Decreasing Marginal Impatience and Capital Accumulation in a Two‐Country World Economy

This research is the first to examine dynamic general equilibrium in a growing two‐country economy under decreasing marginal impatience (DMI). The stability condition is shown to be more restrictive than in the case of an endowment economy and/or under increasing marginal impatience (IMI). By analyzing global‐economy adjustment to time preference shocks, international transfers and productivity shocks, equilibrium dynamics in the presence of DMI differ drastically from what is obtained when the standard IMI model is used. For example, in a country characterized by DMI, a positive productivity shock improves the country's welfare level and lowers its steady‐state time preference and, hence, the steady‐state interest rate. This leads to an increase in the neighbouring country's capital stock.     

Profitability and Investment: Evidence from India's Organized Manufacturing Sector

Using a state‐industry panel data set of 55 industries for 19 major Indian states over the period 1983–84 to 2007–08, we analyze the contemporaneous and long run impacts of the rate of profit and its components—profit share, capacity utilization rate and capacity‐capital ratio—on investment using linear dynamic panel data models. Our results show that: (a) the rate of profit has both short and long run positive impacts on investment; (b) the profit share and capacity‐capital ratio have mainly long run positive impacts, but the capacity utilization rate has a more complex pattern of impact on investment.     

Mortality,the Trade‐off between Child Quality and Quantity,and Demo‐economic Development

An economy is investigated where parents observe wage rates, interest rates and child mortality and decide about savings and the quantity and quality of their children. Expenditure on child quality causes human capital accumulation as an external effect. If mortality is high parents prefer to have many children and spend only essential rearing effort. Without human capital accumulation the economy may stabilize in an equilibrium of economic stagnation and high population growth. If mortality is low parents prefer to have only few children and spend comparatively large fractions of income on their quality. With human capital accumulation the economy is capable of long‐run growth. The paper also shows the possibility of an endogenously explained demographic transition and a development aid program on education is discussed.     

MODELING STABILIZATION POLICIES IN A FINANCIALLY UNSTABLE ECONOMY

A non‐linear macrodynamic model is presented here to study possible stabilization policies in a financially unstable economy. Three policy rules will be considered, namely the interest rate rule (also called Taylor rule), the money supply rule and the fiscal policy rule. It will be shown that the interest rate rule can be used to stabilize a financially unstable economy on a ‘desired’ growth path. However, when the economy falls into a ‘liquidity trap’, the interest rate rule is ineffective, and therefore the fiscal policy rule should be employed. We also find a rule of money supply that can deal with the problem of government debt while the rest of the economy can still be stabilized on the ‘desired’ growth path.     

A STUDY OF THE DIVERSIFICATION OF CHINA'S FOREIGN RESERVES WITHIN A THREE‐COUNTRY STOCK‐FLOW CONSISTENT MODEL

The paper presents a three‐country stock‐flow consistent model, with one fixed exchange rate and two flexible exchange rates, in the tradition of portfolio balance models with imperfect asset substitutability. The model is applied to simulate the impact of the diversification of the foreign reserves of China, away from US dollars and towards euros. The simulation results show that China and the USA both benefit from diversification, while the Euroland economy slows down. An intriguing feature of the model is that it generates path dependence.     

Imperfect asset substitutability and monetary policy under fixed exchange rates

This paper presents a long-run model of the open economy in a world of fixed exchange rates and imperfect substitutability between bonds denominated in different currencies. The model explicitly accounts for the wealth flow accompanying current-account imbalance and for the flow of interest payments associated with international lending. Both the dynamic and steady-state implications of the model are quite different from those of models that specify the capital account as a continuing flow responding to the level of interest rates. In particular, we find that when there exists outside government debt, open-market policy is not in general neutral in the long run. We also find conditions under which the central bank is able to hold the domestic price level constant in the face of an inflationary disturbance from abroad without exhausting, in the long run, its stock of domestic assets.     

调整个人储蓄利息所得税率对我国稳态人均消费的影响——基于拉姆齐模型的实证研究

本文将利息税引入拉姆齐模型,求出稳态人均消费路径.利用经验数据动态模拟与实证分析,发现调整利息税率对我国人均消费的影响有两种效应:"从短期来看,降低利息税率将使人均消费减少;从长期来看,降低利息税率将提高我国稳态人均消费水平".因此,在当前急需拉动内需之时,我国不应降低而应提高利息税率.     

Das Wissenskapital der Nationen: gute Bildung als Wachstumsmotor

The long run prosperity of nations is directly related to the skills of their population. The relevant cognitive skills — the “knowledge capital” of a nation — can be measured well by international math and science tests. The consideration of knowledge capital can completely account for the Latin American growth puzzle and the East Asian growth miracle. Several analyses suggest that the relationship depicts a causal effect of skills. According to the evidence, an understanding of long run growth ultimately has to rest on the knowledge capital of nations. To further long run prosperity, policies should focus on education. Effective education systems align incentives with achievement through better educational practices such as external exams, school autonomy, choice and competition.     

A BEHAVIOURAL FINANCE MODEL OF EXCHANGE RATE EXPECTATIONS WITHIN A STOCK‐FLOW CONSISTENT FRAMEWORK

The paper combines behavioural finance to a stock‐flow consistent model of a two‐country economy in the portfolio tradition, with imperfect asset substitutability. ‘Conventionalists’ and ‘chartists’ set their expectations of changes in exchange rates based on some assessed fundamental value and past trends, respectively. We find that exchange rate expectations have a significant effect on exchange rate movements and trade account balances during the traverse and in steady states. A flexible exchange rate regime will continue to provide stabilizing properties, as long as the proportion of chartist actors relative to other agents is not overly large.     

A division of the capitalist class and the market for money capital

In a one‐commodity economy populated by capitalists equipped with equal endowment but with heterogeneous linear production technology, a division of the capitalist class emerges endogenously. The capitalists with relatively weak technology, yielding the profit rate lower than the interest rate, become a money capitalist (lender), whereas the capitalists with relatively strong technology, yielding the profit rate greater than the interest rate, become an industrial capitalist (borrower). The equilibrium interest rate is derived by the associated demand and supply relation. From this setup of the model follow two essential relationships Marx establishes between the average profit rate and the interest rate: (a) that the profit (rate) sets a maximum limit of interest (rate), and (b) that the two rates are correlated in the long‐run. Lastly, the profit rate of financial sector is less than that of industrial sector due to the basic setup of the model where the industrial sector uses leverage to amplify the underlying capital profit rate, whereas the financial sector lacks intermediation technology, which would have enabled it to borrow profitably.     

REPRODUCTION AND TEMPORARY DISEQUILIBRIUM: A CLASSICAL APPROACH

We build a bisector reproduction model with Classical features in which the capitalists aim at maximizing accumulation. At variance with gravitation models, it is assumed that they invest their profits in their own industry. Their plans are based on actual productions and expected prices. Effective prices and effective allocations of resources are determined by a market‐clearing mechanism. A law on the formation of expectations allows us to define the dynamics of disequilibria, which let appear endogenous self‐sustained fluctuations around a long‐run path. The long‐run rate of growth and the amplitude of the fluctuations depend on the initial conditions.     

The war on pollution: Economic and financial impacts

Viewed over the long run, expenditures for environmental control may be the most productive for society, but they do not fit into the traditional concept of investment. They do not increase our capacity to produce consumer goods in the future. The authors describe the possible impact on the economy of pollution expenditures over the next ten years, using the figure of $7–8 billion annually for capital costs as a supportable estimate. If we invest in environmental control systems, the growth rate of GNP will be slower; the effect will depend first on the amount involved and on the underlying conditions of the economy. The authors discuss financing alternatives on the federal, local, and industrial levels and project the impact on the money market.     

Growth gains from trade and education

A multi-sector general equilibrium model is presented where education enhances general human capital, which is essential for increasing or maintaining the mobility of workers across industries. The paper shows that international trade, combined with education, can have a positive growth effect by allowing workers to move easily to, and specialize in, the industry with the greatest productivity in each period, which enables an economy to grow in the long run at the growth rate of the industry with the most rapid technical progress. Depending on the initial ratio of general-to-specific human capital stock, multiple equilibrium growth paths can exist including a poverty trap, and trade liberalization can allow an economy in a poverty trap to transform into one with continuous education and higher output growth.     

The Complementary Nature Between Technological Progress and Capital Accumulation in India's Long‐Run Growth Transitions

This article develops a multiple‐regime, learning‐by‐doing model, in which technological progress and capital accumulation are complementary factors in long‐run growth transitions. The model accurately predicts India's long‐run growth transitions over the period 1953–2007, with the first phase (1980–2002) being ‘technology’ driven and the second phase (2003–2007) capital accumulation driven. Given the complementary nature between technological progress and capital accumulation, one of the main challenges facing Indian policy makers in the aftermath of the 2008 global financial crisis is to maintain high saving/fixed investment rates. The analysis also provides a critique of the ‘total factor productivity view’ of India's growth performance.     

Monetary Dynamics of Inflation in China

This paper investigates both the short‐run and the long‐run relationships between monetary growth and inflation in China between 1980 and 2010. We construct multivariate dynamic models based on Friedman’s quantity theory of money (but permitting money to be endogenous) and Meltzer’s monetarist model. The empirical results provide robust evidence that there is a bilateral causal relationship between monetary growth and inflation as well as between monetary growth and output growth. An indirect and implicit causal relationship between monetary growth and inflation is found through the asset inflation channel. There are also long‐run equilibrium relationships between money stock, price index and other relevant variables. The present paper further provides a historical exploration of the mechanism of the monetary dynamics of inflation in China over the underlying period. We conclude that the monetary growth rule is likely to be the most promising policy orientation for China to manage its inflation.     

Are Human and Social Capital Linked? Evidence from India

This paper develops a two‐period Overlapping Generations (OLG) model of endogenous growth in which a two‐way relationship between social capital and human capital is studied. In order to illustrate the impact of public policies, the model is calibrated using the data for a low‐income country, India and a sensitivity analysis is reported under different parameter values. Based on the numerical analysis, this paper focuses on possible trade‐offs in the allocation of government spending between two productive components, that is, social capital‐related activities and education. The results of this paper show that an increase in the share of public spending on social capital‐related activities through a cut in spending on education or vice versa entails trade‐offs. However, the trade‐off fades away and the net impact on long‐run growth turns out to be positive for different parameter values in the case where a higher share of spending on education is financed by a cut in spending on social capital‐related activities but a policy in improving social capital accumulation at the expense of education is always detrimental to long‐run growth.     

ARE LONG‐RUN PRICE STABILITY AND SHORT‐RUN OUTPUT STABILIZATION ALL THAT MONETARY POLICY CAN AIM FOR?

A central tenet of the so‐called new consensus view in macroeconomics is that there is no long‐run trade‐off between inflation and unemployment. The main policy implication of this principle is that all monetary policy can aim for is (modest) short‐run output stabilization and long‐run price stability, i.e. monetary policy is neutral with respect to output and employment in the long run. However, research on the different sources of path dependency in the economy suggests that persistent but nevertheless transitory changes in aggregate demand may have a permanent effect on output and employment. If this is the case, then, the way monetary policy is run does have long‐run effects on real variables. This paper provides an overview of this research and explores conceptually how monetary policy should be implemented once these long‐run effects are acknowledged.     

Sustainable Public Debt and Economic Growth under Wage Rigidity

We analyse the effects of public debt on economic growth in a basic endogenous growth model with persistent unemployment due to wages rigidities. We show that there exists either a unique balanced growth path or there are two balanced growth paths depending on structural parameters and on the flexibility of the labour market. Further, public debt does not affect long‐run growth and employment but only stability of the economy. Stability is more likely when governments put a high weight on stabilizing the debt to GDP ratio.     

Demand‐led growth with endogenous innovation

This paper contributes to the recent macro‐dynamics literature on demand‐led growth, drawing upon the seminal idea that the implications of Harrodian instability may be tamed by a source of autonomous expenditure in the economy. Contrary to the other contributions in this literature, real autonomous expenditure is not growing at an exogenously given rate, and partly consists of a flow of profit‐seeking R&D and innovation expenditures raising labour productivity through time. If the state of distribution, hence the wage share, is exogenously fixed and constant, the model gives rise to dynamics in a two dimensional state space, that may converge to, or give rise to a limit cycle around, an endogenous growth path. An exogenous rise of the profit share exerts negative effects on long‐run growth and employment, showing that growth is wage led.