The impact of the Great Recession on TFP convergence among EU countries

This article provides evidence on the effect of the Great Recession on productivity convergence among European Union (EU) economies. We use firm data, aggregated at the country-year level, to analyse the evolution of beta-convergence on total factor productivity (TFP) for 2003–2014. We obtain a positive impact of the recession on TFP (unconditional and conditional) beta-convergence across EU economies. These results support the existence of a catching-up process within the EU during the recent financial crisis. Other macroeconomic and institutional characteristics are important in fostering TFP growth, namely R&D intensity and quality of governance.     

股指期货最后结算价:国际比较与台湾经验

本文对目前全球主要交易所股价指数期货最后结算价的确定规则进行了横向归类和比较,介绍了台湾期货交易所股指期货最后结算价确定规则的历史演变。以我国台湾地区为研究对象,利用拔靴复制检定方法,本文对股指期货最后结算价各种确定规则的效应进行了实证分析,并得到了一系列重要的实证结论。     

A limit theorem for systems of social interactions

In this paper, we establish a convergence result for equilibria in systems of social interactions with many locally and globally interacting players. Assuming spacial homogeneity and that interactions between different agents are not too strong, we show that equilibria of systems with finitely many players converge to the unique equilibrium of a benchmark system with infinitely many agents. We prove convergence of individual actions and of average behavior. Our results also apply to a class of interaction games.     

近年来中国地区差距的变化趋势

改革开放以来,我国的地区差距经历了一个先缩小后持续扩大的历程。与20世纪90年代相比,近年来我国的地区差距发展趋势出现了一定的变化,2000—2004年,我国的地区差距仍然在持续扩大,但扩展的速度比20世纪90年代有所减缓,2004年出现了地区差距缩小的迹象。本文考察了地区差距变化的决定因素,发现中国地区经济存在条件收敛性,同时也存在促使地区差距持续扩大的因素,通过对地区经济增长进行分解,本文分析了多种因素对地区差距发展变化的贡献。     

中国制造业全球价值链位置的行业异质性及收敛性测度

中国制造业通过嵌入全球价值链参与国际分工,全球价值链位置演化呈现收敛趋势。利用TiVA 数据库提供的数据,采用附加值贸易法对中国制造业全球价值链位置进行测度。结果发现,1995-2014年,中国制造业全球价值链位置演化经历了3个阶段（GVC1.0、GVC2.0、GVC3.0）,在GVC1.0时期全球价值链位置不断下降,在GVC2.0时期全球价值链位置加速上升,在GVC3.0时期全球价值链位置稳步上升。构建全球价值链位置收敛计量检验模型,分别对中国制造业全球价值链位置的绝对σ收敛、绝对β收敛和条件β收敛进行检验。结果表明：中国制造业全球价值链位置演化存在绝对σ收敛、绝对β收敛和条件β收敛,但是中高技术和高技术制造业行业全球价值链位置演化存在绝对β发散和条件β收敛。研究结论可为促进我国制造业不同行业迈向全球价值链更高位置提供新证据。     

Revisiting the convergence hypothesis for tourism markets: Evidence from Turkey using the pairwise approach

This paper empirically revisits the tourism markets convergence hypothesis (Narayan, 2006) for the case of Turkey by employing the newly developed pairwise approach to the analysis of stochastic convergence ( [Pesaran, 2007] and [Pesaran et?al., 2009]). This new approach allows for unit root tests to be conducted on all possible pairs of tourist arrival differentials across Turkey’s 20 major tourist source markets, thus avoiding the need to choose a base source market or total tourist arrivals figure as the benchmark. Using monthly data over the period January 1996 to December 2009, the main finding is that despite considerable ‘co-movement’ of international tourist arrivals in Turkey, there is no evidence of long-run ‘convergence’ among Turkey’s major tourism markets. Cluster-based club convergence analyses alongside bivariate pairwise estimations confirm the lack of convergence and highlight specific tourist source markets with considerable untapped potential. These findings have profound policy implications for Turkey’s inbound tourism planning and promotion.     

A contribution to the empirics of convergence in real GDP growth: the role of financial crises and exchange-rate regimes

This paper investigates the convergence in real gross domestic product growth focusing on the impact of financial crises (i.e. banking crises, currency crises and debt crises) and nominal exchange-rate regimes (i.e. fixed, intermediate and flexible) on convergence. To that end, we compute four convergence indicators (σ-convergence, γ-convergence, absolute β-convergence and conditional β-convergence) for 163 countries classified into four income groups during the period 1970–2011. The results suggest that (i) there is evidence in favour of σ-convergence and γ-convergence only for high-income countries; (ii) absolute and conditional β-convergence are present in each of the four income groups of the countries under study; (iii) exchange-rate regimes seem to play some role in upper-middle and lower-middle-income countries; and (iv) financial crises have a negative and significant impact on GDP growth independently of the income level of the countries.     

Human capital and growth in Japan: Converging to the steady state in a 1% world

Annual growth in GDP/adult in Japan has declined from over 10% in 1969 to an average of 1% since the financial crisis in 1991. I show that a dynamic Solow growth model, augmented with human capital, weekly hours worked, and oil prices, explains Japan’s annual growth rates from 1969 to 2007 as conditional convergence to a steady-state rate of 1%/year. Each year of average adult schooling attainment raised GDP/adult directly or indirectly by 20 percent, and weekly hours worked had an output elasticity of 0.5. The marginal product of schooling in 2005 is double the marginal product of physical capital.     

A characterization of Ramsey equilibrium in a model with limited borrowing

This paper considers a one-sector economic growth model with several infinitely-lived heterogeneous households, who differ both in the discount factors as well as preferences over consumption. Unlike the extreme form of borrowing constraint observed in the classical Ramsey model, recently surveyed in Becker (2006), we allow limited borrowing by the households and prove the existence of a perfect foresight equilibrium. We also show that irrespective of production technology employed by the firms, the capital stock sequence converges to the steady state stock and from some time onward all impatient households are in the maximum borrowing state, whereas the most patient household owns entire capital stock and the debts of all other households.     

Financial development convergence

We show that credit levels relative to GDP and other measures for financial development tend to converge across countries over time. The results are obtained using a broad sample of countries over many years and controlling for the quality of country-level institutions, the efficiency of financial institutions, and a range of macroeconomic variables. While we find evidence for convergence in the broad sample, we show that it levels off when countries reach a medium level of financial development. At high levels of financial development, convergence slows down even more and becomes negligible.