Investment in Swedish manufacturing: Analysis and forecasts

This paper uses a neoclassical investment model extended with installation costs for capital, agency costs for investment financing, and the possibility of the firm being output constrained as a framework for an empirical analysis of investment behaviour in the Swedish manufacturing industry. The theory is implemented within a multivariate error-correction approach on data covering the time period 1951 to 1995, and we gain the following main results: (1) Tobins average Q is not the sole determinant of investment, neither in the short nor in the long run, and other variables like real output and capital gearing also affect investment activity; (2) the out-of-sample forecasts of the model track the evolution of actual investment growth quite impressively, especially at short- and medium-term horizons (1–2 years); (3) a relative equity-price variable is shown to constitute a good approximation of average Q, both for empirical modelling in general and forecasting in particular.Jel classification: C32, E22, E27We would like to thank Bob Chirinko, Stefan Palmqvist, Anders Vredin, seminar participants at Sveriges Riksbank, and two anonymous referees for helpful comments. Thanks also to Jan Södersten, Uppsala University, who provided us with most of the data for this analysis. All correspondence to Per Jansson.First version received: July 2000/Final version received: November 2002     

System estimates of potential output and the NAIRU

This paper proposes a new approach for estimating potential output and the NAIRU. The methodology models these key unobservable economic variables as latent stochastic trends within a trivariate system of observables comprising information on unemployment, GDP, and inflation. Identification is achieved through the use of a standard version of Okun's law and a Phillips curve. The performance of the procedure is investigated using Swedish quarterly data covering the time period 1970:1–1996:3. First version received: June 1997/final version received: September 1998     

Fractional integration and business cycle features

We show in this article that fractionally integrated univariate models for GDP lead to a better replication of the main business cycle characteristics. We firstly show that the business cycle features are clearly affected by the degree of integration as well as by the other short run (AR, MA, etc.) components of the series. Then, we model the real GDP in the UK and the US by means of fractionally ARIMA (ARFIMA) model, and show that the time series can be specified in terms of this type of model with orders of integration higher than one but smaller than two. Comparing the ARFIMA specifications with those based on ARIMA models, we show via simulations that the former better describe the business cycles features of the data.Jel classification: C12, C15, C22The authors want to thank two anonymous referees for wise remarks. We have also benefited from questions and comments of the attendances at the econometric seminar of the Humboldt Universität zu Berlin and the ESEM2001 congress in Lausanne. Remaining errors and omissions are ours. All correspondence to: Luis A. Gil-Alana.First version received: February 2002/Final version received: December 2002     

The power of tests for equivalent ARMA models: The implications for practitioners

Analysts frequently find it convenient to use the same ARMA model to make forecasts for multiple time series. The trick is to know when it is safe to assume that multiple series are generated by the same underlying process. Although several authors have developed statistical procedures for testing whether two models are equivalent, no one has shown how to determine the power of these tests. This paper shows how to determine the power of the most general test for equivalent ARMA models. It also shows how to quantify the effect of model misspecification errors on the accuracy of the forecast. An illustrative example and flowchart are then used to show how calculating the power of the test can enable the practitioner to safeguard against a serious degradation in the accuracy of the forecast.Jel classification: C12, C22, C53First version received: March 2002/Final version received: December 2002     

Policy matters. The long run effects of aggregate demand and mark-up shocks on the Italian unemployment rate

This paper estimates a VAR including labor productivity, real wage and unemployment rate, to identify the dynamic effects of technology, demand, and mark-up shocks, respectively, on the Italian labor market. Identification is achieved by imposing recursive restrictions on the matrix of long run multipliers. Our results show that both mark up and aggregate demand shocks permanently reduce the unemployment rate. Finally, technology shocks do not significantly affect the unemployment rate in the long run. These findings convey important policy implications: expansionary aggregate demand and deregulation policies reducing the mark up permanently decrease the Italian unemployment rate.Jel classification: C32, E32, J29This paper has been produced as part of a CEPR Research Network on New Approaches to the Study of Economic Fluctuations. We would like to thank Marcello DAmato, Mario Forni, Marco Lippi and Antonio Ribba for useful comments. We are also grateful to Bernd Sussmuth for pointing out to us several significant improvements to the paper.First version received: November 2001/Final version received: October 2002     

Are overtime plants more efficient than standard-time plants? A stochastic production frontier analysis using the IAB Establishment Panel

Using data from the IAB Establishment Panel, 1995–2000, we investigate between-plant variations in productivity. The study compares technical efficiencies between plants which work overtime (overtime plants) and plants which do not work overtime (standard-time plants), where technical efficiency measures the gap between feasible output and actual output for a given input combination. A fixed effects approach is applied, which does neither rely on any distributional assumptions of the inefficiencies, nor on the independence between the regressors and inefficiencies. For both, models with time-invariant and time-varying inefficiencies, we do not find evidence that the two plant-types differ in their technical efficiency.First version received: May 2002 / Final version received: August 2004The comments by Martyn Andrews and Bob Hart are gratefully acknowledged. The article has also benefited from the comments of two anonymous referees.     

Semiparametric estimation and testing in a model of environmental regulation with adverse selection

We consider a principal–agent model of environmental regulation with adverse selection, where firms are regulated through contracts. We show how the model allows to recover information on structural cost parameters. We use a semiparametric method to estimate consistently such parameters without specifying the distribution of the agents private information. We also show how to check for the specification of the econometric model, as well as auxiliary parametric assumptions, by means of specification tests based on nonparametric estimation. Results are used to discuss a selection of economic issues related to environmental regulation.First version received: August 2002/Final version received: November 2003Previous versions of this work were presented at Seminaire INRA-IDEI, Toulouse, the conference on Applications of semiparametric methods for micro-data, Tilburg, and seminars at UC Berkeley, University of Wisconsin–Madison, CREST, and INRA-LEA. We are indebted to participants, and especially Michael Visser, for their comments. We thank two referees for helpful comments. Financial support from the Conseil Régional Midi-Pyrénées and from INRA is gratefully acknowledged.     

Testing the significance and the non-linearity of the Phillips trade-off in the Euro Area

This paper tests the significance and the non-linearity of the Phillips trade-off in the aggregate Euro Area, in an unobserved components model of stochastic NAIRU and trend output featuring the Phillips equation and the Okun law as main identifying equations, with quarterly data for 1970:I-2002:III. The Phillips curve turns out to be linear and its trade-off statistically significant, while non-linearity shows up in the Okun relation. The results prove to be robust to alternative lag length structures of the model, and to alternative non-linear functional forms. The trend-cycle decompositions estimated with the model capture the main features of the Euro Area’s recent macroeconomic record.First version received: 1 September 2003 / Final version received: June 2004CEMPRE - Centro de Estudos Macroeconómicos e Previsão - is supported by the Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, Portugal, through the Programa Operacional Ciência, Tecnologia e Inovação (POCTI) of the Quadro Comunitário de Apoio III, which is financed by FEDER and Portuguese funds.We thank comments on earlier versions by Fabio Canova, Miguel St Aubyn, Alvaro Almeida, Pete Richardson, Kevin Ross, and two anonymous referees. We acknowledge James D. Hamilton’s help with the confidence bands. The usual disclaimer applies.     

Forecasting exchange rates in transition economies: A comparison of multivariate time series models

This article compares the accuracy of vector autoregressive (VAR), restricted vector autoregressive (RVAR), Bayesian vector autoregressive (BVAR), vector error correction (VEC) and Bayesian vector error correction (BVEC) models in forecasting the exchange rates for five Central and Eastern European currencies (Czech Koruna, Hungarian Forint, Polish Zloty, Slovak Koruna and Slovenian Tolar) against the Euro and the US dollar. Among the specifications composing this battery of multivariate time series models, those with the smallest prediction error still fail to reject the test of equality of forecasting accuracy against the random walk model in short-term predictions, with the exception of the Slovenian Tolar/Euro exchange rate.First version received: October 2002/Final version received: September 2003The authors are grateful to two anonymous referees and the participants in the workshop Monetary and Exchange Rate Strategies Related to the Current European Unions Enlargement Processes, held in Leuven in September 2000, for very helpful comments.     

Do prices count? A micro-econometric study of illicit drug consumption based on self-reported data

Using a unique data set of almost 2,500 interviews with people attending a needle exchange service in Oslo, this paper sets out to estimate the impact of economic factors on heroin and amphetamine injectors drug consumption, including cross-price effects. To examine the robustness of the conclusions, four model versions are considered: with focus on (i) switching regression mechanisms treating dealing/non-dealing as an endogenous decision, (ii) spline function versions examining possible kinks in the price response, (iii) a dynamic model version focusing on addiction, and (iv) pseudo panel data model versions focusing on unobserved heterogeneity. Negative and significant price elasticities and positive and significant income elasticities come out as robust results. Their magnitude vary, however, depending on the type of model, on the main drug for injecting, and on whether the consumer also is a dealer.First version received: November 2002/Final version received: June 2003This paper builds in part on Bretteville-Jensen and Sutton (1996): Under the influence of the market: An applied study of illicitly selling and consuming of heroin, Discussion paper no. 147, Centre for Health Economics, University of York, in which the authors thank Andrew Jones and Jes Søgaard for helpful advice during early stages of the work. We also express our thanks to Jan Erik Askildsen, Kjell Erik Lommerud, Aina Uhde, and a referee for valuable comments on this extended version.     

Unemployment dynamics,wage flexibility,and the NAIRU in Austria

This paper presents some empirical evidence of an increase of distributional pressures in the Austrian economy as reflected in a rise of the NAIRU over the past fifteen years. Employing a simple macroeconomic model of wage-price formation we have been able to establish that both the increase in employers' contributions to social security and the rising share of longterm unemployment associated with higher overall unemployment have exerted pressure on real product wages and, thus, have pushed up the equilibrium rate of unemployment. Even if this latter persistence effect in unemployment is ignored for a moment, the Austrian NAIRU seems to have approximately doubled since 1973. It should be noted, however, that despite of having trended upwards the Austrian NAIRU still compares very favourably with that of most other OECD countries. The estimation results reveal an impressive amount of real wage flexibility putting Austria among the top league in Europe. In particular, this stems from the fact that real product wages seem to be easily adapted to external price shocks and productivity shocks.

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Zusammenfassung Die Arbeit untersucht die Entwicklung der NAIRU in österreich unter Verwendung eines makroökonomischen Lohn-Preisbildungsmodells. Die empirischen Ergebnisse zeigen auf, daß in den letzten zwei Jahrzehnten sowohl die Erhöhung von Sozialversicherungsbeiträgen als auch die steigende Langzeitarbeitslosigkeit zu einer Erhöhung der NAIRU geführt haben. Gleichwohl zeichnen sich die Lohn-Preisbildungsmechanismen in Österreich durch eine im internationalen Vergleich hohe Absorptionsfähigkeit von Import- bzw. Produktivitätsschocks aus.

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Paper presented at the 1989 Conference of the Confederation of European Economic Associations, Barcelona, 25–26 May, 1989. I am indebted to participants at this conference and at seminars at the Wirtschaftsuniversität and the Institute for Advanced Studies, and to two referees of this journal for their comments and criticisms.     

Testing for changing shapes of income distribution: Italian evidence in the 1990s from kernel density estimates

By using nonparametric methods, this paper estimates the distribution of both household and size-adjusted real income in Italy between 1987–1998. Because of data sparseness in the distribution, an adaptive bandwidth is used, while to account for sample design a weighting variable is incorporated in the estimation procedure. The time invariance and the presence of modes in the distributions are tested by means of a nonparametric test and a bootstrap test, respectively. The empirical results suggest that the Italian income distribution significantly changed over time. During the eighties the density shifted rightwards, positively affecting the well being of a large fraction of Italian households. The 1993 recession altered the shape of income distribution increasing inequality and polarisation, and the following period of slow recovery did not show significant changes in the shape of distribution in terms of relative income with a consequent permanence of inequality. The polarisation of the distribution is more noticeable for size-adjusted income rather than whole household income, reflecting the influence of family size on income shape.Jel classification: C14, D31, I30The authors gratefully acknowledge financial support from the Italian Ministry of the Universities and Scientific Research (MIUR). We would like to thank two anonymous referees, Nicholas Longford, Aman Ullah and participants of the International workshop on Income Distribution and Welfare, Milan, May 2002 for their useful comments and suggestions. Obviously we are the solely responsible of any further error and omission.First version received: January 2002/Final version received: January 2003     

An econometric analysis of veterans’ health care utilization using two-part models

Based on the 1992 US National Survey of Veterans, we analyzed veterans inpatient and outpatient health care utilization patterns by estimating count data two-part hurdle models. We also identified factors that affect veterans choice of health care between VA and non-VA facilities using count data selection models. Not surprisingly, we found that health condition measures are the most important factors in determining veterans health care utilization. Gender, disability, and employment status are also significant. Veterans with lower socio-economic status, without other health insurance coverages, or living near VA health care facilities are more likely to use VA health care system for outpatient visits and inpatient admissions. Our study underscores the role of alternative sources of health care and insurance in discerning the true effects of the explanatory variables on an individuals total demand for health care and its allocation between alternative providers.Jel classification: C35, I12, H51This research was done under a contract with the VA Health Care Network, Upstate New York (VISN 2). We are grateful to A. Colin Cameron, Diane Dewer, Joe Engelhardt, Terrance Kinal, Hamp Lankford, Frank Windmeijer, and two anonymous referees for helpful suggestions and comments. We alone are responsible for the views expressed, and deficiencies remaining, in the paper.First version received: September 2001/Final version received: February 2003     

Pricing-to-market tests in instrumental regressions: Case of the transportation equipment industry

Pricing-to-market (PTM) theory suggests that exporting monopolistic firms adjust their destination-specific mark-ups in the face of exchange rate shocks. A large proportion of the existing evidence for PTM comes from Wald tests applied to OLS- and IV-estimated parameters of single-equation models. Such tests can seriously over-reject in the presence of endogeneity and weak instruments so that some of the available results supporting PTM could be spurious. In this paper we revisit the PTM evidence for Japanese and German exporting firms in the transportation equipment industry. Using the model of Marston (1990), we apply exogeneity and LR-LIML-based tests for which the error probability is controlled irrespective of the quality of the available instruments. Our results show right-hand-side endogeneity in almost all of the examined PTM equations. In addition, we find that statistical decisions often differ depending on whether they are based on the traditional Wald test or on our proposed test.The authors would like to thank Philippe Barla, Jean-Thomas Bernard, Christos Constantatos, Larry Schembri, seminar participants at the Bank of Canada, and two anonymous referees for useful comments and suggestions. Thanks also to Richard Marston for providing data. Finally, a special thanks to Marjorie Santos for excellent research assistance. All remaining errors are our own and should not be attributed to the Bank of Canada.First version received: May 2002/Final version received: December 2002     

Requiem for the unit root in per capita real GDP? Additional evidence from historical data

We present new evidence on the uncertain nature of nonstationarity – that is, trend stationarity vs. difference stationarity – of aggregate per capita real output, by submitting to a composite testing procedure a 20-country sample over an historically relevant time span. We find that the degree of uncertainty associated with the presence of a unit root appears to be well exceeding that shown by other studies conducted so far on cross-country historical data. For almost all the countries in our sample, inference appears to be strongly dependent on the type of test one makes use of, so that conclusions reached at early stages of a composite confirmatory testing procedure have to be frequently discarded at subsequent stages. Our reading of these findings points towards rejecting the assumption of temporal homogeneity of per capita GDP time series over long time spans, a prerequisite implicitly assumed in all studies looking for invariant statistical properties like stochastic or deterministic nonstationarity.First version received: October 2002/Final version received: September 2003     

What’s spurious, what’s real? Measuring the productivity impacts of ICT at the firm-level

In order to assess the productivity effects of information and communication technologies (ICT), regressions based on cross–sectional firm–level data may yield unreliable results for the commonly employed production function framework. In this paper, various estimation biases and econometric strategies to overcome their sources are discussed. The effects are illustrated on the basis of a representative set of panel data for German service firms covering the period 1994 to 1999. The application of a suited SYS–GMM estimator yields evidence for significant productivity effects of ICT. However, these are substantially smaller than those suggested by cross–section estimates.I would like to thank Irene Bertschek, François Laisney, Georg Licht, Werner Smolny, Kevin Stiroh, Elke Wolf, Thomas Zwick and two anonymous referees for their helpful comments and the MIP–team for providing me with the data. This paper was written as part of the research project ‘‘Productivity and Spillover Effects from ICT as a General Purpose Technology’’ commissioned by the Landesstiftung Baden–Württemberg foundation.Final version received: September 2002/Final version accepted: April 2004     

A dynamic panel analysis of the profitability of Australian tax entities

This paper investigates the determinants of profitability of Australian tax entities using data for 91 different industries over the period 1991/92 to 1996/97. A simple oligopoly model is augmented with lagged profitability to allow for persistence of profitability shocks. The Wansbeek-Bekker estimator is used to control for endogeneity of this lagged dependent variable, whilst simultaneously controlling for observed and unobserved entity heterogeneity. Aggregate results suggest that profitability in the previous year, capital intensity, and barriers to entry have the expected positive association with current profitability. Market share—and to a lesser extent concentration—have a U shaped relationship with profitability.This paper is the result of work being undertaken as part of a collaborative research program entitled The Performance of Australian Enterprises: Innovation, Productivity and Profitability. This project is generously supported by the Australian Research Council and the following collaborative partners: The Australian Tax Office, Commonwealth Office of Small Business, IBIS Business Information Pty Ltd, Productivity Commission, and Victorian Department of State Development. The views expressed in this paper represent those of the authors and not necessarily the views of the collaborative partners. We are grateful to Badi Baltagi, David Prentice, John Creedy and two anonymous referees for helpful comments.First version received: December 2001 / Final version received: December 2003     

Classical and Keynesian unemployment in Austria

The labor market in a macroeconometric model of Austria is used to determine the natural unemployment rate, full-employment (F.E.) output, and the F.E. real wage for 1966–92. Gaps between actual and F.E. variables are examined analytically and historically. Observed unemployment is decomposed into natural, hidden, classical, and Keynesian components. Classical unemployment is associated with the real wage gap, while Keynesian unemployment depends on the output gap. A rise in the natural rate is found to account for almost all of the increase in unemployment between 1966–74 and 1975–81, but an increase in Keynesian unemployment is the major factor in the rise of unemployment between 1975–81 and 1982–92. A fiscal shock to the complete model is found to increase real GDP for a year or two, reducing Keynesian unemployment without an appreciable rise in classical unemployment; the wage gap is eventually increased, however, producing a modest rise in classical unemployment.A lengthier version of this paper was presented at the Annual Meeting of the Austrian Economic Association, Graz, April 14–16, 1993. The generous finacial support of the Jubiläumsfonds of the Austrian National Bank for the research of which this paper is a part is gratefully acknowledged.     

Endogenous monetary policy and the liquidity effect

We compare the transmission mechanism of exogenous and endogenous monetary policies in a calibrated small open economy model with nominal and real rigidities. Under an exogenous monetary policy rule it takes implausible values of the intertemporal elasticity of substitution and the price adjustment costs to generate the liquidity and overshooting effects. Endogenous rules with strong feedback to inflation and output help to reproduce the response of the nominal interest and exchange rates to unanticipated monetary policy shocks that characterize the transmission mechanism of standard sticky price models. The liquidty and overshooting effects are always obtained when the model is augmented with a Taylor interest rate rule.JEL Classification: E32, E43Javier Andrés acknowledges support of CICYT grant SEC2002-0026. We thank the comments of two anonymous referees and the editor, Jordi Caballé, to an earlier version of the paper. The views expressed here are those of the authors and do not represent the view of the Banco de España.     

Long-run matching relationship in the Japanese labor market

This paper investigates the long-run relationship among new hiring, unemployment (job seekers), and unfilled vacancies in Japan, using an annual panel data on 47 prefectures for 1972-1999. We find that these three variables are I(1) processes, and are cointegrated in our panel data. Further, we estimate the panel cointegration equation derived from a Cobb-Douglas matching function by the heterogeneous fully modified OLS and heterogeneous dynamic OLS. The estimation results reveal that conventional within estimates could have non-negligible biases.First version received: November 2002/Final version received: October 2003All correspondence to Shigeki Kano. The authors are grateful to the associate editor and two anonymous referees of this journal for helpful comments. Doctor Stephen J. Turnbull (University of Tsukuba) is also acknowledged for correcting English errors in this paper. Remaining errors are due to the authors. The data set and GAUSS programming code used in this paperare available upon request.