AN ANALYSIS OF THE WELFARE CUTS IN THE COMPREHENSIVE SPENDING REVIEW AND THE BUDGET 2010

In the Comprehensive Spending Review and in the Budget 2010, the Liberal–Conservative coalition has announced cost‐cutting measures in the benefit system. Some of these measures can be interpreted as ‘random cuts’, where the given scope and structure of a spending programme is retained, while bits and pieces are chopped off here and there. Others can be interpreted as more strategic measures, or reconsiderations of the proper role of government in the respective area. However, where the coalition has pursued a more strategic approach, it has not followed it through consistently. The coalition's consolidation strategy relies too much on temporary caps and freezes, which will eventually expire and give way to renewed spending pressures.     

Land prices and unemployment

We integrate the housing market and the labor market in a dynamic general equilibrium model with credit and search frictions. We argue that the labor channel, combined with the standard credit channel, provides a strong transmission mechanism that can deliver a potential solution to the Shimer (2005) puzzle. The model is confronted with U.S. macroeconomic time series. The estimation results account for two prominent facts observed in the data. First, land prices and unemployment move in opposite directions over the business cycle. Second, a shock that moves land prices also generates the observed large volatility of unemployment.     

Phasing out the GSEs

We develop a new model of the mortgage market that emphasizes the role of the financial sector and the government. Risk tolerant savers act as intermediaries between risk averse depositors and impatient borrowers. Both borrowers and intermediaries can default. The government provides both mortgage guarantees and deposit insurance. Underpriced government mortgage guarantees lead to more and riskier mortgage originations and higher financial sector leverage. Mortgage crises occasionally turn into financial crises and government bailouts due to the fragility of the intermediaries’ balance sheets. Foreclosure crises beget fiscal uncertainty, further disrupting the optimal allocation of risk in the economy. Increasing the price of the mortgage guarantee “crowds in” the private sector, reduces financial fragility, leads to fewer but safer mortgages, lowers house prices, and raises mortgage and risk-free interest rates. Due to a more robust financial sector and less fiscal uncertainty, consumption smoothing improves and foreclosure rates fall. While borrowers are nearly indifferent to a world with or without mortgage guarantees, savers are substantially better off. While aggregate welfare increases, so does wealth inequality.     

The ‘credibility thesis’ and its application to property rights: (In)Secure land tenure,conflict and social welfare in China

Debates over tenure insecurity have been divided between those favoring private, marketable, and formalized property rights versus champions of grassroots’ customary and communal arrangements. By positing the “credibility thesis”, this article argues that it might be more insightful to move beyond concepts of formal and informal, private and common, or secure and insecure institutions, to leave the discussion about institutional form for a discussion about function. The notion of credibility does so by drawing attention to institutional function over time and space rather than to a desired form postulated by theory or political conviction. Apart from furthering the theoretical foundations on credibility and institutional functionalism, this article aims to develop its methodology and empirical study by taking China as a case study, with particular reference to its rural land-lease system, which is perceived to be highly insecure due to forced evictions and government intervention. Paradoxically, the study finds significant social support for the rural land-lease system and a low level of conflict. These findings might indicate that the form of the Chinese rural lease system (insecure tenure) is the outcome of its present function (provision of social welfare). Simultaneously, it was also found that when conflict does occur expropriation is a prime cause for it.     

Individual Agents,Firms, and the Real Estate Brokerage Process

This study examines how individual agents affect house selling prices and time on the market while controlling for brokerage firm-specific effects as well as supply and demand conditions that vary by neighborhood. Firm size effects disappear once firm specialization and agent characteristics are taken into account but geographic concentration by firms leads to higher selling prices. For individual agents, neither sex nor selling own listings affects price or selling time, but there are gains from partnering transactions across firms. Agents who specialize in listing properties obtain higher prices for their sellers while those who specialize in selling obtain lower prices for their buyers. Houses nearer to other transactions of an agent sell for higher prices. Finally, greater scale of listing and selling activity by an agent tends to lower selling price or lengthen the time on the market.

城市居民住房承受能力测度研究——剩余收入视角

借鉴扩展线性支出系统模型确定家庭食品、衣着、家庭设备用品及服务等非住房基本消费支出的基础上,运用剩余收入法测度了2003—2008年武汉市七种不同类型家庭的住房承受能力。剩余收入法测度结果能反映出不同类型家庭住房承受能力的具体差距,显示出武汉市中等偏下收入及以下收入家庭面临住房承受能力问题,并且收入越低住房承受能力问题越突出,结果比传统比率法更具有说服力。而比率法测度显示中等偏上户及以下家庭面临住房承受能力问题,扩大了存在住房承受能力问题的家庭范围。运用剩余收入法可以定量地测度各类家庭住房承受能力的大小和绝对差距,有助于确定城市中低收入家庭住房补贴的对象及标准,制定我国公共住房销售、租赁政府指导价格,促进完善住房保障政策。     

中国利率政策与房地产价格的互动关系研究

本文通过建立结构向量自回归模型对中国房地产价格与利率政策之间的互动关系进行了探讨,发现中国的利率政策并不能对房地产价格形成有效的调节,造成了利率政策房地产价格传导渠道的失效;相反,房地产价格冲击对利率政策却具有显著的正向影响,说明中国历史上的利率政策制定的确参考了房地产价格因素,并对其作出了一定的反应。本文还利用模拟分析对样本期间内我国利率政策的实施效果进行了分析评价。研究结论对中国中央银行利率政策的有效执行及房地产市场调控具有重要政策启示。     

“两房”与美国的住宅金融市场--兼论中国保障房融资机制创新

金融危机使“两房”和证券化倍受诟病。本文试图从历史、政治、经济、内生机制和外部市场环境等多个视角系统梳理美国住宅金融体制演变及“两房”和证券化的作用。通过梳理历史,客观评析了“两房”的创立对促进美国传统住宅金融向现代金融转变的积极作用,分析了网络经济泡沫破灭后金融市场环境和“两房”自身资产结构变化及诱发的危机的金融与实体经济因素。并着重剖析了后危机时代“两房”成为政府救市的工具运作机理和未来美国住宅金融市场改革的要点。最后提出我国保障房融资机制匮乏,应建立政策性住宅金融体系。     

央行加息对我国经济运行的影响

金融危机后的我国经济,通货膨胀的趋势日益增强。为了控制这种局面,我国央行从去年10月份开始采取加息的金融政策和手段,来直接影响到膨胀带来的CPI的不良上涨的局势。从经济发展的角度来看,利用加息的手段是不得已为为之的措施。本文通过对我国今年3次加息政策实施,以及对我国资本市场的变化以及对房地产和股市的影响等几方面展开论述,分析了加息手段应用的现实效应和利弊,在对目前即将开展的进一步加息政策提出自己的观点。     

Supply constraints and housing market dynamics

Although the volatility of house prices is often ascribed to demand-side factors, constraints on housing supply have important and little-studied implications for housing dynamics. I illustrate the strong relationship between the volatility of house prices and the regulation of new housing supply. I then employ a dynamic structural model of housing investment to investigate the mechanisms underlying this relationship. I find that supply constraints increase volatility through two channels: First, regulation lowers the elasticity of new housing supply by increasing lags in the permit process and adding to the cost of supplying new houses on the margin. Second, geographic limitations on the area available for building houses, such as steep slopes and water bodies, lead to less investment on average relative to the size of the existing housing stock, leaving less scope for the supply response to attenuate the effects of a demand shock. My estimates and simulations confirm that regulation and geographic constraints play critical and complementary roles in decreasing the responsiveness of investment to demand shocks, which in turn amplifies house price volatility.