我国供给和需求冲击的区域差异效应研究——基于结构VAR的分析

本文根据Blanchard and Quah发展的结构VAR技术,将影响中国沿海和内陆地区实际GDP与通货膨胀率的冲击分解为供给和需求冲击。估算结果发现,沿海和内陆地区供给冲击的同步性较高但呈下降趋势,需求冲击的同步性弱于供给冲击,不过呈提高趋势,但由于区域协调而降低了其短期内的同步性。根据累积脉冲响应函数和预测误差方差分解结果,实际GDP和价格水平波动的绝大部分分别来自于供给和需求冲击,需求层面的区域协调对缩小区域差距无济于事,反而引致内陆地区的价格波动。各地区对供给和需求冲击反应的差异,使得在宏观调控和区域协调方面产生效率和区域平等、需求管理型宏观政策有效性和区域平等的两难困境。破解之道在于从影响区域反应差异的因素入手,提高内陆地区实际产出对内陆地区正向供给、需求冲击的反应强度和降低沿海需求冲击对内陆地区的负效应。     

我国经济周期波动率的成分分解及稳定性研究

随着世界经济周期波动的减缓,我国经济波动也呈现出稳定性趋势.文章通过建立具有货币政策干预的产品市场均衡模型,对我国实际产出波动率进行了成分分解,并将实际产出波动的来源归结为需求冲击、供给冲击和货币冲击的作用.通过这些经济冲击方差序列的度量,又对实际产出波动率进行了冲击方差序列的回归检验,发现我国需求冲击和货币冲击强度的逐渐平稳是经济周期波动率降低的主要原因,而供给冲击对实际产出波动率没有产生显著影响.因此,我国宏观经济调控仍然需要坚持需求管理的政策导向,以保持经济持续稳定增长.     

消费冲击与中国经济波动

笔者认为:以持久收入消费理论为基础的标准真实经济周期模型,无法解释中国1978年以来消费波动非平滑这一关键特征事实,1978年以来中国经济运行中需求变动影响巨大.笔者重点考察了消费冲击对中国经济波动的影响.研究表明:在技术冲击存在的前提下引入消费冲击可以模拟实际情况.从模拟结果看,中国1978年的经济波动确实是需求冲击(消费偏好改变、政府调控等)和供给冲击(技术不断进步)共同作用的结果.     

供求冲击与中国的产业波动

甄别供给与需求冲击在我国各次产业波动中的地位和作用,是有效制定宏观管理政策,特别是产业政策的重要前提条件.本文借鉴修正后的两变量SVAR模型对我国各次产业波动中的供求冲击进行了分析.蛄果发现,供给冲击比需求冲击在我国各次产业产出波动的形成中发挥着更为重要的作用,这在第二产业中体现得最为明显,其次是第三产业,最后是第一产业;在第一产业中,供给冲击对价格水平波动的影响更大,而在第二、第三产业中,需求冲击比供给冲击具有更高的相对方差贡献率.     

总需求冲击下的国际货币政策协调研究

本文在总需求冲击的假定下,从产出波动的角度研究了两国货币政策的国际协调。研究表明:需求冲击不变,两国进行货币政策协调会提高两国的实际利率,但不改变产出、实际汇率和需求;需求冲击改变,两国进行政策协调会改变两国的产出、实际汇率和需求;从总需求冲击对产出波动的角度看,两国的货币政策协调均衡很难实现。     

人民币成为“两岸四地”主导货币的实证研究——基于经济冲击对称视角的考察

随着大陆与港澳台经济合作与交流的不断深化,区域内经贸联系愈加紧密,市场融合进一步加快。本文从经济冲击对称性的视角出发,在对区域内经济周期相关性进行对比分析的基础上,采用四变量SVAR模型,考察人民币成为该区域主导货币的可能性。结果表明内地与香港、台湾地区之间需求和货币冲击性并不对称,但外部和供给冲击呈现一定的对称,人民币、港币和新台币实际有效汇率对结构冲击也具有相似的响应路径。因此,在当前"两岸四地"尚不能实现货币统一的情况下,内地与港澳台之间更应充分开展汇率合作,加快贸易金融一体化进程,推动人民币成为该区域主导货币。     

基于SVAR模型的中国产出缺口估计与应用

潜在产出与产出缺口对于宏观经济形势的判断和宏观经济政策的把握非常重要。本文应用结构向量自回归模型估计了1983-2007年中国的潜在产出及产出缺口,结果显示估计的产出缺口能够准确反映中国1983年以来的经济周期变化而且具有较好的稳定性。由此得出结论:(1)当前中国经济以较低的通货膨胀为代价就可以实现较高的经济增长;(2)供给冲击与需求冲击对GDP增长率具有暂时影响,而供给冲击对GDP造成了持久影响,需求冲击对GDP只产生暂时的影响。     

贸易强度对中国与东盟五国经济周期同步性影响的研究

基于1996-2011年的数据,本文对中国与东盟五国的经济周期同步性问题进行分析,认为中国与东盟五国之间经济波动的相关性较为密切,双边经济周期呈现一定的同步性。在此基础上,从贸易强度的视角展开讨论,利用面板数据模型来进一步分析贸易强度对中国与东盟五国经济周期同步性的影响,发现双边贸易的强度对中国与东盟五国经济周期的同步性具有正向作用。本文建议提高我国与东盟国家的贸易比重,减少对欧美出口市场的依赖性,提升外向型经济质量,提高中国在东亚经济圈的地位。     

技术冲击与中国经济周期波动

本文基于一个较为一般的动态一般均衡框架,从理论上探讨了技术冲击的长期影响。以此为基础,我们使用SVAR方法识别出导致中国经济周期波动的技术冲击,并且估计了它们对产出和通胀的动态影响,以及对二者波动的贡献率。结果发现,技术冲击虽然是中国经济周期波动的主要成因,但其贡献要远小于现有的其他实证结果。     

中国的实际经济周期与税收政策效应

本文构建了财政税收的实际经济周期(RBC)模型,实证研究了中国宏观经济波动的周期特征及税收政策的经济效应。研究发现:(1)引入财政收支冲击的RBC模型能够解释70%以上中国经济波动的特征事实,政府支出冲击加剧中国实体经济波动,而税收冲击对经济波动的影响不显著。(2)降低劳动收入和资本收入的税率都能促进经济增长和带动资本和劳动的供给增加,降低劳动收入税率有利于促进居民消费增长,降低资本收入税率则起到抑制作用,调整劳动收入税率的政策效果更强。(3)资本收入税率与社会福利呈正相关和非对称性,劳动收入税率与社会福利呈负相关和非对称性,技术冲击和财政冲击的共同作用使得结构性税收调整政策的福利效应具有非对称性,两种税率的同向变动对社会福利具有放大作用,两者的反向变动对社会福利具有削弱作用。     

The optimality of a gulf currency union: Commonalities and idiosyncrasies

A high degree of shared national elements that drive the bulk of observed output volatility between countries is generally seen as a necessary prerequisite for the formation of a successful monetary union. This is because countries in a monetary union accept a one-size-fits all, resigning regions to policies that are based on some aggregate macroeconomic target rather than a country-specific one. For this reason, the cost of monetary union membership depends on the incidence of asymmetric (nation-specific) shocks rather than symmetric, or common shocks. This criteria is examined for the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, who reaffirmed plans for the implementation of a single currency. This paper quantifies, using structural factor models with common factor restrictions, changes in output synchronisation, the importance of common factor or idiosyncratic shocks between the regions, and the synchronisation of these shocks across the GCC as well as the implications for GCC-wide macroeconomic policy at short-to-medium term horizons. Despite current difficulties in fulfilling the convergence criteria goals to monetary union, the results show the synchronisation of output growth fluctuations between economies of the GCC to have increased over the past 25 years. This paper also finds that a fairly sizeable proportion of output fluctuations in business cycle frequencies are driven by a common component that, to some degree, reflects U.S. monetary policy and U.S. demand shocks as well as changes in crude oil prices.     

On the empirics of risk-sharing across MENA countries

In this article, we compute the potential welfare gains and the realized gains from risk-sharing among Middle East and North African (MENA) countries, including the oil-rich Gulf region and the resource-scarce economies. We find that the overall potential welfare gains across MENA countries are positive for all countries under the assumption of full risk-sharing. The potential welfare gains among the six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries are positive even though the magnitudes are smaller compared to those of the rest of the MENA region. We also quantify the extent of risk-sharing for the MENA region and show that it is significant for the MENA region and its subgroups; however, we could not find any sign of inter-temporal smoothing across the same groups. Decomposing the aggregate output shocks shows that the extent of risk-sharing is significant when only positive output shocks exist across the resource-scarce MENA economies. However, we observe that GCC countries share output risks with each other even under negative output shocks.     

Trade integration and synchronization of shocks*

According to the European Commission (1990 ), closer integration leads to less frequent asymmetric shocks and to more synchronized business cycles between countries. However, for Krugman (1993 ) closer integration implies higher specialization and, thus, higher risks of idiosyncratic shocks. Drawing on the evidence from a group of transition countries, this paper tries to determine whose argument is supported by the data. This is done by confronting estimated time‐varying coefficients of supply and demand shock asymmetry with indicators of trade intensity and exchange rates. We find that (i) an increase in trade intensity leads to higher symmetry of demand shocks: the effect of integration on supply shock asymmetry varies from country to country; and (ii) a decrease in exchange rate volatility has a positive effect on demand shock convergence. The results confirm ‘The European Commission view’ and also the argument by Kenen (2001 ) according to which the impact of trade integration on shock asymmetry depends on the type of shock.     

A Tacit Monetary Policy of the Gulf Countries: Is There a Remittances Channel?

The strong economic ties between the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) economies and the USA are manifested in three ways: currency peg, coupling of monetary policy, and the adoption of the US dollar as the trading currency for oil. This paper examines how these dynamics result in a misalignment of the US monetary policy with the business cycles of the GCC economies. The study shows how the staggering amount of remittances outflow of the GCC economies plays a stabilizing role as a tacit monetary policy tool. Incorporating remittances in the money‐demand equation results in a more robust model than otherwise. We further find that the effect of the Federal Funds rate on money demand in these countries diminishes in significance during the period of oil boom between 2002 and 2009. However, the transmission effect of the recession periods in the USA into the demand for money in the GCC countries is not statistically significant.     

Exchange rates of oil exporting countries and global oil price shocks: a nonlinear smooth-transition approach

This paper models logistic and exponential smooth transition adjustments of real exchange rates for six major oil-exporting countries in response to different shocks affecting oil prices. The logistic form captures asymmetric and the exponential form symmetric adjustments in regards to positive and negative oil price shocks. We chose oil-exporting countries that do not peg their exchange rates. For most countries, we detect no statistically significant non-linearities for the adjustment process of real exchange rate returns, be they asymmetric or symmetric, in response to oil supply shocks, idiosyncratic oil-market-specific shocks, and speculative oil-market shocks. Exceptions are oil supply shocks in the UK and possibly Brazil, where exchange rates respond nonlinearly, though the effects are symmetric for both countries. On the other hand, global aggregate demand shocks, which are shocks not originating directly in the oil market, have nonlinear asymmetric effects on real exchange rate returns for Canada, Mexico, Norway and Russia, and nonlinear symmetric effects for Brazil and the UK.     

货币政策对房地产市场冲击效力的动态测度

以货币政策传导渠道为理论依据,通过结构向量自回归(SVAR)模型构造货币政策对房地产市场的作用途径,可测度各种货币政策工具冲击对我国房地产市场供求的相对强度.实证分析结果表明,利率政策的冲击效力明显且持久,是调控房地产市场最有效的货币政策工具;紧缩的信贷政策仅能在短期内抑制房地产市场需求,长期效果欠佳;而货币供给量冲击对房地产市场的影响并不显著.相对于房地产需求,房地产市场供给对各种货币政策工具冲击的响应深度高,但响应速度较慢.     

Nominal Wage Flexibility and Economic Performance: Evidence and Implications Across Industrial Countries

By considering the theoretical connection between labour and product markets, the paper evaluates the economic relationship of these markets within the contractual wage rigidity New Keynesian explanation of business cycles. The empirical analysis focuses on the short‐run cyclical behaviour of real output, prices and wages for 19 industrial countries. Time‐series and cross‐sectional regressions are estimated. Cross‐sectional cyclical correlations in the labour and goods markets are also evaluated across countries. Consistent with the theoretical predictions, aggregate uncertainty is an important factor in increasing the flexibility of the nominal wage in response to aggregate demand shocks. Wage flexibility accelerates price inflation and moderates the response of real output growth to aggregate demand shocks. Wage flexibility does not appear to be an important factor in differentiating the real and inflationary effects of energy price shocks across countries. Finally, aggregate uncertainty increases the responsiveness of output and price to productivity shocks.     

Interpreting fluctuations in output growth in China

Unlike in OECD countries, fluctuations in output growth in China are not straightforward in their interpretation. On the one hand, they reflect the business cycle, which results from shocks to aggregate demand. On the other hand, they also reflect the structural transformations that have accompanied China’s transition to a market economy. Demand shocks can be identified by virtue of the persistence of their impact. This paper decomposes the variance in provincial, regional, and national output growth according to its persistence characteristics. The results suggest that during the reform period, only a minority of output growth variance can be attributed to demand shocks and business cycle fluctuations. It is also found that there is substantial heterogeneity in the persistence characteristics of output growth across provinces. Implications of the findings for macroeconomic policy are discussed.     

The endogeneity of the Optimum Currency Area criteria in East Asia

The Asian financial crisis in mid-1997 has increased interest in policies to achieve greater regional exchange rate stability in East Asia. It has renewed calls for greater monetary and exchange rate cooperation. A country's suitability to join a monetary union depends, inter alia, on the trade intensity and the business cycle synchronization with other potential members of the monetary union. However, these two Optimum Currency Area criteria are endogenous. Theoretically, the effect of increased trade integration (after the elimination of exchange fluctuations among the countries in the region) on the business cycle synchronization is ambiguous. Reduction in trade barriers can potentially increase industrial specialization by country and therefore resulting in more asymmetry business cycles from industry-specific shocks. On the other hand, increased trade integration may result in more highly correlated business cycles due to common demand shocks or intra-industry trade. If the second hypothesis is empirically verified, policy makers have little to worry about the region being unsynchronized in their business cycles as the business cycles will become more synchronized after the monetary union is formed. This paper assesses the dynamic relationships between trade, finance, specialization and business cycle synchronization for East Asian economies using a Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) approach. The dynamic panel approach improves on previous efforts to examine the business cycle correlations — trade link using panel procedures, which control for the potential endogeneity of all explanatory variables. Based on the findings on how trade, finance and sectoral specialization have effects on the size of common shocks among countries, potential policies that can help East Asian countries move closer toward a regional currency arrangement can be suggested. The empirical results of this study suggest that there exists scope for East Asia to form a monetary union.     

Macroeconomic fluctuations: Demand or supply, permanent or temporary?

We use generalized method of moments to estimate a rational expectations aggregate demand/aggregate supply macroeconomic model for five European economies and the United States. Our aim is to examine whether supply or demand shocks have predominated in these economies during the post-war era, and whether shocks of either type have been primarily temporary or permanent in nature. We find that permanent or temporary demand shocks have been the dominant source of variance in output growth in all six countries, but there is a less consistent pattern for inflation. Permanent supply shocks had the dominant influence on autocorrelations.