On the Relevance of John Rawls's Theory of Justice to Welfare Economics

Mainstream microeconomic theory makes some use of John Rawls's Theory of Justicein discussing welfare economics and social welfare functionals. While various elements of his approach are usually mentioned, his basic point is generally taken to be his difference principle (maximizing the welfare of the worst off individual) applied as a decision principle for evaluating the equity of resource allocation.

To take the difference principle as the essence of Rawls's work is an error. The present paper reviews the basic argument of the Theory of Justice

compares it with the use that economists make of it, and concludes that in a number of quite specific ways Rawls's ideas are misrepresented and misused by mainstream microeconomists.     

Business Cycles: Theory, Evidence and Policy Implications

This paper looks at recent advances in the study of aggregate fluctuations. The emphasis is on three prominent areas of research: the stochastic growth model, economies which exhibit macroeconomic complementarities and models that emphasize heterogeneity. Each section of the paper outlines the theory, examines relevant empirical evidence and then discusses some policy implications of the analysis.     

动态拨备规则的西班牙经验及其在中国实施的可行性分析

文章基于预期损失模型分析了动态贷款损失拨备规则的作用机制,并总结了西班牙实施动态拨备规则的模式和实施效果。研究表明,动态拨备规则能提高银行体系的风险缓冲能力和增强其稳健性,并可作为危机后抑制银行顺周期行为的逆周期资本监管措施的重要补充工具。文章认为我国短期内全面推行动态拨备规则的条件和时机并不具备,但我们应借鉴西班牙动态拨备经验,与《新巴塞尔资本协议》的国内实施时间表相结合,适时改革和推出符合中国国情的银行业前瞻性拨备制度,提高国内银行的风险管理和抵御冲击能力。     

金融市场中的披露管制:现代金融理论与信号传递理论的意义

金融市场信息披露的规制是各国政府监管部门非常关注的问题,也是新兴市场国家和转轨经济国家市场制度建设的中心问题之一。本文运用现代金融理论与信息传递理论分析了金融市场中的披露管制问题。文章一部分讨论了古典经济学对信息披露的研究,提出了建立信息竞争市场的诸多难题。第二部分通过激励-信号传递的分析,认为经济力量能够驱动和实现内部信息的发布。第三部分考察了在传统的和新的观点下披露立法的意义。最后部分概述了有关这些立法的政策性和措施性建议。     

中小企业融资难的几个理论假说及政策含义

中小企业融资难一直是困扰中小企业发展的重要问题,从目前国内外的研究成果对中小企业融资的解释来看,中小企业融资与不同类型银行的信贷倾向之间存在一定的相关性。根据已有的理论假说,增强市场的有效性和发展中小银行可能是解决中小企业融资难最好的方法。     

Model Uncertainty,Ambiguity and the Precautionary Principle: Implications for Biodiversity Management

We analyze ecosystem management under ‘unmeasurable’ Knightian uncertainty or ambiguity which, given the uncertainties characterizing ecosystems, might be a more appropriate framework relative to the classic risk case (measurable uncertainty). This approach is used as a formal way of modelling the precautionary principle in the context of least favorable priors and maxmin criteria. We provide biodiversity management rules which incorporate the precautionary principle. These rules take the form of either safety margins and minimum safety standards or optimal harvesting under precautionary approaches.     

动态购买力平价理论:概念、证据与运用

本文探索性地建立动态购买力平价(PPP)理论的分析框架,通过模型化国民经济市场化和开放化以及国际经济一体化的结构性因素,描述实际汇率对传统PPP理论平价水平的系统偏离及其动态演化特征。本文依据国际横截面数据进行动态PPP理论的计量分析,取得动态PPP理论的结构方程和可计算形式,进而情景预测2006—2010年间人民币实际汇率升值趋势,为未来时期人民币汇率的均衡调整提供数值参考。     

The Information Society: Implications for Economic Institutions and Market Theory

The extraordinary growth and reduction in inequalities achieved between the mid-1960s and mid-1990s by the High Performing Asian Economies (HPAEs) — namely Hong Kong, the Republic of Korea, Singapore, Taiwan (collectively called "the four tigers"), Japan, China, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand — has been discussed at great length in the economic literature. However, no clear explanation has been suggested for the poor performance of other Asian economies, like India, which share the HPAEs geographical proximity and similar economic structures. This paper shows that the stark contrast between the high growth rates and declining income inequalities of HPAEs on one side, and low growth rates and stable (or rising) income inequalities of India and other Asian countries on the other side, may at least in part be explained by the different role that human capital has played in those economies between the mid-1960s and mid-1990s.     

Dynamic models of religious conformity and conversion: Theory and calibrations

This paper develops overlapping generations models to explain and simulate changes in the proportion of secular and religious people. The church is modeled as generating an externality associated with “conformity-enhancing” education. Observed changes in the number of nonbelievers are explained by different birth rates among secular and religious parents and the relative proportion of young nonconformists. Calibrations for the conformity rates among secular and religious people show that the observed long-run increase in the difference between percentage of secular people in Europe and the United States can be attributed to lower conformity rates prevailing in Europe.     

Dynamic Security Design: Convergence to Continuous Time and Asset Pricing Implications

An entrepreneur with limited liability needs to finance an infinite horizon investment project. An agency problem arises because she can divert operating cash flows before reporting them to the financiers. We first study the optimal contract in discrete time. This contract can be implemented by cash reserves, debt, and equity. The latter is split between the financiers and the entrepreneur and pays dividends when retained earnings reach a threshold. To provide appropriate incentives to the entrepreneur, the firm is downsized when it runs short of cash. We then study the continuous-time limit of the model. We prove the convergence of the discrete-time value functions and optimal contracts. Our analysis yields rich implications for the dynamics of security prices. Stock prices follow a diffusion reflected at the dividend barrier and absorbed at 0. Their volatility, as well as the leverage ratio of the firm, increase after bad performance. Stock prices and book-to-market ratios are in a non-monotonic relationship. A more severe agency problem entails lower price-earning ratios and firm liquidity and higher default risk.     

服务贸易的动态发展模型研究——兼对中国数据的实证检验

文章以新的视角研究服务贸易的动态发展,首先借鉴新增长理论中的研究与开发模型——将资源分配到两个生产部门——讨论内生要素动态变化的分析方法,针对资源在对外贸易的货物生产以及服务生产这两个最终产品部门之间的分配建立模型,分析了在不同的现有服务贸易规模影响状态下,服务贸易的动态变化以及其他变量对其运动情况的影响。其次结合模型,对我国的服务贸易发展状况进行了实证研究,得出的主要结论是,准确了解服务贸易的规模报酬状况,是分析市场发展战略的关键;中国的服务贸易正呈现出规模报酬递增的状态,但仍表现为劳动和资本密集型的特征。     

哈耶克对凯恩斯有关通货膨胀理论的批判及其启示

在全球应对金融海啸初见成效之时,国内外无论政府还是学界都对通货膨胀存在一定预期。本文通过对哈耶克有关文献的梳理,站在哈耶克立场上着重对凯恩斯通货膨胀的性质、形式及后果进行了批判。剖析了人为的、只重视结果的凯恩斯通货膨胀理论在经济和政治层面可能造成的后果,并运用哈耶克理论为中国预防通货膨胀从心理、政治和现实三个方面提供了思想资源。     

A Reinterpretation of Chapter 17 of Keynes's general Theory: Effective Demand Shortage Under Dynamic Optimization

This article is an attempt to formalize Chapter 17 of Keynes's General Theory using a continuous dynamic optimization model with perfect foresight. I present two subjective interest rates: the time preference rate and the liquidity premium that, respectively, govern the consumption-saving and portfolio decisions. Under optimal household behavior, they are equalized to the market rate of interest. In the monetary economy described by Keynes, however, the equality can be inconsistent with the condition of market equilibrium, in which case persistent stagnation occurs. A new analytic method based on dynamic optimization is proposed as an alternative to IS-LM analysis.     

Capital as Embodied Knowledge: Some Implications for the Theory of Economic Growth

Capital goods are embodied knowledge of how to produce. Therefore, capital development is a learning process, through which knowledge gets embodied in new capital goods. Because the necessary knowledge is dispersed among many people who must interact to communicate their particular, often tacit knowledge, capital development is a social process. Because this interaction takes time and continually changes the capital structure, capital development is an on-going process. Capital development is a social learning process. Neither traditional nor new growth theory illuminates how the capital structure evolves. Traditional growth theory, by modeling capital as single variable in the production function, ignores the heterogeneity of capital goods and their varied structural relationships of complementarity, substitutability, feedback, and feed-forward. New growth theory, while accounting for technological change, still treats capital as aggregable and thus implicitly homogeneous. That capital development is a learning process suggests that growth rates can increase. What prevents exponential growth is neither diminishing returns nor upper bounds to human capital, as growth models assume. It is the constant challenge of maintaining capital complementarities in a world of incomplete and rapidly changing knowledge.     

国际碳市场与能源市场动态相依关系研究与启示——基于DCC-MVGARCH模型

本文应用基于条件多元t分布的DCC-MVGARCH模型研究CERs期货价格收益同能源期货价格收益之间的动态相依关系,旨在探讨跨品种套期保值的可行性及操作策略,为国内减排企业及时对冲CERs价格波动风险提供经验依据。实证结果显示:CERs期货价格收益和能源期货价格收益之间存在正相关性;相较Euro天然气期货合约与GlobalCoaL期货合约,BRenT原油期货合约更适用于构造套期保值组合;以动态条件相关系数测算时变套期保值比率明显降低了组合收益的方差并提升了组合收益的均值,其套期保值绩效要优于条件相关系数。基于此结果本文认为,国内减排企业应当积极采取相关套期保值策略并定期更新动态条件相关系数均值,政府主管部门亦应着手实施碳资源战略储备以对冲风险。     

Pollution Control in Open Economies: Implications of Within-period Interactions for Dynamic Game Equilibrium

This paper examines a two-country, dynamic game model of pollution control in the presence of economic interactions between countries within a period, as well as the environmental interaction between periods (i.e., a change in the stock of global pollution). These economic interactions emerge because of changes in the terms of trade of polluting goods or the market share of domestic polluting industries. It is shown that if within-period externalities exist, a noncooperative equilibrium may result in a smaller stock of global pollution in the steady state than does international cooperation. Moreover, the properties of equilibrium paths depend on the direction and size of such externalities. In addition, trigger strategy equilibria that achieve the outcome of the collusive solution are examined.     

A Dynamic Tiebout Theory of Voluntary vs. Involuntary Provision of Public Goods

This paper considers a dynamic model of Tiebout-like migration between communities that utilize distinct allocation procedures for public goods. At issue is whether voluntary or compulsory procedures are more likely to prevail over time. We model infinitely lived individuals who make repeated, sequential location decisions over one of two communities. Each community uses a distinct mechanism for allocating public goods. The first is one in which contributions are given voluntarily by the citizenry of the community. The second is a compulsory scheme by which individuals are taxed proportionately to wealth with the tax determined by a majority vote. Opportunities to accumulate wealth exist via accumulation of public capital.
The Markov Perfect equilibria of the dynamic game are studied. Our main result shows that when accumulated wealth converges to a steady state, individuals' locational choices eventually select the involuntary provision mechanism. This holds despite the fact that unanimous location in the voluntary provision community may in many cases remain as a Nash equilibrium of the static game each period. We also describe conditions under which voluntary provision survives. These conditions require that accumulation of capital fails to decrease wealth dispersion over time. The results are shown to be consistent with findings relating inequality to school choice.     

A Democracy Principle and Strategy-Proofness

In some social choice applications we want more than one alternative to be selected in some situations. This allows the construction of strategy-proof social choice rules that are not dictatorial. But if we also require x alone to be selected if it is at the top of some ordering that is submitted by more than half of the individuals then the rule cannot be strategy-proof. We prove this for rules that sometimes select one alternative, and sometimes two, but never more than two.