increased due to the VAT adoption, whereas consumption inequality has remained unaffected.

Innovation expectations and patenting in private and public R&D projects

peer-reviewed In this paper, we investigate how the innovation expectations of public financiers are related to realized patents. The analysis is based on a novel dataset of collaborative R&D projects subsidized by the Finnish Agency of Technology and Innovation (Tekes) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) during the period 2000–2004. Innovation expectations are measured using reports submitted by Tekes experts during ex ante assessments of projects. Our probit model results reveal that Tekes’ patent expectations are positively related to realized patents for projects led by private firms (but not by public organizations). For large organizations, Tekes’ innovation expectations…

When are investment subsidies crucial for investments?

EU enlargement to the less developed countries in Central and Eastern Europe is forcing policy makers to reconsider the role of business subsidies in the EU. For example, to what extent the use of investment subsidies should be allowed in the future? Which regions should be supported? In this paper we study conditions under which investment subsidy is a necessary requirement for project implementation in Finland. Empirical analysis is conducted using micro level data on investment projects of private sector firms. The data set comprises 1,836 projects that received public investment subsidies between 2001 and 2003. Our results show that the necessity of the investment subsidies is strongly …

Can Migration Decisions Be Affected by Income Policy Interventions? Evidence from Finland

Haapanen M. and Ritsila J. (2007) Can migration decisions be affected by income policy interventions? Evidence from Finland, Regional Studies 41, 339–348. Using Finnish micro-level data, this paper maps out whether migration decisions can be affected by income policy interventions. The analysis focuses on individuals living in peripheral regions and distinguishes peripheral migration from growth-centre migration. In support of the human capital hypothesis, the estimation results imply that migration decisions can be affected by income policy interventions. For example, an intervention that would increase an individual's expected disposable income by 10%, given that he/she does not move to a…

MIGRATION OF THE HIGHLY EDUCATED: EVIDENCE FROM RESIDENCE SPELLS OF UNIVERSITY GRADUATES*

We examine the inter-regional migration of university graduates from 1991 to 2003 in Finland. The results show that time matters: two-years before and during the graduation year the hazard rates of migration increase, and then decrease thereafter. Although university graduates are particularly mobile, we find that most of them do not move from their region of studies within 10 years after graduation. The out-migration, i.e., brain drain, is much higher among graduates in the more peripheral universities than in the growth centers (Helsinki in particular). Migration is also substantially more likely for those studying away from the home region than for those studying at home. peerReviewed

Aluetaloustieteen menetelmät liikennejärjestelmän kehittämisen vaikutustarkastelussa

Tässä selvityksessä on arvioitu, voidaanko aluetaloudellisilla tarkasteluilla selvittää liikenneinfrastruktuurien kehittämiseen sekä liikenteen hinnoitteluun ja sääntelyyn liittyvien toimenpiteiden vaikutuksia yrityksille, kuluttajille ja julkiseen talouteen aluetalouksien tasolla. Tulosten mukaan se voidaan tehdä aluetalousmalleilla, joilla kuvataan ja lasketaan kokonaisvaltaisesti talousjärjestelmässä toisistaan riippuvien vaikutusketjujen muutoksia. Liikennejärjestelmän muutosten suorista käyttäjähyödyistä ja -haitoista seuraa välillisesti laajempia taloudellisia vaikutuksia eri markkinoiden välisen vuorovaikutuksen dynamiikassa. Nämä vaikutukset toteutuvat kasautumiseen, työmarkkinoihin…

Back to School : Labor-Market Returns to Higher Vocational Schooling

This paper examines the labor-market returns to a new form of postsecondary vocational education: vocational master's degrees. We use individual fixed effects models on a matched sample of students and non-students from Finland to capture any time-invariant differences across individuals. We find that attendance in vocational master's programs leads to an earnings increase of more than seven percent five years after entry. The estimated effect remains positive even if selection on unobservables is twice as strong as selection on observables. Earnings gains are similar by gender and age, but they are marginally higher for those in the health sector than for those in the business or technolog…

School Tracking and Mental Health

To understand how the type of education affects long-term mental health, we examine the effects of a comprehensive school reform on mental health–related hospitalizations and deaths. The reform postponed the tracking of students into vocational and academic schools from age 11 to age 16, thus affecting the set of peers and the curriculum to which these students were exposed. The reform was implemented gradually across Finnish municipalities between 1972 and 1977. We use difference-in-differences variation and administrative data. Our overall results show no discernible effects on mental health–related hospitalizations or deaths, but heterogeneity analysis shows an adverse effect on hospital…

Can migration decisions be affected by income taxation policies?

In this empirical paper we examine whether or not migration decisions can be affected by individual measures of regional policy. To shed light on the question, we study formation of expected earnings and effect of expected earnings on interregional migration decisions in Finland. We consider how this effect varies among individuals, especially among employees in medical and health care sector and in teaching sector. We generated expected earnings in migration and staying alternatives from an endogenous switching regression. These expected earnings were used as additional explanatory variables in a random parameter logit migration model. In the migration model individual can choose between t…

The Effects of the Value-Added Tax on Revenue and Inequality

This paper examines the impact of the introduction of the value-added tax on inequality and government revenues using newly released macro data. We present both conventional country fixed effect regressions and instrumental variable analyses, where VAT adoption is instrumented using the previous values of neighbouring countries’ VAT systems as an instrument. The results reveal – in contrast to earlier work – that the revenue consequences of the VAT have not been positive. The results indicate that income-based inequality has increased due to the VAT adoption, whereas consumption inequality has remained unaffected. Peer reviewed

Working while studying: does it lead to greater attachment to the regional labour market?

This chapter studies the link between working while studying and migration. Understanding this link is important because policy-makers are often calling for actions that would cut down the hours students spend on working to shorten the graduation time. The chapter’s analysis focuses on graduates from Finnish universities, polytechnics and vocational schools in 1991–2004. It uses rich register-based longitudinal microdata constructed by Statistics Finland, and find a negative relationship between working while studying and graduate migration. An increase in student employment can thus partly explain the decline in geographic mobility among Finnish graduates from higher education.

Labor-Market Returns to Higher Vocational Schooling

This paper examines the labor-market returns to a new form of postsecondary vocational education, vocational master's degrees. We use individual fixed effects models on the matched sample of students and non-students from Finland to capture any time-invariant differences across individuals. Attendance in vocational master's programs leads to higher earnings of eight percent five years after entry even if selection on unobservables is twice as strong as selection on observables. Earnings gains are similar by gender and age, but they are marginally higher for health than for business or technology and trades. nonPeerReviewed

Determinants of Prescription Opioid Use : Population‐Based Evidence from Finland

Background and aims Previous studies have shown that prescription opioid use is more common in the socioeconomically disadvantaged communities in the US. This study examined the area and individual‐level determinants of prescription opioid use in Finland during the period 1995‐2016. Design Logistic regression analysis using nationwide data on filled opioid‐related prescriptions dispensed at Finnish pharmacies and covered by the National Health Insurance. Opioid consumption was linked, using personal identification codes, to population‐based data maintained by Statistics Finland, which records individual background and area‐level characteristics. Setting and participants Working‐age populati…

Liikenneinfrastruktuurihankkeiden rakentamisaikaiset vaikutukset työllisyyteen

Hankkeen tavoitteena on ollut määrittää tutkittuun tietoon perustuva viitekehys liikenneinfrastruktuurihankkeiden rakentamisaikaisten työllisyysvaikutusten arviointiin. Liikenneinfrastruktuurihankkeen rakentamisaikainen bruttomääräinen vaikutus työllisyyteen muodostuu suorasta työpanostarpeesta työmaalla ja välillisestä työpanostarpeesta. Välillinen työpanostarve taaksepäin syntyy rakentamisen välituotevalmistuksessa ja välillinen työpanostarve eteenpäin palkkatulojen synnyttämän kulutuskysynnän lisäyksen kautta. Nettotyöllisyysvaikutus tarkoittaa työllisyysasteen muutosta taloudessa. Silloin huomioidaan rakentamisesta johtuvan työvoiman kysynnän syrjäytysvaikutus jo olemassa oleviin työpai…

Miksi naisia on vain vähän yrittäjinä?

AMK-tutkinto – avain menestymiseen työmarkkinoilla?

Artikkelissa tarkastellaan ammattikorkeakoulututkintojen vaikutuksia yksilöiden menestymiseen työmarkkinoilla. Tulokset perustuvat Tilastokeskuksen keräämiin kattaviin rekisteritietoihin työllisyydestä ja ansiotasosta. Tarkastelun perusteella AMK-tutkinnot parantavat merkittävästi ansiotasoa. Tämä koskee sekä alempia että ylempiä ammattikorkeakoulututkintoja. AMK-tutkinnon suorittaneet ovat hyötyneet tutkinnoistaan tuntuvasti korkeamman ansiotason muodossa – myös silloin, kun tutkinto on suoritettu vanhemmalla iällä. nonPeerReviewed

Ammattiliittomallit työllisyyden ja palkkatason selittäjinä : katsaus teoreettisiin malleihin ja soveltava tutkimus teollisuuden reaalipalkkoihin vaikuttavista tekijöistä Suomessa vuosina 1961-1994

Cumulative inertia or cumulative stress? Migration behaviour of Finnish graduates

An interesting yet largely unstudied question regarding labour migration behaviour and residence duration is whether migration becomes more or less likely over time. This paper analyses the determinants of residence duration for Finnish graduates. Our results affirm the importance of cumulative inertia as a determinant of migration. The longer a person stays in a region, the smaller are the hazard rates of migration. However, for those graduates who moved to a new region during their year of graduation, the propensity for repeat migration is particularly high during their first three years of residence. 

Työ, talous ja yliopisto : Jaakko Pehkonen 50 vuotta

Government policy failure in public support for research and development

peer-reviewed Promoting Research and Development (R&D) and innovative activity is a key element of the EU Lisbon Agenda and is seen as playing a central part in stimulating economic development. In this paper we argue that, even allowing for benevolent policy-makers, informational asymmetries can lead to a misallocation of public support for R&D, hence government policy failure, with the potential to exacerbate preexisting market failures. Initially, we explore alternative allocation mechanisms for public support, which can help to minimize the scale of these government policy failures. Of these mechanisms (grants, tax credits, or allocation rules based on past performance), our results sug…

Determinants of prescription opioid use: population‐based evidence from Finland

BACKGROUND AND AIMS Previous studies have shown that prescription opioid use is more common in socio-economically disadvantaged communities in the United States. This study examined the area and individual-level determinants of prescription opioid use in Finland during the period 1995-2016. DESIGN Logistic regression analysis using nation-wide data on filled opioid-related prescriptions dispensed at Finnish pharmacies and covered by National Health Insurance. Opioid consumption was linked, using personal identification codes, to population-based data maintained by Statistics Finland, which records individual background and area-level characteristics. SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS Working-age pop…

Studies on the determinants of migration and the spatial concentration of labour

This thesis consists of five empirical studies which seek to understand the processes behind interregional migration decisions and the spatial concentration of labour. The empirical studies are preceded by an introductory chapter that, among other topics, discusses spatial concentration in Finland between 1980 and 2000, and surveys prior evidence on the determinants of migration. The thesis mainly utilises Finnish longitudinal population census data from 1993?1996. A variety of advanced microeconometric methods are used in the modelling of the migration phenomenon to ensure robustness and the reliability of the results. The results of the thesis imply that person-specific productivity has h…

School Tracking and Mental Health

We examine the effects of a comprehensive school reform on mental health. The reform postponed the tracking of students into vocational and academic schools from age 11 to age 16. The reform was implemented gradually across Finnish municipalities between 1972 and 1977. We use difference-in-differences variation and administrative data. Our results show that there is no discernible effect on mental health related hospitalizations on average even though the effect is precisely estimated. Heterogeneity analysis shows that, after the reform, females from highly-educated families were more likely to be hospitalized for depression. nonPeerReviewed

Evaluating Project Deadweight Measures: Evidence from Finnish Business Subsidies

An important problem in measuring the impacts of business subsidies is their separation from deadweight, which refers to changes that would have occurred even in the absence of intervention. Both public and private assessments have been used previously to study deadweigh, but so far little is known about how they correspond to each other. To address this issue we conducted a joint evaluation of the private and public assessments of deadweight for Finnish business projects. A unique dataset combines large register data with both public and private information on projects financed in 2000–03. First, our results suggest that the different measures for deadweight are greatly uncorrelated, and …

The Effects of the Value-Added Tax on Revenue and Inequality

This paper examines the impact of the introduction of the value-added tax on inequality and government revenues using newly released macro data. We present both conventional country fixed effect regressions and instrumental variable analyses, where VAT adoption is instrumented using the previous values of neighbouring countries’ VAT systems as an instrument. The results reveal – in contrast to earlier work – that the revenue consequences of the VAT have not been positive. The results indicate that income-based inequality has increased due to the VAT adoption, whereas consumption inequality has remained unaffected.

Kokemuksia oppijalähtöisestä työn taloustieteen opetuksesta

Evaluation of investment subsidies - When is deadweight effect zero?

In the evaluation of investment subsidies one of the critical issues concerns the assessment of deadweight, that is, the degree to which projects would have been carried out without grant assistance. With the increasing restrictions on and cuts in subsidies for investment projects in the EU countries maximisation of the impact of the public resources that remain can be achieved through their allocation for projects with minimum deadweight. This paper studies the profile of subsidised zero deadweight investment projects – projects that would be abandoned without public subsidies – in Finland. The empirical analysis is conducted using micro level data on investment projects by private sector …

Regional concentration of university graduates : The role of high school grades and parental background

In this paper, we analyse long-term changes in the regional distribution and migration flows of university graduates in Finland and Sweden. This study is based on detailed longitudinal population register data, including information on high school grades and parental background. We find a distinct pattern of skill divergence across regions in both countries over the last 3 decades. The uneven distribution of human capital has been reinforced by the mobility patterns of university graduates, for whom regional sorting by high school grades and parental background is evident. Our findings indicate that traditional measures of human capital concentration most likely underscore actual regional …

Patterns of inter- and intra-regional differences in human capital and earnings : Evidence from Finland and Sweden 1987–2015

In this paper, we examine the long-term patterns of geographical disparities in human capital and income in Finland and Sweden over the period 1987–2015. Using nationwide longitudinal population register data, we analyze disparities at different spatial scales, between and within functional labor market regions determined by observed travel-to-work patterns. Contrary to the findings from many other developed economies indicating inter-regional divergence in per capita income, we find indications of inter-regional convergence in per capita earnings among the functional labor market regions in both countries after 2000. However, small, and peripheral regions have not recovered from the macroe…

More skilled, better paid : labour-market returns to postsecondary vocational education

Outside the USA, relatively little is known about the labour-market returns to postsecondary vocational (or polytechnic) education. Yet, polytechnics in Europe are distinct from US community colleges. This paper focuses on the labour-market returns to polytechnic attendance in Finland, where polytechnics are representative of many European countries. Using matching methods and longitudinal administrative data, we find that, compared to individuals with no postsecondary education, students who attend polytechnics have higher annual earnings of €3,300 to €3,700 and employment gains of 2.5 to 6.6 percentage points 10 years after the entry decision. However, the returns vary by personal charact…

Opportunity- and Necessity-Driven Self-Employment Among Older People in Finland

To date, few empirical studies have attempted to highlight the impact of the socio-economic characteristics of older entrepreneurs according to whether they are driven by necessity or opportunity. Tervo and Haapanen contribute to the economics of ageing by showing that opportunity- and necessity-driven senior entrepreneurs differ in terms of socio-economic characteristics. This chapter utilizes a longitudinal data set from Finland. Individuals aged between 55 and 70 entering self-employment are grouped in terms of pull and push motivations. Profiles of entrepreneurs are developed using personal, family, and environmental characteristics. The results show that opportunity-driven older self-e…

Ammattikorkeakoulut, työmarkkinat ja muuttoliike

Regional Concentration and Migration of Human Capital in Finland and Sweden

Evaluation of investment subsidies: when is deadweight zero?

In the evaluation of investment subsidies one of the critical issues concerns the assessment of deadweight, that is, the degree to which projects would have been carried out without grant assistance. With the increasing restrictions on and cuts in subsidies for investment projects in the EU countries maximisation of the impact of the public resources that remain can be achieved through their allocation for projects with minimum deadweight. This paper studies the profile of subsidised zero deadweight investment projects – projects that would be abandoned without public subsidies – in Finland. The empirical analysis is conducted using micro level data on investment projects by private sector …

Where do the highly educated migrate? Micro-level evidence from finland

This paper analyses the role which migration of highly educated labour plays in human capital reallocation. The study focuses on actual migrants, examining the direct effect of educational attainment on destination choices. The paper uses the ordered probability model and a micro-level data set in econometric analyses. Individual level investigations of migrants show that highly educated migrants are likely to move to urban regions. As a result, the reallocation of highly educated labour, and thereby also the redistribution of human capital, seems to be taking place in Finland. peerReviewed

Migration Behaviour and Duration of Residence Spells of Graduating Students in Finland in 1987-2002

An interesting, but yet largely unstudied question concerns migration behaviour in different labour markets from the point of view of duration. How long are residenece spells? Why do some migrants move quite soon after the move, while others stay for a long time? How do personal and family characteristics account for differences in residence spells and repeat migration? Does earlier migration experience or other prior activity or experience explain for this? What is the role of labour market conditions and other region-specific factors? This paper deals with migration behaviour in Finland in 1987-2002. Migration will be analyzed in a duration-model context where movement is seen as terminat…