Unique Equilibrium in a Dynamic Model of Speculative Attacks

A main challenge of understanding currency crises is explaining their puzzling timing. Most “second generation” currency crisis models are static models with multiple equilibria, and exogenous shifts between equilibria are interpreted as shifts of sentiments on financial markets leading to crises. This article develops a dynamic, continuous time model with a payoff structure similar to second generation models. We derive endogenous conditions under which shifts in sentiment occur over time, characterise them in terms the strategic risk associated with speculation, and provide comparative statics. Moreover, we show that the findings correspond almost exactly to the implications of global game currency crisis models, which are often used for equilibrium selection in the static context.     

The interrelationships between relationship marketing constructs and customer engagement dimensions

The study examines the interrelationships between selected relationship marketing constructs, namely customer satisfaction, trust, perceived value and commitment, and their effect on the dimensions underlying customer engagement. The study is quantitative and an explanatory research design was followed. A total of 489 self-administered questionnaires were collected from customers of short-term insurance providers on the basis of convenience. Customer satisfaction impacts positively on affective commitment and trust. Customer value also impacts positively on affective commitment and trust, while trust impacts positively on affective commitment. Affective commitment in turn impacts positively on the four customer engagement dimensions: interaction, attention, absorption and affection. The research findings offer an initial understanding of the interrelationships between key relationship marketing constructs and their ultimate effect on various customer engagement dimensions. These matters have received little attention in marketing research, and knowledge of the proposed relationships may lead to further research on this topic.     

Financial impact of wheat quality standards on South African wheat producers: A dynamic linear programming (DLP) approach

The South African wheat industry has been under pressure in recent years from global economic instability and a fast-changing domestic policy environment. This has manifested itself in declining wheat production and profitability at the farm level. Wheat quality plays a key role in wheat buying decisions, with quality improvements correlating negatively with yield and, ultimately, productivity. Yet any new wheat cultivar released for commercial production must still meet the standards of the country’s wheat classification system, which has led to wheat sometimes being imported in the face of a domestic shortfall. This situation has inevitably led to tension within the industry and affected both performance and pricing. Using various data sources and a dynamic linear programming (DLP) approach, this paper takes an in-depth look at the link between wheat quality and yield, with a view to determining the impact of wheat quality standards (ceteris paribus) on the profitability of South African wheat producers. Results indicated that were these classification discrepancies removed, the country-wide effect on net farm income is estimated to range between ZAR606 million and ZAR920 million per annum.     

What＇s So Special about China＇s Exports？

I. Introduction The phenomenal performance of China constitutes the great economic miracle of the last quarter century. China’s economy has expanded by leaps and bounds, at historically unprecedented rates that few economists would have found plausible or feasible ex ante. More importantly, this growth has lifted hundreds of millions of people from deep poverty and has helped improve health, education and other social standards. China has accomplished all this using its own brand of experime…     

Rule of law, democracy, openness, and income

We estimate the interrelationships among economic institutions, political institutions, openness, and income levels, using identification through heteroskedasticity (IH). We split our cross‐national dataset into two sub‐samples: (i) colonies versus non‐colonies; and (ii) continents aligned on an East–West versus those aligned on a North–South axis. We exploit the difference in the structural variances in these two sub‐samples to gain identification. We find that democracy and the rule of law are both good for economic performance, but the latter has a much stronger impact on incomes. Openness (trade/GDP) has a negative impact on income levels and democracy, but a positive effect on rule of law. Higher income produces greater openness and better institutions, but these effects are not very strong. Rule of law and democracy tend to be mutually reinforcing.     

Comparison of Sampling Schemes for Dynamic Linear Models

Hyperparameter estimation in dynamic linear models leads to inference that is not available analytically. Recently, the most common approach is through MCMC approximations. A number of sampling schemes that have been proposed in the literature are compared. They basically differ in their blocking structure. In this paper, comparison between the most common schemes is performed in terms of different efficiency criteria, including efficiency ratio and processing time. A sample of time series was simulated to reflect different relevant features such as series length and system volatility.     

Premature deindustrialization

I document a significant deindustrialization trend in recent decades that goes considerably beyond the advanced, post-industrial economies. The hump-shaped relationship between industrialization (measured by employment or output shares) and incomes has shifted downwards and moved closer to the origin. This means countries are running out of industrialization opportunities sooner and at much lower levels of income compared to the experience of early industrializers. Asian countries and manufactures exporters have been largely insulated from those trends, while Latin American countries have been especially hard hit. Advanced economies have lost considerable employment (especially of the low-skill type), but they have done surprisingly well in terms of manufacturing output shares at constant prices. While these trends are not very recent, the evidence suggests both globalization and labor-saving technological progress in manufacturing have been behind these developments. The paper briefly considers some of the economic and political implications of these trends.     

How Students Learn Statistics Revisited: A Current Review of Research on Teaching and Learning Statistics

This paper provides an overview of current research on teaching and learning statistics, summarizing studies that have been conducted by researchers from different disciplines and focused on students at all levels. The review is organized by general research questions addressed, and suggests what can be learned from the results of each of these questions. The implications of the research are described in terms of eight principles for learning statistics from Garfield (1995) which are revisited in the light of results from current studies.     

What you export matters

When local cost discovery generates knowledge spillovers, specialization patterns become partly indeterminate and the mix of goods that a country produces may have important implications for economic growth. We demonstrate this proposition formally and adduce some empirical support for it. We construct an index of the “income level of a country’s exports,” document its properties, and show that it predicts subsequent economic growth.