This paper provides an assessment of employment and working conditions in Latvia before and immediately after the EU accession. The issues addressed include self-employment, multiple jobs, fixed-term contracts, unreported wages, overtime, unsocial working hours, health and safety at work, social...

Industrial productivity levels of formerly socialist economies in Central East Europe (including East Germany) are considerably lower than in the more mature Western economies. This research aims at assessing the reasons for lower productivities at the firm level: what are the firm-specific...

With the enlargement of the European Union, many Central and Eastern European (CEE) manufacturing companies have greater opportunity for internationalizing their activities. Although it is generally held that SMEs have the flexibility and ability to adapt to their environment more quickly than...

Economic growth continues to be a major objective of state governments in Mexico. What role do firm location, openness, education, and wage rates play in determining the ability of a state to increase the growth of its economy? This study examines the economic competitiveness of the Mexican...

This paper assesses empirically structural change in the Indian manufacturing based export sector, based on an analysis of 143 industries / product groupings (mainly manufacturing industries). Trade indices such as Balassa’s revealed comparative advantage (RCA) index, and other variants...

With the enlargement of the European Union, many Central and Eastern European (CEE) manufacturing companies have greater opportunity for internationalizing their activities. Although it is generally held that SMEs have the flexibility and ability to adapt to their environment more quickly than...

Nowadays of increasing functioning of network competitors, the Portuguese Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) of the Textile and Clothing Industry are facing new digital challenges. In order to strengthen their market power and reduce their dependence on foreign subcontractors, they should create...

In this paper we try to explain some restructuring patterns of Czech textile and clothing industries from a microeconomic point of view. We introduce two measures of production efficiency (the technical and the allocative efficiency) and look at changes in the behaviour of enterprises. In 1994,...

The study estimates the rate of capacity utilization for the Indian paper industry for the period 1973-74 to 1997-98 on the basis of the theoretical framework of variable cost function. It is based on the basic premise that deviation from full utilization of capacity takes place as the levels of...