The pandemic disrupted all activities, so it became necessary to understand, but also rethink, the complexity of economic resilience to better deal with future shocks. A component that can signal the resilience potential of a socio-economic system is smart city response, using technology to make services more efficient. This paper aims to analyze the relationship between smart cities and urban resilience to determine whether urban resilience is significantly influenced by urban smartness. Given the EU SDGs Strategy and the Implementation of RRF Programs, we have also identified the main driving forces that can amplify the impact of smart city development policies on local resilience. The results highlighted that at the European level, smart cities are significantly correlated with urban resilience; urban resilience is explained by the variation in urban smartness; resilience is correlated with all smart city dimensions, highly in (post-)pandemic, redefining a “new normal” in resilience approaches for smart cities. We also stressed the emerging, more complex content of the economic resilience concept and the new structural approach of smart cities resilience for the post-COVID-19 period.
The article aims to identify the stage of development of Fintech in the Balkan countries given the existence of numerous influencing factors Fintech is present in the Balkan countries, with a landscape colorfully generated by the different factors as the involvement of public authorities, the EU membership of only a few countries, the level of financial and digital education of the population. In order to highlight the variables influencing Fintech and financial inclusion in selected countries, specific indicators were used—internet usage and the share of bank assets in GDP, and several indicators regarding individuals performance, that is, online shopping, paid bills via internet, accessed a bank account online, paid utility bills using a mobile phone, made or received digital payments, account ownership and debit card ownership. The sample consists of all eight Balkan countries: Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, Macedonia, Bulgaria, and Romania. For testing the hypothesis in the analysis are used: descriptives, ANOVA, cluster analysis and principal components analysis. The results demonstrated that Balkan countries are not homogenous regarding Fintech and financial inclusion, the differences being generated both by the public policies in the financial field but also by IT development and by the population openness for using the new financial services and products. For these reasons, the authors identified economic policy measures that can be applied to increase financial inclusion in these countries given the facilities offered by Fintech and the digitization of financial products.
The phenomenon of migration among medical personnel from less developed countries is a large one, with negative effects on the origin country, but more worrying is graduates’ propensity to migrate during or immediately after university studies. The analysis of the labor market in the health sector from the last two decades shows us greater attractiveness of employment in (more) economically developed states compared to the demand from the health sector in graduates’ origin countries. This research’s purpose is to identify the determinants of the propensity to study and work abroad of medical students as a defined factor for better employment, and to identify the push factors in the origin country. As a result of the dichotomous nature of the dependent variables, logistic regression was applied. The independent variables (gender, residence, medical specialization, grades and perceived economic status) were used to identify the odds of the intention to migrate for studies. The results highlighted a higher propensity to migrate for studies among medical students, with opportunities offered by universities differing across countries and geographical areas. Moreover, students with a lower level of household income have openness to migrate, the tuition fees being managed through part-time/temporary employment during studies.
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