一幅名叫澳洲的画

悉尼的天气很好,空气极为纯净,天很蓝、云很低,日照充足.闭上眼睛深呼吸,有一种错觉仿佛又回到了西藏. 悉尼街道不算宽阔,路口岔道很多.街道两边有各式各样的餐馆、露天咖啡屋、商店、写字楼、政府用房等.虽是闹市区,但街上行人很少.在港口的咖啡屋里,人们静静地喝着咖啡,海鸥悠闲地飞来飞去,不时落在餐桌上.悉尼的建筑群不算高,可人与人、房与房的空间稀疏宽阔,给人一种轻松自在之感.     

Business Development in Colonial Australia

We know little about business enterprises in colonial Australia. Existing case studies are analysed within the context of the established theoretical and international comparative literature on business history. Emphasis is placed upon the uncertainties caused by smallness and remoteness in the early decades, the opportunities of expansion in the middle of the century, and the challenges of economic crisis in the years leading up to Federation. Each period produced different types of strategies and structures from initial vertical integration, diversification, and networking, through to economies of scale, innovation, and internal hierarchies, and finally to collusion and incorporation.     

Early Analytical Agricultural Economics in Australia

Analysis of home consumption pricing by Giblin and Copland in the 1930s preceded the development of an identifiable Australian agricultural economics profession. They demonstrated that costs of increasing domestic prices of agricultural products above export levels would be borne largely by lightly assisted exporters and hinder their development. This work was taken up later within a framework of computable general equilibrium modelling. Now largely of historical interest, their work sheds light on likely consequences of some past policy debates ? of protection all round in the 1920s and tariff compensation in the 1970s.     

Why was Australia so rich?

Between 1870 and 1890 Australian incomes per capita were 40 percent or more above those in the United States. About half this gap is attributable to Australia’s higher labor input per capita, and half to its higher labor productivity. The higher labor input is due in part to favorable demographic attributes and partly to a favorable workforce participation rate. The higher productivity results from an advantageous natural resource endowment. By 1914 the income lead over the U.S. had all but disappeared due to declines in Australia’s advantages both in labor input per capita and in labor productivity.     

奥大利亚 渐行渐近的肥沃市场

澳大利亚大陆的面积为769万平方公里,是世界上最大的“岛屿”。进入21世纪以后,随着世界经济好转,澳大利亚政府开始实施新的税制改革,经济继续强劲地增长。胡锦涛主席2003年在访问堪培拉时签署的经贸框架是双边经济关系中一个重要的里程碑,该框架包括双方承诺进一步促进贸易往来和贸易自由化,促进能源和矿产、农业等重要领域的合作,以及在经贸方面的互访。     

A wage curve for Australia?

This paper examines the wage curve in Australia. Regressionsfor weekly earnings are estimated on a pooled cross-sectiondata set for 1982 to 1994/95. Using the preferred regressionspecification it is found that the elasticity of weekly earningswith respect to state-level rates of unemployment is -0.07 to-0.09. These findings are robust to a variety of modificationsto the regression specification. A comparison of Australia,the US and UK is undertaken to examine how differences in wage-settinginstitutions between those countries might affect wage curveestimates.     

Excise Tax Harmonisation in Australia at Federation

Constitutional changes at the time of Federation in Australia required the harmonisation of the excise tax rates of the former Colonies. This paper outlines the excise tax systems of the Colonies before Federation and that of the Commonwealth after Federation. Estimates are made of the consumer tax equivalent rates and of the implicit rates of protection in each Colony and in the Commonwealth after Federation. The Commonwealth Government harmonised the excise tax rates of the Colonies at about the mid‐points of the rates of the Colonies but the implicit rates of protection increased after Federation.     

The Evolution of Fiscal Policy in Australia

This paper examines the evolution of Australian fiscal policyand the fiscal policy framework over the past quartercentury.Following the early 1980s recession, a sustained fiscal consolidationsaw the general government budget balance (for all levels ofgovernment) move from a deficit of 3 per cent of GDP in 1983/4to a surplus of 1 per cent 5 years later in 1988/9. A severerecession in the early 1990s interrupted this process, and thebudget returned to sizeable deficits which peaked at 4 per centof GDP in 1992/3. The second half of the 1990s saw a repeatof the experience a decade earlier, with the budget returningto surplus in 1997/8. In contrast to the 1980s experience, however,the general government sector (for all levels of government)has recorded surpluses for the subsequent 8 years to the present.The paper outlines Australia's macroeconomic experience overthis time and argues that there have been two significant medium-termfactors motivating the extended periods of fiscal consolidation.The first factor, relevant since the mid-1980s, has been thelarge Australian current-account deficits since that time, andthe associated build-up of net foreign liabilities. The secondfactor, which entered the public debate more recently, is adesire to provide fiscal policy flexibility to respond to theageing of the population and the projected rising public costof health services—both influences that are likely tobe of increasing importance over the next generation or so.The paper discusses the introduction and evolution of Australia'smedium-term fiscal framework which has been put in place torespond to these challenges. Footnotes ¹ E-mail addresses: dgruen{at}treasury.gov.au; asayegh{at}treasury.gov.au     

新解中国在澳大利亚投资

澳大利亚是中国最大的对外直接投资对象,大部分投资目标是资源部门。是否需要对这些主要来自于中国国有企业、无论在规模还是增速上都汹涌而来的投资进行特殊审查,成为一个问题。这关乎中国投资是否与其他国家在澳投资获得了同等待遇的问题。较世界上其他国家,澳大利亚始终保持着对中国投资更为开放的态度。尽管关于国企投资的讨论给澳大利亚和其他国家的政策制定者带来了新的问题,但中国投资仍然对澳大利亚有利,并且在适当的制度和政策推动下,仍将强劲增长。