Productivity growth and the U.S. saving rate

Over the last half century, the saving rate in the United States exhibited significant variations. In this paper, I examine whether a general equilibrium model that allows for shifts in the growth rate of total factor productivity can account for these variations. The model generates significant medium-run variations in the U.S. saving rate, and establishes a link between episodes of productivity growth slowdowns or accelerations and the saving rate—two concepts that have often been treated in isolation. While a productivity-growth based explanation is able to account for broader trends in the rising consumption–income ratio from about 1980 to 2000, there are other episodes during which the model is less successful.     

资源、技术、制度与经济增长

资源、技术、制度三类因素在经济增长中的作用得到学术界越来越广泛的承认.从静态的角度,资源的数量取决于技术水平;一定技术水平决定了一个国家的潜在最大产量,而制度则决定了这种潜在量转变为现实量的程度.从动态的角度,技术变迁和制度变迁是解决人类与自然紧张关系的两种手段,不存在谁一定决定谁的关系;在经济发展的不同阶段,资源、技术和制度对经济增长的贡献不同.     

国有银行制度变迁中政府的次优制度安排偏好分析

政府的制度安排服从于收益最大化目标是个动态优化的过程,它决定了国有银行绩效目标由社会目标优先逐步向自身绩效优先的转化.由于中央政府对公有产权保护的内在倾向性,强制性变迁方式下市场机制发育的不足,以及地方政府、国有银行本身以及国有企业等利益集团的利益约束等,政府具有对次优制度安排的选择偏好.最终国有银行制度安排的优化取决于外部环境的建设和政府市场角色的理性回归.     

THE SOCIAL PRODUCTION OF SPACE IN TOURISM ENCLAVES: MAYAN CHILDREN’S PERCEPTIONS OF TOURISM BOUNDARIES

This paper adopts an interpretive approach to investigate children’s perceptions of their socio-spatial surroundings. It focuses on two tourism service towns, Akumal Pueblo and Chemuyil, and two major tourism centers, Akumal Playa and Bahia Principe, all located in the Mexican Yucatan Peninsula. Drawing on scholarship related to tourism’s role in demarcating and segregating space and Lefebvre’s trialectics of space production, this inquiry focuses on ways in which Mayan children residing in Akumal Pueblo and Chemuyil render their surrounding spaces intelligible, while reproducing or challenging the boundaries, symmetries and inclusions/exclusions created by the tourism industry. Tourism scholarship has tended to ignore children. By contrast this study engages the geographies of childhood to understand the lived socio-spatial experiences of this demographic group.     

ESTIMATING THE INCIDENCES OF THE RECENT PENSION REFORM IN CHINA: EVIDENCE FROM 100,000 MANUFACTURERS

An ongoing reform in China mandates employers to contribute significant amounts to employee pension funds. The current study estimates the impact of this reform on the wage, employment, and performance of firms using data from over 140,000 medium and large manufacturers in China during 2004 and 2006. We find that the nominal wages of employees were rigid, but their real wages may have declined due to the pension reform. In addition, we find an interesting dichotomy in the incidences of pension reform. In localities with high agglomeration levels, firms' profits declined because the pension burden could not be fully transferred to employees. In less agglomerated jurisdictions, firms responded positively to pension reform, possibly because local governments over‐subsidized the pension costs as a way to attract investment. (JEL H32, H55, J26)     

社会经济调查中整群抽样的应用及误差处理方法

本文从技术上探讨了整群抽样在社会经济调查中的适应性及其基本运用,重点分析了整群抽样在实施过程中的误差问题,指出并分析了总体的变异效应、群体效应、单位比率变异度的效应、群体规模效应和偏差效应等五种因素对整群抽样的误差的影响方式和特点,并分析了各种情况下的具体处理方法。     

劳工标准全球化对中国私营企业劳资关系的影响——基于博弈论的分析

笔者基于博弈论的分析发现目前中国的劳动力供给仍然过剩,劳动密集型产业还处于过度竞争的状态,所以劳工标准全球化对中国私营企业劳动者权益保护难以起到实质性的作用。在中国劳动密集型产业中培养名牌企业和形成垄断竞争的市场结构,有利于劳工标准全球化发挥保护中国私营企业劳动者权益的作用。     

选本与文学权力意志的外化——试论沈德潜诗歌选本批评的“正典”意识

沈德潜是清代著名的诗人和诗论家,曾选编了多部诗选集,以唐诗为基点,上溯先秦,下探清代,构建了一部比较完整的“诗史”。这部独具风格的诗史,以“温柔敦厚”的诗教立论,重视人品与诗品的合,一,严谨而又通侻认可诗歌创作风格的多样性,包容诗史“正”与“变”的多种样态,相对降低了唐宋诗之争所带来的负面效应。     

Political turnover and economic performance: the incentive role of personnel control in China

In this paper, we provide empirical evidence on the incentive role of personnel control in post-reform China. Employing the turnover data of top provincial leaders in China between 1979 and 1995, we find that the likelihood of promotion of provincial leaders increases with their economic performance, while the likelihood of termination decreases with their economic performance. This finding is robust to various sensitivity tests. We also find that the turnover of provincial leaders is more sensitive to their average performance over their tenure than to their annual performance. We interpret these empirical findings as evidence that China uses personnel control to induce desirable economic outcomes. Our study adds some basic evidence to a growing theoretical literature emphasizing the role of political incentives of government officials in promoting local economic growth.     

European bank equity risk: 1995–2006

We examine changes in bank equity risk following the formation of the Economic Monetary Union (EMU) in 1999. With the exception of Germany, we observe a decline in bank risk across euro-zone countries. Total risk decreased for 70% of the euro-zone banks in our sample with a statistically significant decrease in total risk observed for 51% of the sample. Similar results are found for idiosyncratic risk and systematic risk. These results are robust to financial crisis effects and test specification. Moreover, we find some evidence of a decrease in bank equity risk for a sample of neighbouring non-euro-zone European countries, consistent with the existence of some spill over effects.