Tax Morale and the Taming of Leviathan

An explanation for tax morale based upon a simple model of psychological costs that depend on the perceived legitimacy of public policies is introduced. It is shown that empirically observed low levels of tax evasion can be explained even for a risk-neutral taxpayer with such a model. In a discussion of aggregate tax revenue, it is argued that tax revenue as a function of tax rates may differ fundamentally from the notorious Laffer curve. It is then necessary to look at the interaction of formal and informal institutions to predict the nominal tax rates chosen by a revenue maximizer.      

Social and solidarity economy and social and solidarity commons: Towards the (re)discovery of an ethic of the common good?

This research poses the ethic of the common good and the institutions of the social and solidarity economy (SSE) as the foundation of commoning practices. Specifically, it illustrates how the latter may contribute to regenerating the commons, fostering open and shared access to key productive resources and essential goods and services. The analysis focuses on social and solidarity commons (SSC), defined as all those relational practices that contribute to the accumulation and regeneration of human and social (as well as other types of) critical capital. To achieve this research goal, this study collected new and old issues debated in the academic literature concerning the geographic nature of commons and their juridical and economic treatment within socioeconomic disciplines. Then, a historical overview of the commons highlights their dynamic and multifaceted nature and illustrates how they have often been co‐owned and co‐governed according to shared rules and norms. Within this general framework, SSC are introduced, and a role for the institutions of the SSE is proposed to foster an ethic of the common good as a necessary (but not sufficient) condition for expanding and enforcing people's participation in commoning practices.     

Good geography,good institutions? Historical evidence from nineteenth-century British colonies

This paper uses a historical natural experiment – the opening of the Suez Canal – to investigate the relationship between geography and the formation of institutions. While the conventional view is that good geography (commodity endowment) inevitably favours the creation of extractive institutions, we discover that a second aspect of geography – location – may in fact encourage the establishment of non-extractive institutions when rent extraction by elites depends on the productivity of non-elites. Specifically, we find that entrepôt colonies (Hong Kong and the Straits Settlements) received larger public investments in the post-Suez period than resource colonies (British India, Ceylon, and West Africa), after accounting for year effects and permanent differences across colonies. We demonstrate, using supplementary data, that the entrepôt colonies' locational advantage, coupled with their lack of extractable resources, plays a key role in explaining our empirical findings.     

中国的地区工业集聚:经济地理、新经济地理与经济政策

本文使用新经济地理学的分析框架讨论了经济地理和经济政策等因素对工业集聚的影响,并利用1987—2001年省级面板数据研究了导致中国地区工业集聚的因素。我们的主要发现是(1)经济开放促进了工业集聚,而经济开放又与地理和历史的因素有关;(2)市场容量、城市化、基础设施的改善和政府作用的弱化也有利于工业集聚;(3)沿海地区具有工业集聚的地理优势。我们的研究为新经济地理学的理论提供了来自于中国的证据,同时也发现,除了经济地理的作用以外,政策也是导致工业集聚的重要因素。     

基于微观异质性的新新经济地理研究

新新贸易理论在我国已经引起了充分注意,但紧随其后产生的新新经济地理却受到忽视,而新新经济地理对空间经济理论的突破是:在规模经济与垄断竞争的框架下,放弃企业或劳动者同质性假定,从微观角度研究产业集聚和地区经济“质”(企业效率)的差异.在理论方面本文将当前研究归结为DS、OTT和BEJK三大分析框架;在实证方面总结了新新经济地理对新经济地理估计偏误的校正.并且展望了新新经济地理与企业理论、人力资本理论、中国转型经济特殊国情相结合的研究方向.     

How do middle-aged children allocate time and money transfers to their older parents in Europe?

This paper analyses the determinants of financial and time transfers from adult children to their older parents using the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE). It is the first survey containing rich comparable interdisciplinary information about individuals aged 50+ from ten European countries (Austria, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland). The first part of the paper highlights the differences in the provision of upward private intergenerational transfers (in terms of both time and money) across the ten European countries. The second part describes the different determinants in the decision to provide time or money transfers to parents and evaluates whether these two types of assistance are substitutes or complements. Results highlight the existence of a substitution between time and money in relation to geographical distance and the existence of a weak substitution regarding the employment status of the middle-aged children.

非正规部门就业:效应与对策

我国当前和未来就业形势不容乐观,非正规部门就业不仅是缓解就业压力的有效途径之一,也能够促进社会经济持续稳定发展。针对非正规部门就业存在的问题,应采取鼓励非正规部门发展等措施促进非正部门就业。     

Economic liberalization, capital mobility and informal wage in a small open economy: A theoretical analysis

Empirical evidence suggests that the size of the informal sector in the developing countries has increased considerably during the liberalized economic regime. The present paper purports to analyze the consequences of economic reforms on the wellbeing of the informal sector workforce using a three-sector general equilibrium model with two informal sectors. The theoretical analysis finds that different liberalized policies produce diverse effects on the informal wage and that these results are independent of the nature of capital mobility between the informal and the formal sectors. It also shows that labour market reforms, contrary to the common wisdom, are likely to produce favourable effects on the informal wage.     

中国省级预算中的非正式制度:一个交易费用理论框架

运用交易费用经济学 ,本文研究了中国省级预算中非正式制度出现的原因及其主要形式。本文的主要观点是 :中国省级预算中存在的非正式制度是省级政治中的政治家发展出来解决他们制定和实施预算合同时所面临的交易费用问题的。主要的非正式制度包括三种横向非正式制度 ,即预算产权、部分等级制和完全等级制 ,以及围绕着这三种横向非正式制度而形成的“以关系为基础”的纵向非正式制度。     

企业好行为与环境绩效关系的实证研究

Is the adoption of best practice in business associated with improved environmental performance？ And what methods can he used to assess and compare the environmental practices and performance of different companies？ In this paper, through case anatysis, the business environmental practices and performance of five companies in the manufacturing sector were examined and scored. Assessing these companies practices and performance according to “The best practice model” designed by Australian Manufacturing Council （AMC. 1994）. The finding shows that there is strong correlation between environmental practices and performance of companies （r=0.85, p〈0.05）, and indicates that corporate paying attention to environmental issue will improve its all performances in business.     

The participation of Russian households in the informal economy: Evidence from the VTsIOM data

This study presents the size and structure of secondary employment in Russia, analyses the determinants of Russian informal secondary employment, and discusses differences between job qualifications in a main job and those in a secondary job. We estimate that 27 percent of Russia’s GDP was produced in the informal economy during 1997–98 and informal secondary employment amounts to about 20 percent of value added produced in the informal economy. We found that the probability of holding an informal secondary job as opposed to a formal one is positively associated with higher wage rates and lower education. However, there is little evidence that low income is correlated with holding an informal secondary job. We also found evidence that an informal secondary job requires lower job qualifications as compared to a formal one. Again, low income is not significant in determining differences between job qualifications in a main job and those in a secondary job. JEL classification: J22, J24, O17, P20.     

Regulation of entry, labor market institutions and the informal sector

This paper develops a two-sector matching model that incorporates the main features of Latin American labor markets. It has an innovation in its matching structure that makes it more consistent with some key stylized facts of the informal sector in these countries. The model is numerically solved using Brazilian data and several policy simulations are performed. Reducing formal sector's entry cost significantly reduces the size of the informal sector and improves overall labor market performance. Increasing enforcement significantly reduces informality but has strong adverse effects on unemployment and welfare. Thus, the results indicate that the tradeoff between lower informal employment and higher unemployment rates is not present when one looks at policies that aim at reducing the costs of being formal, as opposed to policies that simply increase the costs of being informal.     

论非正规金融之于农村反贫困的作用机制与制度安排

一直以来,非正规金融处于被打击的状态,但是,作为一种诱致性制度变迁的产物,它顽强地生存了下来,并在许多地区呈扩大之势。非正规金融的制度优势使其在农村反贫困中发挥了正规金融难以替代的作用。基于此,本文探讨了农村非正规金融对于反贫困的作用机制,并提出了相应的制度安排。     

论我国农村民间金融的治理

我国农村正式金融安排实际上是一种从农村汲取资金的制度安排,而民间金融是真正满足农村经济需要的融资机制.可以通过正式认可民间金融以提供其发展空间,改革完善现有正式金融以提供其替代和规范现有民间金融以促进其演进来实现对农村民间金融的治理.     

信息、非正规金融与中小企业融资

各种形式的非正规金融在发展中国家和地区广泛存在。本文认为,由于中小企业信息不透明,且常常不能提供充分的担保或抵押,正规金融机构难以有效克服信息不对称造成的逆向选择问题,而非正规金融则在收集关于中小企业的“软信息”方面具有优势。这种信息优势是非正规金融广泛存在的根本性原因,金融抑制只是一个强化因素,同时非正规金融市场的各种特征也都源于其存在的根本逻辑。本文构建了一个包括异质的中小企业借款者和异质的贷款者(具有不同信息结构的非正规金融和正规金融部门)的金融市场模型,证明非正规金融的存在能够改进整个信贷市场的资金配置效率。     

我国农村正规金融与非正规金融效率分析

高效率的金融制度对经济发展提供强有力的资金支持,可以提高经济的总体竞争力,促进经济增长。对农村信用社、农业银行、农业发展银行和邮政储蓄银行等正规金融机构和村镇银行、小额贷款公司等非正规金融组织的效率进行调查,从资金配置效率、适应性效率和运行效率方面进行分析,结果显示：正规金融制度的效率偏低,非正规金融组织的效率偏高;两种金融制度的效率有各自的空间,在规模和范围较小时,非正规金融制度效率更高,而超出一定的发展范围和规模,正规金融制度的优越性则进一步凸显。