Information and telecommunication technologies are always joint with economic growth in modern economies, because they participate on reduction of transaction costs and increase production factors productivity and competitiveness. Benefits from ICT had been obvious untill 2001, but right after the investmens and expenditure in ICT started to decrease rapidly. There are studies capturing this drop in developed economies, whereas there are not many works considering the situation in center and eastern Europe. This master thesis brings an analysis of impact of ICT capital and production factors productivity on gross value added by growth accounting methodology in Czech Republic between 1996-2007. It also provides econometric testing of the impact of investments in ICT equipment and software on gross value added in Czech Republic between 1993-2013 by fixed effects model. The output of the master thesis demonstrates the empirical evidence of significant negative impact year-by-year change investment in ICT equipment and software on a change of growth pace of gross value added.

This research addressed two main issues that have become evident in studies of interstate cooperation. The first issue has to do with the relationship between cooperation and conflict. Can they be represented on a single, uni-dimensional continuum, or are they better represented by two theoretically and empirically separable dimensions? Granger causality tests were able to clarify the nature of cooperative events. The second issue is related to factors that might facilitate or discourage cooperation with other countries as a foreign policy tool. Factors used to explain cooperation and conflict include domestic variables, which have not been fully accounted for in previous empirical analyses. It is hypothesized that economic variables, such as inflation rates, GDP, and manufacturing production indices affect the likelihood of cooperative event occurrences. The effect of political dynamics, such as electoral cycles, support rates and national capability status, can also affect the possibility of cooperative foreign policies. The domestic factors in panel data was tested with Feasible Generalized Least Square (FGLS) in order to take care of heteroscedasticity and autocorrelations in residuals. The individual case analysis used linear time series analysis.

Suicide is social tragedy that devastates families and is very costly for society. Even though suicide have been a known social problem for over a century society have yet to solve it. The purpose of this essay is to examine whether the socio-economic theory can explain the variance of suicide rate in Sweden. From previous studies and socioeconomic theories, the variables unemployment, divorce rate, fertility was picked because of their ability to explain the variance of suicides rates. Population density was also picked because of its close relation with social isolation. A two-way fixed- effect model controlling for region and time was employed on a panel of 21 counties over the years 2005-2017. The results of the regression were that all independent variables, but population density were insignificant. The study concludes that the panel employed are not enough to determine whether the socio-economic factors can explain the variance of suicide rates in Sweden. / Självmord är en social tragedi som ödelägger familjer och är en stor kostnad för samhället. Även om självmord har varit ett känt problem i århundraden så är det fortfarande ett olöst problem. Syftet med den här uppsatsen är att undersöka om socioekonomisk teori kan användas för att förklara variansen av självmord i Sverige. Från tidigare studier och socioekonomiska teorier utrönandes tre variabler som anses kunna förklara variansen av självmord. De tre variablerna var arbetslöshet, skilsmässor och fertilitet. Befolkningstäthet lades till i regressionen, eftersom den ansågs vara i relaterad till sociologiska teorier. En tvåvägs fasteffekt regression som kontrollerar för län- och tid effekter applicerades på en panel bestående av 21 län under åren 2005–2017. Resultatet av regression visade att alla variabler förutom befolkningstäthet var icke signifikanta. Studien konkluderar att panelen som analyserats inte är tillräckligt för bedöma om socioekonomiska teorier kan förklara variansen av självmord.

Air pollution (in terms of PM2.5) is severe in developing countries, and the rapid population growth accompanied by urbanization may limit their potential economic development. This paper aims to investigate if urbanization and economic freedom cause higher levels of PM2.5 in developing countries. By measuring the potential effect of economic freedom on PM2.5 with the Ease of Doing Business-score by the World Bank, a new measure is introduced to the research on socioeconomic factors’ influence on air pollution. It is done by running both fixed effects- and system GMM regressions on a panel consisting of 63 low- and lower-middle-income economies between 2010-2017. The results indicate that PM2.5 is insensitive to changes in both variables and that urbanization’s effect on PM2.5 depends on the level of economic freedom and vice versa. However, both estimators may suffer from bias, and thus, the real relationship of urbanization and economic freedom on PM2.5 remains uncertain.

Numerous companies experienced the digital transformation of their functional and operationalstrategies. Among all the business sectors, which are being transformed, the industrial sector exhibits aconsiderable delay in transforming its operational strategy. The most significant underlying reason isthe high expenditure involved in upgrading the hardware components and infrastructure. According tothe literature, transformed companies enjoyed higher revenues and became more innovative. However,in most researches, an instant character was given to the transformation, and only a few years wereinvestigated; therefore, there was a need to describe the dynamics of the transformation with differentstages based on how it was executed. The digital transformation variable constructed in this studycontained the missing information from both the time the transformation was implemented and thespecific level it has reached. In particular, the investigated sample included ten firms from theindustrial sector of motion, automation, and robotics over ten years, and a panel data analysis wasconducted by utilizing the developed digital transformation variable. The analysis revealed that boththe business revenue and patented innovations were positively related to the transformation. Thetransformation brought immediate results to the innovation aspects, and all the examined companiesimproved their patented innovations. In contrast, the relationship of the business revenue with thelevel of the digital transformation was found impaired compared to previous studies. The investigationof the impact of the time lag resulted in the same conclusions for both explored variables, whereas themodel has been found robust against changes in the constructed digital transformation variable. Sincemore time and resources are required for the industrial sector to enjoy the transformation benefits, thissector must be studied independently by understanding its unique implications for the interpretation ofthe transformation outcomes.

Chinese commercial banks are the leading players directly participating in China's market economy activities. Macroeconomic stability is an essential prerequisite for the development of the banking industry. However, with the development of economic globalization, more and more influencing factors determine the changes in the business cycles, thus making commercial banks face higher risks in their operations. What's more, policy factors may make the operation of China's commercial banks inconsistent with changes in the business cycles. At present, China's domestic research literature that extends to the operation of commercial banks from the perspective of economic cycles lacks a systematic theoretical analysis. The purpose of the study was to examine the correlation between the profitability of commercial banks and business cycles in China by using the panel data analysis method. This paper selected return on assets, loan growth rate, non-performing loan ratio and net interest spread of 34 listed commercial banks from 2001 to 2018 as related variables and selected GDP growth rate, unemployment rate, and industry value added growth rate of China from 2001 to 2018 as the indicators of business cycles. The findings show that business cycles have a negative effect on the profitability of commercial banks in China. Based on the result of the empirical conclusions and the interest-oriented profit model of Chinese commercial banks, the paper also analyzes the impact of the business cycles on commercial bank profitability from the perspective of loan and net interest spread. Commercial bank practitioners can use these findings to avoid risks in bank operations, while other researchers can use our findings to develop further research on the factors affecting the profitability of commercial banks.

Over the past two decades there has been a significant increase in the support for radical-right populist parties in Europe. Simultaneously the income inequality has been rising. The aim of this thesis is to examine how income inequality affects the support for populist radical-right parties. To achieve this, we study the support for the Sweden Democrats, a radical-right populist party, and income inequality measured as the Gini coefficient. Using Swedish municipality level panel data of the election years from 2002 to 2014, a fixed effects-method is employed to examine the relationship between the Gini coefficient and support for the Sweden Democrats. Interestingly, the results show a robust statistically significant negative relationship between income inequality and support for the Sweden Democrats. Thus, our findings indicate that increased inequality decreases the support for the Sweden Democrats.

The determinants of health expenditures have been studied extensively for the past 50 years and income has been seen as the major driver. The focus has rarely left developed countries which raises the question as to whether the same positive relationship exists in developing countries as well. The purpose of this thesis is to answer this question by conducting a fixed effect regression on a sample of 38 countries labelled as the least developed in the world by the United Nations with data stretching between 2000 to 2017. The results indicate a weaker relationship in the sample compared to estimates on developed countries. However, due to a lack of theoretical guidance on how health expenditures are determined and indications that omitted variable bias is present, the results do not provide definitive conclusions.

Under 1990-talet infördes radikala, marknadsorienterade reformer i Sverige som gav upphov till utökade möjligheter att välja andra skolor än de kommunala. Syftet med denna uppsats är att undersöka huruvida föräldrar värderar att bo i ett område med fler skolalternativ. Vi gör detta genom att studera effekten av andelen friskoleelever i en kommun på bostadspriser i kommunen. Studien använder paneldata på kommunnivå från 2010 till 2018 hämtad från Statistiska Centralbyrån (SCB) och Skolverket. Det empiriska sambandet analyseras med fixed effects modeller vilket möjliggör kontroll för års- och kommunfixa effekter. Resultatet visar att det finns ett positivt men statistiskt icke-signifikant samband mellan andelen friskoleelever och huspriser. Resultatet är robust mot en rad utförda känslighetstester. Studien finner således inte belägg för att föräldrar söker sig till områden med fler skolalternativ. Detta ger vare sig stöd för fortsatt implementering av liknande reformer som främjar alternativ till den kommunala skolan eller reformer som reducerar möjligheterna till skolval. / During the 1990s radical, market oriented reforms were implemented in Sweden which allowed for increased opportunities to choose other schools than the public. The purpose of this thesis is to examine whether parents value living in an area with more school options. We do this by studying the effect of the share of pupils who are enrolled in a private school in a municipality on housing prices in that municipality. The study uses paneldata on the municipality level from 2010 to 2018 gathered from Statistics Sweden and the Swedish National Agency for Education. The empirical relationship is analyzed using fixed effects models which makes it possible to control for year and municipality fixed effects. The results show that a positive but statistically insignificant relationship exists between the share of private school students and housing prices. The result remains robust for different sensitivity tests. Therefore, the study does not find support for the assumption that parents value living in an area with more school options, which neither provides basis for further implementation of similar reforms that promote alternatives to public school nor reforms that reduce school choice.

Fifteen or so years into what is said to be the game changer of our time there are many fields of science  focusing  their  attention  towards  the  online  market  in  attempts  to  describe  its implications for the traditional, offline markets. Where most of the literature on economics of ecommerce focus on pricing mechanisms and growth little attention has been directed towards more general market structure effects. This thesis adopts techniques, empirical and theoretical models  from  the  search  cost  and  market  structure  literature  in  order  to  examine  the relationships between ecommerce and offline market structures in the retail industry through regional employment and establishment data. The literature reviewed and used focus only on the US market whereas this thesis shifts the attention to the European regions. The results are convincing and in general corresponding to previous research results. As ecommerce usage increase and the consumer search costs thereby gets lower inefficient firms drop out of the market resulting in a decline in local establishment counts. The opposite effect is seen for pure online retailing establishments that thrive in the presence of local ecommerce usage. The effect of   ecommerce  on  traditional  offline  establishments  seems  to  be  aggregated  phenomena whereas  the  effect  on  pure  online  firms  seems  to  be  of  a  more  local  nature.  Focus  of policymakers and company management therefore might consider looking at the two effects in their respective aggregation level to best sort out how to react in the presence of increased competition from ecommerce usage.