The regional effects of Indonesia's oil and gas policy: options for reform

This paper analyses the effects on the regions of Indonesia's fuel policy. It discusses how the sharing of oil and gas revenue and taxes between the centre and the regions affects the sub-national fiscal position, and examines the distribution of fuel subsidies across regions. The paper also examines the recent proposals to discontinue subsidising gasoline for private vehicles or to eliminate fuel subsidies altogether, and shows how the regions would be affected if these suggestions were adopted. We argue that the proposals would increase efficiency and equity and should therefore be implemented.     

On Income Transfers and Equivalence Scales

This article focusses on the relations between equivalence scales and income transfers linked to household characteristics, also called demogrants. Since transfer payments have to be financed, the relation is analyzed in the framework of an optimal tax model. The – in a second-best sense – optimal demogrants and optimal marginal tax rate are characterised by their first-order conditions. Some general properties of the demogrant structure are derived and discussed. Finally, an adopted version of Stern's model for the numerical calculation of optimal taxes is used to obtain more explicit indications about how different factors affect the structure of demogrants and the marginal tax rate.     

中国地方政府总体财力不均等程度及其分解：1997-2005

本文以1997年～2005年全国31省级财政数据为样本,运用基尼系数和GE指数分解法对省级财力差异进行了分解,结果发现：1997年至2005年间我国省际间财力差距没有明显收敛迹象,省际间财力差距一半以上来源于地区内部,并且呈扩大趋势;对省际间财力差异贡献最大的是本级财政收入,其中营业税和增值税贡献是主要因素;净转移支付解释了财力差异的约30％,其中税收返还和专项转移支付是造成省际间差异的主要原因,唯一起到均等化作用的是农村税费改革转移支付,旨在均衡地区间财力差距的一般性转移支付并没起到相应的作用;预算外收入的不平等贡献率大幅缩小,从边际效应看,增加净转移支付和预算外收入的规模,可以降低总体财力差距。     

Land Inheritance and Schooling in Matrilineal Societies: Evidence from Sumatra

This paper explores statistically the implications of the shift from communal to individualized tenure on the distribution of land and schooling between sons and daughters in matrilineal societies, based on a Sumatra case study. The inheritance system is evolving from a strictly matrilineal system to a more egalitarian system in which sons and daughters inherit the type of land which is more intensive in their respective work effort. While gender bias is either non-existent or small in land inheritance, daughters tend to be disadvantaged with respect to schooling. The gender gap in schooling, however, appears to be closing for the generation of younger children.     

农地流转：历史、困境与制度创新

文章采用激励理论、合约理论的分析方法,探讨了中国农村土地流转发展缓慢的原因：农户土地转让激励不足、关系型合约限制了农地转让的发展。只有通过完善农户转让的激励机制,实现由关系型合约向规则型合约的转变,才能真正使农地流转起来。     

The Impact of Social Safety Net Programs on Household Savings in Colombia

This paper seeks to understand and quantify how social safety net programs impact household savings in developing countries, considering the case of Colombia using two complementary approaches. The first approach explores how the health regime affects savings in the country. The second evaluates the impact on savings of familias en acción, a major antipoverty conditional cash transfer program. The results suggest that the savings of informal households are higher than those of formal households, because, with little incentive to enter the formal job market, informal households need to cover slightly greater non‐covered risks. The results also show that familias en acción recipients save more than non‐recipients because recipients favorably adjust their expenditure patterns.     

Foreign Transfers and Real Exchange Rate Adjustments in a Financially Constrained Dependent Economy

This paper investigates the role of the real exchange rate in determining the effects of foreign transfers. If capital is perfectly mobile between sectors, a pure transfer has no long-run impact on the real exchange rate. A decline in the traded sector occurs because the transfer, being denominated in traded output, substitutes for exports in financing imports. While a pure transfer causes short-run real exchange appreciation, this response is temporary and negligibly small. Transfers allocated to productivity enhancement do generate permanent real exchange rate adjustments in response to the sectoral reallocation of productive factors. The analysis, which employs extensive numerical simulations, emphasizes the tradeoffs between real exchange adjustments, long-run capital accumulation, and economic welfare, associated with alternative forms of transfers.

The Dynamics of International Trade Patterns

This paper introduces new dynamic measures for examining changes in international trade patterns. Using data for 20 OECD countries over the 1980–2000 period, we show that inter-industry trade changes contrary to countries’ previous specialization are frequently the dominant form of trade expansion. The econometric analysis indicates that the observed changes in trade patterns were explained by initial endowments of human-capital and industry-specific changes in labour productivity and labour costs. The results also suggest that trade liberalization induced an increase in the previous specialization of larger OECD economies in industries with increasing returns to scale. JEL no. F1, O33, O50     

Capitalization of local government grants on land values: Evidence from Tokyo metropolitan area,Japan

This study investigates the capitalization effect of intergovernmental fiscal transfers from central to local governments on land prices. Using a drop in the size number of fiscal transfers following fiscal reform in the early 2000 s, this study examines the extent to which unconditional fiscal transfers to municipalities in the Tokyo metropolitan area are attributed to land prices. The result shows that the decline in the transfer has decreased the land prices in the municipalities. Furthermore, reducing one unit in the per capita grant reduced the value of housing area per capita by one or more units, even if the real discount rate was assumed to be as low as 2%. Therefore, the fiscal transfer reform more negatively affects the benefits of residing in a municipality in the area than the reduction amount in the transfer.     

The North American Industry Classification System and Its Implications for Accounting Research*

Industry classification is an important component of the methodological infrastructure of accounting research. Researchers have generally used the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) system for assigning firms to industries. In 1999, the major statistical agencies of Canada, Mexico, and the United States began implementing the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS). The new scheme changes industry classification by introducing production as the basis for grouping firms, creating 358 new industries, extensively rearranging SIC categories, and establishing uniformity across all NAFTA nations. We examine the implications of the change for accounting research. We first assess NAICS's effectiveness in forming industry groups. Following Guenther and Rosman 1994, we use financial ratio variances to measure intra‐industry homogeneity and find that NAICS offers some improvement over the SIC system in defining manufacturing, transportation, and service industries. We also evaluate whether NAICS might have an impact on empirical research by reproducing part of Lang and Lundholm's 1996 study of information‐transfer and industry effects. Using SIC delineations, they focus on whether industry conditions or the level of competition is the main source of uncertainty resolved by earnings announcements. Across all levels of aggregation, we find inferences are similar using either SIC or NAICS. How‐ever, we also observe that the regression coefficients in Lang and Lundholm's model show smaller intra‐industry dispersion for NAICS, relative to SIC, definitions. Overall, the results suggest that NAICS definitions lead to more cohesive industries. Because of this, researchers may encounter some differences in using NAICS‐industry definitions, rather than SIC, but these will depend on research design and industry composition of the sample.     

不动产物权变动制度在我国农村城市化进程中的现实意义

本文研究了我国特别是深圳地区的农村城市化改造的情况后发现,非依法律行为而发生的土地物权变动对于加快城市化进程非常必要。笔者对各地政府普遍采用的土地征用制度存在缺陷进行了深刻地批判,肯定了深圳市政府2005年通过国有化改制转变土地物权性质的做法,进而对土地物权国有化转制后急待解决的土地使用权年限、土地使用权转让、规范"炒地皮"、闲置土地收回、土地使用权转让方式等后续问题提出了自己独到的思路。     

Altruism as a motive for intergenerational transfers

This study investigates the role of altruism as a motive for transfer payments. In the existing literature on altruism, it is generally assumed that a transfer payment is made out of altruism that a transferor feels towards a transferee. This study demonstrates that this is not necessarily the case. By using a dynamic model in which children are altruistic towards parents, it demonstrates that such altruism may induce a parent to give a transfer to children.     

发展中国家面临的国际贸易所造成环境问题分析

本文主要从目前国际贸易而产生的环境问题出发,分析了现在的跨境污染问题带来的严重后果,特别是对于发展中国家造成的主要影响分析,以及现行一些解决方法的总结。期望从分析过程中找出一定的解决措施,寻求发展中国家面临现在状况的改善办法和措施,为进一步控制贸易对环境的影响并进行进一步的探究提供一点意见。     

承接“二个转移”推进内蒙古优势特色产业升级的思考

近年来,以跨国公司为主导的国际资本扩大了在中国西部地区的产业转移。与此同时,中国东部地区基于降低营运成本等考虑,也加快了向中西部地区的产业转移。内蒙古面对国际、国内产业转移的良好机遇,凭借其资源优势成为热点承接地区。承接"二个转移",对于提升内蒙古优势特色产业的产业竞争力具有重要意义。内蒙古应积极优化投资环境、引导产业投向、增强产业配套能力,推进承接"二个转移",并以此带动本地区优势特色产业的优化升级。