The Structure of Protection in Indonesia in 1989 1

Around the mid-1980s, Indonesia's protectionist regime supported an industrial structure in which industries were mainly oriented towards producing for the domestic market. Since then, trade policies have shifted to a more outward-looking strategy, stimulating the growth and diversification of non-oil manufactured exports. This paper attempts to quantify the nominal and effective rates of protection resulting from trade policies at the end of the 1980s. After an introduction in which the 1989 trade policies are discussed, estimates of nominal and effective rates of protection are presented. It is shown that though the level of protection has declined since 1987, it still varies widely across economic sectors. Furthermore, despite the more open trade strategy, the paper's findings show that the trade regime remains biased against exports. Finally, by examining some trade policy issues, the paper presents further ways of rationalising the structure of protection in Indonesia's industrial sector.     

An econometric investigation of the condition of children in Italy

This paper provides some analytical contributions in evaluating the impact of worsening economic conditions and the prospect of more restrictive social policies on children's status in Italy. It specifies a causal model linking child's status to a set of variables (including, for example, parent's education, parent's employment, etc.). The specific effect of those variables has been estimated on the basis of two sets of data. The first consists of pooled cross-sectional and time-series information for infant mortality and the other variables indicated above. The second consists of data drawn from a 1979 household survey for the city of Turin. The results indicate that mortality rates, particularly neonatal rates, are sensitive to economic conditions and fluctuations. The employment level of mothers is also found to have a strong effect on child psychosocial status.     

The Cross-industry Spillover of Technological Capability: Korea’s DRAM and TFT–LCD Industries

Studies of Korea’s Thin Film Transistor–Liquid Crystal Display (TFT–LCD) industry have emphasized the government policy, industrial organization, and the firm’s strategy as key success factors. However, the fact that knowledge spillover, which tends to occur between highly technologically related industries, can lead to a reduction in innovation effort has been overlooked. We examined the technological relationships between Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM) and TFT–LCD industries and investigated their spillover into the areas of technology, human resources and organization, and network. The results show spillover in capital control, technology, production and quality management, organizational systems, and key personnel. This implies that spillover effect in high technology firms may diversify their products due to existing technological capabilities.     

Production versus reproduction: A threat to China's development strategy

The goals of the post-Mao leadership to turn China into a powerful and modern socialist society are jeopardized by the sum total of China's population and projected population growth rates. National development plans are thus based on policies to rapidly promote production and drastically reduce population growth, which at the local level make quite contradictory demands on peasant households. The question underlying China's future development is: can current production plans based on the responsibility system and expanding domestic sidelines which demand that peasant households have access to considerable labour resources be reconciled with State reproduction plants which demand that peasant households have only one child?     

Development assistance: Trade versus aid and the relative performance of industrial countries

Given that both theory and empirical analyses show that foreign trade and aid have similar effects on the development process, this study develops a methodology for assessing the joint (aid plus trade) contribution of industrial countries. The results show that countries like Sweden, Norway and Denmark, which are generally regarded as having liberal aid policies, perform below average when the combined effects of aid and trade are considered while the United Kingdom, Netherland and Belgium emerge as making maximum contributions to development. In addition, the trade practices of the United States and the Federal Republic of Germany largely offset these countries relatively poor aid record. The trade and aid contribution of the USSR and other socialist countries of Europe are also shown to fall far below that of the poorest performing DAC members. If the socialist countries matched average DAC performance measures their imports from developing countries would increase by $7 billion and their aid flows would be $3.1 billion higher. Finally, this study calls into question the rationale for uniform aid targets which do not account for the donor's differential trade contribution to the development effort.     

TNC takeovers in Brazil: The uneven distribution of benefits in the market for firms

Control of the future stream of earnings is perhaps the most valuable component of returns to a transnational investment. As with other components, controlis subject to bargaining between TNCs and host governments. This paper argues that by leaving acquisitions (that is, the ‘market for firms’) unregulated, Brazil has inadvertantly surrendered some of its bargaining power to TNCs. The paper's first section uses cases to show how the market for firms in the electrical industry favours TNCs, particularly because of their market power in technology and finance markets. A second section analyses the overall effects of TNCs' acquisitions on market structure and ownership changes, and finds that takeovers by TNCs raise both the level of industrial concentration and denotionalization. Foreign control of the electrical industry rose from 66% in 1960 to 77% in 1974, almost all attribute to TNCs' acquisition policies. It is argued that Brazil could substantially raise its gains from TNC investments by instituting a merger review and prohibiting non-socially beneficial takeovers.     

既有工业建筑绿色改造业主内源动力研究综述

既有工业建筑绿色改造市场发展是市场主体协同驱动的结果,业主改造动力是促进既有工业建筑绿色改造市场发展的内源动力.从法律法规、信息披露渠道、经济激励政策和节能宣传活动等4个方面分析发达国家既有建筑节能改造市场运行经验,从推广合同能源管理模式、健全法律法规制度、开展示范合作项目及实施多层次经济激励政策等方面阐述中国既有建筑节能改造实践进展,基于市场运行视角,考虑既有工业建筑绿色改造业主市场作用的特殊性,论证既有工业建筑绿色改造业主内源动力研究的必要性.     

Effects of the current world recession on the welfare of children: The case of Korea

The remarkable growth of Korea's GNP during 1963–1978 was achieved through export-led industrialization. The accelerating rate of growth in labour-intensive export industries provided job opportunities to the growing labour force. However, during the last years of the 1970s the Korean economy experienced bottlenecks and strong inflationary pressures which eroded its export competitiveness. As a response to these problems, the government implemented stabilization and restructuring programmes which did not affect the expansion of social welfare programmes for the poor and the vulnerable.     

Microeconomic adjustments in Argentina during 1976–1981: The importance of changing levels of financial subsidies

This paper uses the financial statements of Argentine industrial firms to study the micro level impact of recent liberalization and reform attempts. The main lesson is that extremely large subsidies were provided to the industrial sector by way of negative effective financial costs. These negative costs appeared first in the late 1970s because of real currency appreciation and unconstrained access to foreign credit, then again in 1981 because of an exchange insurance program. We also find that the Argentine Government's announced intention to promote exporting activities did not translate into relatively favorable product market conditions for exporting firms. To the contrary, the real currency appreciation squeezed exporters' profits while redundant tariff protection insulated import competing firms from world competition, at least until 1980.     

Development Bank lending: The Cameroon experience

The purpose of the paper is to analyse the lending activities of the Cameroon Development Bank, which was established to promote the economic development of Cameroon, particularly in the industrial field. It is found that most of the Bank's lending has been in the form of short-term loans for financing marketing activities, housing and household equipment, and that to this extent the Bank has not so far played its intended role in promoting industrial development. Consequently, it is suggested that in future the Bank should place greater emphasis on the granting of credits to finance industrial operations which utilize Cameroon's agricultural resources.     

Stabilization: The political economy of overkill

This paper considers whether national and international aspects of the IMF's stabilization programmes during the 1970s and early 1980s have resulted in a process of ‘overkill’ — or, in other words, a process of economic retrenchment which went much further than was strictly necessary in terms of what could have been regarded as reasonable objectives. In the international context, the author describes how the attack on inflation has become an end in itself, at the expense of other stated objectives of the IMF, thus creating a distortion of its priorities. The paper discusses errors of diagnosis which have led to this disorientation and explains why deflationary policies should not be regarded as a panacea. The paper then considers the nead for equity and efficiency in the distribution of the political and economic costs of adjustment.The next section of this paper discusses the assumptions underlying the IMF's treatment of Fund members and to what extent ‘even-handedness’ in the application of stabilization measures may result in inequality of burden-sharing among borrowers. Problems related to monetarist theories and the consequent policies are examined, followed by a consideration of the dangers involved in devising ‘straightforward’ performance criteria in the form of precise monetary targets that can readily be monitored by the IMF. This means of evaluating the national adjustment policies' success is seen to be unsatisfactory, viz. the frequency of stand-by arrangement breakdowns and mistakes in forecasting.The paper concludes that the concept of unilateral adjustment is not an acceptable basis for IMF supervision of the international monetary system. In addition, care should be taken to avoid overkill in determining the degree and character of adjustment needed in stabilization programmes. One possible solution to the extra burden imposed on the LDCs might be a liberalization of the compensatory financing facility with the objective of applying the same kind of regime to imports as to exports.     

Can East Asia rise again?

In recent times, the economies of East Asia have been confronted by two major economic recessions, the first caused by the East Asian financial crisis, and the second by the slump in the ‘new economy.’ The causes of these two recessions, their scope and their influences differ significantly and during these periods of economic downturn the economies affected have adopted various monetary policies aimed at reducing interest rates and tax rates, and pursuing the expansion of government expenditure. However, these policies have obviously not yet been as effective as expected.This paper sets out to determine those factors affecting the possibility of East Asia rising again from the recent economic slump, a slump which has stemmed from excessive investment in the electronics and information industries. The paper begins with an overview of the East Asian economy, with particular reference to the recent serious decline following the steady recovery from the East Asian financial crisis and a review of the measures taken to counter it. Proposals are then made with regard to a number of lessons to be learned from the recent slump.There are three major issues involved in the question of whether East Asia can rise again from the current economic slump. First of all, many of the economies of East Asia have tried their utmost to upgrade their industrial structures from labor- to technology-intensive, or towards a knowledge-based economy and, to some extent, have actually been quite successful in achieving their goals. Secondly, almost all of the East Asian economies have paid particular attention to educational development, with many families having sent their children to foreign countries to receive advanced education in the hope that when they return they can make a substantial contribution to the progress of their home economies—examples of this trend are provided by Taiwan and India. Thirdly, there are abundant natural resources in East Asia along with rich sources of manpower with a hard-working spirit; these two factors can create comparative advantages and strengthen the competitiveness of these economies.In view of the recent developments towards regionalism, it is imperative for the economies of East Asia to form an East Asian Community in the near future, and many of the economies in this region are currently endeavoring to realize this vision, despite many obstacles still facing East Asia which will ultimately need to be overcome.     

国家产业政策、产权性质与公司业绩

通过采用双重差分估计法,文章实证检验了国家产业政策对微观企业经营业绩的影响及其传导机制。研究发现,长期性产业政策鼓励发展的企业拥有更好的投资机会和更强的融资能力,其经营业绩也得到明显增长;进一步产权性质分组的结果表明,长期性产业政策的正激励效应在民营企业表现的更为显著。与长期产业政策不同,短期产业调控政策对支持发展企业的经营业绩具有显著负效应,并且这种负面影响主要体现在国有企业。     

The Policy Challenge with Floating Exchange Rates: Turkey’s Recent Experience

This paper evaluates the developments in the Turkish economy in light of the Central Bank of Turkey’s (CBT) policies during a recent period of floating exchange rate system (March 2001–July 2003). It is found that the CBT was effective in containing volatility and reducing the average inflation rate while there was a strong recovery of output. However, there are accumulated risks in the economy. Particularly, the extreme appreciation of the Turkish lira during this period and the record level of real interest rates give the impression that the current state of the economy is fragile. Unless the government accelerates the structural reform process and pursues sound fiscal policies to reduce the public sector borrowing requirement and the debt ratio, an adverse shock to the system may trigger a reversal of fortune.     

Mexico from bust to boom: A political evaluation of the 1976–1979 stabilization programme

This paper evaluates Mexico's recent experience of economic stabilization policies (under the the 3-yr Extended Fund Facility arranged with the IMF in September 1976) from a comparative politics standpoint. By comparison with various South American experiences of inflation and stabilization that were discussed in the same Wilson Centre workshop, Mexico's short-term performance must be rated quite favourably. This was not a case in which Fund orthodoxy prevailed at every point, nor was the Fund analysis accepted without qualification by Mexico's policy-markers. At the end of the period, economic disequilibria, as measured by IMF criteria, remained considerably larger than the 3-yr plan had envisaged, but ‘confidence’ had been restored and rapid growth was in prospect. The interpretation offered in the paper is that Mexico's cyclical pattern of presidential politics largely determined the effective contents of the stabilization package, and that the resilience of the Mexican system of political management goes far to explain why the economic outcome was more favourable than in the South American cases. An accident of geological endowment (the nation's huge oil resources) certainly accentuated the process of recovery from ‘bust’ to ‘boom’, but this factor did not operate in isolation, and should not be considered an adequate explanation on its own. The impact of a geological endowment upon economic conditions depends upon political mediation. However, although this paper seeks to highlight the contribution of Mexican political management to the recent short-term economic improvement, it concludes with some qualifications. The final section considers some constraints on the scope and efficacy of Mexican ‘reformism’, particularly in relation to longer-term and more structural problems.     

Mao and the Chinese rural economy

The essay argues that Mao's economic ideas, though often couched in misleadingly ideological terms, are based on practical experience and can be described and analysed in familiar economic terms. It argues that these ideas had their precedents in the Soviet industrialization debate of the 1920s among Stalin's opponents; their parallels can be found in theories and policies developed in India and elsewhere in the 1950s; and their practical precedents can be observed in the pre-1949 Communist Border Regions, where conditions put a premium on labour-intensive construction, intermediate technology, and community development. In particular, these ideas owe a great debt to the achievements of the non-Communist Chinese Industrial Cooperatives of the late 1930s and 1940s. They stress the human factors in economic development, and seek to provide a specific process of social change and economic growth which will spontaneously develop mass consciousness of new economic possibilities. The essay concludes that if the Chinese economy is analysed in terms of the expectations implied in Chinese theory, rather than in terms of the economic expectations of advanced industrial countries, quantitative analysis of the Chinese economy may be possible.     

税收优惠对企业创新的影响——基于先进制造业企业的实证分析

正确评价税收政策对先进制造业企业创新的影响具有重要意义。以2010—2019年中国A股先进制造业上市公司为研究样本,实证考察税收优惠与先进制造业企业创新的关系。研究发现：税收优惠对于先进制造业企业的创新具有激励效应,与所得税优惠相比,增值税优惠激励作用更为明显;区域异质性分析发现增值税优惠激励先进制造业企业创新呈现中、东、西部递减的状态,所得税优惠激励创新呈现东、西、中递减的状态。为提高税收优惠政策对于先进制造业企业创新的激励效应,提出完善税收优惠政策的建议。     

Informal Sector Pollution Control: What Policy Options Do We Have?

In developing countries, urban clusters of informal firms such as brick kilns and leather tanneries can create severe pollution problems. These firms are, however, quite difficult to regulate for a variety of technical and political reasons. Drawing on the literature, this paper first develops a list of feasible environmental management policies. It then examines how these policies have fared in four independent efforts to control emissions from informal brick kilns in northern Mexico. The case studies suggest that: (a) conventional command and control process standards are generally only enforceable when buttressed by peer monitoring, (b) surprisingly, clean technologies can be successfully diffused even when they raise variable costs, in part because early adopters have an economic incentive to promote further adoption, (c) boycotts of “dirty” goods sold in informal markets are unenforceable, (d) well organized informal firms can block implementation of costly abatement strategies such as relocation and (e) private sector-led initiatives may be best suited for informal sector pollution control.     

发达国家反金融危机措施比较及中国未来政策取向

文章比较分析了美国、西欧国家和日本的反金融危机措施,并对发达国家的反危机措施进行简要评价,最后,总结了中国的反危机措施,认为中国政府经济刺激政策已经见效,但仍有诸多不稳定因素。实现中国经济可持续增长,要以危机为契机,推进各项改革,通过制度创新释放经济活力,加大科技教育投入,使科技创新成为中国经济增长的新引擎。     

Central bank cooperation under the interwar gold standard

The limits of cooperation and the failures of leadership are recurrent themes in historical accounts which seek to explain the instability of the interwar gold standard. Yet these themes are wholly incompatible with received models of the gold standard. In an attempt at reconciliation, this paper has presented a simple model of central bank interaction under the interwar gold standard, and used it to interpret Anglo-French financial relations following Britain's return to gold. The model is inspired by Keynes' and Norman's comment that the interwar system can be understood as a competitive struggle for gold. It shows that if two central banks play a noncooperative game in which they both seek to augment their gold reserves, they will tend to raise their discount rates above the level consistent with price stability, depressing incomes at home and abroad. While central bank policy was but one factor at work in the world economy in the 1920s, the model is suggestive when applied to a period marked by historically high discount rates, conflicts over the distribution of gold, and steady deflation culminating in a Great Depression.