This study aims to analyze how SMEs handle the disruptions caused by the Covid-19 crisis. We used a questionnaire-based survey and analysed the results based on descriptive and inferential quantitative methods. Following the processing and interpretation of the data collected, we note, the importance of the government measures in order to support SMEs to ensure the economy’s functioning as close as possible to the normal state. Limited access to liquidity, lack of strong state support, poorly prepared and motivated human resources, low digitalization are the weaknesses of SMEs are the main obstacles to resilience in this crisis.

The core of sustainable public procurement lies in its ability to stem uneconomical public expenditures that waste taxpayer money and stifle social trust and development. The external audit of public procurement proves problematic since current research fails to provide sufficient empirical studies aimed at identifying procurement fraud. The development of online portals with embedded e-procurement solutions, along with the big data revolution, open new horizons and allow us to reveal trends otherwise impossible to spot, such as transactions achieved in an exclusive commercial relationship, in which a vendor engages only with a single public entity. By using innovative data acquisition techniques, our research encompasses 2.25 million online direct public procurement procedures conducted in 2023 using the Romanian portal for public procurement, totaling EUR 3.22 billion. By aggregating databases obtained from various public sources, our analysis achieved remarkable granularity, using over 112 million data elements—50 pertaining to each transaction. Research results indicate a unique sub-population of public procurement procedures—those conducted with “in-house” vendors totaling 14.28% of all direct public acquisitions and which is significantly differentiated along the entire list of analyzed criteria—financial, geographical, statistical, or risk-wise—illustrating a troubling phenomenon: possible gerrymandering of the online public procurement landscape, which, at least in theory, resembles a perfect market, by cultivating preferential commercial relations, thus affecting the legality, regularity, and economical aspects of public procurement.

In the present paper, we focus on the macroeconomic implications of the populist public policies and in particular on the effects of wage led growth strategy, which started to be applied in Romania from January 2017. Such a study is important as a practical example of applying this particular wage related public policy and sets the premises for analyzing its sustainability and its macroeconomic implications and costs. For analyzing the implications of the wage-led growth strategy upon the sustainability of macroeconomic variables, we have used an unrestricted VAR (vector auto regressive) and compared the effect of the impulse response functions with the recent evolutions of the Romanian economy. Thus, we have observed the effect of the wage led growth strategy, by using the average wage, trade deficit, number of employees, inflation rate, labor productivity, and minimum wage as variables. Our study shows that the wage-led growth policy had a strong positive impact on the number of employees and on inflation, increasing it, but a negative impact on productivity. In addition, we have seen a strong positive impact on increasing the trade deficit. These particular evolutions have left the Romanian economy with almost no fiscal and monetary space of maneuver in the face of the exogenous shock produced by the pandemic.

The aim of this paper is to analyze the real impact of ICT skill mismatch on SME’s sustainable competitiveness in presence of minimum wage guaranteed. As part of public policies – the minimum wage need to maintain a balance between increasing employment and not being a burden for the companies, leading them to bankruptcies, especially in times of disruptive change in which economy have to be more resilient. The rapid progress in information and communication technologies has dramatically redefined the rising unemployment as a result of skills mismatch. This paper aims to understand, on one side if, there is a match between the supply demand of ICT skills and how increasingly powerful digital technologies affect skills, jobs, and the demand for human labour. On the other, if increasing productivity and a fair minimum wage could be an integrated approach in stimulating SME’s in increasing sustainable competitiveness.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are quite varied in terms of business concepts, size, age or entrepreneurial personalities and draw on a wide talent pool of both genders. From liberal professions and micro-firms in the service sector to medium-sized industrial enterprises, their diversity is the starting point in establishing the communication strategy. SMEs need to take full advantage of the benefits of information, a vital component of the digital economy. Traditional SMEs often do not know what digital business strategy to pursue, struggle to capitalize on the massive data stores available to larger firms, and shy away from advanced AI-based tools and applications. The COVID-19 epidemic has accelerated the progress of digitization. Economic entities have reduced their activity in physical stores following the isolation and social distancing regulations. Simultaneously, the number of consumers using the Internet and mobile services has increased, underscoring the need for entities to accelerate the development of technology and other solutions. The accounting profession can step up its efforts and raise awareness of its role in increasing government transparency, reporting and accountability, and in assisting governments with financial, fiscal and risk governance, reporting and management.