Stock market reactions to monetary policy surprises under uncertainty

This article investigates how uncertainty impacts the effect of monetary policy surprises on stock returns. Using high-frequency US data, we demonstrate that stock markets respond more aggressively to monetary policy surprises during periods of high uncertainty. We also show that uncertainty asymmetrically influences the transmission of positive and negative monetary policy surprises to stock market prices. The amplifying effect of uncertainty is found to be stronger for expansionary shocks than for contractionary shocks. Our robustness analysis confirms that financial uncertainty has a significant role in shaping the influence of monetary policy on the stock market.     

Development built on crony capitalism? The case of Dangote Cement

This paper critiques the emergence of Dangote Cement as the dominant player in cement manufacturing in Nigeria. It argues that the changed economic environment General Obasanjo met when he became president of Nigeria for a second time in 1999 made it difficult for him to continue the nationalisation policies and the expansion of government involvement in several spheres of economic activity that he helped to promote in the 1970s. The realisation that this strategy, which created numerous crony capitalists, was unsustainable resulted in Obasanjo allying with Dangote and promulgating the Backward Integration Programme (BIP) for the local cement industry. This made it possible for Dangote to risk aggressive investment in the capital-intensive cement production business. This strategy achieved public good by rapidly making Nigeria, an oil rent- and import-dependent economy with enormous limestone reserves, self-sufficient in cement production.     

State‐Led Financial Regulation and Representations of Spatial Fixity: The Example of the Spanish Real Estate Sector

This article offers a bottom‐up contribution to the fixity–motion literature. It aims to unravel the apparent contradiction of real estate spatial fixity in Spain, which is portrayed both as a barrier to accumulation and as a unique source of investment by different capitalist actors. Empirically, it describes the shifts in real estate ownership and changes in profit‐making strategies that have taken place across the real estate sector during the crisis years, and the role of the state in these shifts. The article asserts that the idea of spatial fixity representing a spatial barrier for accumulation does not necessarily apply in the Spanish case. It further claims that the tensions in capital circulation through real estate are not only to be found in the action of time, but in different state strategies pursued by various actors. The opposing representations of fixity are the result of state regulation of interest rates, taxation and risk weighting. The state also increasingly promotes land rents as a source of liquidity creation.     

“引洮工程”引发的受水区污染治理研究

[目的]为了解决甘肃中部安定区、陇西县、渭源县、临洮县、榆中县和会宁县的人畜饮水、工业用水、生态用水及农业灌溉用水问题,引洮工程通过九甸峡水利枢纽抬高水位将黄河上游洮河支流水资源引入受水区。在受水区,在调水增加本区供水总量的同时,相应增加了增量水资源使用后带来的废污水,客观上对污染治理工作水平提出了更高要求,轻视排污问题将加剧受水区乃至下游的水系污染程度,影响受水区经济社会的可持续发展。[方法]文章采用文献研究法从理论上探讨了环境容量、排污权及其关系。采用定额计量法计算了调水带来的COD和氨氮增量。[结果]调水使得受水区COD和氨氮每年分别增加6 914. 30t和1 440. 48t。就COD而言,受水区平均排放量占该区环境容量的51. 12%,似有较多的容量结余,但区内排放极不平衡,榆中和会宁已经超排。就氨氮而言,受水区平均排放量将占该区环境容量的151. 55%,总体超排很严重。区内除临洮以外,其余5县区均超排,其中,榆中和会宁超排1倍以上。[结论]排污量是假定增量污水符合二级排放标准的前提下计算的,如果处理率低、排放达标率低,则超排现象会更为严重。对此,要从宏观上进行综合治理,诸如完善政府、社会与市场共同治污机制、排污权配置的过渡性制度安排、污水处理企业改革及引导受水区进行产业结构调整等。     

Institutionalism and Fiscal Policy at Midcentury

This article analyzes the career and contributions of Roy Blough (1901–2000) as a case study of Wisconsin institutionalism in government policy-making at midcentury. As a faculty member at Cincinnati, Chicago and Columbia, editor of the National Tax Journal, director of the research division of the U.S. Treasury and member of the Council of Economic Advisors, Blough played a significant role in the development of fiscal policy. The article also considers Blough’s contributions to tax policy and his views on Keynesian public finance. It further identifies the contributions of Wisconsin institutionalism to modern fiscal policy.     

Institutional Economics as Theory of Policy Change: Impact of Past Policy Failures on Present Policy

Social scientists have developed several theories for understanding or evaluating policy change over time. Since all costs or benefits are not internalized owing to positive transaction costs, policymaking is always implemented under cost underestimation conditions and, therefore, is imperfect. I call this trait policy failure in this article. Furthermore, I show that a new framework combining the social costs approach and the legal/economic approach in institutional economics is suitable and can be applied to evaluating how past policy failures affect present policy, providing as an example the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan.     

On credit and output: Is the supply of credit relevant?

The consensus that changes in the supply of credit were irrelevant to making monetary policy decisions existed among macroeconomists during the second half of the twentieth century. Transmission of shocks to the real economy through changes in the supply of credit, however, played an important role in the recent U.S. financial crisis. This paper explores the extent to which policymakers should consider changes in the supply of credit when making forecasts and monetary policy decisions. More specifically, it considers whether a measure of real credit balances offers consistent and stable information, beyond that of a real interest rate and real money balances, about future output gaps during the U.S. post-war era. Results yield evidence that changes in real credit balances are the only variable, among those considered, to provide consistent and stable information about future output gaps over the entire sample period. Each information variable, however, provides relatively little value added for forecasting future output gaps, beyond a simple autoregressive model. To improve upon forecasts and monetary policy decisions, policymakers therefore should consider a broader range of information variables and occasionally reassess the relative weightings assigned to each.     

Relevance of corruption on the effect of public health expenditure and taxation on economic growth

We investigate whether corruption distorts the positive effect of public health expenditure and taxation on growth through panel data analysis of 75 developing countries for the period from 1995 to 2014. The findings indicate that, although both public health expenditure and taxation can increase economic growth, in countries with more corrupt governments this effect is reduced.     

Is Abe's Fiscal Policy Ricardian? What Does the Fiscal Theory of Prices Mean for Japan?

The second arrow of Abenomics is flexible fiscal policy. However, it does not mean just fiscal stimulus as the Abe administration decided on the fiscal consolidation target of achieving a primary surplus by fiscal year 2020. Improving the primary balance implies making government debt more sustainable. Although the consumption tax rate was raised from 5% to 8% in April 2014, the Abe administration has decided twice to postpone increasing the consumption tax from 8% to 10%. In addition, a fiscal stimulus package was implemented. We use a Fiscal Stance Index to examine fiscal policy from the viewpoint of fiscal sustainability and a Markov switching model to examine fiscal policy from the viewpoint of the fiscal theory of the price level, and find that the Abe's fiscal stance is not Ricardian.     

Effective HR implementation: the impact of supervisor support for policy use on employee perceptions and attitudes

Abstract

Effective implementation of human resource (HR) policies appears to depend on supervisors’ active involvement in the intervention process. Following recommendations of a recent intervention evaluation framework, we examine how perceived supervisor support during the implementation of a work-life intervention helps to change participants’ perceptions of organizational family supportiveness, and how this ultimately changes participants’ engagement and turnover intentions. A three-wave longitudinal study in a professional services firm (N = 434) that has formally involved supervisors in the process of a work-life intervention showed support for our study hypotheses. Supervisor support for policy use influenced employees’ positive work–home culture perceptions, which in turn strengthened employees’ work engagement and diminished their turnover intentions over time. We discuss practical implications and give recommendations on the future design of HR interventions and related policies.