通货膨胀与社会福利损失

通货膨胀到底对经济有多大的影响?这是经济学家和各级政府所关心的问题.本文按照Lucas(2000)的方法,在Gong和Zou(2001)给出的带有人们对社会地位的追求和消费品及投资品的Cash-in-Advance约束的模型的基础上分析了通货膨胀对社会福利的影响,给出了通货膨胀的福利损失的估计.     

Welfare costs of shifting trend inflation

This paper studies the welfare consequences of exogenous variations in trend inflation in a New Keynesian economy. Consumption and leisure respond asymmetrically to a rise and a decline in trend inflation. As a result, an increase in the variance of shocks to the trend inflation process decreases welfare not only by increasing the volatilities of consumption and leisure, but also by decreasing their average levels. I find that the welfare cost of drifting trend inflation is modest and that it comes mainly from reduced average levels of consumption and leisure, not from their increased volatilities.     

On the welfare implications of nominal GDP targeting

This paper examines the welfare implications of a nominal GDP growth targeting rule, a nominal GDP level targeting rule, and inflation targeting regime in a New Keynesian model featuring positive trend inflation, two measures of welfare, and both high and low growth environments. The paper finds that (i) in general, nominal GDP growth targeting dominates other rules with changes in all dimensions; (ii) nominal GDP growth targeting framework is superior to the level targeting regime for most scenarios; (iii) inflation targeting is preferred to nominal GDP level targeting regime, but to minimize short-run fluctuations, the latter is advantageous; (iv) nominal GDP level targeting may be desirable only in a low growth environment with both low inflation indexation and consumption equivalence criteria. The simulation results provide solid evidence to policy makers on the desirability of nominal GDP growth targeting.     

中国通货膨胀的福利成本研究

通货膨胀一直以来都是衡量一国宏观经济运行是否稳定和健康的重要指标。本文对国内外关于通货膨胀福利成本的研究发展进行了较为完整的综述,并在此基础之上运用消费者剩余方法和新古典宏观经济学一般均衡模型对中国通货膨胀的福利成本进行了计算和比较。实证结果说明,在中国高通货膨胀会带来较高的福利损失,因此将通胀率保持在较低的水平对提高中国的经济福利水平是有利的。     

Migration Effects of Welfare Benefit Reform

This study tests for a migration response to the implementation of stricter rules for receiving welfare benefits (means-tested social assistance for individuals who lack sufficient work-related income), in the form of mandatory participation in activation programmes in Stockholm town districts. The results give no indications that activation programmes affect the moving choices of recipients of welfare benefits.     

中国债务的福利损失分析

政府债务问题始终是经济学者研究的重要领域,它也为各国政府广泛关注。围绕着巴罗—李嘉图等价定理成立与否展开的最优债务规模引起了经济学者极大的关注,这方面的研究在中国也取得了一定的进展。在现实经济中,究竟国债政策发生变化给中国经济带来多大的福利损失,还没有学者进行相应的讨论,大多数人仅局限于参照国外公债的一些指标讨论中国公债的合理性,而没有从数量上进行福利分析。本文在一个劳动力存在着冲击和消费者受到借贷限制的市场不完善的模型中,从中国的样本经济出发,考虑政府债务政策变化带来的福利损失。     

Untying the motives of giving grants vs. loans

The aid allocation literature has assumed that two forms of aid flows – grants and concessional loans – are determined identically. Its findings reflect average behavioral patterns based on an aggregate of these two distinct transfer types. This analysis shows that the past findings generally apply to grants but not to concessional loans. In particular, the amount of grants decreases with income, whereas the amount of concessional loans increases with income. However, donors increase both grants and loans to politically aligned administrations during election years irrespective of recipients’ income level. Other econometric issues such as endogeneity of income and cross-sectional dependence are taken into account.     

价格歧视战略与福利效应分析

在完全竞争市场条件下 ,竞争均衡可实现帕累托最优效率。垄断市场一般很难提供价格等于边际成本的产量水平 ,其产量与价格选择对社会来说不是最优的。垄断厂商以内生范畴和外生范畴为基础对消费者进行分类 ,使得价格歧视成为一种可行战略。由于定价策略存在差异 ,不同类型的价格歧视便具有不同的福利效应。     

公立医院公益性问题研究

近年来,公众之所以会对"公立医院是否具有公益性"产生疑问,是源于社会上对"公立医院收费使它们丧失了公益性"的批评,而这种批评又混淆了公立医院提供医疗服务应不应当收费和医疗费用最终应当由谁支付这两个不同的问题。因此,文章在综合各种公益性概念并对公益性给出一个确切定义的基础上,分别梳理了目前国际上医疗费用筹措与医疗服务提供的几种主要方式,分析各自的优缺点,指出了增加公共医疗支付的必要性。文章最后提出,目前我国一些城市试行的"按病种付费"的体制,可望根据实际情况进行改进以后在更大的范围内推广。     

2000年以后福利国家养老金体系发展趋势考察——基于“去商品化”的分析框架

文章根据"去商品化"的分析框架,对2000年以后三种福利模式国家的养老金体系发展趋势进行了考察。研究发现,社会民主主义福利模式国家的养老金体系表现出去商品化的趋势,体现了社会民主主义福利模式对社会权利及普惠主义思想的回归;自由主义福利模式国家的养老金体系呈现出继续商品化的趋势,是对1990～2000年间再商品化趋势的继续和发展,体现了自由主义福利模式对市场作用的信奉;保守主义福利模式国家的养老金体系同样表现出一定的商品化趋势,但这是各个社会群体博弈后,选择商品化手段对养老金体系进行调整的过程。     

Welfare effects of subsidizing higher education when access and quality are endogenous

Tuition and product quality are determined in cases where subsidies offset inefficiencies. Lower subsidies imply a tradeoff between access and quality. For all quality levels, social welfare increases in the subsidy whenever tuition exceeds the marginal cost.     

结构调整与需求空间

我国目前的经济增长已经进入了以消费为主导的发展阶段，能否有效地启动消费，扩展需求空间，成为推动新一轮经济增长的决定性因素，目前的消费不足和需求空间萎缩，既有供给结构方面的背景，也有需求结构方面的原因，要从实际出发，加大结构调整的力度，实现经济结构的升级和优化，为国民经济的发展创造需求空间。     

农户借贷行为及其福利效果分析

本文研究分析了农户借贷行为及其对收入和福利状况的影响。研究发现 :受教育年限、土地规模、非农收入、所在村庄的发展水平和同一村庄其他竞争农户的特征对特定农户的借款数额都具有显著的影响 ;此外 ,农产品的价格对农户借款数额也具有显著的影响 ,产粮区的农户获取借款的难度明显比其它地区的农户大得多 ;借款对农户纯收入和福利状况在统计上有很显著的影响。     

合作主义:中国福利制度框架的重构

合作主义 (corporatism)或称三方伙伴合作的程度在当代发达国家的经济制度和福利制度中是一个值得关注的问题。它与几乎所有工业化国家的社会保障制度相生相伴 ,相互依存 ,成为一枚硬币的两个侧面 ;它是现代文明国家发展进程中一个不可逾越的历史阶段 ,是现代社会保障制度与现代社会福利制度的结构中一种不可或缺的要素。在社会保障制度设计上我们应该有一个理性的预期 ,使之充分体现着我们价值观的追求 ,利用“后发国家”的优势和我国独特的政治优势 ,以避免当代西方福利国家中出现的问题 ;我国在进行经济制度的转型过程中不能忽略福利制度的转型 ,我国新工会法的颁布客观上为树立现代社会保障和社会福利制度法律框架的第一个支柱打下了桩基     

从福利经济学的角度看生态系统服务功能

生态系统服务功能与人类福利之间存在着密切的联系。深入认识生态系统服务功能与人类福利之间的相互联系与相互作用,对于保护和持续利用生态系统服务功能,提高人类的福利,促进经济社会的可持续发展具有重要的意义。本文基于联合国“新千年生态系统评估”(Millennium Ecosystem Assessment,MEA)项目的最新成果．系统分析了生态系统服务的内涵,从福利经济学的角度分析了生态系统服务与人类福利之间的关系,探讨了恢复和提高生态系统服务功能的主要措施。     

国际金融中心演进对国家福利效应的实证检验

本文利用伦敦、纽约、东京三个国际金融中心及其相应国家的大量数据,通过固定效应模型检验方法对国际金融中心演进水平与东道国福利水平之间的关系进行了实证研究,结果显示,国际金融中心银行业的发展会对东道固的居民收入水平、消赍水平和国家财政收入水平有显著为正的效应,而证券业的发展对东道固福利水平的效应不明显,国际金融中心的演进对降低东道国失业率也没有作用.     

最优财政和货币政策及其福利效应分析

本文建立了财政和货币政策协作的最优政策模型,并以中国经济为研究对象,以福利效应为最优政策的评估标准,研究了财政和货币政策协作的最优政策机制。分析表明:在Ramsey最优均衡下,财政和货币政策共同作用于通货膨胀和产出目标,以严格通货膨胀为目标的最优货币规则会使得政策的福利损失最小,但货币政策在产出目标、通货膨胀目标以及政策福利损失三者上不能同时兼顾;最优财政规则是趋向缩小收支差,从而趋近于福利损失最小。本文同时使用贝叶斯分析,对中国经济政策2005年第一季度至2009年第二季度的福利效应进行了评估,实证分析表明:样本期间政策的无条件福利损失处于波动状态,经济增长增加了家庭部门的条件福利损失,即经济增长导致跨期消费成本增加。     

Welfare Effects of Foreign Direct Investment: Cost Saving vs. Signaling

We compare the effects of two types of foreign direct investment (FDI) (viz., FDI for trade cost saving and FDI for signaling foreign cost of production) on consumer surplus, profit of the host-country firm and host-country welfare. We show that the effects are dramatically different. If the reason for FDI is to save trade cost, FDI (compared to export) always makes the consumers better off and the host-country producer worse off, while the effect on host-country welfare is ambiguous. However, if the FDI is to signal the foreign cost of production, FDI (compared to export) always makes the host-country producer better off and increases host-country welfare, while it makes the consumers almost always worse off.     

Balanced budget vs. Tax smoothing in a small open economy: A welfare comparison

The objective of this paper is to investigate the effect of lending and borrowing constraints on the dynamics of public debt and optimal taxation policy in the context of a general equilibrium model with tax smoothing. The results from the numerical simulation of the model show significant welfare gains, provided that the policymaker is allowed to borrow and lend in order to smooth taxes across time instead of maintaining a balanced budget at all times. Moreover, for a specific process for asset prices, it is also shown that if the government can issue state-contingent debt then overall welfare can be further improved substantially.     

Differentiability of the value function without interiority assumptions

This paper studies first-order differentiability properties of the value function in concave dynamic programs. Motivated by economic considerations, we dispense with commonly imposed interiority assumptions. We suppose that the correspondence of feasible choices varies with the vector of state variables, and we allow the optimal solution to belong to the boundary of this correspondence. Under minimal assumptions we prove that the value function is continuously differentiable. We then discuss this result in the context of some economic models, and focus on some examples in which our assumptions are not met and the value function is not differentiable.