Can the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership minimise the harm from the United States–China trade war?

Using ex post tariff schedules for the first time, it was found that the global gains provided by the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) are not enough to overcome the negative impacts of the United States–China trade dispute. While trade tensions cause China's welfare loss to be more than twice as large as the United States, they provide some trade diversion to RCEP members. But of concern is if India successfully delays the conclusion of the RCEP even by a year, there will be a global loss of US$17.7 billion. The RCEP is also beneficial for the emerging economy of Vietnam and the high‐tariff‐imposing Korean economy. The results obtained here are, however, conservative as reduction in non‐tariff barriers and other positive spillover effects of trade liberalisation related to investment and productivity improvements due to competition or increased intra‐industry trade could not be accounted for.     

制服脱缰之马──旅费开支

商务旅行虽是工作所必需，却会带来灾难。但是，导致员工工作效 率下降的并不仅仅是出差的单位联系失误，不舒服的饭店床铺，和时差影响而已。不断上涨的旅费开支也正在抽干公司的盈亏余额。除了薪水之外，旅游和娱乐开支，即使在控制范围内，也是各公司最大的开销。据估计，去     

New Evidence on the Export‐led Growth Nexus: A Case Study of Malaysia

This paper revisits the highly debated export‐led growth hypothesis in a number of different ways using Malaysia as a case study. First, the hypothesis is tested in terms of labour and total factor productivity growth as a potential channel via which exports can affect or be affected by GDP growth. Considering the impact of imports on GDP and productivity growth serves a similar purpose. In addition, GDP is trade‐adjusted to avoid the double‐counting problem arising from the national income identity. Second, the relationships are examined using the relatively recent Toda and Yamamoto (1995 ) causality tests. These results have major implications and are necessary to reassess the effectiveness of trade policy as a strategy for economic development.     

Trade liberalization and productivity growth in Australian manufacturing industries

Although there has been a revival of interest in the trade-growth nexus, the impact of trade liberalization on productivity gains remains empirical, given the ambiguity in the literature on this issue. This paper examines the case for Australia using annual data of eight two-digit manufacturing industries from 1968–69 to 1994–95. Unlike earlier studies, total factor productivity growth is first decomposed into technological progress and gains in technical efficiency, and the effect of trade liberalization is then investigated separately on TFP growth, as well as on each of the components of TFP growth. The empirical finding that trade liberalization has a positive and significant effect on technological progress, but no significant effect on gains in technical efficiency, adds yet another dimension to the evaluation of trade liberalization policies.     

A DEA Approach to Understanding the Productivity Growth of Malaysia's Manufacturing Industries

This paper seeks to explain the productivity growth performance of Malaysia's manufacturing sector using a panel data of 28 industries from 1981–1996. Here, the data envelopment analysis technique is used to calculate and decompose the Malmquist index of total factor productivity (TFP) growth into technical change, change in technical efficiency and change in scale efficiency. This allows the identification of the sources of productivity growth which is crucial for policy formulation. It was found that the annual TFP growth of the Malaysian manufacturing sector was low at 0.8% and this was driven by small gains in both technical change and technical efficiency, with industries operating close to optimum scale.     

Exploiting comparative advantage in agriculture and resources: the way forward for Small Island States

Using Papua New Guinea as a case study, this paper investigates the macroeconomic and sectoral impacts of various developments in its agricultural and resource sector. It was found that commodity booms from 2004 to 2009 and the proposed large liquefied natural gas project increase output growth substantially but with Dutch disease consequences. The output expansion of the agricultural and fishery sectors on the other hand has limited positive impacts and the challenge lies in raising the productivity growth in these sectors and the better use of foreign aid. Lastly, the optimal policy strategy for sustainable development in the agricultural, fishery and resource sectors lies in the packaging of appropriate complementary policies (both institutional and economic) that support one another and the coherent implementation of these policies in a timely manner.     

Panel evidence on the impact of tourism growth on poverty,poverty gap and income inequality

Using a panel of 13 tourism-intensive economies for the period 1995–2012, this paper shows that rising growth in tourism which is proxied by tourism receipts to GDP ratio has an impact on poverty conditional on the poverty measure used. Using a panel Vector Autoregression method, there is little evidence to suggest that growth in tourism reduces headcount poverty. However, the poverty gap measure shows that the amount of money needed to help the poor out of poverty is significantly reduced. Based on different types of Gini coefficient, the results fail to find an improvement in income inequality resulting from tourism growth. Alternative measures such as relative poverty and poverty gap may be considered to better assess the impact of tourism on the poor.     

How technically efficient are Singapore's manufacturing industries?

This study attempts to understand the technical efficiency performance (i.e. how well resources and given technology are being used) in 28 manufacturing industries in Singapore from 1975–1994, using an improved version of the stochastic frontier model. In addition, an analytical model is used to investigate the causes of technical inefficiency in these industries to help policy formulation. The efficiency performance of foreign and local-dominated industries is also closely examined.     

The challenge of building an effective innovation system for catch-up

To date, the concept, measurement and interpretation of total factor productivity (TFP) growth remains highly discussed but poorly understood. This paper attempts to provide a review of these issues. First, the definition of TFP growth and the related concepts of embodied and disembodied technical change are discussed. Second, a brief overview and critique of TFP growth measuring techniques is provided. Third, the debate surrounding the accounting identity underlying the estimation of a production function for TFP growth is highlighted. Fourth, the usefulness of TFP growth is evaluated (and maintained) in the light of the criticisms hurled at this measure. Finally, some direction for future work on TFP growth is suggested.