The Financial Stability of Notional Account Pensions

A number of European countries are reforming their pension benefit formulas by adopting 'notional' accounts. These accounts are used to determine individual benefits, but pay-as-you-go financing is retained. This paper addresses the belief that by choosing adjustment rules cleverly, notional accounts can provide automatic financial equilibrium in the short run. If this were true, it would be a valuable advantage in terms of insulating the government budget from demographic pressures, while insulating the pension budget from fiscal pressures. It is shown that notional account benefit formulas cannot provide automatic financial equilibrium in the short run. The paper also suggests that if indexing rules are chosen in a particular way, and shocks revert rapidly to a mean, the pension institution may achieve financial stability in the long run. However, long-run stability is unlikely to be valuable because political interference occurs in the short run.     

泛布雷顿森林体系下美国经常项目赤字的可持续性--论美元资产本位的稳定性

在现行国际货币体系即以资产为本位的泛布雷顿森林体系下,中心国家美国和外围亚洲国家形成了双赢的局面。该体系与布雷顿森林体系相比具有更大的安全性和稳定性,美国能够承受更大规模的经常项目赤字,并由此获得了更为灵活的政策操作空间。在某种程度上,美国巨额的经常项目赤字是其雄厚的金融和经济实力的体现。     

金融崛起对中国资本项目开放的影响

30年前中国曾经是一个缺少外汇和资本的金融弱国,30年后的今天,中国已经成为名副其实的对外金融大国。中国对外金融实力具体表现为：中国已经成为全球最大的外汇储备国、最大的资本净输出国和全球第二大对外债权国。本文将探讨我国金融实力变化对中国资本项目开放策略和政策的影响。研究表明,中国金融崛起不仅加快了资本项目开放的速度,而且改变了资本项目开放的重点和结构。     

The Taxation of Financial Capital under Asymmetric Information and the Tax‐competition Paradox

Information sharing between governments is examined in an optimal‐taxation framework. We introduce a taxonomy of alternative systems of international capital‐income taxation and characterize the choice of tax rates and information exchange. The model reproduces the conclusion found in earlier literature that integration of international caopital markets may lead to the under‐provision of publicly provided goods. However, in contrast to previous results in the literature, under‐provision occurs due to inefficiently coordinated expectations. We show that there exists a second equilibrium with an efficient level of public‐good provision as well as complete and voluntary information exchange between national tax authorities.     

外商直接投资对中国国际收支双顺差影响的分析

20世纪90年代以来,中国的国际收支呈现出经常项目和资本与金融项目顺差并存的“双顺差”特点。造成双顺差的原因有很多,其中外商直接投资（FDI）是一个重要的影响因素。运用理论和实证的分析结果表明,外商直接投资与“双顺差”之间存在着显著的因果关系,且两者之间存在着长期稳定的均衡关系。积极合理的利用外商直接投资,不仅有利于化解中国宏观经济的外部失衡,也有利于带动中国经济的协调发展。     

评《企业的性质》

本文从交易费用、企业的定义、企业的规模、企业和市场的关系四个方面评论了科斯的经典论文《企业的性质》,科斯最主要的贡献在于将交易费用概念引入经济分析,但是基于交易费用的一些结论有以偏概全之嫌。     

信用衍生品的信用风险转移对金融稳定性的影响

银行信用风险转移激励与监管当局提高金融稳定性的目标是一致的,监管当局应该通过鼓励金融机构之间的总信用风险转移,使得信用风险转移的收益最大化;研究还发现,随着跨部门之间信用风险转移的出现,为了使得个体激励与提高信用风险管理中金融机构稳定性的社会目标相一致,应该鼓励部门之间的差异化监管。     

Comment on “C.E.S. production functions in the light of the Cambridge critique”

The controversy revived in Bertram Schefold’s paper is based on three common assumptions: (1) the underlying techniques are linear (2) perfect competition obtains (3) the economy operates in a putty-putty context. The consequences of dropping these assumptions are discussed, and the relation between nonlinearity and the error due to the use of an “imprecise” production function is examined.     

“金融抑制”的法律镜像及其变革——中国金融市场现实问题的制度思考

中国的金融体系带有非常明显的“金融抑制”色彩,这为我国金融法律制度带来了一些根本性缺陷,具体表现为:金融法律规则留给公共部门以极大的权力行使空间;大量起实际作用的金融法律制度表现为“隐性规则”;金融法律规则制定与实施的“部门化”倾向.而由“金融抑制”导向“金融深化”的制度变迁过程中,既有来自市场自身和决策者的推动力,同时也不可避免存在来自既得利益者的改革阻力.     

美国次级房货危机对中国房货和金融市场的影响

美国次级房贷危机已对全球股市和美国经济产生较大影响。分析美国次级房贷危机产生的背景和原因,并指出中国的抵押贷款市场存在的重大风险。我们应该以美国次级债危机为借鉴,为中国房地产市场发展和金融市场的健康发展获得一些启示,并做好风险防范措施。     

积极财政政策的"淡出":必要性、条件与对策

目前我国经济运行已进入新一轮的快速增长期，经济增长的内在动力已经形成，并正在增强。因此，积极财政政策“淡出”的条件已基本具备，但是鉴于我国经济中尚存在的问题和国内外的历史经验，应采取渐进式的“淡出”方式，可以把今明两年作为积极财政政策“淡出”的过渡年。积极财政政策的逐步“淡出”，应当适应经济形势的变化，在调控目标、调控方式、调控手段和方法组合上进行适时调整。     

The Favourite‐Longshot Bias, Bookmaker Margins and Insider Trading in a Variety of Betting Markets

This paper verifies the existence of the favourite‐longshot bias in a variety of sports betting markets where odds are set by bookmakers, but the precise pattern of the bias is not identical. Evidence is found to support a central prediction of the Shin (1993) model, which asserts that bookmakers are impelled to create a bias in their odds because of the presence of insider traders: that margins increase with the number of competitors.     

The "Inability to be Self-Reliant" as an Indicator of Poverty: Trends for the U.S., 1975–97

In this paper we present a new concept of poverty, Self-Reliant poverty, which is based on the ability of a family, using its own resources, to support a level of consumption in excess of needs. This concept closely parallels the "capability poverty" measure that has been proposed by Amartya Sen. We use this measure to examine the trend and composition of the Self-Reliant poor population from 1975 to 1997. We find that Self-Reliant poverty has increased more rapidly over this period than has official poverty. Families considered to be the most vulnerable—those headed by minorities, single women with children, and individuals with low levels of education—have the highest levels of Self-Reliant poverty. However, these groups have also experienced the smallest increases in poverty. Conversely, families largely thought to be economically secure—those headed by whites, married men with children, and highly educated individuals—have the lowest levels of Self-Reliant poverty, but have experienced the largest increases in poverty. We also find that the Self-Reliant poor is increasingly composed of vulnerable groups relative to the composition of the official poor. The labor market, demographic, and policy sources of the divergent trends in Self-Reliant and official poverty, and of the gender, race and family structure changes in poverty rates are explored.     

Asset Specificity,R&D Financing,And The Signalling Properties of The Firm's Financial Structure

Equity financing is the optimal strategy for innovating firms, which can use their financial structure as a signalling device to attract outside investors. This situation is likely to arise when the firm undertakes a specific purpose R&D project aimed at developing a certain product innovation. Typically, innovations of this kind draw on the firm's cumulative. idiosyncratic knowledge base and, accordingly, the innovation process involves an high degree of asset specificity. Under such circumstances, the terms of debt financing will be adjusted adversely, and equity financing will represent the most economically efficient solution.

These arguments are developed in standard static principal-agent models dealing with New Technology Based Firms and publicly held large firms undertaking an aggressive R&D strategy. In the case of NTBFs, two kinds of optimal venture capital contracts are considered, which render the sharing rules independent (a) of the agent's action and (b) of both the agent's action and the specific assets involved in the transaction. Regarding innovating large firms, it is argued that in this case, too, equity represents the optimal financing strategy, and that top executives use their equity share to signal the firm's expected return stream and value to outside investors.     

金融危机对美国对外贸易的影响及其传导

金融危机通过对进口的抑制和对出口的刺激改变了美国的对外贸易结构,这些影响首先传导到贸易收支账户.使美国的贸易收支状况得到改善;之后进一步传导到国民收入账户,减少了金融危机对美国经济增长的冲击.