Journal of Security and Sustainability Issues

The prime objective of the current study is to examine the influence of infrastructure of transportation on economic growth for various countries in ASEAN. This influence differs in terms of administrative status and quality of infrastructure across the counties. GDP has been used as an economic growth measure in terms of per worker along with various kinds of infrastructure of transportation for years 2002–2017. Therefore, a short model has been incorporated with capital stock of railways and roads. Two variables have been incorporated to differentiate rods with different covering and quality. In the next step, the administrative status of roads has been distinguished. The results have revealed difficulty in interpretation because of the problem of endogeneity and reverse causality. Therefore, the research model was modified by including the lag values of variables of infrastructure of transportation for getting robust estimates. The unit root test has been performed and first differences in model ere used to obtain stationary time series. It was found that GRP per worker is greatly influenced by overall roads stock. This is because of the use of such roads for large traffic load. The regional growth of economy is greatly influenced by the light covering roads rather than national roads of similar quality/covering. The influence of local government’s quality was controlled on development of economy. The turnout of voters was used as proxy variable for the local government’s quality. It was found that the influence of infrastructure of transportation stock in the areas (where government is of better quality) has not much influence on GRP per worker. Different kinds of infrastructure of transportation have been shown by this research being the drivers of growth of economy in. The administrative status and quality of covering roads creates an influence on the growth of economy. Based on the findings of study, the following recommendations have been made. There is need to develop national roads to improve the economic performance. Further, there is need to improve the quality of countries. However, the influence of infrastructure transportation is high where the government has low quality and overall capital stock influence is high where the government is of good quality (Crescenzi, Cataldo, & Rodríguez, 2016). In future, researches can be conducted by focusing on the influences of other variables of infrastructure including electricity lines, supply of water and for long time periods. The future studies can work on investigating the network effect of transportation infrastructure in ASEAN.

This research study has given important implications for regulators through elaborating the association between economic growth, financial openness among the five member countries of ASEAN including Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore. An insight has been provided about the relation of economic growth and trade openness from the practical aspect in ASEAN economies. Therefore, the policy makers are supported through this information to develop, overview, and revise the existing regulations and policies of financial openness. This research study has made significant contributions through analyzing the association between economic growth and financial openness from the theoretical aspect. The study has argued that the current literature is extended by this study through focusing on the developing economies of ASEAN. Banking sector is a crucial institution for any economy and economic growth is negatively influenced through collapse of the banking activities. Further, financial system comes at risk through financial openness, but it has a considerable role in the development of economies. The financial system liberalization is the main factor, which drives economic growth among the ASEAN countries. There is need for the policy makers to review and alter the existing regulations of financial openness.

The main objective of the currents study is to investigate and explore the antecedents of the convergence in ASEAN countries. Foreign direct investment, trade, government size, population are examined as the antecedents of the economic convergence in ASEAN countries. Examining the phenomena of absolute convergence among ASEAN countries is another set goal of this research. Achieving this goal obviously requires different approach, methodology wise. Cross section regression-based studies have utilized what is called ‘regression to mean’ to examine absolute convergence across countries traditional unit root testing procedure developed by Dickey and Fuller (1979) is employed to test for convergence hypothesis. Employing ADF test also serves two purposes: 1) the methods has to be used to provide input for performing simulations to apply SURADF procedure. Developed by Blundell and Bond (1998), system GMM uses additional moment conditions to serve as an improvement in terms of performance of estimators in the models developed in Arellano and Bond (1991). The implication of this finding is that economies that are more open in terms of trade and with high level of government participation are more likely to show high level of convergence to the group average real GDP per capita than economies that less open to trade with little government participation as measured by government final consumption expenditure as a percentage of GDP.

The objective of this study is to examine the effect of business size, market value of equity, required rate of return, systematic risk, debt ratio and total debt along with inflation on cost of capital for selected firms in five states of ASEAN region. Secondary data is collected during the time of 2000–2017 for ten firms in each country. Findings through regression analysis indicates the fact that significant determinant for fixed payment ratio is required rate of return, size, market to book ratio, systematic risk, and inflation are significant determinant. For interest covered ratio, key determinants are required return, total debt, and market to book ratio, size, and inflation. For dividend payment, size, debt ratio, inflation, and market value of equity. For interest payment, systematic risk, inflation, log market value of equity, size and market to book ratio are found to be significant determinant. These findings are providing a new insight in the literature of finance and financial management. Both theoretical and practical significance of the study can be viewed through provision of literature discussion and empirical findings. Policy makers, financial analysts, and other industry experts can utilize these findings as a meaningful source for strategic decision. However, future studies can be reconsidered remaining countries in ASEAN region and better sample size of the firms.

As an alternative to the conventional GDP, a new “progressive” GDP termed as the “Holistic Progress Index” or the HPI has been proposed; and an original approach to its quantitative evaluation has been presented. The HPI integrates social, economic, ecological and political aspects of human progress. The rationale of HPI and its evaluation methodology are presented. As proposed, the HPI is based on three major parameters i.e. the Net GDP per capita, Socio-Ecological Progress Index and Socio-Political Progress Index representing Peaceful Development, Sustainability and Human Freedom respectively. The factors involved in the quantitative evaluation of HPI are GDP, military expenditure, health, education, carbon emission, poverty reduction, leisure, population growth, crime and human freedom. Hence the proposed HPI is much more comprehensive than the conventional GDP. Future actions / projects required to utilize the concept of HPI are also proposed and discussed. It is concluded that a pursuit of the growth in HPI (rather than a growth in GDP alone) will lead to Peaceful and Sustainable Development without curtailing Human Freedom.