• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.10 no.4
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• pp.698-712
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• 2004

As EU's enlargement toward Central and Eastern countries, it is expected to change of the economic activity space of EU. This paper aims to examine the changing of economic activity space of EU with a locational analysis of foreign direct investment in Central and Eastern countries. The foreign enterprises, particularly EU's firms are increasing the direct investment in the Central and Eastern countries from the middle 1990's for a raising of the efficiency of production and a prior occupation of the potential market. The foreign direct investment in Central and Eastern Europe has a tendency to concentrate in Poland, Hungary, Czech and Slovakia, which has relatively a large market, a cheap and plentiful labor, a stable political system and a positive inviting policy of foreign direct investment. And, the foreign direct investment shows a tendency to locate generally in a big city, which has a advantageous production factors by a well-developed infrastructure and a regional industrial organization, a skilled labors, a market, etc., and in a border area between East and West Europe because of a cheap and plentiful labor, a similar cultural environment and the low cost of transportation. In conclusion, as an integration of the Central and Eastern countries into EU, the capital territories of Hungary, Czech and Poland, and the border area between East and West Europe is becoming a new economic activity space of EU with a location of foreign direct investment. And. the Baltic zone is also expect to become a new economic activity space according to the augmentation of exchanges and direct investment inter near countries.

• Korea journal of population studies
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.1-32
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• 2005

The optimum population of a society or country can be defined as 'the population growth path that maximizes the welfare level of the society over the whole generations of both the present and the future, under the paths allowed by its endowments of production factors such as technology, capital and labor'. Thus, the optimum size or growth rate of population depends on: (i) the social welfare function, (ii) the production function, and (iii)demographic economic interrelationship which defines how the national income is disposed into consumption(birth and education of children included) and savings on the one hand and how the demographic and economic change induced thereby, in turn, affect production capacities on the other. The optimum population growth path can, then, be derived in the process of dynamic optimization of (i) under the constraints of (ii) and (iii), which will give us the optimum population growth rate defined as a function of parameters thereof. This paper estimates the optimum population growth rate of Korea by: specifying (i), (ii), and (iii) based on the recent development of economic theories, solving the dynamic optimization problem and inserting empirical estimates in Korea as the parametric values. The result shows that the optimum path of population growth in Korea is around TFR=1.81, which is affected most sensitively, in terms of the size of the partial elasticity around the optimum path, by the cost of children, share of capital income, consumption rate, time preference, population elasticity of utility function, etc. According to a survey implemented as a follow up study, there are quite a significant variations in the perceived cost of children, time preference rate, population elasticity of utility across different socio-economic classes in Korea, which implied that, compared to their counterparts, older generation and more highly educated classes prefer higher growth path for the population of Korea.

• Korean Journal of Agricultural and Forest Meteorology
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.43-53
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• 2017

This study aims to analyze the effect of typhoons on pear production. Pears are typical fruits that are vulnerable to typhoon damages, so typhoons are negatively associated with pear productivity. However, relatively less pear damages by typhoons in the main pear production area, comparing to the average in Korea, have been reported. The main production area seems to adopt better agricultural techniques or practices to cope with natural disasters such as typhoons. Thus, this study tests the hypothesis that there are differences of production losses due to typhoons between the main pear production area and the rest using the stochastic frontier analysis. The main production area is defined by Location Quotient Index (LQI), and we found that LQI had a significant effect to decrease the productivity losses in the main production areas, which shows that those production areas alleviated the pear production loss due to typhoons.

• Environmental and Resource Economics Review
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.523-544
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• 2009

The purpose of this paper is to estimate the impact of foreign direct investment on environmental performance for 27 OECD countries using endogenous environmental policy model. The empirical test shows that with 1% increase in the ratio of inflow stock of foreign direct investment over domestic capital stock, emission on NOx and $CO_2$ will increase by 0.0071%(NOx) and 0.0165%($CO_2$) and 1% increase in the ratio of foreign capital stock induces 0.044%(fixed effect) and 0.047%(random effect) of economic growth. 1% increase of per labor total output increases 2.038%(fixed effect) or 1.890%(random effect) in reinforcement of environmental regulation. However, we could not confirm the Porter's hypothesis that the more strong environmental regulation leads technical innovation. The scale effects (0.0119, 0.0172) are estimated higher than the technical effects (-0.0048, -0.0007) in two pollutants (NOx, $CO_2$). It implies that each country needs to increase pollution abatement and control expenditure more aggressively to protect environment.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.32 no.4
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• pp.561-572
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• 1997

This paper attempts to analyze the changes of the contents in foreign area research carried out by Korean geographers, and discuss the task of the new regional geography in a global-local context. As compared with domestic area research, only a scant of foreign area research has been carried out. In the 1990's, the research interests are paid to how an open economy affects the regional economy, especialy the production technique, division of labor, industrial mix, market strategy, industrial location and organization, and so on. Unfortunately, however, the boundaries between economic geography and regional economy are gradully disappearing.

• Journal of Korean Society of Transportation
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.113-132
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• 2003

Using nonradial data envelopment analysis(DEA) under assumptions of strong disposability and variable returns scale, this paper annually estimates productive. technical and allocative efficiencies of three publicly-owned rail transit properties which are different in terms of organizational type: Seoul Subway Corporation(SSC, local public corporation), the Seoul Metropolitan Electrified Railways sector (SMESRS) of Korea National Railroad(the national railway operator controlled by the Ministry of Construction and Transportation(MOCT)), and Busan Urban Transit Authority (BUTA, the national authority controlled by MOCT). Using the estimation results of Tobit regression analysis. the paper next computes their true productive, true technical and true allocative efficiencies, which reflect only the impacts of internal factors such as production activity by removing the impacts of external factors such as an organizational type and a track utilization rate. And the paper also computes an organizational efficiency and annually gross efficiencies for each property. The paper then conceptualized that the property produces a single output(car-kilometers) using four inputs(labor, electricity, car & maintenance and track) and uses unbalanced panel data consisted of annual observations on SSC, SMESRS and BUTA. The results obtained from DEA show that, on an average, SSC is the most efficient property on the productive and allocative sides, while SMESRS is the most technically-efficient one. On the other hand. BUTA is the most efficient one on the truly-productive and allocative sides, while SMESRS on the truly-technical side. Another important result is that the differences in true efficiency estimates among the three properties are considerably smaller than those in efficiency estimates. Besides. the most cost-efficient organizational type appears to be a local public corporation represented by SSC, which is also the most grossly-efficient property. These results suggest that a measure to sort out the impacts of external factors on the efficiency of rail transit properties is required to assess fairly it, and that a measure to restructure (establish) an existing(a new) rail transit property into a local public corporation(or authority) is required to improve its cost efficiency.

• Journal of Korean Society of Transportation
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• v.19 no.6
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• pp.89-102
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• 2001

Using a multiproduct translog cost function model, this paper examines the existence or absence of scale and scope economies in Seoul's urban bus industry. The Paper then conceptualizes that the bus firm produces three outputs (city, seat and local bus-kilometers) using low input factors(labor, capital, fuel and maintenance). Using 1996 annual observations for 81 Seoul's bus firms, the equation system consisting of a cost function and three input share equations is estimated with the nonlinear iterative Zellner method. The findings show that the cost function corresponding to a non-homothetic production technology with separability between local bus outputs and inputs adequately represents the structure of cost for Seoul's bus firms, and that the demand lot all input factors is quite inelastic with respect to their own price. On the other hand, nearly all firms experience mild overall economies or scale, but rather marked product-specific economies of scale with respect to all the three outputs. In addition, there appear to be substantial economies or scope associated with the joint production of city and seat bus services, while considerable diseconomies of scope associated with that of city and local bus services. These results indicate that the merger of smaller firms into larger firms with a fleet of approximately 200 buses would result in more cost-efficient bus services.

• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.137-165
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• 1994

Structural adjustment of industry (or industrial restructuring) seems to be inherent in the process of capitalist economic development, which tends to be proceeded with shifts from one stage to another in order to overcome structural crises generated in each stage. The structural adjustment of industry is necessarily accompanied with regional restructuring, since it is not only projected on spece, but also mediated by space. Such a restructuring necessitates industrial and uneven regional devlopment through which capital can seek excessive profits over the rate of socio-spatial average. The industrial restructuring and uneven regional development in the 1980s in Korea can be seen as a process in which capital attempted with a strong support of the govenment to overcome the crises in the end of 1970s and hence to go on rapid economic growth. In this process, capital, especially monopoly capital concentrated into few conglomerates, pursued both extensive expansion and intensive development of industry simultaneously. In results, the Korean economy could eliminate some of peripheral characters and maturate the Fordist accumulation system. The extensive expansion of the Korean industry in the 1980s was stimulated mainly through the enlargement and adjustment of investment for equipment facilities which was planned to exclude or rationalize traditional light industries on some places, and to continue rapid growth of key heavy-chemical industries, especially of fabricated metal industry, on other places. In this process, keeping mainly the existing developmental axis which polarized the Seoul Metroplitan region and the Southeast region in Korea, the enhancing spatial mobiiity of capital and the further differentiating division of labour enforced a tendency of concentration of all types of industry in the Seoul Metropolitan region, and at the same time provoked the diffusion of some industries over Jeolla and Chungchong regions in a considerable extent. The intensive development of industriai structure in the 1980s was pursued through the strategic encouragement of subcontracting small firms mainly which produced assembling components, the technical enhancement and factory (semi-) automation, and the enrichment of service industries for estate management, finance, distribution and retailing which supported and complemented the production of goods. In this process, enabling capital to extend and elaborate its domination over space through the reorganization of regulating systems, the Fordist division of labour generated a socio-spatial hierarchy in the nation-wide scale that characterized: the Seoul Metropolitan region as an overmaturated (or overarching) Fordist region performing the conceptive functions of management, research and development, in which all types of industry (including service industries) tended to be reconcentrated; Kyungsang region as a maturated Fordist region with excutive branches of large conglomerates and with subcontracting firms around them which produced standardized products through the automized production processes in secialized Fordist industries or rationalized traditional industries; and Jeolla and Chungchong regions as newly devloping Fordist regions with newly migrated branches and some subcontracting small firms-in relatively older Fordist industries or partly rationalized traditional industries. From these analyses, it can be argued that the structural adjustment of the Korean industry in the 1980s, which had carried out both through the extensive expansion and the intensive deveiopment, strengthened further uneven regional development process, even though it appears to have reduced apparently the economic and regional disparity by balancing numerically large and small firms and by extending the Fordist industrial space nation-wideiy. And it seems more persuasive to see that the Korean industrial structure in the 1980s maturated the Fordist system of accumulation, but not yet transformed towards the post-Fordist (or the so-called flexible) accumulation system, even though the Korean economy in the 1990s seems to be under a pressure of restructuring towards the latter system.

• Journal of Sericultural and Entomological Science
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• no.12
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• pp.47-50
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• 1970

There are many factors affecting the development of sericultural industry in Korea. The setting of a rational pricing system for sericultural products is one of important activities of the Korean Government to improve the incentives to producers. The determination o： the prices for many years were based on the production costs including a certain level of profits. Some of cost items are in conflict both in cocoon producers and silk-reeling industries. Government officials have to evaluate these conflicting problems and estimate the consequences of their decisions. In this situation the final decision often became political decisions. This analysis is aimed at providing an alternative method of setting the prices of sericultural products. The criteria of the equilibrium employed in this analysis are based on economic principle which equilibrium condition is determined by the relationships between the marginal productivity of input factors and factor prices. In order to obtain the related information Cobb-Douglas'functions were fitted using KIST computer and data were obtained mostly from the Bank of Korea and the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestru, An important assumption is that "Opportunity Costs" of factors input in both cocoon production and silk-Peeling industries are same, The major finding s obtained are as followings. 1) The sum of coefficient of production elastisity in silk-reeling industries is greater than one. Silk-reeling industries are operating under the situation of increasing return to scale and it is, therefore, expected to develop the industries as the capital-intensive large scale. 2) The cocoon producing farmers are under the situations of the decreasing return to scale and it is expected to continue their cocoon farming as the labor-intensive small scale, assuming the present level of production technology. As the development of commercial farming, the resources input in cocoon production will be shifted to the production for higher profitable crops, 3) The price elastisity of production is higher in cocoon production than in silk-reeling industries. It is expected that the price changing effects on domestic production will be resulted from cocoon producers. 4) Based on analysis results of marginal productivities and the opportunity costs of resources, cocoon price for meeting equilibrium price condition is to be increased by 8-16 percent or standard price level of silk increased by 6-8 percent. There were the possibilities of over evaluation on opportunity cost of resources input in silk-reeling industries, or income transfered from the farmers to the industries. It is recommended that the prices for meeting equilibrium price conditions are to be determined by 72 percent for cocoon and 28 percent for silk-reeling costs, based on standard level of the exporting prices.

• Journal of Korea Port Economic Association
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.139-152
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• 2022

In this paper, samples are collected for individual companies and the factors affecting worker wages (average annual salary) are analyzed in depth. In addition to the average annual salary of workers in a company, we would like to conduct an in-depth analysis of the average annual salary of first-time employees. Specifically, we tried to explain the size of companies, the production structure of capital and labor, and the impact of business on the average annual salary of first-time, college, and graduate school graduates by educational background of first-time employees. The difference in average annual salary of first-time employees of logistics companies is a decisive factor in the main project on sales, and first-time graduates and college graduates provided high salaries in the overseas passenger cargo transportation, port operation, and unloading management, and low salaries in the land cargo and warehouse industries. n addition, Korean logistics companies had relationships between the location of the headquarters, the number of employees, the proportion of labor costs to sales, and the four characteristic factors of the main business on sales. This fact is that Seoul-based foreign passenger cargo transportation, corporate logistics agency, complex transportation, and international transportation relay are large companies, with a low proportion of labor costs and a higher proportion of capital, technology, and information-intensive investments.