Volume 8 (2019): Edizione 2 (December 2019)

This paper advances in the detection of anomalous data in income reports of Argentina. In particular, income declared by households surveyed in the Encuesta Permanente de Hogares (EPH, Permanent Household Survey in English) -for the period 2003-2017- and in the Encuesta Anual de Hogares Urbanos (EAHU, Annual Urban Household Survey in English) -for the period 2010-2014- are analyzed.

A widely known technique in forensic accounting and auditing, such as Benford’s law -also known as the first digit law- is used. If the analyzed data were generated naturally-free of manipulation- it should follow the logarithmic distribution of Benford. The Chi-square test and the absolute mean deviation (MAD) are used for verification.

The results suggest that the income reported in the EPH does not follow the Benford distribution and the degree of compliance with this law decreases significantly between 2007-2015 coinciding with the intervention period of the Instituto Nacional de Estadísticas y Censos (INDEC, National Institute of Statistics and Censuses in English).

As economic crises periodically disrupt the economic activity, a large and continuously growing literature was dedicated to understanding the reasons behind the crises, their mechanism, effects and, most of all, the determinants of resilience capacity, and the ability to overcome hardships by adapting and changing. By preparing in advance for economic shocks through resilience building during good times, the impact of economic crises can be attenuated. Starting from these considerations, the paper focuses on regional economic specialization and its opposite – economic diversification, two business strategies already acknowledged in the literature as relevant factors for the capacity to mitigate economic crises. We tested the hypothesis of vulnerability-inducing economic specialization in the Romanian economy, using NUTS3 level data and found that more diversified regional economies were better at coping with the hardships triggered by the recent recession.

Foreign direct investment and Trade were regarded as an important elements in enhancing economic development. This study used some time series econometric tests including the Augmented Dickey – Fuller (ADF) unit root test developed by Dickey – Fuller, stationary test developed by Kwiatkowski-Philips-Schmidt-Shin (KPSS), Johansen co-integration test and Granger causality test to analyse the connection between foreign direct investment, trade and economic growth in Niger. The tests results showed a bilateral relationship between trade and economic growth and a unidirectional causal relationship between trade and foreign direct investment with direction from trade to foreign direct investment. The long run effect tests revealed that trade has a positive effect on economic growth while foreign direct investment has a negative effect on economic growth in Niger. On average, ceteris paribus, the coefficients are statistically significant at 5% level.

In this article we investigate the correlation between the attitude toward education and the subjective social status of the students. We used a previously validated questionnaire to measure the attitude toward education and the MacArthur Scale of subjective social status capturing first, personal familial placement within society and secondly, personal placement in the school environment. This questionnaire was distributed online and was completed by 185 respondents from different schools and universities. The data was analyzed in R, performing factor analysis and a structural equation model. 4 latent factors were identified, that influence the formation of the attitude toward education, namely a general factor, usefulness of education, benefits of education and dislike of education. Only the second part of the scale influence 2 latent factors-general factor and usefulness of education. These results suggest that students positioning themselves higher in school or university have a better attitude toward education and are more prone to appreciate educational process and outcomes.