Do Consumers Learn from Their Own Experiences?

It is natural to think that a household may learn from its own experiences and subsequently increase savings. This paper tests empirically the hypothesis that Japanese households learn from their experiences of large expenditure and increase their targets for precautionary savings after such experiences. The results imply that households raise their targets for precautionary savings by 4–5 percent of annual income in response to such experiences. Moreover, data are consistent with the argument that targets for savings affect actual savings. Assuming this holds, the results in this paper suggest that consumers may increase their actual savings following large expenditure.     

VOTER PREFERENCES FOR TRADE POLICY INSTRUMENTS*

We analyze voter preferences for tariffs and production subsidies. The distribution of tax revenues argument shows that voters with high direct tax burdens prefer tariffs to subsidies. The uncertainty argument demonstrates that if actual tariff and subsidy rates are chosen from the set of individually optimal rates then the range of tariff rates is smaller than the range of subsidy rates. Thus, tariffs might be preferred even though they are less efficient. Finally, the large country argument shows that if a country is large then voters whose income shares decline with more protection prefer tariffs to subsidies.     

农户对奶牛补贴政策的评价及期望——基于河北、辽宁两省农户问卷调查的分析

本文以河北、辽宁两省农户问卷调查数据为基础,对农户对我国奶牛补贴政策的评价与期望进行了分析。结果表明:农户对我国奶牛补贴政策的总体评价较高,但政策在增加产量、抵御养殖风险等方面的作用效果只对部分农户比较显著,未被广泛认可,不具有长效作用。因此,必须因地制宜地完善补贴政策的标准和操作流程,创新信贷担保和抵押方式,加强对奶牛补贴政策的宣传力度,建立奶牛养殖业的长效发展机制。     

How to curb poverty-related deforestation?

Drawing upon recent data from the Southeast Asian Mekong region, I study poverty-related drivers of deforestation (logging) activities by rural households. I do not find an environmental Kuznets curve-type relation between income and deforestation. Albeit I find a negative relation between income and the deforestation probability, this relation turns insignificant once I take into account specific socio-economic household characteristics: better education, higher relative affluence, younger age, self-employment, a higher value of nonproductive assets owned by the household as well as affiliation to an ethnic majority significantly reduce the deforestation probability. Received credits, remittances or (public) transfers do not significantly affect the deforestation probability. This implies for development policy that pure income-increasing financial support does not suffice for curbing poverty-related deforestation. Fostering education, social status, doing business and private ownership of assets are more promising options.     

食品价格上涨对城镇家庭消费与福利影响研究——基于EASI模型

文章基于与2015年度诺贝尔经济学奖得主迪顿的接近理想需求系统 AIDS 来源相同的EASI需求系统 ,采用CHNS调查数据 ,运用 EASI需求系统实证分析了各类食品价格上涨对不同收入等级城镇家庭消费与福利的影响 ,并比较了收入补贴与价格补贴的经济效果.研究发现:(1)我国城镇居民动物性食品消费支出占食品总支出的比重最大 ,其次是粮食和蔬菜 ,城镇居民的食品消费结构为"动物性食品+粮食+蔬菜" ,这说明动物性食品价格上涨对我国城镇居民日常膳食消费的影响相对较大.(2)粮食价格对困难户和最低收入家庭的福利影响最大 ,动物性食品价格对较低收入家庭的福利影响最大.(3)对低收入家庭而言 ,当动物性食品价格上涨时 ,收入补贴政策的效果优于价格补贴政策 ;当粮食价格上涨时 ,价格补贴政策的效果优于收入补贴政策.文章最后从生产、补贴政策和分配制度的角度提出了政策建议.     

On Assisting Domestic Industries under Bertrand Competition

In a homogeneous‐good duopoly game with a home and a foreign firm, which compete on prices, it has been shown that the optimal way to assist the domestic industry is by a production subsidy. The argument here is that the subsidy is used to keep potential competitive pressure on the foreign firm. This paper analyzes under which conditions this threat of entry of a subsidized home firm is credible. It is shown that in markets where the firms move before the government, a subsidy is not credible and dominated by a tariff in terms of welfare.     

Assortative marriage and the effects of government homecare subsidy programs on gender wage and participation inequality

We develop a model of the labor market where firms incur an adjustment cost when one of their workers quits, and males and females form households assortatively by skill. We show how this environment can lead to an economy where females earn less and drop out more frequently than equally skilled males in equilibrium, even when males and females constitute ex-ante identical populations. We then examine how different government homecare subsidy schemes may affect such gender inequality in the labor market. We show that the effect of government homecare subsidy schemes on gender inequality depends crucially on the form in which the subsidy is given and to whom it is allocated.     

Is the housing allowance shifted to rental prices?

This paper deals with the incidence of housing subsidies, which we analyze using Finnish panel data. The main data set includes 50,000 households that received housing allowances during the period 2000–2008. In addition, we utilize repeated cross-sections of all Finnish households for 1989–2008, the annual sample exceeding 10,000. Estimation results suggest that a part of the subsidies will indeed go into rental prices. A conservative estimate of the size of the shift is one-third, but it is certainly possible that the number is as high as 50 %. On the other hand, the subsidy seems to have increased housing demand more than the subsidy-induced income effect would have implied, which is in accordance with the goals of the subsidy program. Our results seem to be consistent with other studies, which have also indicated relatively large rent effects. If this is indeed the case, we are advised to reconsider the need for reforming the system of housing subsidies, at least with respect to the share of costs that remains on households’ own accounts and the implicit indexation of the system.     

Forests, biomass use and poverty in Malawi

Malawi is one of the poorest countries in Africa and has faced significant deforestation over the years. This paper seeks to examine the nature of the relationship between poverty and forests in Malawi. We try to answer three sets of questions: a) what is the extent of biomass available for meeting the energy needs of the poor in Malawi and how is this distributed? b) To what extent does fuelwood scarcity affect the welfare of the poor? And c) do households spend more time in fuelwood collection in response to scarcity? We answer these questions by matching household surveys with remote-sensing data.Our analyses suggest that biomass scarcity is associated with small but significantly lower household welfare, particularly for the rural poor. At current high levels of scarcity, 80% of rural poor households are likely to benefit from an increase in biomass in the community. Rural women spend more time on fuelwood collection where biomass is scarce. The small decrease in welfare associated with biomass scarcity suggests that households cope with scarcity in a variety of ways. Any effort to reduce degradation and deforestation in Malawi has to build on a clear understanding of household adaptation to fuelwood scarcity.     

An integrated fares policy for transport in London

A common but disputed justification for public transport subsidy is that lower fares will encourage transfer from private vehicles, alleviating the congestion externality. A quantitative method is developed to judge the validity of this ‘second best pricing’ argument and it is applied to the best available evidence on peak and off-peak bus, rail and private car models in Greater London. A total operating subsidy not exceeding £150m per annum may be justified despite low private traveller response to public transport fares. Substantial reallocation of public traffic between times and modes would also be desirable, but current car traffic and subsidy levels seem broadly correct.     

林业重点工程对样本农户收入不平等影响的分解与分析

本文采用15个案例县的1995—2006年3 096个样本数据分析林业重点工程对农民收入不平等及其影响程度的作用机理。研究结果显示:(1)在1995—2006年的12年间,样本农户的收入结构发生了重大变化,林业重点工程补贴收入提高了8.03个百分点;(2)林业重点工程补贴收入对样本农户收入的基尼系数的贡献呈现上升态势,从1995年的0.330 7%上升到2006年的3.794 1%;(3)林业工程收入格局与国家工程区域规划有密切关系,工程政策的影响更为显著。因此,适当调整林业重点工程政策可以更好地实现农村扶贫的目标。     

Demand for different types of public goods: evidence from Nigeria

Preferences of Nigerian households vary across different types of public goods. For example, some prefer roads while others favor education even after controlling for the existing supply of these goods. What explains this variation? We argue that the perceived distributional consequences of specific public goods differ conditional on the personal characteristics of households. In particular, households demand the type of public good that (a) increases the utility of assets they already own and (b) resonates with their past experiences involving the lack of particular public goods. We test our argument with data on 123,000 Nigerian households. We find strong evidence for our argument across six types of public goods.     

西藏“一江两河”地区农户生产效率分析及改进方案——基于三阶段DEA模型和农户微观数据

为剔除环境效应和随机因素对生产效率值测算结果的影响,以三阶段DEA模型和农户实地调查数据为基础,进行了西藏"一江两河"地区2009年农业生产效率的实证分析,结果显示:农户的生产补贴、受教育年限和非农收入等环境变量和随机因素显著影响了其农业生产效率,而将生产环境和随机因素同质化之后,农户在农业生产过程中的决策与管理效率较为有效,且区域间并未呈现出显著差异,规模效益成为制约农业生产效率提升的最主要瓶颈。在此基础之上,基于投影分析,本文提出了发展农区畜牧业、优化农业投入和提高人力资源配置效率三个方面的政策建议。     

Distributional effects of public policy choices

This paper examines the effects of a budget-neutral public spending allocation between public investment and private investment subsidy on inequality dynamics and intergenerational mobility in an environment with heterogeneous households and incomplete capital market.     

Nutrition and nonparticipation in the US food stamp programme

Microdata from the National Food Consumption Survey are used to test for differences in caloric and protein intake distributions. We compare poor households that participate in the US food stamp programme to eligible households that do not participate. Tests for stochastic dominance provide unambiguous evidence that eligible nonparticipants suffer from relative undernutrition compared to participating households. Probit analysis is used to identify characteristics of participating and nonparticipating households.     

Learning by Doing, Precommitment and Infant-Industry Promotion

We examine the implications for strategic trade policy of different assumptions about precommitment in a two-period Cournot oligopoly game with learning by doing. The inability of firms and governments to precommit to future actions encourages strategic behaviour which justifies an optimal first-period export tax relative to the profit-shifting benchmark of an export subsidy. In the linear case the optimal subsidy is increasing in the rate of learning with government precommitment but decreasing in it without, in apparent contradiction to the infant-industry argument. Extensions to active foreign policy, distortionary taxation and Bertrand competition are also considered.     

农户参与生态旅游的能源碳排放测算及影响因素研究——基于大熊猫国家公园试点调查数据

在自然保护地周边生态旅游发展过程中,乡村农户的生产经营活动对环境和资源产生的压力是当前研究的热点问题,而能源消费则是其中的重要方面。研究以大熊猫国家公园试点区为例,测算了农户在参与生态旅游前后各项能源的消耗及其碳排放的变化情况,并利用改进的STIRPAT模型探讨其影响因素,结果发现:农户在参与生态旅游之后能源消费结构呈多元化趋势,薪柴和电能源消耗成为碳排放的主要来源;农户接待游客量、收入水平以及实物和资金等能源补贴政策显著影响了能源碳排放量。基于此,提出规范农户经营行为、提高资金补贴、推广节能技术和设备、加强宣传力度等对策建议。     

Attracting Fdi in a Politically Risky World*

Conventional wisdom holds that lack of government commitment deters foreign investment in developing countries. Yet this explanation is not convincing because some econometric studies have found little support for the role of political risk and host governments can offer upfront subsidies that compensate foreign investors for their sunk cost. This paper shows that a second commitment problem upsets the argument. A multinational firm cannot credibly commit to invest in only one country. Since countries differ in production costs and government credibility, this article explains the pattern of investment in a politically risky world.     

Modelling energy and labour linkages: A CGE approach with an application to Iran

We develop a unique dynamic CGE model suitable for analysing the policy interrelationships between fuels, crude oil and the labour market. Special emphasis is placed on the modelling of energies, crude oil, and the factors of production in the economy. To fully outline the model's features, we build simulations that hypothesize removing fuel and crude oil subsidies in an oil exporting economy to assess their effects on the labour market. The model allows for extensive treatment of transition dynamics, featuring gradual as well as immediate removal of the subsidies. We focus on constructing two alternative simulations applied to a purpose built Social Accounting Matrix (SAM) of the Iranian economy, with the revenue from subsidy elimination redistributed to households as extra income or into increased investment. The study pays particular attention to SAM data construction of energy goods and factors of production. In the specific case of Iran, the model shows that rebating the revenue from subsidy removals to households affects the labour market adversely, while channelling revenue into investment improves labour fortunes in the long run. The model is sufficiently detailed and encompassing to allow for further applications to other countries and energy–labour policy issues.