This research identifies and quantifies horizontal and vertical inequities resulting from selected owner-occupied housing tax policies though micro-simulation. The simulations are spread sheet constructions underpinned by the respective UK and US tax systems. Within each country-specific simulation case families are established varying with regard to income levels and investment choices. The specific tax policies analysed are the acquisition taxes, property taxes, elements specific to housing affecting income taxes (i.e. mortgage interest relief) and capital gains taxes. In addition to the specific tax policies, the overall tax obligations (the sum of the four specific taxes) are considered. The time frame of the study is a twenty-year period from 1990 through 2009. A recurring theme in the literature is that homeowners ought to be taxed as investors in rental properties to ensure tenure neutrality or, alternatively, taxed as any other investor to ensure tax neutrality. This research considers the corresponding effects on horizontal and vertical equity by modifying the UK and US tax systems for increased levels of neutrality through further micro-simulation analysis. Finally, the respective owner-occupied housing tax policy changes and reforms that occurred within the twenty-year period studied are evaluated in terms of enhancements to or hindrances of horizontal and vertical equity. This is accomplished by simulating sixteen five-year periods within the twenty-year time frame and evaluating horizontal and vertical equity on a within-country and a cross- country basis. What appears to be lacking in the literature is an extensive comparative analysis of the specific owner-occupied housing tax policies and their interrelationship with respect to the complex overall tax system in which they are present. The aim of this research is to contribute to the middle/high range of comparative analytical work. The research is set within a comprehensive theoretical framework and systematically ii compares the two countries’ specific tax policies and their overall impact on the respective tax systems. The methodology used is consistent between the two countries, ensuring a robust dual-nation comparison. The US specific tax policies relevant to homeownership and the overall tax system were found to have greater inherent horizontal inequities when compared with the UK tax policies and tax system. Both countries’ specific tax systems were found to have varying inherent vertical inequities. The UK homeowner occupiers experience more vertical equity (progressivity) in the acquisition tax system when compared with the US investors. Conversely, the US homeowner occupiers experience more vertical equity (progressivity) in the property tax, income tax and capital gains tax systems. Overall, the US investors experience a more progressive tax system when compared directly with the UK investors. The abolition of the UK Mortgage Interest Relief at Source (MIRAS) resulted in a less progressive income tax system for homeowner occupiers but one that is more horizontally equitable with other investors. The erosion of the benefits realised from the US mortgage interest and real estate tax deductions has resulted in a more vertically and horizontally equitable income tax system for all but the most wealthy. Vertical equity was improved by the adoption of the UK council tax in that it is a less regressive form of property taxation when compared with its predecessor. The recent reforms to the UK stamp duty (land tax) have made the system of acquisition taxation more vertically equitable but have exacerbated the horizontal inequity of the system with respect to other capital investors. The US capital gains tax system as it relates to the homeowner occupier changed significantly with the Tax Reform Act of 1997, resulting in a simpler but less equitable system depending on circumstances. With regard to the equity of the overall tax systems of the two countries, the UK’s progressivity has decreased while the horizontal equity has improved during the twenty-year period, whereas the progressivity of the US system has remained relatively flat with an improvement in horizontal equity. iii The author concludes with a call for the gradual repeal of the mortgage interest relief in the US, a subsidy shown to be extremely vertically inequitable in this study and one that was estimated to cost the exchequer $79 million in lost tax revenue in 2010 by the US Office for Management and Budget. While a taxable imputed rental income may be theoretically optimal, the well-recognised administrative and compliance issues associated with such tax reform make it untenable. Therefore, the second best option and the one adopted by the UK and most other developed nations, is not to allow a deduction for a cost in generating untaxed income. This research contributes a unique synthesis of methodological techniques to the housing equity literature. The combined analyses of horizontal equity under the classical definition with the chosen structural and distributional techniques in evaluating vertical equity have never been done before. The analysis of the overall tax system comprising four specific tax systems is also original in this area of research and employs the Suits (1977) method for determining overall progressivity. There is an attempt within this research to replicate the results derived from the Suits indices by similarly extending the structural indices, thus testing the transferability of the methodology established by Suits. This is the first attempt to extend the structural indices established decades earlier to researcher’s knowledge. The results from two of the three structural measures are inconsistent with each other and the results from the Suits indices and therefore not believed to be informative. However, the results from the extended Liability Progression of both countries are indeed consistent with the results of Suits indices. This is an interesting research observation and may be indicative of the transferability of the Suits methodology. This area of research continues to be discussed by academics and policymakers given the conflicting underpinning theories and continued fiscal favouritism in many developed countries. This research area has become even more topical in the last few years given the recent financial crisis. The multi-layered, comparative micro-simulation technique employed within this research provides a solid platform from which to appraise conventional wisdoms and proposals for future policy with regard to owner-occupied housing taxation and beyond.

Name of Author: Cornelius Babatunde Alalade Title of the Investigation: THE ECONOMIC PERFORMANCE OF INTERNATIONAL OIL COMPANIES IN NIGERIA: The Effect of Fiscal Taxation and the Separation of Ownership and Control. This research investigates the tax policies of the Nigerian government and the separation of ownership and control and the possibility that they impact on the economic performance of the international oil companies operating in Nigeria. The key areas of the research include a literature review which concentrates on both shareholder and stakeholder theories in corporate governance and on the separation of ownership and control. The literature review is also on government control mechanisms, including state ownership of corporations and taxation. Another key part of this research is the investigation of the relationship between types of contract between host government and the operating companies, and the companies' economic performance in relation to contract type. The second part of this research examines the relationship between the variables representing fiscal taxation and those representing economic performance. Given that there are essentially two types of contracts operating in Nigeria's oil and gas exploitation business, that is, Joint Venture (JV) and Production Sharing Contract (PSC), these two formed the basis of the research. For the purposes of measuring economic performance, the unit cost of production and gross margin per barrel were chosen as the variables for measuring the impact of the separation of ownership and control and the impact of fiscal taxation on the economic performanceof the operating companies. Data obtained from secondary sources served as the basis for the quantitative analysis employed in this research,and the results obtained were statistically tested before any interpretation and recommendations were suggested. Interviews were also conducted for the qualitative aspect of this study in order to obtain information on the factors that influenced Nigeria's oil and gas exploration and production fiscal policy formulation in the past. This research provided the opportunity to arrive at certain conclusions which, even if they sometimes appeared obvious, were never previously empirically substantiated, and the corroboration of some existing theories as being applicable to the Nigerian situation. They also provided a basis for suggesting the inappropriateness of some existing concepts or theories in their application to Nigeria's oil and gas exploration and producing companies. For example, the results suggest that the existence of separation of ownership and control does not guarantee optimization of economic performance (or maximization of wealth) for the production sharing contract type in oil companies operating in Nigeria, even if they do elsewhere. Fiscal taxation was also suggested as critical to economic performance but possibly not the only variable impacting on the economics of petroleum exploitation in Nigeria. This research provided other possible areas for further research in both fields of corporate governance and fiscal taxation.

There is an increasing interest in research on internal marketing in the marketing services literature. This has arisen largely from the suggestion that internal marketing contributes to services companies' success through its role in developing customer orientation among employees, leading to a consistently high level of customer service quality. Most research on internal marketing has however been conducted in large firms and consequently research in this field in small firms is scarce. Specifically, research on internal marketing in small insurance brokers has been limited despite the significance of the insurance sector to the UK economy as a source of both employment and income. The literature review concludes that small insurance brokers are being squeezed out of the market due to the challenging nature of the insurance market. This thesis investigates the understanding and use of internal marketing in small insurance brokers in the UK and its role in developing customer orientation among employees. A qualitative research approach was used to collect data from managers and employees within small insurance brokers in the UK. More specifically, a series of semi-structured interviews was conducted to find out how the terms internal marketing and customer orientation were understood and to explore internal marketing activities and the extent to which it has been used to develop customer orientation among employees. This research contributes to knowledge on internal marketing by identifying: the impact of broker size on the formality of its application; the differences between employees and managers with respect to their understanding of the term; the differences between commercial and personal-insurance with regard to their awareness of the role of internal marketing in developing customer orientation among employees; and the impact of an external factor (the FSA) on the manner of its adoption. The research findings indicated: that there is a lack of understanding of the concept of internal marketing within small insurance brokers; that it is used informally, except for employee training which has been introduced to satisfy the FSA regulations; that there are some linkages between the elements of internal marketing; and that small insurance brokers lack awareness of its role in developing customer orientation among employees.

Britain has the most active and developed Islamic banking sector in the European Union. This sector is set to grow with both Islamic and non-Islamic banks now offering a range of Sharia compliant products. However, are these banks meeting the service quality needs of their customers? Previous studies on service quality within Islamic banks have been restricted to Muslim-based countries and whilst English Muslims will have the same religious beliefs, their values may have been altered by the western society in which they live and work. Hence existing service quality tools are likely to be unsuitable for this market. Using mixed methods, this research developed a modified SERVQUAL model for measuring service quality in English Islamic banks. The resulting instrument is intended to help the managers of Islamic banks based in England to measure their service quality and focus their attention on the service quality dimensions that matter most to Muslim customers Items for the new service quality instrument were taken from the original SERVQUAL model, previous studies that modified SERVQUAL and eight focus groups conducted with members ofthe English Muslim community. The resulting instrument was tested via a questionnaire with more than 300 Muslims in England resulting in the EIBSQ, an English Islamic Banking Service Quality tool. This measures service quality as perceived by English Muslims. Using factor analysis, the instrument includes thirty-four items, which are grouped into five dimensions. The five dimensions are: responsiveness, credibility, Islamic tangibles, accessibility, and bank image. One of the key contributions ofthis thesis is the proposed EIBSQ. Previous studies using SERVQUAL reveal that the use of this original scale in an international context raises a legitimate concern about validity across borders and the scale construct as items can be affected by different contexts. To the researcher's knowledge, very few service quality models have been developed for the Islamic banking industry and none exists to measure the quality of service and customer satisfaction for the English Islamic banking industry.

The research has three objectives. The first is to investigate the extent of publishing delay and its determinants in Libya. The second is to find out how useful the annual report is to five user groups in Libya namely the Tax Authority, Academics, Auditors, Banks and the Auditing Authority. Finally, the research also seeks to determine the impact publishing delay has on banks, Tax and Auditing Authorities. A sample of 33 companies over two year period was used to determine the extent of publishing delay and its determinants. The results indicate that the average publishing delay is 154.86 days. The results of the ordinary least square regression analysis indicate that company size, profitability, company age, number of accountants, accountant qualification, and audit opinion are significantly associated with publishing delay. However, the type of accounting system is not associated with publishing delay. The results of the usefulness of the annual report indicate that the balance sheet is regarded as the most important followed by the profit and loss account, auditors' report, management report and the funds flow statement. The results also suggest that there are significant differences in the perceived usefulness of 'on-time' and 'late' annual reports in terms of predictive value, confirmatory value and faithful representation. The results of the impact of the publishing delay on banks, Tax authority and Auditing authorities are as follows. Loans advanced by banks on the basis of 'on-time' annual reports are more likely to be repaid than those made on the basis of 'late' annual reports. The Tax Authority collect less revenue from companies whose annual reports are produced late compared to those whose annual reports are produced on time and Auditing Authority is more likely to issue a qualified audit report if the annual report is produced late compared to one produced 'on-time'. The results have important implication for the Libyan Authorities in terms of what actions they should take to reduce the publishing delay. Reduction in publishing delay is likely to increase the usefulness of the annual report and reduce the impact the delay is having on banks, Tax and Auditing Authority.

A closed-end fund, known as an investment trust in the UK and closed-end fund in the US, is a collective investment company that invests in shares of other companies. This study attempts to describe and explain the persistence of the excess discount return on UK investment trusts and US closed-end funds. The ability to identify which factors best capture return variation is central to applications of multifactor pricing models. So the main purpose of this thesis is the application of a multifactor risk model that will explain the-existence of the excess discount return. Hence, the title of the thesis: "A Multifactor Model of Investment Trust Discounts. A Comparative Study of UK Investment Trusts and US Closed-End Funds" First, the time-series properties of the closed-end funds' net asset values (NAVs) and discounts are investigated. In terms of normality, we find that the UK and US excess NAV returns and discounts are approximately normally distributed. In addition, through Augmented Dickey-Fuller tests, we find that the UK and US discounts are non-stationary, but the excess discount returns and the excess NAV returns are stationary. In terms of multicollinearity, we find that the independent variables included in our models are not closely correlated, so we do not have problems in using them in the regression models in Chapters 7 and 8. Finally, there are no significant differences in the discount during the month of January and other months. In Chapter 7, we study the importance of management performance in terms of excess NAV returns and discount persistence. We use three approaches: Fama and French's (1993) three-factor model, an extended Fama and French model which incorporates a market timing variable, and a performance persistence model used by Carhart (1997) and Dimson and Minio-Kozerski (2001). On average, the six-factor model developed in the thesis can explain 67% of the variation in the excess discount return in the UK market by taking into consideration the market effect, size, the book-to-market effect, momentum, sentiment and expenses. In contrast, Fama and French's (1993) three-factor and Carhart's (1997) four-factor models explain only 42% of the variation of the excess discount return. Similarly, the six-factor model can explain 66% of the variation in the excess discount return in the US market by taking into consideration the same six independent variables. In contrast, Fama and French's (1993) three-factor model explains 59% of the excess discount return variation and Carhart's (1997) four-factor model explains 65% of the variation.

The Treasury's report "Institutional Investment in the United Kingdom: A Review" (the Myners Review) suggested in 2001 that various sectors of the UK equity market may be suitable for active investment management, tacitly assuming that some sectors are efficient whilst others are not. The validity of this assumption is tested against 29 industrial sector indices within the FTSE All Share index. Sector efficiency is, taken to be that index values reflect information correctly (strong efficient) or to the point where benefits do not exceed costs (weakly efficient). Existence of a sector index following a random walk is used to identify strong efficiency with the subsequent conclusion that passive management would be appropriate. Where the time series is not random, forecasting gains less than the management costs of active trading indicate weak efficiency with the corollary that passive management is still applicable. Industrial sectors where the index can be forecast with gains in excess of costs are not efficient and are appropriate for active management. The indices are tested for stationarity: none are stationary in levels but all reject the Dickey Fuller null hypothesis of a unit root in their first difference, the logarithmic return. Tests for randomness are based on pure random walks and random walks with drift and/or trend. Non-random time series are examined for maintained regressions based on AR, MA and ARMA. Where appropriate, ARCH is applied to the variance, utilising GARCH, Threshold GARCH, GARCH-in mean, Exponential GARCH and Component GARCH. Additionally there is a test for cointegration. All potential data generating processes' residuals are tested for independent identical distributions using the BDS test. If the maintained regression produces residuals that are III) then that series is assumed to be explained. The results show that four indices are strong efficient and five are weak; giving nine sectors that should be managed passively. Only one sector is found where there is scope for active management to make an abnormal gain in excess of costs. Nineteen of the indices had GARCH, which indicated a possible lack of efficiency but no decision on management style. One index was unexplained. Thus the Myners review's suggestion of active management where appropriate was valid, but limited solely to the Personal Care & Household Products sector.