Suchergebnisse

The rationale for more European Commission (EC) support for Open Innovation is there, as a whole-of-society approach seems to be the best to address the challenges arising mainly from competition at the global level. This paper supported this view and was built as a case study research paper based on the EU and USA case studies. In the first sections, a theoretical framework is built, which establishes a link between R&D, innovation, and competitiveness, introduces culture and military as factors influencing innovation, and shows how open innovation has changed innovation. A discussion evolves regarding the current position of the EU and EU countries in terms of innovation and what the EC is undertaking to address the identified challenges. The core section is dedicated to the case study, elaborates benchmarks, gains learnings from a country successful in the field of (open) innovation such as the USA, and suggests what the EC could concretely implement in the case of the EU. The outlook section suggests a few possible areas for future research and policies.

Based on the sample of all municipalities in Slovenia from 2008 to 2014, the authors answered how austerity measures affect the expenditure side of the revenue and expenditure account of municipalities. The authors used a statistical program to process the data. The research intends to anticipate timely action in the next economic crisis. The results showed that the austerity measures represent a reduction in annual holiday pay abundantly visible in the first year. Other savings measures in wages and expenses for employees are less visible in the first year and more visible in the following years. There is a positive correlation between the variables payroll and other employee expenditure and the number of employees. The authors propose to change the legislation in the area of financing of municipalities.

Municipalities are self-governing local governments established for the purpose of providing and improving social and economic life. However, the financial resources of the municipalities are limited, which is why they provide additional funds for the implementation of investments, among other things by taking out loans. The debt level of municipalities can be influenced by a variety of factors. In this paper, the authors limit themselves to a selection of factors, which have been divided into three areas - legislation, organisation and economy. As far as the legislative factor is concerned, we provide an insight into whether the total debt of municipalities has decreased with the adoption of the Constitutional Act amending Article 148 of the Constitution of the Republic of Slovenia (UZ148) and how this affects investment. With regard to the organisational factor, the authors try to find out, on the basis of correlation analysis, how the size of municipalities, divided into three classes according to the number of inhabitants, affects debt, current expenditure and total expenditure. With regard to the economic factor, the authors examine the impact of the municipalities' own revenues on their debt.