经济转轨、财政分权与预算软约束

我国正处于经济转轨时期，预算软约束问题普遍存在。财政分权在通过地区竞争逐步缓解国有企业预算软约束问题的同时，却使政府预算软约束愈演愈烈。解决的办法在于规范财政分权。     

预算软约束视角下的资本结构理论研究

预算软约束存在于各种经济体中,并影响着不同制度背景下的公司融资模式。文章回顾了现有的资本结构理论,试图构建预算软约束对资本结构作用机理的理论模型与可验证的假设。文章还提出了预算软约束的分析框架,并通过放宽预算硬约束假设来分析现有资本结构理论,最后总结了预算软约束和资本结构的相互作用及其理论假设,并提出了进一步研究的建议。     

软约束下的资源配置和技术特征

在存在着预算软约束的情况下,生产要素的配置通常是低效率的。本文研究软约束体制下生产要素配置与预算软约束程度之间的关系,同时讨论资源配置的低效率与生产技术特征之间的联系。我们的研究表明,在预算软约束体制下,生产要素配置的浪费程度以一种微妙的方式受制于生产技术特征。 科尔内的预算软约束理论（１９７９）于中国经济学界久已耳熟能详。科尔内的中心思路是,传统的社会主义中央计划经济体制中,国有企业的预算软约束导致资源配置的扭曲和低效率。最近１０年,博奕论的引入使得预算软约束理论研究更上一层楼,最具影响力的一…     

政府质量、预算软约束与政府会计准则制度执行效果——基于预算执行审计和财政透明度的双重视角

不同地方政府质量对政府会计准则制度执行效果的影响不同。基于2009—2017年中国31个省、自治区、直辖市的地区数据实证分析发现：地方政府质量对政府会计准则制度执行效果具有显著的正向影响。但是在预算软约束作用下，这种正向影响发生了逆向改变，即预算软约束对地方政府质量与政府会计准则制度执行效果的关系起到了反向调节作用。进一步研究发现：由于东、中、西部地区的发展差异以及中央政策的地区性差异，东部和西部的政府质量对政府会计准则制度执行效果的影响要高于中部地区；随着东、中、西部省份发展程度由强变弱，预算软约束对政府质量与政府会计准则制度执行效果关系的负向调节作用也逐渐减弱。     

预算软约束的成因、后果及治理对策

自科尔奈1980年提出"预算软约束"这一术语以来,这一概念不仅被广泛地应用于传统计划经济和转型经济的研究当中,同时也被应用于市场经济条件下的预算软约束的研究当中。本文在分析了当前环境下预算软约束形成的总体原因和具体原因,以及预算软约束带来的总体后果和具体后果的基础上指出,通过政府适当退出金融领域的直接经营活动,同时强化商业银行改革和公司治理,来硬化预算约束,从而为经济发展提供更好的市场经济环境。一、预算软约束的成因     

浅谈预算软约束视角下私营企业的发展

目前金融经济领域从预算软约束视角对私营企业的发展探讨并不多,更多研究者把目光放在了政府和银行及其他金融机构对国有企业的预算软约束方面做分析研究,本文在简要探析了政府对私营企业预算软约束的表现方式的基础上,提出了针对性的私营企业软约束刚性化、硬性化的措施,希望能抛砖引玉,从预算软约束层面探讨私营企业良性发展这一论题提供更多更好的见解。     

预算软约束与地方政府债务风险 ——基于政府审计监督调节效应的研究

本文基于我国2008—2017年30个省级(包括直辖市、自治区)政府债务数据,从预算软约束视角,实证检验了政府审计与地方政府债务风险之间的关系及其作用机理.研究发现:预算软约束越大,地方政府债务风险越大;政府审计监督力度越大,地方政府债务风险越小;审计监督力度有助于减弱预算软约束对地方政府债务风险的负面影响.进一步研究发现,当地区腐败程度越低、法制环境越好时,政府审计对减弱预算软约束带来地方政府债务风险负面影响越显著.     

软预算约束下的国有商业银行改革

本文利用软预算约束的理论框架,分析了银行领域的软预算约束形成原理和表现,并进一步具体讨论近年来我国政府对国有商业银行相关政策中的软预算约束含义。然后建议中国国有商业银行改革应注重法治建设和所有权结构改革,才能妥善解决软预算约束问题。     

所有权性质、融资约束与企业投资——基于投资现金流敏感性的经验证据

本文通过研究中国制造业上市公司投资支出与其内部现金流的敏感性,分析经济转轨过程中不同所有权企业融资约束的变动情况。研究发现:(1)制造业上市公司存在明显的融资约束,且民营企业的融资约束明显高于国有企业;(2)在研究期间,全部样本企业的投资现金流敏感性随时间逐渐降低;(3)预算软约束的存在,使得国有企业投资现金流敏感性随时间下降的幅度比民营企业低。     

银企关系中的道德风险分析

道德风险问题历来是银企关系中的主要问题之一。在微观经济中，产生这种道德风险的根源在于政府与银行的借贷政策的预算软约束，以及缺乏竞争性的、集权的金融制度。事实上，在这一体制条件下，银行居于债权人位置却不能对企业的道德风险行为实行有效地控制，进而恶化企业的治理结构。不仅如此，银企关系中的道德风险还破坏了经济运行的微观基础，导致银行危机和经济动荡。     

CORPORATE CAPITAL STRUCTURE AND HOW SOFT BUDGET CONSTRAINTS MAY AFFECT IT

Abstract.  This survey paper examines existing theories of capital structure and related empirical tests with the aim to derive theoretical as well empirically testable predictions about the implications of the soft budget constraint for corporate capital structure. We show that the soft budget constraint syndrome is relevant for a variety of institutional environments, from central planning to capitalist economic systems, and consider features of company financing patterns in various institutional contexts. Special attention is paid to emerging and transition economies where, with the development of financial markets, companies reduce their financial dependence on the state and begin to borrow from a variety of sources. However, due to the persistence of soft budget constraints, corporate capital structure in transition and emerging economies may still deviate significantly from the capital structure of companies operating under hard budget constraints.     

Stability or restructuring? Macroeconomic dynamics under soft budget constraint problems

In this paper, we examine how a decrease in firms’ productivity or the degree of financial market imperfection affects macroeconomic dynamics when the bank has an incentive to misallocate its credit. We develop a model that incorporates a soft budget constraint into a simplified version of Kiyotaki and Moore (1997) environment and show that soft budget constraint problems may arise if the economy becomes less productive or the financial market is less developed. Because of this shift in firms’ productivity, not only do more bad projects survive, but profitable new entrants are crowded out, so that, as in transition economies and Japan in the 1990s, the recession is not only prolonged, but also becomes more severe in the long term.     

The London Business School with Gower Publishing

Last year saw the most coordinated cyclical upturn in the world economy since the early I970s, with OECD output rising 4per cent, industrial production and world trade even more rapidly. The boom in demand, which followed five years of continuous expansion, has outstripped supply and prices have begun to accelerate. To tackle inflation, the G7 monetary authorities have tightened policy over the last year, reversing the short-lived drop in interest rates necessitated by the stock market crash. This tightening may have to go further, especially in Germany and Japan where the effects of a rising oil price and higher indirect taxes are being exacerbated by currency depreciation. Although the rise in interest rates came too late to stop inflation rising, it has beet pursued with sufficient vigour to prevent inflation from seriously breaching the 5 per cent level. It is on these grounds that we forecast a relatively soft lending for the world economy on output, with growth continuing at 2.5–3per cent, accompanied by a limited reduction in inflation which stays in the 4–5per cent range. Progress on current account balances is also likely to be sluggish: in the absence of a serious attack on the budget deficit, the US deficit is likely to stay in the region of $140bn a year.     

Soft budgets and hard rents: a note on Kornai and Gomulka

This note shows how Kornai's concept of the soft budget constraint can be decomposed into separate elements of technical inefficiency and relative price distortion. The distinction between r-budget softness and m-budget softness introduced by Gomulka is shown to correspond to the equivalent and compensating variation measures of efficiency loss. It is also argued that budget softness should be viewed as the outcome of a rent-seeking process in which a firm's action in the control sphere incurs an opportunity cost in the real sphere. Adopting such a perspective leads to a re-definition of the resource loss associated with budget softness and results in much higher estimates of the social costs of soft budgets than those proposed in the existing literature.     

The transmission of foreign shocks to South Eastern European economies: A Bayesian VAR approach

The paper analyses the macroeconomic effects of foreign shocks in three South-East European (SEE) economies: Croatia, Macedonia and Bulgaria. In this regard, we investigate the transmission of several eurozone shocks (output gap, money market rates and inflation) on various macroeconomic variables in the aforementioned countries (output, inflation, money market rates and budget deficits). We trace the effects of foreign shocks on the basis of impulse response functions obtained from the Bayesian Vector Auto Regressions (VARs) separately for each country. The main findings from our study are: first, economic expansion in the eurozone has strong output and inflation effects on SEE economies, implying some degree of synchronization of business cycles; second, eurozone inflation is instantly and to a great extent transmitted to domestic inflation, suggesting that inflation in the SEE economies is mostly driven by foreign inflation; third, domestic money market rates are not closely linked with eurozone money markets; fourth, monetary policy in the SEE countries does not seem to be responsive to eurozone inflation shocks; and fifth, the fiscal authorities attempt to offset the spillover effects from both economic expansion and monetary tightening in the eurozone.     

中国通货膨胀的性质特征与货币政策的选择

2007年以来,我国通货膨胀问题日趋严重,紧缩性货币政策的实施效果却不明显.本轮通货膨胀不同于以往历次的通货膨胀,它是在经济全球化不断加深、我国对外开放不断扩大、综合国力不断增强、经济金融化程度不断提高的背景下,由多种原因形成的一种"综合型"通货膨胀.因此,采取单一的"紧缩性货币政策"是难以奏效的,必须运用多种调控政策,协调配合,共同防治.     

Federal budget deficits and long-term interest rates in USA

We investigate whether the emergence of high inflation rates after 1965 and large budget deficits after 1980s caused the financial market agents to become more sensitive to the outlooks for inflation and budget deficits. Our approach is parametric and our models fully account for possible presence of ARCH effects in the data.Our results show a statistically significant positive link between the budget deficits and the slope of the yield curve which is more pronounced in the later sub-sample period. These results are in line with Reinhard and Sack [Reinhard, V., & Sack, B. (2000). The economic consequences of disappearing government debt. Brooking Papers of Economic Activity, 163–209] but in sharp contrast with Evans [Evans, P. (1985). Do large deficits produce high interest rates? American Economic Review, 7, 68–87] and Evans [Evans, P. (1987). Do budget deficits raise nominal interest rates? Journal of Monetary Economics, 20, 281–300].     

The London Business School with Gower Publishing

The debate amongst economic forecasters currently centres on whether the UK will experience a “hard” or a “soft” landing. Those outside this narrow community probably have an intuitive feel for what is implied by the metaphor and understand that the recent swing in City opinion towards a hard landing implies a less favourable overall economic performance. But what precisely constitutes a “landing” - soft or hard - and why is the City view moving towards the latter? In this Forecast Release we show that the debate revolves around the cost in output and employment terms of the government's policy to remove excess demand and hence reduce inflation. This cost in turn depends upon the government's ultimate inflation objectives, the extent that demand is currently excessive and the speed with which that excess demand is removed by high interest rates. Doubts on the two last explain the recent hardening in City attitudes.