农村公共产品供给地区差距的实证分析

本研究利用第二次全国农业普查数据,对我国东、中、西部农村公共产品供给的地区差距进行了实证分析,探讨了造成农村公共产品供给地区差距的原因,提出了通过改革农村公共产品供给制度、加大中央财政向中西部地区的转移支付力度、促进中、西部地区的经济发展等措施来缩小地区间基本公共产品和服务的差距,从而实现地区间基本公共产品和服务的均等化。     

最低工资标准与劳动者待遇:统一抑或排斥

最低工资制度的存废至今仍处于争议之中,我国中央政府、地方政府与企业三者的目标函数不同,最低工资标准陷于标准过低的权宜困境,其调整并没有真正惠及劳动者,因此要求重新定位我国的最低工资制度:明确最低工资制度的社会保障制度归属,政府应该承担最低工资保障职能,同时建立以工资正常增长机制为主和最低工资保障机制为辅的工资制度,以及积极探索制定其他公共政策来保护社会弱势群体。     

全球产业链、区域工资差异与产业升级——对长三角和珠三角产业发展模式的一个比较研究

本文从全球产业链视角,对珠三角和长三角目前发展的差异做了理论分析。研究发现,后发国家或地区在产业链中的位置决定了其相应的工资水平。在工资内生决定的情况下,任何干预工资的外部行为并不能促使其产业升级。研究还发现,后发国家或地区的产业升级具有"囚徒困境"的性质,跨国公司的进入一方面有可能促使其摆脱困境进而升级,另一方面也有可能使其陷入低水平发展陷阱中不能自拔。当后者发生的时候,政府对于企业技术创新或新技术引进的鼓励和补贴有助于本土企业摆脱低水平发展的情形。以上分析同时也指出了珠三角产业升级的重点。     

中国农村地区收入差距解释:1997～2005

1997～2005年我国农村地区收入差距以2000年为转折点,经历了先下降后上升的变化过程。要素分解分析表明,1997～2000年地区收入差距的下降完全归因于分配效应;2001～2005年地区收入差距的上升主要归因于结构效应。样本分解分析表明,东中西部地区间的差距和东部地区内部的差距是形成农村地区差距的主要原因。费景汉-兰尼斯分解分析表明,工资性收入、地理位置、教育、物质资本和人均占有耕地面积共解释了地区收入差距的80%以上。     

中国政府间转移支付制度对改善收入分配效果探析

改革开放解放和发展了中国的生产力,使一部分人先富起来,但中国的贫富差距却被拉大了。作为一个社会主义国家,中央政府应该通过再分配的方式,让全体人民分享市场运作的成果,实现共同富裕这一目标。近年来出台的一系列社会政策显示,1998年后,中央政府既有政治意愿也有财政能力来调节收入再分配,然而,这些政策效果却不明显。本文以山西省1993-2005年县级财政数据为样本,通过分析中央政府转移支付结构和地方政府支出结构,得出中央政府通过对地方政府转移支付这一财政手段并不能有效缩小贫富差距这一结论。     

Sex Differentials in Earnings in the South Korean Labor Market

We examine gender differences in earnings among South Korean workers in 1988 – the year the South Korean National Assembly enacted the Equal Employment Opportunity Act. Using the "88 Occupational Wage Bargaining Survey on the Actual Condition," we calculate women's mean earnings as a percentage of men's mean earnings by major industrial category and educational attainment. We find a larger wage gap among clerical and sales workers than production workers or professionals. Generally, the more education a woman has, the smaller the gap between her earnings and those of her male counterparts. Women with a middle-school education have a mean income 53.5 percent that of comparable men, while the female-to-male wage ratio among college graduates is 76.1 percent. We analyze wage differences separately for women and men. Following Ronald Oaxaca's (1973) work, we decompose male–female wage differentials. We also calculate a discrimination coefficient. Our work shows that, all else equal, men earn from 33.6 percent to 46.9 percent more than women with comparable skills. We attribute the difference to gender discrimination.     

Basket trading under co-integration with the logistic mixture autoregressive model

In this paper, we propose a co-integration model with a logistic mixture auto-regressive equilibrium error (co-integrated LMAR), in which the equilibrium relationship among cumulative returns of different financial assets is modelled by a logistic mixture autoregressive time series model. The traditional autoregression (AR) based unit root test (ADF test), used in testing co-integration, cannot give a sound explanation when a time series passes the ADF test. However, its largest root in the AR polynomial is extremely close to, but less than, one, which is most likely the result of a mixture of random-walk and mean-reverting processes in the time series data. With this background, we put an LMAR model into the co-integration framework to identify baskets that have a large spread but are still well co-integrated. A sufficient condition for the stationarity of the LMAR model is given and proved using a Markovian approach. A two-step estimating procedure, combining least-squares estimation and the Expectation-Maximization (EM) algorithm, is given. The Bayesian information criterion (BIC) is used in model selection. The co-integrated LMAR model is applied to basket trading, which is a widely used tool for arbitrage. We use simulation to assess the model in basket trading strategies with the statistical arbitrage feature in equity markets. Data from several sectors of the Hong Kong Hang Seng Index are used in a simulation study on basket trading. Empirical results show that a portfolio using the co-integrated LMAR model has a higher return than portfolios selected by traditional methods. Although the volatility in the return increases, the Sharpe ratio also increases in most cases. This risk–return profile can be explained by the shorter converging period in the co-integrated LMAR model and the larger volatility in the ‘mean-reverting’ regime.     

Globalization,technical change and the skill premium: magnification effects from human – capital investments

This paper shows that endogenous adjustments in the composition of labour supplies magnify the effects of changes in commodity prices on the measured skill premium under quite plausible conditions. These composition effects arise from decisions of individuals with heterogeneous inherent abilities about acquiring human capital. They reinforce the well-known Stolper?–?Samuelson effect on the measured skill premium in countries with a sufficiently high relative supply of skilled labour, but compensate them otherwise. As a result, the model can account for the observation of a worldwide increase in the skill premium during the last two decades.     

Emigration and wages: The EU enlargement experiment

The enlargement of the European Union provides a unique opportunity to study the impact of the lifting of migration restrictions on the migrant sending countries. With EU enlargement in 2004, 1.2 million workers from Eastern Europe emigrated to the UK and Ireland. I use this emigration wave to show that emigration significantly changed the wage distribution in the sending country, in particular between young and old workers. Using a novel dataset from Lithuania, the UK and Ireland for the calibration of a structural model of labor demand, I find that over the period of five years emigration increased the wages of young workers by 6%, while it had no effect on the wages of old workers. Contrary to the immigration literature, there is no significant effect of emigration on the wage distribution between high-skilled and low-skilled workers.     

Tariffs,trade and unemployment in a disequilibrium model: issues and policies

This paper studies the disequilibrium transition process engaged by increased openness to trade, and the effect of institutions, market behaviors and economic policies on that transition. The issue is analyzed with a simple two country (north and south), two goods model, amended in order to take into account the time dimension of both the production and the decision processes. Investigating the consequences of a tariff decrease by means of numerical simulations, we show to what extent wage and price setting, and the degree of tightness of monetary policy affect the outcome of the disequilibrium process. The main result is that capturing the gains associated with international trade requires market behaviors and economic policies, which are rather different from what is usually prescribed.