Currency Devaluation and Resource Mobilization: A Computable General-Equilibrium Analysis of Adjustment in Cameroon

Currency devaluations prescribed for many developing countries are usually expected to generate a growth-stimulating reallocation of resources in favor of export production. Results from a computable general-equilibrium model of devaluation in Cameroon indicate aggregate growth in export agriculture with decline in some traditional export crops and expansion in specific nontradable food crops. While agriculture and manufacturing expand after devaluation, reduced output from services and construction causes short-term contraction in aggregate output. Positive growth and trade balance effects are dependent on a major reallocation of labor which has been difficult to achieve in Cameroon.     

East–West European Integration: A General-Equilibrium Analysis of Alternative Agricultural Policies

This paper studies the budgetary and trade implications of European Union (EU) membership of Eastern European countries under various agricultural policy scenarios. The author uses a six-region, 13-sector general-equilibrium model with many explicitly modeled agricultural and trade policies. It is found that EU membership of Eastern European countries, including their adoption of the EU's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), leads to a surge in Eastern Europe's agricultural exports. Moreover, the EU's agricultural expenditure increases by 26%. A reform of the CAP following the Agenda 2000 proposal does not reduce the cost of enlargement if Eastern European farmers receive compensation payments.     

The Balassa-Samuelson Model: A General-Equilibrium Appraisal*

We derive two key propositions of the Balassa-Samuelson model as long-run balanced growth implications of a neoclassical general equilibrium model. the propositions are that productivity differentials determine international differences in nontradable relative prices and deviations from PPP reflect differences in nontradable prices. Closed-form solutions are obtained and tested using panel methods applied to long-run components of OECD sectoral data computed using the Hodrick-Prescott filter. the results indicate that labor productivity differentials help explain international low-frequency differences in relative prices. However, predicted nontradable relative prices are less successful in explaining long-run deviations from PPP. Unless very sophisticated indeed, PPP is a misleadingly pretentious doctrine, promising us what is rare in economics, detailed numerical predictions. (Paul A. Samuelson, 1964, p. 153)     

Food Prices Policy in Israel: A Strategic Instrument

Abstract:

The goal of this research is to demonstrate a significant importance of state policy of food prices supervision in Israel. The article begins with a detailed discussion of the healthy food basket’s components, based on the Israeli Ministry of Health recommendations. Next, we present the prices of the goods included in the basket, and a calculated estimate of the per capita cost of funding the basket. Based on this cost figure, we assess the economic ability of Israeli households to purchase the basket. The results show that two lowest quintiles would have trouble paying the price of a basic health food basket. Further, it describes the food prices in Israel and its significance, Israel’s food market and the major regulatory tools associated with the food market. In the end, we define the need for short-term and longer-term regulation of food costs, and the necessity of expanding competition in the food market.     

资产价格与货币政策

随着资本市场的发展和金融资产存量的增加 ,资产价格的波动对货币政策提出了诸多挑战。本文讨论了资产价格与货币政策目标的关系 ;资产价格在货币政策传导过程中对消费、投资和金融体系的影响 ;以及货币政策操作中有关资产价格的争论 ;最后提出了这一研究领域中存在的问题     

公债管理政策有效性的理论分析

本文将传统的李嘉图等价定理引入到公债管理政策的分析中，建立了公债管理政策的无效性假说，并在此基础上分析得出成立的前提条件，最后通过检验得出：无效性假说所隐含的大多数前提条件与现实并不相符，因而政策无效性的命题在实践中并不成立。     

我国货币政策与资产价格的相关性分析

运用我国1998年1月～2010年6月的数据,采取理论与实证分析相结合的方法研究货币政策与资产价格的动态相关性。实证分析的结果表明,央行不应直接将资产价格作为货币政策的目标,制定货币政策时应高度关注资产价格的变化,还应充分地、前瞻地考虑货币政策对资产价格的影响,并将资产价格未来变动趋势作为影响货币政策有效性的重要参考因素之一。     

Gender Analysis of the Policy Responses to High Oil Prices: A Case Study of South Africa

ABSTRACT

The 2007–8 surge in oil prices has created concern about its impacts on poor and vulnerable populations in developing countries. Government management of the energy crisis was shown to be important in reducing adverse impacts. This study uses an applied general equilibrium framework to examine alternative policy and external shocks with the recent surge in oil prices in South Africa through a gender lens. Simulation results show that although the 2007–8 energy crisis contributed to slowing down South African gross domestic product (GDP) growth and reducing employment and earnings, the distributional impact between men and women has been neutral. This neutrality is driven by an increase in capital inflows, which has mitigated the exchange rate depreciation owing to the oil price hike. Without an increase in capital inflows, the crisis would have significantly depreciated the exchange rate and contributed to decreasing women's market opportunities and increasing women's workload as compared to men.     

A Normative Analysis of Housing-Related Tax Policy in a General Equilibrium Model of Housing Quality and Prices

We evaluate an array of housing-related tax policies in a general equilibrium model with endogenous housing quality and prices. The local government facilitates the provision of local public amenities, financed by an array of housing-related taxes, including a developer gross revenue tax, a property tax, a land tax, and a development license fee. In a competitive spatial equilibrium, all households optimize and reach the same utility, all monopolistically competitive developers optimize and receive zero profit, and both housing and land markets clear. We examine the effects of various tax policies on housing quality, housing prices, land rent, as well as the population and housing density. By evaluating quantitatively the welfare of the local economy, we establish a globally optimal tax scheme in the housing market: complete elimination of the property tax and imposition of a lower gross revenue tax (possibly fully eliminated) than both development and land taxes.     

A Survey of Textbooks for Industrial Organization and Public Policy

All teachers of economics will be interested in the author's dissection of the industrial organization course into its components. Teachers of this specialty will find this survey particularly useful for its examination of how the major texts treat each of the components.     

A Nobel Prize for the Empirical Analysis of Asset Prices

Abstract

The 2013 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics was awarded to Eugene Fama, Robert Shiller, and Lars Peter Hansen for their empirical analysis of asset prices. The paper reviews critically the work of the three economists and highlights the differing conclusions that the three researchers reached on the relatively narrow question of the rationality of individual investors. The paper argues that there is a time inconsistency in the idea that markets reveal information about the future and concludes that, despite the sophistication of their statistical analysis, the laureates have been unable to demonstrate how a sophisticated financial economy can produce their empirical results.     

经济学视域下的公共政策分析:批判与反思

当前主流经济理论对公共政策的分析主要是基于其广泛适用的规则和假设,在进行演绎式分析推理过程中,其所使用的抽象效率标准将公平分析几乎完全排除在外,从而使公共政策在很大程度上失去了其应有的价值判断。现实中,社会性个体基于契约理性追求角色意义上的目标及其协调,因此,公共政策首先应考虑的是目标定位与一致认可,这必然要兼顾公平与效率,并全面考虑人类行为的伦理、经济和法律方面,这是人作为一切社会关系的总和的必然产物和要求。政府公共政策及其引导下的集体行动是对个体角色目标的协调一致的表现和结果,因此公共政策只有能够满足诸多个体实现不同的个人目标,才有被认可并得到执行的可能。由此可见,公共政策首先应当有其价值判断,该价值判断建立在共识判断的基础之上。     

公共政策中公平与效率问题的分析

公共政策作为政府用来协调社会利益关系的重要手段,其必然涉及到政策选择,而政策选择实质上就是一种价值选择.公平与效率作为公共政策最基本的价值,一直是困扰我国政府行为的两难选择.目前无论是个人收入还是在财富占有比例方面,差距都在迅速拉大.从我国当前的实际情况看,问题的症结在于缺乏公平.要弥补诸多的不公平,根本途径在于政府的公共政策中应以注重公平,强调公平为优先考虑的价值取向.     

货币政策、资产价格与金融稳定性

传统的货币政策理论认为,中央银行制定货币政策时应严格以通货膨胀为目标,但金融危机的爆发,资本市场的膨胀、资产价格的波动,都不断地冲击货币政策的有效性,并在一定程度上影响金融体系的稳定性,由此引发学术界对货币政策中介目标的探讨。本文以具有变参数特征的动态金融景气指数(DFCI)为工具,考察了DFCI对CPI和金融稳定性的预测作用,在此基础上,扩展前瞻性中央银行利率反应函数,将包含资产价格信息的DFCI纳入反应函数,研究中央银行货币政策行为,并拓展直接以资产价格为操作目标的泰勒准则作比较。实证表明:在扩展形式的前瞻性利率反应函数中,DFCI变量统计显著,包含资产价格的DFCI要比不包含资产价格的DFCI显著,以资产价格作为货币政策目标的利率规则作用效应不完全显著。这说明,DFCI的建立具有合理性,资产价格波动显著地影响货币政策的有效性,严格的通货膨胀目标规则存在不足,中央银行的货币政策行为需要考虑资本市场的变化以及资产价格的波动,但直接将资产价格作为目标的货币政策具有不确定性。     

Response of Asset Prices to Monetary Policy under Abenomics

In this paper, I investigate the causes of the recent sharp response of the yen and Japanese stock prices to the discussion of, and the subsequent implementation of bold monetary easing by the Bank of Japan as demanded by Prime Minister Abe. I present statistical evidence that the response of the two asset prices have indeed been unusually large relative to the past experience with nonconventional monetary policy (NCM) even after allowance is given for the rise in global economic activity and asset prices. I also point out that the rally has been led by speculative trading by foreign investors, while domestic investors have largely stayed on the sidelines. I discuss possible reasons for such foreign investor behavior. Simply put, the unprecedented political pressure raised hopes of the adoption of bold measures by the Bank of Japan. I discuss, however, the possibility that the room for further action by the Bank is quite limited apart from what might be called a targeted helicopter drop of money. I also point out the possibility that investor behavior may have not been based on economic fundamentals. The asset price volatility since April 2013 is interpreted in the light of such discussions.     

Time-Consistent Public Policy

In this paper we study how a benevolent government that cannot commit to future policy should trade off the costs and benefits of public expenditure. We characterize and solve for Markov-perfect equilibria of the dynamic game between successive governments. The characterization consists of an inter-temporal first-order condition (a "generalized Euler equation") for the government, and we use it both to gain insight into the nature of the equilibrium and as a basis for computations. For a calibrated economy, we find that when the only tax base available to the government is capital income—an inelastic source of funds at any point in time—the government still refrains from taxing at confiscatory rates. We also find that when the only tax base is labour income the Markov equilibrium features less public expenditure and lower tax rates than the Ramsey equilibrium.     

中国商品期货价格指数对货币政策效果监控的参考价值

已有的实证研究表明,我国商品期货价格指数能够在一定程度上反映主要宏观经济指标的变动情况。商品期货价格指数不但能够在数值水平上领先GDP和CPI,在波动幅度上对CPI也具有一定的预示作用。本文经过理论推导和实证分析,分析了当货币供应量发生变化时,商品期货价格指数如何预先反映经济增长和通胀水平的变动方向和幅度,论证了在监控货币政策对实体经济影响效果方面商品期货价格指数的参考价值,从而在新的维度上刻画了其对于货币政策的参考意义。