This dissertation consists of three essays on different attributes of immigrants and remittances over time. Using the recently available three waves of the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants in Canada (LSIC), our first essay investigates the relationships between socio-economic characteristics and remittance behaviour of Indian and Chinese immigrants in Canada. After conducting a logistic regression on the likelihood of remitting and an instrumental variable regression of the amount remitted, the study observes significant differences between the remittance behaviour of Chinese and Indian immigrants. While Chinese remittances are mostly affected by age, income, level of education and personal investment in home country, Indian remittances are influenced by marital status, having family members in the host country, and being involved with social/religious organization in the host country. Financial variables play significant roles for both types of immigrants. Using data from the LSIC, our second essay explores the link between health and education among recently arrived immigrants in Canada. The empirical evidence suggests that education has a positive impact on the health of newly arrived immigrants. This relationship remains valid for a few years after arrival. More educated immigrants seem to be better informed and appear to make use of health-related information. If differences in health can be explained using educational inequality then education might directly affect the quality of life. The likelihood of being in better health increases amongst those with higher levels of education. Our third essay examines whether the financial sector of a country plays a significant role in explaining a country’s capacity to take advantage of remittances to influence economic growth. Using data from 1979 to 2011 for the 33 top remittance recipient developing countries and employing the GMM approach, the study observes a positive association between remittances and growth. However, no conclusive evidence on the importance of financial development on remittance-growth nexus could be established. Moreover, remittances have the strongest effect on economic growth under repressed financial regimes. Ensuring that remittance recipients have access to financial intermediaries and promoting financial literacy may increase the positive influence of the financial sector on the relationship between remittances and economic growth.

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In South Africa there is high unemployment rates and poverty amongst a large part of the population. Entrepreneurship is identified by National Government and various research programs such as the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) as a possible solution to the above socio-economic problems hampering economic growth of a developing region. It is however very difficult to start and grow a business that can last over time. This research report investigates the major problems associated with business sustainability of SMMEs and provides strategies for businesses to stay operational over time. The main aim of the study is to establish determinants of sustainability and reasons for success of SMMEs, based on a sample of small companies in Lesedi, Gauteng. Suggestions are made based on their unique experiences. The empirical study was conducted by means of a field study using a structured questionnaire. The reliability of the questionnaire was determined by the Cronbach alpha coefficient of the constructs. Data from 52 SMMEs were collected and analysed. The results indicate that most SMMEs in Lesedi are struggling to make profit and are generally unsustainable by measuring up the results against elements identified within the literature review. A total of 100 businesses restricted to Lesedi municipality in Gauteng were visited in the process of collecting the peer-aided questionnaires. The biggest problems of SMMEs in the sample were: gross profit control, marketing, strategic management, inventory control, information management, staff development, expense control, sourcing funds, time management and financial management. / Thesis (MBA)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013.

In South Africa there is high unemployment rates and poverty amongst a large part of the population. Entrepreneurship is identified by National Government and various research programs such as the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) as a possible solution to the above socio-economic problems hampering economic growth of a developing region. It is however very difficult to start and grow a business that can last over time. This research report investigates the major problems associated with business sustainability of SMMEs and provides strategies for businesses to stay operational over time. The main aim of the study is to establish determinants of sustainability and reasons for success of SMMEs, based on a sample of small companies in Lesedi, Gauteng. Suggestions are made based on their unique experiences. The empirical study was conducted by means of a field study using a structured questionnaire. The reliability of the questionnaire was determined by the Cronbach alpha coefficient of the constructs. Data from 52 SMMEs were collected and analysed. The results indicate that most SMMEs in Lesedi are struggling to make profit and are generally unsustainable by measuring up the results against elements identified within the literature review. A total of 100 businesses restricted to Lesedi municipality in Gauteng were visited in the process of collecting the peer-aided questionnaires. The biggest problems of SMMEs in the sample were: gross profit control, marketing, strategic management, inventory control, information management, staff development, expense control, sourcing funds, time management and financial management. / Thesis (MBA)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2013.

This dissertation investigates the determinants of China's exports and regional economic growth, the direction of causality between foreign direct investment (FDI) and exports; and convergence analysis among Chinese provinces. The study firstly discusses the evolutional process of China's foreign trade regime through comparing the strategies and policies before 1978 with those after 1978. It is emphasised that the export-promotion development policies result in the recent basic export patterns and characteristics. Furthermore, the study reviews the existing literature on exports, FDI, and convergence/growth determinants in the case of China. The empirical work comprises three parts. Firstly, fixed-effects ordinary least squares (OLS) and random-effects generalised least squares (GLS) panel data estimators are applied to test the determinants of provincial exports from 1994 to 2003. It is found that FDI, geographical location, investment in manufacturing innovation, and human capital have significant influences on regional export performance. Secondly, the augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) tests are carried out to test stationarity and the Granger causality tests are conducted to test the causal direction between FDI and exports, based on monthly national data from January, 2002 to June, 2006. The empirical results indicate that there is a one-way complementary causal link from FDI inflows to China's export flows. Thirdly, three methods, beta convergence, sigma convergence, and Markov Chain analysis, are used to do convergence debate among China's regions and the standard OLS cross-section and random-effects GLS panel data are applied to test the conditional convergence. The results suggest that the convergence hypothesis does not hold in China between 1994 and 2003 and there is a sign of conditional convergence, conditioning the explanatory variables such as exports, human capital, and population growth. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Economics))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2007.

This dissertation investigates the determinants of China's exports and regional economic growth, the direction of causality between foreign direct investment (FDI) and exports; and convergence analysis among Chinese provinces. The study firstly discusses the evolutional process of China's foreign trade regime through comparing the strategies and policies before 1978 with those after 1978. It is emphasised that the export-promotion development policies result in the recent basic export patterns and characteristics. Furthermore, the study reviews the existing literature on exports, FDI, and convergence/growth determinants in the case of China. The empirical work comprises three parts. Firstly, fixed-effects ordinary least squares (OLS) and random-effects generalised least squares (GLS) panel data estimators are applied to test the determinants of provincial exports from 1994 to 2003. It is found that FDI, geographical location, investment in manufacturing innovation, and human capital have significant influences on regional export performance. Secondly, the augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF) tests are carried out to test stationarity and the Granger causality tests are conducted to test the causal direction between FDI and exports, based on monthly national data from January, 2002 to June, 2006. The empirical results indicate that there is a one-way complementary causal link from FDI inflows to China's export flows. Thirdly, three methods, beta convergence, sigma convergence, and Markov Chain analysis, are used to do convergence debate among China's regions and the standard OLS cross-section and random-effects GLS panel data are applied to test the conditional convergence. The results suggest that the convergence hypothesis does not hold in China between 1994 and 2003 and there is a sign of conditional convergence, conditioning the explanatory variables such as exports, human capital, and population growth. / Thesis (Ph.D. (Economics))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2007.

Corruption is a major cause and result of poverty around the globe. It arises at all levels of society, from national governments and military to small businesses and sports. Corruption affects all elements of society in some way as it undermines democracy and economic growth as well as the environment and people’s health. The main purpose of this thesis is to examine if corruption has a significant effect on economic growth in developing countries. The empirical analysis is conducted with a regression analysis, using data from recognized institutions. Other variables that can affect GDP per capita growth are also examined such as the level of democracy, fertility rate, life expectancy, education and the Initial GDP per capita to test for conditional convergence. In our main model, the empirical results show that corruption does not have a significant effect on economic growth but this is basically due to that the model exhibits multicollinearity. In our second model, where we omitted the variables Democracy, Initial GDP and Life expectancy, we found that corruption has a significant, negative effect on economic growth. This is in accordance with previous empirical results which hold that more corruption in a nation leads to less economic growth.

This paper examines for the first time the relationship between the net issue values of aggregate bonds, as well as the different bond sectors separately, and economic growth. The other new feature of this study is the usage of quarterly data. Granger causalities are calculated for time series of 15 European countries, the USA, and Japan in order to test if there is a positive relationship between the development of bond markets and economic growth also for shorter time periods. The significant Granger causalities found show the following tendency: Economic growth is causal for net issue values of government bonds, and net issuance of corporate and financial institutions bonds are causal for economic growth. That finding is important for the future architecture of the financial sector, in particular in emerging markets and the new EU member countries. (author's abstract) / Series: EI Working Papers / Europainstitut

We use annual real GDP and the volume of the bond, stock and credit markets to assess the causal relationship between the aggregate bond market development and economic growth in the USA, Japan, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, France and the Netherlands over the 1950 to 2001 period. The literature on the real - financial nexus to date has focused on the credit and stock markets, with few exceptions. Partially due to data availability problems, the impact of bond markets on economic growth has not yet been examined in the same way. To fill this gap we provide empirical evidence for long-run equilibrium and Granger causality in at least one direction in the relationship among real GDP and bond, credit and stock markets in seven economies with large bond markets. The supplyleading hypothesis that development of the financial markets enhances growth is supported in all countries except for Germany. The demand-leading hypothesis that economic development pulls the development of the financial markets is supported only for Germany. A feedback between domestic credits and output is found in Japan. There is evidence for a feedback between the equity markets and real output in Japan and the Netherlands. (author's abstract) / Series: EI Working Papers / Europainstitut

Regional income disparity continues to be a source of major concern for Canadian policymakers. This study explores the temporal pattern of income disparity for Canadian provinces, and seeks to identify the role of one particular determinant entrepreneurship in explaining regional economic growth. The neoclassical growth framework is applied to a set of panel data drawn from Canadian provinces. An econometric model is applied to test for convergence and to identify the role of entrepreneurship in determining growth. The estimation results suggest that entrepreneurship plays a significant role in regional development in Canada. A dynamic vector autoregression (VAR) model is employed to predict the long-run effects of entrepreneurial policy changes on regional development. The dynamic estimation results suggest that entrepreneurship has long term stimulative effects on regional development in Canada. These findings, while important from a policymakers perspective, have surprisingly gone unnoticed. / Agricultural and Resource Economics