Five charges against the precautionary principle

We defend the precautionary principle against five common charges, namely that it is ill-defined, absolutist, and a value judgement, increases risk-taking, and marginalizes science. We argue, first, that the precautionary principle is, in principle, no more vague or ill-defined than other decision principles and like them it can be made precise through elaboration and practice. Second, the precautionary principle need not be absolutist in the way that has been claimed. A way to avoid this is through combining the precautionary principle with a specification of the degree of scientific evidence required to trigger precaution, and/or with some version of the de minimis rule. Third, the precautionary principle does not lead to increased risk-taking, unless the framing is too narrow, and then the same problem applies to other decision rules as well. Fourth, the precautionary principle is indeed value-based, but only to the same extent as other decision rules. Fifth and last, the precautionary principle is not unscientific other than in the weak sense of not being exclusively based on science. In that sense all decision rules are unscientific.     

Europe's precautionary principle: promise and pitfalls

The European Union, through a recent 'Communication' from the Commission, has sought to legitimize the precautionary principle while establishing criteria for adoption of appropriate precautionary measures. Although the precautionary principle is not new and indeed reflects a basic human instinct, this article argues that the EC makes a constructive contribution towards formalizing it by describing the principle in the context of established processes of risk analysis: objective scientific evaluation, risk assessment, risk management and risk communication. The EC's reference to a broad spectrum of precautionary measures, subject to specific managerial criteria, also offers some assurance that the principle shall be implemented through thoughtful processes of decision making. There are pitfalls in the EC approach that should be rectified in future refinements of the principle. Critical terms need to be defined, the evidentiary hurdles for precaution need to be clarified, and checks and balances against ill-considered application of the principle need to be strengthened. A systematic process of ranking hazards and targeting cost-effective protection opportunities should be implemented by the EC as a counterweight to enactment of precautionary measures on a crisis-by-crisis basis.     

The precautionary principle: an 'unprincipled' approach to biotechnology regulation

A tenet of administrative law, particularly in the United States, is that regulators must base their decisions on 'intelligible principles' to provide consistency, predictability, transparency and accountability. The precautionary principle, which purports to provide a new decision rule for making environmental decisions under conditions of uncertainty, fails to provide such an intelligible principle for making decisions. The precautionary principle is ambiguous on the use of the two major criteria currently used to make environmental decisions - significant risk and cost-benefit balancing - yet offers no new specific decision criteria in their place. The second fundamental problem with the precautionary principle is that it is based on the unsubstantiated premise that the current regulatory system is insufficiently protective. The current system already tends to err on the side of the safety, as it should, but the relevant question is just how precautious should we be? As illustrated by the example of genetically modified organisms, the prudent level of precaution depends on factors such as the magnitude, distribution and uncertainty of risks, the extent of exposure, and the trade-offs and lost benefits in foregoing the risk. These are precisely the factors that are considered under the current risk-based approach, which the precautionary principle seeks to replace.     

The influence of the precautionary principle on science-based decision-making: questionable applications to risks of radiofrequency fields

The precautionary principle, recognized by the European Commission as a 'full-fledged and general principle of international law,' has been advanced as a paradigm for response to potential risks to the environment or health when scientific data are uncertain. But lacking the elements and operational qualities that characterize principles that have proven useful in law, politics, science, and ethics, the precautionary principle lends itself to regulation based on the perception of a threat or fear itself. In the absence of scientific evidence for risk, recent application of the precautionary principle to questions about radiofrequency electromagnetic fields of cellular telephones and cellular telephone base stations has produced wasteful and misguided regulations and questionable advice to the public. The formation of scientific 'fire brigades' is suggested for rapid acquisition of targeted scientific data needed so that precautionary policies on technologically driven issues can be based on quantitative risk assessment.     

On the precautionary demand for assets

Precautionary demand models are developed for n assets under assumptions of both fixed and variable transactions costs. Applications of the models are made to all short-run cash needs portfolios as well as to the traditional banking case. Implications of the models are shown for interest rate structure and central bank reserve and secondary reserve controls. Emphasis is put on unsolved problems with the models such as integration with capital asset pricing models and problems with intraperiod timing with the hope of spurring additional research in this rather neglected area.     

Buffer stocks and precautionary savings with loss aversion

This paper reexamines buffer stocks and precautionary savings in the presence of loss aversion. We assume that agents are disappointment averse, as in Gul [Econometrica, 59 (1991) 667–686]. We show that the concavity of the marginal utility continues to determine precautionary saving, but its effect is of a second order magnitude (proportional to the square of the coefficient of variation) compared to the first order effect (proportional to the coefficient of variation) induced by loss aversion. We show that a stabilization fund that is rather small when agents are maximizing the conventional expected utility, turns out to be rather large with loss aversion.     

Comparative precautionary saving under higher-order risk and recursive utility

Measuring and comparing the precautionary saving motive rest almost exclusively on the expected utility framework, and only focus on income risk or coefficients of the Arrow–Pratt type. We generalize the standard approach by characterizing comparative precautionary saving under recursive utility for increases in income risk and increases in risk on the saving return, including higher-order risk effects. We express the comparisons in terms of precautionary premia. In addition, we define a new class of preference coefficients, and derive the associated conditions to predict a stronger precautionary motive. The coefficients provide a detailed picture of the preferences sustaining precautionary saving and could be useful in applications.     

Borrowing constraints,the cost of precautionary saving and unemployment insurance

When it is costly for individuals to save or to borrow, unemployment insurance (UI) provides an alternative source of liquidity that smooths consumption over time and leads individuals to spend longer unemployed searching for a suitable job. We show in a tractable life-cycle model how the optimal unemployment replacement ratio and the fall in consumption on job loss depend on the cost of self-insurance and the cost of borrowing. This implies that the value of UI depends on age at job loss, consumption needs (such as the presence of children), discount rates, the return on saving, access to credit and the presence of other social insurance programmes. Optimal replacement rates vary substantially with plausible variation in these factors (from less than 20 percent to almost 60 percent).     

A comment on the foundations of the precautionary demand for money

The model of the precautionary demand for money presented by Plessner and Reid (1980) is critically examined. It is shown that households derive no benefit from unscheduled consumption (in the model in question) and will therefore choose not to hold precautionary balances. Positive balances were obtained only by ensuring that scheduled consumption was chosen sub-optimally. However, this note confirms the Plessner-Reid hypothesis by explicitly modelling the benefits of unscheduled consumption.     

Convertibility risk: the precautionary demand for foreign currency in a crisis

This paper presents theoretical work linking money demand to the perceptions of households about the risk that domestic currency may become inconvertible or that it may be devalued. An empirical investigation of the size of this effect is carried out using monthly data for Korea to estimate an augmented demand-for-money equation. It is found that the fear of inconvertibility arising from the 1997 Korean currency crisis may have caused broad money demand to fall by 4–5% points,equivalent to the loss of reserves of $6–7.5 billion (or about 30% of reserves as measured at end-November 1997). This is a revised version of IMF Working paper WP/2001/210; it was written while Professor Black was Senior Policy Advisor at the IMF Institute and Christofides and Mourmouras were staff members in the IMF’s Policy Development and Review Department. The views expressed are those of the authors and should not be attributed to the IMF, its Executive Board, or its management. For useful comments and suggestions we thank an anonymous referee, Tim Lane, Ydahlia Metzgen, Roberto Perelli, Tony Richards, Christian Mulder, Steve Russell, as well as seminar participants at the IMF Institute, the IMF’s Asia and Pacific Department, Federal Reserve Board, and Bank of Indonesia. We would also like to note similar (unpublished) empirical results using our approach by Dr. Rino Effendi for Indonesia and Angana Banerji for Russia     

Labor market search, the Taylor principle, and indeterminacy

In a sticky-price model with labor market search and matching frictions, forecast-based interest rate policy almost always induces indeterminacy when it is strictly inflation targeting and satisfies the Taylor principle. Indeterminacy is due to a vacancy channel of monetary policy that makes inflation expectations self-fulfilling. The effect of this channel strengthens as the sluggishness of the adjustment of employment relative to that of consumption increases. When this relative sluggishness is high, the Taylor principle fails to ensure determinacy, regardless of whether the policy is forecast-based or outcome-based, whether it is strictly or flexibly inflation targeting, or contains policy rate smoothing.     

有线网络的灵活扩展——无线局域网概述与设计原则

近年来，无线局域网产品逐渐走向成熟，正以其高速传输能力和灵活性在网络的构建中发挥着日益重要的作用，金融系统移动办公对此需求也在日益增长。本文从无线局域网的技术细节出发，介绍了无线局域网的发展过程以及技术标准的特点和优劣性，给出了无线局域网设计上应采取的原则，可供金融系统用户在实施无线局域网时在环境因素、技术选型、产品选择等方面参考。 再限局域网在金融系统的应用要特别关注安全方面的要求，需要有较大篇幅来研讨。限于文章的篇幅，本文未能详细描述。作者另撰写了一篇《无线局域网的安全技术》，我刊将在近期刊出，以供读者参考。同时，我刊也欢迎各位作者和读者踊跃来稿进行探讨。[编者按]     

The origin principle and the welfare gains from indirect tax harmonization

This paper establishes a parallelism between indirect tax harmonization when taxes are levied according to the destination principle and its counterpart when taxes are imposed on an origin basis. Using a simple two-country model of international trade it is argued that, under normal circumstances, indirect tax harmonization under the origin principle, considered as a movement of domestic taxes toward an appropriately designed average tax structure, is potentially Pareto improving. It is also shown that if the initial position is a Nash equilibrium, there are exceptional situations under which the above-mentioned reform may generate an actual Pareto improvement, so that both countries improve their welfare without any need for a compensating international transfer.     

简析USB Key的工作原理及应用

网上银行在人们的生活中发挥着越来越重要的作用,由于运行环境的特殊性,其安全性备受关注,并成为衡量网上银行系统优劣的一个重要指标。目前,国内的网上银行广泛采用USBKey作为存储介质,本文将对USBKey的工作原理和相关应用作一简要介绍。     

“新国九条”基本原则的解读与思考

中国资本市场改革与发展要处理好四大基本关系,如果这四大关系处理好,资本市场就能够发展与繁荣,中国股市就能够走出长期低迷的困境。否则,再好的制度安排都无法实施     

大型数据库的设计原则与技巧

~~大型数据库的设计原则与技巧$中国建设银行福建省厦门市分行@温小珍 $中国建设银行福建省厦门市分行@谢龙泉     

违背金融原理就是伪金融

目前所有人普遍已经认识到互联网金融的本质仍然是金融,并不是互联网.但往往在现实当中,很多人拿着"互联网+"的由头做一些违背金融规律的事情,还美其名曰为创新、变革,甚至说是颠覆.我认为既然大家能够认可互联网金融的本质就是金融,那么就不能违背金融最根本的规律,违背了一定会出问题,就是伪金融.     

The principle of not feeling the boundary for the SABR model

The stochastic alpha–beta–rho (SABR) model is widely used in fixed income and foreign exchange markets as a benchmark. The underlying process may hit zero with a positive probability and therefore an absorbing boundary at zero should be specified to avoid arbitrage opportunities. However, a variety of numerical methods choose to ignore the boundary condition to maintain the tractability. This paper develops a new principle of not feeling the boundary to quantify the impact of this boundary condition on the distribution of underlying prices. It shows that the probability of the SABR hitting zero decays to 0 exponentially as the time horizon shrinks. Applying this principle, we further show that conditional on the volatility process, the distribution of the underlying process can be approximated by that of a time-changed Bessel process with an exponentially negligible error. This discovery provides a theoretical justification for many almost exact simulation algorithms for the SABR model in the literature. Numerical experiments are also presented to support our results.