Business cycle and level accounting: the case of Portugal

This paper studies what accounts for the recent business cycles phenomena in Portugal and why it is depressed relatively to the United States. The business accounting procedure applied here suggests that most of the changes in output per worker in Portugal over the period (mainly, from 1979 to 1991) can be attributed to changes in economic efficiency. For instance, the strong economic recovery in output per worker just after Portugal joined the European Union until the first years of the 1990s can be essentially attributed to improvements in economic efficiency. From 1979 to 2000, Portugal caught up with the industrial leader. Its output per worker is currently depressed by about 46% relative to the United States level (it was depressed by 57% in 1979). In the 1980s all of this depression in output per worker relative to the United States was due to the productivity factor. By 2000 Portugal depression relative to the United States was a mix of the French and Japanese depression. The labor factor accounted for roughly 24% of this depression, while the economic efficiency accounted by about 89%.      

Business cycles synchronization in East Asian economy: Evidences from time-varying coherence study

This paper analyzes the feasibility of a monetary union in East Asia focusing on business cycles synchronization. Considering the critical role of trade integration in the East Asian integration process, we study whether East Asian countries are characterized by business cycle synchronization. The related empirical literature dedicated to business cycles synchronization in East Asia does not lead to firm conclusion. In this paper, we suggest a different empirical approach allowing, contrary to the previous studies, to detect endogenously structural changes in the comovement process between outputs. We apply a new measure based on the time-varying coherence function. Such a measure not only detects comovement dynamics but it distinguishes also this dynamics between short- and long-term. We compute also cohesion statistics to test if countries tend to be more synchronized or not. The main finding of this paper is that the increase in bilateral trade inside the East Asian region significantly improves long-run business cycle synchronization. The short-run influence of bilateral trade shows mixed results. Indeed, short-run cycles remain significantly influenced both by shocks hitting each country and by economic policy responses. As a consequence, more bilateral trade and convergence in economic policy constitute two complementary processes to promote business cycle synchronization.     

论企业投资活动中的税收理财

本文围绕企业投资活动中的税收理财,介绍了新古典投资理论、税收对投资的作用机制及投资活动的具体税收分析.     

Business cycle and corruption

In studying the Great Depression, Galbraith asserts that the higher the transitory income the higher the corruption. For a panel of 39 countries over 13 years, 1995-2007, Galbraith's claim holds. Regression analyses also confirm that the higher the permanent income, the lower the corruption.     

Why the Tigers Roared: Capital Accumulation and the East Asian Miracle

Recent growth accounting studies of Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and South Korea have found that the Solow residuals in these economies were relatively small. Given the high capital contributions, these results are often interpreted as evidence that factor accumulation, savings and investment were the principal cause of the East Asian miracle. This paper develops an alternative method of analysing these data, combining growth accounting methods with the linearized neoclassical growth model of Mankiw et al. (1992). The method explicitly quantifies the extent to which increases in productivity, as measured by the Solow residual, induced capital accumulation in these economies. It shows that in Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea, productivity growth contributed between half and two-thirds of the growth in GDP per worker over a 20-year period.     

Land tenure and investment incentives: Evidence from West Africa

The existing literature on the relationship between property rights in land and agricultural investment in Africa has given results that are often confusing and contradictory. I make two clarifying contributions to this literature. First, I pull together existing studies and investigate whether the results they find have been affected by research methods or local contexts. Studies with small sample sizes, those that use binary investment measures, and those that control for household fixed effects are less likely to find a statistically significant link between land tenure and investment. Self-reported tenure security has been a poor predictor of investment outcomes. Second, I test for a relationship between land tenure and agricultural investment in nine data sets from West Africa. While the link between tenure and investment is significant for fallow and tree planting, it is less robust for labor use and other inputs, such as manure or chemical fertilizer.     

Trends in management accounting in the Asian pacific region

Summary and conclusions The results of this study indicate that the manufacturing firms in Asia responding to this questionnaire are adopting some of the changes in advocated in the "new" managerial accounting. Respondents see increasingly important roles in their organizations for activity based costing, evaluation of value added activities, quality control, and production and inventory control systems, while retaining some of the traditional techniques appropriate for their more labor oriented manufacturing environment. The integration of accounting controls with strategic measures and the use of non-financial performance measures will become more important in the future. Respondents also considered their cost/managerial information to be useful in a wide variety of management decisions. Managerial accounting techniques and practices have changed in response to the challenges of global competition, international markets, technological advances, and complexity of business. Adoption of these innovations by Asian manufacturers suggest a changing role for the managerial/cost accountant. The future management accountant will need to be knowledgeable of production, quality control, marketing, and management strategy. The results also indicate a broadening of management accounting and a trend toward the integration of management accounting information with strategic planning, suggesting the emergence of the integrative area of cost management. This evidence of changes in the practice of management accounting in Asia will also have significant implications for American universities and manufactures regarding the common body of knowledge required for domestic and international management accounting and the future direction of management accounting education.     

Business cycle synchronization and the Euro: A wavelet analysis

We use wavelet analysis to study business cycle synchronization across the EU-15 and the Euro-12 countries. Based on the wavelet transform, we propose a metric to measure and test for business cycles synchronization. Several conclusions emerge. France and Germany form the core of the Euro land, being the most synchronized countries with the rest of Europe. Portugal, Greece, Ireland and Finland do not show statistically relevant degrees of synchronization with Europe. We also show that some countries (like Spain) have a French accent, while others have a German accent (e.g., Austria). Perhaps surprisingly, we find that the French business cycle has been leading the German business cycle as well as the rest of Europe. Among the countries that may, in the future, join the Euro, the Czech Republic seems the most promising candidate.     

Stress test for reforms: Transition and East Asian 'contagion'

Contagion from East Asia imposed a severe 'stress test' on the market-orientedreforms of transition economies. We find that the portfolio reallocations of investors differentiated sharply among these economies at the height of the East Asian turmoil, appearing clearly in the relative movements in interest rates and share prices. Those countries that appeared more vulnerable to contagion had large public or private sector imbalances and low reserve cover of short-term debt. The analysis, however, goes beyond macroeconomic and financial imbalances to link these weak fundamentals to inadequate structural and institutional reforms. We find that flaws in public finances together with weak enterprises and financial institutions were key underlying factors in the vulnerability to East Asian contagion. They were also key causes of the Russian crisis, which initiated a new round of contagion driven primarily by high exposures to Russian trade.     

Asset Bubbles, Leverage and 'Lifeboats': Elements of the East Asian Crisis

Collapsing credit markets have been blamed for the depth and persistence of the Great Depression in the United States. Could similar mechanisms have played a role in ending the East Asian economic miracle – and in creating fragility in global financial markets? After a brief account of the nature of the East Asian crises of 1997/8, we use the framework of highly-leveraged, fully-collaterised firms due to Kiyotaki and Moore (1997) to explore the impact of a credit crunch. The paper emphasises the fragility of equilibrium and how rapidly boom can turn to bust.     

园区网络:东亚投资合作的重要载体

东亚地区吸引FDI成效卓著,但区内投资合作严重滞后。在当前世界经济一体化和区域经济集团化的背景下,东亚地区的区域经济合作需要全面展开,尤其在投资合作方面,在滞后于贸易与金融合作的情况下需要及时跟进。东亚投资合作具有坚实基础,东亚各经济体应该顺应这一潮流,采取有效的政策措施推进和强化东亚投资合作,以此来实现东亚经济的持续、快速增长。目前东亚总体投资环境还是良好的,这一点可以通过东亚地区FDI流入的情况得到证明。在世界FDI流入量自2000年以来呈逐年递减趋势下,东亚的FDI流入量却自2002年呈现出逐年递增趋势。2003年中…     

东亚货币合作：现实动因与可行性分析

蒙代尔(2000)预言,在未来10年内将出现三大货币区:欧元区、美元区和亚洲货币区,即“稳定性三岛”。东亚主要经济体构建统一货币区具有可行性。加强子区域货币合作,逐步融合为大的货币区,对于建立以次区域合作为基础、制度化建设为依托、动态的渐进式东亚货币合作模式具有重大意义。     

Intertemporal current account balance and the East Asian currency crises

Under the assumption that the balance of the current account must satisfy the expected intertemporal balance, this paper seeks to establish a precondition for the recent currency crises in East Asian countries. Whenever current policy violates the expected intertemporal balance, it is argued that future policy changes (possibly including the exchange rate regime) are anticipated. Using Trehan and Walsh's [1991] result that nonstationarity of the change of assets is evidence of a violation of the expected intertemporal balance, this paper calculates the augmented Dickey-Fuller statistics of the current account prior to the East Asian currency crises. In each of these crises, there is evidence of a persistent violation of intertemporal balance prior to the crisis. There is also evidence of countries being affected by the plight of their neighbors. Their currencies depreciated even though it was not necessary. This is a revised version of a paper presented at the Forty-Fifth International Atlantic Economic Conference, Rome, Italy, March 14–21, 1998. The author would like to thank the participants of the conference for their comments. Suggestions from Tsangyao Chang, Wen-Shwo Fang, and Richard Lu at the Feng-Chia University seminar are appreciated. Financial support from the National Science Fund of Taiwan, Republic of China, NSC 88-2415-H-035-010, is greatly appreciated.     

Business investment in euro area countries: the role of institutions and debt overhang

The recovery of business investment in the euro area has been sluggish, thereby hampering aggregate demand in the short term and potential growth in the long run. While we show that business investment can be associated to cost and supply of credit, cyclical demand conditions and economic uncertainty. But we also find evidence of additional factors. We suggest that there exists a link between excess leverage and weak economic institutions on the one hand and subdued investment growth on the other hand. Moreover, in euro area countries with both larger excess leverage and weaker economic institutions, the link with business investment is found to be stronger. The link between investment and weak institutions or excess leverage highlights the importance of structural reforms aimed at easing business regulations, reducing administrative burdens and increasing the efficiency of insolvency frameworks. These reforms are thus expected to reduce distortions in the allocation of resources and be supportive of a smoother deleveraging process, hence fostering business investment.     

Vicarelli,Keynes, and the unstable nexus between investment,liquidity, and finance

The goal of this article is to reconstruct Keynes’s vision of the unstable nexus between investment, liquidity and finance, as set out by the Italian economist Fausto Vicarelli (1936–1986). As argued in the article, one of Vicarelli’s main contributions consists of explaining the inherent instability of financially sophisticated capitalist economies in terms of the interaction (and double dissociation) between investment, saving, and stock-holding decisions, within a Keynesian framework characterized by the presence of fundamental uncertainty. While Vicarelli’s interpretation of Keynes is best understood in the context of the post-Keynesian literature, its relevance goes beyond that, as its sheds light on current issues related to the post-2008 financial crisis and its policy implications.