Institutions Rule: The Primacy of Institutions Over Geography and Integration in Economic Development

We estimate the respective contributions of institutions, geography, and trade in determining income levels around the world, using recently developed instrumental variables for institutions and trade. Our results indicate that the quality of institutions trumps everything else. Once institutions are controlled for, conventional measures of geography have at best weak direct effects on incomes, although they have a strong indirect effect by influencing the quality of institutions. Similarly, once institutions are controlled for, trade is almost always insignificant, and often enters the income equation with the wrong (i.e., negative) sign. We relate our results to recent literature, and where differences exist, trace their origins to choices on samples, specification, and instrumentation.     

Managing resource dependency: The United States and Japan in the markets for copper,iron ore and bauxite

This study analyses the different arrangements through which the US and Japan have procured their imports of non-fuel minerals, and attempts to shed light on the likely implications of these arrangements for the relations between these two countries. It focuses on three critical minerals — copper, iron ore and bauxite — which, after oil, constitute the core of every industrial society. Because both the US and Japan exhibit high levels of dependence on foreign supplies of these three minerals, it is clear that ensuring adequate supplies at reasonable costs will be a major guiding force in their respective future policies. This paper examines factors affecting the international markets for these minerals, the structure of investment, production and trade, and the relations with the source countries.From the discussion of these issues two paradoxical themes emerge: (1) that Japan has been able to procure much of her raw materials during the 1960s and 1970s at more favourable terms than has the US, even though the latter country had tighter links to its supply sources; (2) that the changing conditions in the minerals industries under study have resulted in recent years in a convergence in the procurement mechanisms of the US and Japan and this convergence is likely to increase strains on US-Japanese relations.     

Indicators of development and data availability: The case of the PQLI

The Physical Quality of Life Index (PQLI) has received considerable attention in recent years as a readily available composite indicator of development. While the discussion of the merits of the PQLI has thus far focused primarily on its methodology, this paper shows that potentially an equally serious problem is a lack of comparability across countries of the underlying data, since the literacy rates used in the calculation of the PQLI were drawn from years ranging from 1946 to 1973. As a result, in a number of cases differences in reported PQLIs reflect not a fundamental disparity in level of development but only a lack of comparability of the data.     

Factors influencing purchase intent in virtual worlds: a review of the literature

Previous empirical studies have identified several factors that seem to play a role in determining purchase intent in virtual worlds; three-dimensional online environments in which users interact while represented by their avatars. So far however, a clear overview of these factors is lacking, and the question that remains is what factors affect purchase intent most. Therefore, this study aims to create an overview of factors that influence users’ purchase intent in virtual worlds, and to subsequently identify the most influential factors. To conduct this review, relevant literature was gathered using a variety of search engines and keywords. An article had to explicitly study factors influencing purchase intent in virtual worlds in order to be included in this review. This search method resulted in a selection of twelve relevant articles that were used for further analysis. Results show that perceived enjoyment, social influence, customization and ease of use are important factors that influence purchase intent in virtual worlds. Enjoyment of the virtual world, beliefs and attitudes of others, avatar customization, and easy-to-use virtual world applications can thus increase users’ willingness to purchase products in the virtual world. Practical implications as well as limitations and suggestions for future research are discussed.     

枪械、药品和金融市场

金融创新是像阿司匹林那样,能够以很低的风险带来巨大的收益,还是像脱氧麻黄碱那样,只能带来短暂的精神愉快,随之而来的就是崩溃的危险。     

The multivariate Variance Gamma model: basket option pricing and calibration

In this paper, we propose a methodology for pricing basket options in the multivariate Variance Gamma model introduced in Luciano and Schoutens [Quant. Finance 6(5), 385–402]. The stock prices composing the basket are modelled by time-changed geometric Brownian motions with a common Gamma subordinator. Using the additivity property of comonotonic stop-loss premiums together with Gauss-Laguerre polynomials, we express the basket option price as a linear combination of Black & Scholes prices. Furthermore, our new basket option pricing formula enables us to calibrate the multivariate VG model in a fast way. As an illustration, we show that even in the constrained situation where the pairwise correlations between the Brownian motions are assumed to be equal, the multivariate VG model can closely match the observed Dow Jones index options.     

反思发展中国家的增长政策

文章从经验事实出发,对几个经验命题进行了总结性的阐述,包括1980年代和1990年代改革的结果让人失望;增长最成功的经济体采用的都是“非正统”的政策;存在若干所有成功国家都或多或少遵从的普遍的、第一级的经济政策原则,等等。下一步该如何做呢？文章也给出了两种方法,一是扩展华盛顿共识;一是替代华盛顿共识的方法。在讨论针对经济增长战略的诊断试验的基础上,文章认为将精力集中在那些回报率最高的领域是更具建设性的,而在实践政策建议时,需要摆脱经验法则经济学的影响。     

谁杀死了华尔街？

现在你很容易就会变成金融怀疑论者。但且让我们提醒自己，将我们带进当前困境的金融创新，在不久前还显得理由十足。     

Understanding South Africa's economic puzzles*

South Africa has undergone a remarkable transformation since its democratic transition in 1994, but economic growth and employment generation have been disappointing. Most worryingly, unemployment is currently among the highest in the world. While the proximate cause of high unemployment is that prevailing wages levels are too high, the deeper cause lies elsewhere, and is intimately connected to the inability of the South African to generate much growth momentum in the past decade. High unemployment and low growth are both ultimately the result of the shrinkage of the non‐mineral tradable sector since the early‐1990s. The weakness in particular of export‐oriented manufacturing has deprived South Africa of growth opportunities as well as of job creation at the relatively low end of the skill distribution. Econometric analysis identifies the decline in the relative profitability of manufacturing in the 1990s as the most important contributor to the lack of vitality in that sector.     

Saving Transitions

This article takes a systematic cross-national approach to identifyingsaving transitions— defined as sustained increases inthe saving rate of 5 percentage points or more—to studytheir determinants and to reexamine the question of causalitybetween growth and saving. Countries that undergo saving transitionsdo not necessarily experience sustained increases in their growthrates. In fact, growth rates typically return to their levelsbefore the transition within a decade. By contrast, countriesthat undergo growth transitions—arising from improvedterms of trade, increased domestic investment, or other sources—doend up with permanently higher saving rates. Hence saving transitionsdo not appear to be causal with respect to superior economicperformance.