Beyond Publication Bias

Abstract.  This review considers several meta‐regression and graphical methods that can differentiate genuine empirical effect from publication bias. Publication selection exists when editors, reviewers, or researchers have a preference for statistically significant results. Because all areas of empirical research are susceptible to publication selection, any average or tally of significant/insignificant studies is likely to be biased and potentially misleading. Meta‐regression analysis can see through the murk of random sampling error and selected misspecification bias to identify the underlying statistical structures that characterize genuine empirical effect. Meta‐significance testing and precision‐effect testing (PET) are offered as a means to identify empirical effect beyond publication bias and are applied to four areas of empirical economics research – minimum wage effects, union‐productivity effects, price elasticities, and tests of the natural rate hypothesis.     

A Meta‐Analysis of β‐Convergence: the Legendary 2%

Abstract.  The topic of convergence is at the heart of a wide‐ranging debate in the growth literature, and empirical studies of convergence differ widely in their theoretical backgrounds, empirical specifications, and in their treatment of cross‐sectional heterogeneity. Despite these differences, a rate of convergence of about 2% has been found under a variety of different conditions, resulting in the widespread belief that the rate of convergence is a natural constant. We use meta‐analysis to investigate whether there is substance to the 'myth' of the 2% convergence rate and to assess several unresolved issues of interpretation and estimation. Our data set contains approximately 600 estimates taken from a random sample of empirical growth studies published in peer‐reviewed journals. The results indicate that it is misleading to speak of a natural convergence rate since estimates of different growth regressions come from different populations, and we find that correcting for the bias resulting from unobserved heterogeneity in technology levels leads to higher estimates of the rate of convergence. We also find that correcting for endogeneity of the explanatory variables has a substantial effect on the estimates and that measures of financial and fiscal development are important determinants of long‐run differences in per capita income levels. We show that although the odds of a study being published is not uniform for studies with different p ‐values, publication bias has no significant effect on the conclusions of the analysis.     

The Last Word on the Wage Curve?

Abstract.  Since 1990, there has been extensive international research on the responsiveness of wages of individuals to changing local labour market conditions. For many countries, an inverse relationship between wages and local unemployment rates has been found. In their book, The Wage Curve , Blanchflower and Oswald argued that the unemployment elasticity of pay is around −0.1 in most countries. In a 1995 literature survey, Card referred to this striking empirical regularity as being close to an 'empirical law of economics'. Nonetheless, reported elasticities do vary, even excluding outliers, between about −0.5 and +0.1. There is also considerable heterogeneity among wage curve studies in terms of data and model specification. This paper carries out meta‐analytic techniques on a sample of 208 elasticities derived from the literature to uncover the reasons for the differences in empirical results across studies. Several causes of variation are identified. There is also clear evidence of downward publication bias. In addition, many reported t ‐statistics are biased upwards due to the use of aggregate unemployment rates. A maximum likelihood method and a trimming procedure are used to correct for these biases. Both methods give similar results for our sample. An unbiased estimate of the wage curve elasticity at the means of study characteristics is about −0.07.     

A Meta‐Analysis of the International Gender Wage Gap

Abstract.  Since the early 1970s, a number of authors have calculated gender wage differentials between women and men of equal productivity. This meta‐study provides a new quantitative review of this vast amount of empirical literature on gender wage differentials as it concerns not only differences in methodology, data, and time periods, but also different countries. We place particular emphasis on a proper consideration of the quality of the underlying study which is done by a weighting with quality indicators. The results show that data restrictions – i.e. the limitation of the analysis to new entrants, never‐marrieds, or one narrow occupation only – have the biggest impact on the resulting gender wage gap. Moreover, we are able to show what effect a misspecification of the underlying wage equation – like the frequent use of potential experience – has on the calculated gender wage gap. Over time, raw wage differentials worldwide have fallen substantially; however, most of this decrease is due to better labor market endowments of females.     

Productivity,Technology and Economic Growth: What is the Relationship?

The relationship between productivity, technology and economic growth has been debated extensively in the endogenous growth, growth accounting, New Economy and policy literature. This paper briefly surveys the literature on total factor productivity (TFP) calculations – the various techniques and problems associated with it. We argue that TFP is not a measure of technological change and only under ideal conditions does it measure the supernormal profits associated with technological change. The critical driving force of economic growth is not the super normal profits that technological change generates but rather the continuous creation of opportunities for further technological development. Six illustrations of when TFP fails to correctly measure these super normal profits are provided. A version Carlaw and Lipsey's (2003b) model of endogenous general purpose technology‐ driven growth is then utilized to make some progress toward answering Prescott's (1998) call for a theory of TFP. The model is used to simulate artificial data and connect theoretical assumptions of returns to scale and resource costs to the conditions under which TFP miss‐measures the actual growth of technological knowledge.     

A Meta‐Analytic Assessment of the Effect of Immigration on Wages

Abstract.  In our increasingly interconnected and open world, international migration is becoming an important socioeconomic phenomenon for many countries. Since the early 1980s, many studies about the impact of immigration on host labour markets have been undertaken. Borjas (2003 , The labor demand curve is downward sloping: reexamining the impact of immigration on the labor market. Quarterly Journal of Economics 118(4): 1335–1374) noted that the estimated effect of immigration on the wage of native workers varies widely from study to study and sometimes even within the same study. In addition, these effects cluster around zero. Such a small effect is a rather surprising outcome, given that in a closed competitive labour market an increase in labour supply may be expected to exert a downward pressure on wages. We revisit this issue by applying meta‐analytic techniques to a set of 18 papers, which altogether generated 348 estimates of the percentage change in the wage of a native worker with respect to a 1 percentage point increase in the ratio of immigrants over native workers. While many studies in our database employ US data, estimates are also obtained from Germany, The Netherlands, France, Norway, Austria, Israel and Australia. Our analysis shows that results vary across countries and are inter alia related to the type of modelling approach. Technical issues such as publication bias and quality of the estimates are addressed as well.     

THE FINANCIAL DEVELOPMENT AND GROWTH NEXUS: A META‐ANALYSIS

We conduct a meta‐analysis of the literature of financial development and economic growth. We cover a large number of empirical studies and estimations that have been published in journal articles. We measure the degree of heterogeneity and identify the causes of the observed differentiation. Among the most significant factors behind this heterogeneity is the choice of financial‐variable proxies, the kind of data used as well as whether a study takes into account the issue of endogeneity. Our results suggest that the empirical literature on the finance–growth nexus is not free from publication bias. Also, a genuine positive effect exists between financial development and economic growth.     

Market‐oriented institutions and policies and economic growth: A critical survey

Abstract.  This paper surveys recent evidence suggesting that market‐oriented institutions and policies are strongly related to economic growth, focusing on studies using the economic freedom (EF) indicator of the Fraser Institute. This index is critically discussed. Also various serious shortcomings of empirical studies using this index are identified. Nevertheless, there are strong indications that liberalization, i.e. an increase in the EF index, stimulates economic growth. This paper also reviews studies on the determinants of EF. Political liberalization is often found to enhance economic liberalization, whereas there is less evidence for causality running in the other direction.     

Economic freedom: a comparative study

This paper presents a comparative study of economic freedom in five groups of countries: Free, Mostly Free, Islamic, Latin American, and a subset of EU member countries. The study includes 103 countries, and uses data from the 2007 Index of Economic Freedom. The paper tests for the statistical significance of the difference between group means for each of ten measures of economic freedom and for the overall freedom score. The empirical evidence shows that the Islamic countries have significantly less economic freedom than the other groups, and that they are the only group with declining economic freedom in the last 13 years.

Fiscal Policy and Economic Growth

This paper surveys the literature on fiscal policy and economic growth. We present a unifying framework for the analysis of long run growth implications of government expenditures and revenues. We find that several tax rates and expenditure categories exhibit a direct impact on the growth rate of the economy. In a creative synthesis we have assigned the relevant literature to the twelve introduced policy variables. Due to the equivalence of some policy variables we are left with six degrees of freedom, where we need four to internalize the model's intrinsic externalities, leaving two instruments to conduct short run fiscal policy.     

The Returns to Education: Macroeconomics

We offer an extensive summary and a critical discussion of the empirical literature on the impact of human capital on macro‐economic performance, with a particular focus on UK policy. We also highlight methodological issues and make recommendations for future research priorities.
Taking the studies as a whole, the evidence that human capital increases productivity is compelling, though still largely divided on whether the stock of education affects the long‐run level or growth rate of GDP. A one‐year increase in average education is found to raise the level of output per capita by between three and six percent according to augmented neo‐classical specifications, while leading to an over one percentage point faster growth according to estimates from the new‐growth theories. Still, over the short‐run planning horizon (four years) the empirical estimates of the change in GDP are of similar orders of magnitude in the two approaches. The impact of increases at different levels of education appear to depend on the level of a country's development, with tertiary education being the most important for growth in OECD countries. Education is found to yield additional indirect benefits to growth. More preliminary evidence seems to indicate that type, quality and efficiency of education matter for growth too.     

The non-observed economy and economic growth: A meta-analysis

Academics, politicians, the public in general and researchers have great interest in the non-observed economy. However, there is divergence in its definition, accounting methodology and economic effects. In this paper we conduct a meta-analysis on the empirical literature that estimates the impact of the parallel economy on economic growth. We conclude that there is no publication bias and that the average effect of the parallel economy on economic growth is insignificant. However, the reported effects differ considerably with the type and number of countries included in the sample of primary studies, the structure of the data, the methodology used to measure the parallel economy, the number of citations of primary studies, and the year they were published.     

Economic Efficiency and Frontier Techniques

Abstract. Most of the literature related to the measurement of economic efficiency has based its analysis either on parametric or on non‐parametric frontier methods. The choice of estimation method has been an issue of debate, with some researchers preferring the parametric and others the non‐parametric approach. The aim of this paper is to provide a critical and detailed review of both core frontier methods. In our opinion, no approach is strictly preferable to any other. Moreover, a careful consideration of their main advantages and disadvantages, of the data set utilized, and of the intrinsic characteristics of the framework under analysis will help us in the correct implementation of these techniques. Recent developments in frontier techniques and economic efficiency measurement such as Bayesian techniques, bootstrapping, duality theory and the analysis of sampling asymptotic properties are also considered in this paper.     

DOES ICT GENERATE ECONOMIC GROWTH? A META‐REGRESSION ANALYSIS

Despite phenomenal technological progress and exponential growth in computing power, economic growth remains comparative sluggish. In this paper, we investigate two core issues: (1) is there really no connection between ICT and national economic growth? and (2) what factors moderate the ICT–growth relationship? We apply meta‐regression analysis to 466 estimates drawn from 59 econometric studies that explore the Solow or Productivity Paradox that there is little impact of ICT on economic growth and productivity. We explore the differential impact of ICT on developed and developing countries and the differential impact of different types of ICT: landlines, cell phones, computer technology and Internet access. After accommodating potential econometric misspecification bias and publication selection bias, we detect evidence that ICT has indeed contributed positively to economic growth, at least on average. Both developed and developing countries benefit from landline and cell technologies, with cell technologies’ growth effect approximately twice as strong as landlines. However, developed countries gain significantly more from computing than do developing countries. In contrast, we find little evidence that the Internet has had a positive impact on growth.     

PAC Congressional Election Campaign Contributions and Other Political or Economic Influences on the Voter Participation Rate

A bstract .   This study empirically investigates the potential impact of political action committee (PAC) election campaign contributions and other factors on the aggregate voter participation rate in the United States. For the study period 1960–1998, the aggregate voter participation rate appears to have been positively and significantly affected by the opportunity to vote in presidential elections and by the Vietnam War, as well as by "excessive" inflation and slow real GDP growth. The latter two findings of this study appear to be unique to this literature. In addition, the Watergate scandal and increased public dissatisfaction with government appear to have significantly discouraged voter participation. Finally, there appears to be strong evidence that PAC congressional election campaign contributions may have also acted to reduce the voter participation rate over the study period, a finding that also is unique to this study.     

经济结构失衡背景下的中国经济增长质量

利用客观因子分析法与主观打分法相结合,测度了1978-2010年中国经济结构和各要素之间的失衡程度,利用结构方程模型分析了产业结构、投资消费结构、金融结构、区域经济结构与国际收支结构的失衡对于经济增长质量的影响。结果表明：中国经济结构整体失衡水平呈U型变化趋势,五大结构的失衡水平不断恶化。产业结构、投资消费结构、金融结构的失衡程度对经济增长质量产生了负效应,区域经济结构与国际收支结构对于经济增长质量产生正效应。在未来发展中,通过产业结构与投资消费结构、金融结构、区域经济结构、国际收支结构的协调、有序、均衡的调整,实现经济增长质量的稳定、可持续发展。     

How Large Is International Trade’s Effect on Economic Growth?

The estimated static welfare gains from international trade are very small, on the order of one percent of GDP. The case for free trade is therefore increasingly linked to trade’s apparent positive effects on economic growth. But how large are these growth effects? The vast empirical literature has emphasized the statistical significance, not the economic significance, of the trade‐growth relationship. This survey’s re‐examination of the empirical literature focuses on the size of the relationship between trade and growth. Our survey reveals that the many empirical studies are surprisingly consistent in terms of the size of the relationship: A one percentage point increase in the growth of exports is associated with a one‐fifth percentage point increase in economic growth. Given the power of compounding, the effect of trade on growth is very important for human welfare.     

政府债务对经济增长的影响及作用渠道

基于1960～2010年113个国家的面板数据集,运用系统广义矩动态面板方法和稳健性分析,比较发达国家和发展中国家政府债务经济增长效应的差异,并尝试分析政府债务影响经济增长的渠道。研究结果显示,政府债务对经济增长有非线性影响;发达国家政府债务对经济增长、投资以及全要素生产率均无显著影响;发展中国家对政府债务的直接承受力更弱,但在一个宽松的临界点内,政府债务的增加可以提高投资率。     

ECONOMIC GROWTH AND THE QUANTITY AND DISTRIBUTION OF EDUCATION: A SURVEY

Abstract The focus of this survey is to discuss different attempts at incorporating the distributional dimension of human capital into the theoretical and empirical growth framework. We present a series of models which deviate from the direct link between the aggregate or average level of human capital and economic growth in that they introduce the distribution of education as a new element in explaining the relationship under investigation. After surveying the theoretical literature, we present recent empirical work on the relation between economic performance and the average level, as well as the distribution of education, respectively.     

经济增长主动力的国际比较

本文运用灰色关联法比较分析了中国与美国、印度、印度尼西亚、墨西哥四个人口大国的经济增长主动力的差异。实证结果表明,国内需求是中国与这四个国家经济增长的主动力,然而不同的是,这四个国家的消费需求对经济增长的影响大于投资需求的影响,而中国则是投资需求对经济增长的影响大于消费需求的影响;另外,净出口对中国经济增长的影响也大于这四个国家。据此,本文强调中国应加快形成内需尤其是消费需求为主,同时积极利用外需共同拉动经济增长的格局,促使经济更加稳定的可持续发展。进一步,本文也提出了相关扩大内需的政策建议。