Identifying Discretionary Fiscal Policy Reactions with Real‐Time Data

We propose a method of identifying discretionary fiscal policy reactions using real‐time data. Automatic stabilizers should depend on true GDP, while discretionary fiscal policy is contingent on the information that policy makers have in real time. We can compute a real‐time measurement error by comparing the first release of GDP data with later revisions. Discretionary fiscal policy is influenced by this measurement error, whereas automatic fiscal policy is not. We use this identification approach to test the central identifying assumption of Blanchard and Perotti’s (2002) seminal structural vector autoregression (VAR). According to this assumption, fiscal policy makers do not react to GDP developments contemporaneously in a discretionary fashion. We find that government expenditure is adjusted upward if GDP growth in real time is lower than true GDP. This suggests that fiscal policy makers use short‐term funds to buy goods and services in response to their perception of GDP dynamics.     

Economic nationalism and economic integration: the Austro‐Hungarian Empire in the late nineteenth century 1

This article seeks to square two seemingly contradictory strands in the literature on economic development in the late nineteenth‐century Habsburg Empire. On the one hand, there is an extensive historiography stressing the rise of nationalism and its close correlate of growing efforts to organize economic life along ethno‐linguistic lines. On the other, there is a substantial body of research that emphasizes significant improvements in market integration across the empire as an outcome of the diffusion of industrialization and an expanding railway network, among other factors. In this article, it is argued that the process of market integration was systematically asymmetric, shaped by intensifying intra‐empire nationality conflicts. While grain markets in Austria‐Hungary became overall more integrated over time, they also became systematically biased: regions with a similar ethno‐linguistic composition of their population came to display significantly smaller price gaps between each other than regions with different compositions. The emergence and persistence of this differential integration cannot be explained by changes in infrastructure and transport costs, simple geographical features, asymmetric integration with neighbouring regions abroad, or communication problems. Instead, differential market integration along ethno‐linguistic lines was driven by the formation of ethno‐linguistic networks due to intensifying conflict between groups—economic nationalism mattered.     

国际策展经验与亚洲当代艺术:CIGE2009论坛

Sook-Kyung Lee泰特利物浦美术馆每两年举办一次利物浦双年展,我们的顾问有来自包括台北等亚洲其他地区的策展人,正因为有了这些身份多元的策展人的参与,使得我们能够在展览当中充分地体现出不同地区的一些作品。     

The Global Impact of Brexit Uncertainty

We propose a text-based method for measuring the cross-border propagation of large shocks at the firm level. We apply this method to estimate the expected costs, benefits, and risks of Brexit and find widespread reverberations in listed firms in 81 countries. International (i.e., non-U.K.) firms most exposed to Brexit uncertainty (the second moment) lost significant market value and reduced hiring and investment. International firms also overwhelmingly expected negative first-moment impacts from the U.K.'s decision to leave the European Union (EU), particularly related to regulation, asset prices, and labor market impacts of Brexit.     

CEO Ownership,Stock Market Performance,and Managerial Discretion

We examine the relationship between CEO ownership and stock market performance. A strategy based on public information about managerial ownership delivers annual abnormal returns of 4% to 10%. The effect is strongest among firms with weak external governance, weak product market competition, and large managerial discretion, suggesting that CEO ownership can reverse the negative impact of weak governance. Furthermore, owner‐CEOs are value increasing: they reduce empire building and run their firms more efficiently. Overall, our findings indicate that the market does not correctly price the incentive effects of managerial ownership, suggesting interesting feedback effects between corporate finance and asset pricing.     

EFFECTS OF PRICE AND AVAILABILITY ON ABORTION DEMAND

Over 1.5 million legal abortions were performed in the United States in 1988. State-level regulation affecting the price or availability of abortion services may expand given recent Supreme Court decisions. This paper uses state-level data pooled over time to estimate abortion demand. Using single cross-sections of state data, past studies find abortion demand per 1,000 pregnancies to be price inelastic and find income elasticity to be positive and significant. The analysis here shows that price elasticity estimates in a single cross-section are sensitive to the choice of state characteristics used to control for "abortion attitudes" within a state. Ajixed-efects model design with pooled data gives more robust abortion demand price elasticity estimates. The results suggest that any new state regulations that increase the costs of obtaining abortions will reduce abortion use and increase unintended fertility .     

Trading volume reactions to a change in dividend policy: the Canadian evidence*

Abstract. This study examines the volume of trading in the stock of 34 Canadian companies that initiated a policy of regular cash dividends during the period 1972–1982. Using a time-series methodology linked to changes in Canadian tax legislation, we test whether the volume of trading surrounding first-time dividend adoptions declined after 1978, a year when tax legislation changed the taxation of dividends toward tax neutrality for investors in high tax brackets. We observe a significant trading volume decline after 1978, which we interpret as implying that fewer investors wanted to dispose of initial dividend stocks after 1978. The result is inconsistent with dividend irrelevance theories and possibly points to tax clientele relevance in Canada. Résumé. Les auteurs examinent le volume de titres négociés pour 34 sociétés canadiennes ayant mis en place une politique de versement périodique de dividendes en espèces durant la période 1972–1982. À l'aide d'une méthodologie de séries chronologiques liée aux changements apportés à la législation fiscale canadienne, les auteurs vérifient si le volume des titres négociés dans le contexte de l'adoption initiale de cette politique de dividendes a décliné après 1978, année au cours de laquelle le fisc a modifié l'imposition des dividendes pour pencher vers la neutralité fiscale pour les investisseurs appartenant aux tranches d'impôt élevées. Ils observent un déclin appréciable du volume de titres négociés après 1978, déclin qui suppose, selon eux, qu'un moins grand nombre d'investisseurs ont voulu se défaire de telles actions après 1978. Ce résultat s'oppose aux théories de la non-pertinence du dividende et pourrait indiquer la pertinence de la «clientèle fiscale» au Canada.