Accounting, Economics and Law: A Convivium

Abstract In this paper I reconsider the concept of equity in corporate accounting from the perspective of the origin and attribution of business profit. In both Financial Accounting Standards Board’s (FASB’s) and International Accounting Standards Board’s (IASB’s) Conceptual Frameworks, shareholders’ equity is synonymous with a firm’s net assets. However, it is not the sole definition of equity. We may regard equity as the interest in the corporate capital itself. From this viewpoint, shareholders’ equity consists of retained earnings attributable to shareholders’ as well as invested capital provided by them. We should note that, under the current corporate accounting system, shareholders are assumed to be the sole residual claimants. However, the existence of implicit contracts in corporate activities implies other residual claimants in addition to shareholders. If shareholders are not the sole residual claimants, it is necessary to revisit the proprietary theory under which equity is identical to shareholders’ equity. In this paper I reconsider the significance of the entity theory, which emphasizes an entity as an organization comprising various stakeholders and attributes business profit above shareholders’ expectations to an entity itself. The ownership interest cannot generate the excess profit by itself. Without firm-specific investments by employees and/or entrepreneurial activities by managers, the excess profit would never emerge. We should critically examine the foundation of the current corporate accounting in order to design a more equitable and efficient corporate accounting in which business profit is attributable not only to shareholders but also to other stakeholders who contribute to its generation.

Satoru Otaka

Accounting Economics and Law - A Convivium

Rethinking the Concept of Equity in Accounting: Origin and Attribution of Business Profit

重新思考会计中的公平概念：企业利润的起源与归属

Abstract This paper examines the textual design of Double Taxation Agreements (DTAs). Using Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques we analyze the heterogeneity of a country’s set of DTAs and the drivers that lead to (non-)adherence to the OECD Model Convention. We observe that wealthier countries hold a more diverse DTA set compared to poorer countries and more frequently diverge from the OECD Model Convention. Furthermore, we show that negotiation results are less likely to follow the OECD Model Convention when treaty partners are closely related in terms of trade volume or share a colonial history. Institutional factors, such as OECD or EU membership, can counteract this effect and thus lead to a stronger adherence to the OECD Model Convention. As such, our study highlights how socio-economic, institutional, and geopolitical factors influence (non-)adherence to the OECD Model Convention and how this depends on the article under consideration.

Markus Diller

Daniel Ehm

Patrick Katzlmayr

Johannes Lorenz

Adherence to the OECD Model Tax Convention: A Textual Analysis of Member and Non-Member Countries’ Double Taxation Agreements

《遵循OECD税收协定范本：成员国与非成员国双重征税协定文本分析》

Abstract The present paper addresses the following questions: Is non-arbitrary goodwill impairment testing possible? Would amortization be a better alternative than the impairment-only approach and, if so, should there be case-specific amortization periods or should accounting standards require a uniform amortization period? Empirical evidence suggests that non-arbitrary goodwill impairment testing is not feasible. However, academic literature provides very little in terms of a theoretical debate. To fill this gap, the present paper theoretically substantiates these empirically inspired concerns regarding arbitrariness of goodwill impairment testing and illustrates this substantiation with simple examples. Referring to the question whether an amortization approach is less arbitrary, it theoretically substantiates concerns regarding the arbitrariness of determining case-specific amortization periods. On the basis of this analysis, the paper recommends replacing the impairment-only approach by an amortization approach with uniform amortization periods.

Hendrik Sander

Accounting for Goodwill: A Critical Analysis of the Impairment-Only Approach

商誉会计：减值测试法的批判性分析

Abstract Eric Monnet’s piece, “Democratic consequences of the insurance functions of central banks,” starts in exactly the right place. Monnet acutely observes some of the most fundamental issues with the dominant contemporary monetary policymaking regime. Most foundationally, he observes a gap between what central banks do and how they are legitimized. The consequence, in short, is a failure of the contemporary regime to justify itself on democratic terms. To overcome this failure, Monnet proposes an institutional reform—establishing a European Credit Council (ECC). He defends this proposal by appeal to democratic theory, particularly the literature on democratic theory that prizes ‘good deliberation’. While there is nothing wrong with Monnet’s claim that establishing an ECC would likely improve the quality of deliberation about the role of central banks, and in so doing, produce better policy, I argue here that this view misses something essential. Democracy requires more than accountability, transparency, and good deliberation. It requires democratic power: the power of the people and their elected officials to steer policy. Adopting this view of democracy, in contrast to the deliberative democratic view Monnet embraces, suggests a different set of required reforms. Instead of establishing an independent credit council, I suggest that we should be vesting stronger monetary policy guidance powers in existing democratic legislative bodies.

Leah Rose Ely Downey

Democratic Central Banking: Power Not Deliberation

民主集中制下的中央银行：权力而非审议

Abstract By formulating a proposal for the “democratisation” of the ECB through the establishment of a European Credit Council, Eric Monnet makes a fundamental contribution to the contemporary debate on central banking. This idea appears to be in line with other critiques that often see the post-World War II institutional set-up as a model to be revived to bring central banks back to democracy after the neoliberal disengagement of the 1980s. However, I argue in this article that the intellectual optimism with which these historical experiences are often viewed can be misleading. Going beyond the French “ideal type” and focusing instead on the “twin case” of Italy, I intend to show how the attempt to democratically control the central bank has not always been linear nor necessarily democratic and successful. The establishment of a credit council did not prevent the Bank of Italy from enjoying a high degree of independence and ability to influence policy. At the same time, the widespread system of credit policy that the central bank has explicitly promoted in pursuit of the country’s development agenda has often degenerated into irrational and opaque practices, revealing the side effects of an economy in which a sustainable boundary between fiscal and monetary policy struggles to emerge. While the Italian experience might show how problematic and “fictitious” the relationship between the credit council and the central bank can be, it can also offer interesting insights for a better articulation of it.

Mattia Lupi

A European Credit Council? Lessons from the History of Italian Central Banking after World War II

欧洲信贷委员会？二战后意大利中央银行历史教训

Abstract According to the widespread, neoclassical market ideology, market prices are not simply helpful, yet imperfect, reference points for consumers and profit-seeking enterprises. Rather, they are interpreted as reflecting the true value of goods. The hypothetical end result of the market process – the market equilibrium – is thereby assumed to be an ever-satisfied condition of the market economy. Based on this unrealistic presupposition, this market ideology maintains that the performance of managers can be evaluated from the prices of the (net) assets they control and, in the case of publicly traded companies, share prices. The share prices supposedly reflect the value that managers create for shareholders and, thus, the economy as a whole. If this were actually the case, the maximization of so-called shareholder value would be a socially beneficial goal for managers. The present paper demonstrates, however, that the ongoing re-orientation of corporate governance towards the maximization of values (as revealed by share prices) instead of profits (as determined by the accounting system) destroys the very market processes that coordinate business activity and allocate resources in the market economy.

Eduard Braun

How the Neoclassical Market Ideology Destroys the Market: Shareholder Value Maximization as a Self-Defeating Prophecy

新古典市场意识形态如何摧毁市场：股东价值最大化作为自我毁灭的预言

Abstract Against the background of taxation, this article critically examines Schmiel’s commentary “Why tax planning without considering societal interests is unfounded” ( https://doi.org/10.1515/ael-2021-0115 ) and points out the overarching context. This rejoinder argues that the task and the object of my business tax research article, namely to analyse value-neutral tax regulations, in this case the ATAD CFC taxation regulations, with regard to their effectiveness and their achievement of objectives and to derive practical consequences for future tax legislation and further legislative development of the existing tax regulations. Through such an analysis, deficits in the effectiveness of the current tax regulations are revealed at an early stage and the legislator can react before tax losses occur (early information function). This is precisely how social interests are pursued and answered. Moreover, this rejoinder argues that in the area of taxation, it is exclusively the tax legislator who determines in the democratic legislative process which objectives, steering effects and (tax) burden effects it pursues with a norm and to what extent it pursues these objectives. The extent to which the legislator pursues societal or social interests with a tax norm is up to the legislator. This is the so-called assessment prerogative, i.e. the prerogative of the legislature (norm-setter) to decide on the appropriateness and necessity of a particular statutory regulation to achieve a legitimate goal in an ultimately binding manner, taking into account the interests of the state as a whole. This rejoinder rejects’ Schmiel’s claim to use critical rationalism as a methodological framework for research on tax law. From my viewpoint, only the objective will of the legislator (objective intention of the legislator, aim of the law, principle of legality) and the relevant legal principles and methodology as well as the methods of business tax research are relevant when it comes to examining the scope of application of current tax law provisions and their effectiveness, here the CFC taxation rules. Alternative theories such as critical rationalism, a philosophical view, appear to be too vague to ensure legal certainty and appropriate taxation.

Thomas Kollruss

The (Social) Tasks of Business Tax Research and the Binding Effect of the Statutory Tax Burden Decision

企业税务研究的社会任务与法定税负决策的约束效应

Abstract In Rating Politics, Zsófia Barta and Alison Johnson dig deeply into how and why ratings agencies act the way that they do and come up with a surprising conclusion: in spite of their very considerable global power, ratings agencies are above all driven by their fear of failure. In this short essay, I will take a closer look at this preoccupation with rating failures and draw out some of its wider implications for how we think about global economic governance. I will suggest that rather than seeing this fear of failure as a specific feature of ratings agencies we may want to understand it as part of a wider global shift towards more provisional forms of governance.

Abbreviation
Journal Impact	0.95
Quartiles(Global)	BUSINESS, FINANCE(Q3)

ISSN	2152-2820, 2194-6051
h-index	19

Publication Information	Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH，Publishing cycle: ，Journal Type: journal，Open Access Journals: No
Basic data	Year of publication: 2011，Proportion of original research papers: 100.00%，Self Citation Rate:33.30%， Gold OA Rate: 9.18%

Accounting, Economics and Law: A Convivium

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Rethinking the Concept of Equity in Accounting: Origin and Attribution of Business Profit

Adherence to the OECD Model Tax Convention: A Textual Analysis of Member and Non-Member Countries’ Double Taxation Agreements

Accounting for Goodwill: A Critical Analysis of the Impairment-Only Approach

Democratic Central Banking: Power Not Deliberation

A European Credit Council? Lessons from the History of Italian Central Banking after World War II

Adherence to the OECD Model Tax Convention: A Textual Analysis of Member and Non-Member Countries’ Double Taxation Agreements

Accounting for Goodwill: A Critical Analysis of the Impairment-Only Approach

How the Neoclassical Market Ideology Destroys the Market: Shareholder Value Maximization as a Self-Defeating Prophecy

The (Social) Tasks of Business Tax Research and the Binding Effect of the Statutory Tax Burden Decision

The Fear of Failure: Ratings as a Form of Provisional Governance