Resilience in the Dynamics of Economy-Environment Systems

The ecological concept of resilience has begun to inform analysis of change in economy-environment systems. The linkages between resilience and the stability of dynamical systems are discussed, along with its role in understanding of the evolution of such systems. Particular linkages discussed include those between resilience, biodiversity and the sustainability of alternative states. Recent developments in modelling the resilience of joint economy-environment systems suggest the advantages of analysing change in the system as a Markov process, the transition probabilities between states offering a natural measure of the resilience of the system in such states. It is argued that this ‘emergent property’ of the collaboration between ecology and economics has far-reaching implications for the way we think about, model and manage the environmental sustainability of economic development.     

The Rate of Change in Evolutionary Systems and Evolutionary Economic Modeling

Evolutionary economics seeks to model socio-economic reality as an evolutionary system. This powerful approach entails the implication of the continuous loss of information through the evolutionary process. The implication corresponds to evolutionary biology, although the systems in evolutionary economics are different from those in evolutionary biology. The issue of the loss of information has not been extensively studied in economics. Many open questions remain: Which knowledge is lost under what circumstances? Can loss of information be harmful to the socio-economic system as a whole in the presence of runaway dynamics caused by, for example, network externalities? How can the development of knowledge in economic systems be studied? The present article examines these questions and more.     

多元灾害驱动下的山地农业生态经济:脆弱性与恢复力研究

山地农业生态系统是一个典型的复杂社会生态系统,受到自然灾害与人类活动的双重干扰,多维脆弱性与灾害恢复力是国际上研究的热点与前沿问题。测量、模拟和分析复杂的山地"生态-经济"系统的互动过程,研究人类高强度活动和全球环境快速变化对这个过程的驱动作用,进行灾害恢复和适应性管理,制定可持续发展政策,具有重要的理论和现实意义。在查阅大量文献的基础上,论述了国际、国内山地农业生态经济系统的研究现状、相关理论与方法,分析了当前山地农业生态经济系统脆弱性与灾害恢复力研究的重点,提出了当前山地农业生态经济系统研究的发展趋势和呈现出的新特点。     

职业弹性的研究现状述评及展望

本文阐述了职业弹性的内涵,分析了职业弹性的结构,从职业弹性的测量方法、影响因素及其作用三个方面对职业弹性的研究现状进行了综述,并提出了今后研究的方向。     

Energy price-induced and exogenous technological change: Assessing the economic and environmental outcomes

In this paper, we distinguish between factor/output substitution and shifts in the production technology frontier. Our model includes the by-products of carbon dioxide and sulfur dioxide emissions where the function requires the simultaneous expansion of good outputs and reductions in emissions. We estimate a directional output distance function for 80 countries over the period 1971–2000 to measure the exogenous and oil price-induced technological change. On average, we find substantial oil price-induced technological progress at the world level when long-term oil prices are rising, although the growth rate is more volatile in developed countries than in developing countries. The results also show that developed countries experience higher exogenous technological progress in comparison with developing countries, and the gap between the two has increased during the period of our study.     

中国ICT行业创新网络弹性——基于专利数据的实证研究

基于复杂网络弹性的视角,运用专利数据分析了中国ICT行业创新网络的弹性。结论如下:整体来看,中国ICT行业的创新网络具有无标度网络结构特征,少数网络主体间存在技术知识的非对称性依赖,局部网络锁定效应降低了创新网络弹性,网络关系瓦解导致创新网络弹性下降;随着行业创新主体的不断增加,创新网络的均衡性和异质性增强,创新网络弹性整体呈上升趋势,中国ICT行业的创新网络抵抗外部不确定性因素冲击的适应性增强。     

新冠疫情冲击、经济韧性与中国高质量发展

新冠肺炎疫情不仅威胁了国人的生命安全和身体健康,对中国宏观经济、不同产业和微观企业产生重大冲击,而且也改变了国人的消费方式和生活方式,对中国经济及其高质量转型升级产生了重要的影响。本文客观地分析了疫情对中国经济高质量转型升级所造成的冲击、对中国经济韧性和企业发展的挑战。特别地,本文还诠释了经济韧性的内涵及其持续演进过程,解析了国民经济韧性体系以及彼此之间的相互作用关系,总结了影响经济韧性水平的各个关键因素,识别了提升经济韧性过程中需要特别权衡的几个重要关系,并围绕全力推进中国经济向数字化、智能化、消费化和服务化转型升级以及中国企业如何有效应对动荡的市场环境提供了相应的对策。     

Evolution-Based Approaches in Economics and Evolutionary Loss of Information

Evolutionary economics provides a self-organizing, stabilizing mechanism without relying on mechanic equilibria. However, there are substantial differences between the genetic evolutionary biology and the evolution of institutions, firms, routines, or strategies in economics. Most importantly, there is no genetic codification and no sexual reproduction in economic evolution, and the involved agents can interfere consciously and purposefully. This entails a general lack of fixation and a quick loss of information through a Muller’s ratchet-like mechanism. The present contribution discusses the analogy of evolution in biology and economics, and considers potential problems resulting in evolutionary models in economics.     

Stimulating different types of eco-innovation in the UK: Government policies and firm motivations

In this paper, we adopt a recent OECD framework and examine the role of external policy tools and internal firm specific factors for stimulating three different types of eco-innovations that range on a spectrum of lower to higher technological and environmental impacts: End-of-Pipeline Pollution Control Technologies, Integrated Cleaner Production Technologies and Environmental R&D. Using a novel firm-level dataset from a DEFRA survey, we estimate a Tobit model, which provides empirical evidence showing that these eco-innovations are motivated by different external policy tools and internal firm specific factors. Our findings indicate that End of Pipeline Technologies and Integrated Cleaner Production Technologies are mainly driven by equipment upgrade motives with a view of improving efficiency while environmental regulations are effective in stimulating the End-of-Pipeline technologies and Environmental R&D. Interestingly, alongside government induced regulations, we find that market factors, mainly motivated by cost savings, are effective in driving Environmental R&D. Finally, ISO14001 certification is effective in strengthening the positive impact of environmental management systems on both End-of-Pipeline technologies and Environmental R&D while CSR policies have no significant impact on motivating any of the eco-innovations.     

Pursuing Problems in Growth

This paper explores the theoretical implications of Schmooklers (1966) argument that a key determinant of technological change is the usefulness of new technologies. There is both historical and empirical support for his argument. The analysis implies that on-going growth depends delicately on a tension between uses for solutions to technological problems and the allocation of resources toward pursuing those solutions. Even alongside an endogenously increasing number of problems pursued, increasing research labor need not increase technology growth or per capita income growth. The results provide reconciliation of stylized facts regarding technological change and growth in the United States and Western Europe.     

Breaking the waves: a Poisson regression approach to Schumpeterian clustering of basic innovations

The Schumpeterian theory of long waves has given rise to anintense debate on the existence of clusters of basic innovations.Silverberg and Lehnert have criticised the empirical part ofthis literature on several methodological accounts. In thispaper, we propose the methodology of Poisson regression as alogical way of incorporating this criticism. We construct anew time series for basic innovations (based on previously usedtime series), and use this to test the hypothesis that basicinnovations cluster in time. We define the concept of clusteringin various precise ways before undertaking the statistical tests.The evidence we find supports only the ‘weakest’of our clustering hypotheses, i.e., that the data display overdispersion.We thus conclude that the authors who have argued that a longwave in economic life is driven by clusters of basic innovationshave stretched the statistical evidence too far.     

International Emissions Trading and Induced Carbon-Saving Technological Change: Effects of Restricting the Trade in Carbon Rights

This paper examines the implications of restricting the tradability of carbon rights in the presence of induced technological change. Unlike earlier approaches aimed at exploring the tradability-technology linkage, we focus on climate-relevant “carbon-saving” technological change. This is achieved by incorporating endogenous investment in carbon productivity into the RICE-99 integrated assessment model of Nordhaus and Boyer (2000). Simulation analysis of various emission reduction scenarios with several restrictions on emissions trading reveals a pronounced dichotomy of effects across regions: Restrictions to trading raise the investments in carbon productivity in permit demanding regions while reducing them in permit supplying regions. In terms of per capita consumption, permit demanding regions lose and permit supplying regions gain from restrictions. In scenarios that involve “hot air,” restrictions to trade lower overall emissions, which results in reduced climate damage for most regions. Reduced damage, in turn, reduces the incentive to invest in carbon productivity.     

The sources of total factor productivity growth: Evidence from Canadian data

A dynamic general equilibrium model is constructed and used to identify sources of total factor productivity growth in Canada and to quantify their importance. The model also provides procedures for constructing measures of technological progress. We find that periods of low productivity growth correspond to periods of high growth in investment-specific technology (IST) or high rates of technology embodiment. For example, the growth rate of IST was relatively high between 1974 and 1996. The higher growth rate of IST during this period should have increased the rate of productivity growth by an estimated 0.29 percentage points, ceteris paribus. Yet, productivity growth slowed. Why?     

Endogenous Growth Cycles in Continuous Time

The endogenous dynamics of a closed constant returns multi-market economy are examined in which agents face downward sloping demand. The trigger for growth in this model is a technological change that warrants costly adjustment in input quantities by agents. In the resulting dynamic game, relative prices within markets remain constant. Consequently, all own price elasticities are constant. In markets characterized by lower cost of capital the unique outcome is collusion in which agents do not incur adjustment cost and there is no adoption of new technology. But in other markets a unique non-cooperative equilibrium exists in which agents do incur the cost of adopting the new technology. Only three specifications of adjustment costs are feasible. Output increases along an S-shaped time path with or without a non-explosive cyclical component.     

基于变异系数熵权法的水资源系统恢复力评价——以黑龙江省2007—2016年水资源情况为例

对于传统熵权法权重分配不合理的问题,将熵权法和变异系数法用最小信息熵原理进行耦合,并首次应用于水资源系统恢复力评价。以黑龙江省2007—2016年十年间的水资源情况为例,用综合评价法对水资源系统恢复力进行评价,并提出适应性对策。结果表明:变异系数熵权法得到的权重解决了单一客观权重分配不合理的问题,使分配权重的结果具有协调性。根据黑龙江省水资源系统恢复力的综合评价结果来看,影响黑龙江省水资源评价的主要因素有5项指标,分别是生态环境用水比例、节水灌溉面积率、人均GDP、城市污水处理率和万元工业产值用水量。根据评价结果,从政策制度、提升恢复力和进行多区域对比等方面提出了相对应的适应性对策。     

Economic growth, skill-biased technical change and wage inequality: A model and estimations for the US and Europe

In recent literature skill-biased technical change has been viewed as a major cause for wage inequality. Some modelling and presentation of stylized facts have been undertaken for US time series data. A preliminary study of wage inequality in a model with knowledge as input in an aggregate production function has been presented by Riddell and Romer [General Purpose Technologies and Economic Growth, 1998, MIT Press]. Although some important forces determining wage inequality are widely accepted we know little about the quantitative impact of each source and differences across countries. We present a growth model of the Romer type with innovation-based technical change and two skill groups where the growth of knowledge, the relative supply of the two skill groups, externalities and substitution effects among the two groups are the driving forces for wage inequality. We undertake estimates for US time series data and contrast those estimates with results from some European countries. In particular, we compare parameter estimations for US and German time series data. The paper concludes that there is less wage inequality across skills in Europe in contrast to the US on the macroeconomic level. But, considering disaggregated data we observe some increases in inequality for Germany, too. Although our model reveals important variables for the explanation of wage inequality there may, however, also be other factors, such as trade unions, which have impacted the wage spread.     

Spot market wages,implicit contracts and technological change: skill-level evidence from Finland

This article investigates the relevance of the theories of implicit contracts and spot market model to the skill-level wages in Finland. We use linked worker-firm panel data over the period from 1991 to 2004, which included major institutional and technological changes. We find similar patterns in the wage flexibility of primary and highly educated workers: their wages increased with the decreasing spot market unemployment rate after the EU membership still exhibiting some weak backward linkages. The wages of the secondary-educated did not follow the decreasing spot market unemployment, but instead some signs of the full commitment risk sharing were found.     

Developmental Rent Management Analysis: Learning,Upgrading, and Innovation

In this article, I construct an original analytical framework, called the developmental rent management analysis (DRMA), for the analysis of rents and rent management. This framework is based on the premise that successful rent management depends on political and institutional arrangements to produce incentives and pressures for technical upgrading and innovation. This is because, while rents are created for a variety of purposes, rent outcomes — whether growth-enhancing or growth-reducing — depend on a set of political, institutional, and market conditions that take place formally and informally. Therefore, the key objective of the DRMA framework is to understand how a country’s politics, institutions, and industries are configured to incentivize and compel industrial upgrading. Thus, DRMA enables a broader and more complex understanding of the various factors at play in the process of development. I provide an illustrative application of the DRMA framework using the Vietnamese experience of adopting third-generation technology in the telecommunications industry.     

Twin Engines of Growth: Skills and Technology as Equal Partners in Balanced Growth

We develop an endogenous growth model in which skill acquisition by households and innovation by firms make distinct contributions to productivity growth. Nevertheless, the incentives faced by firms and households are inextricably linked because skills are required to implement new technologies. Skills and technologies are dynamic complements but, because their production complementarity is inherently bounded, they are equal partners in driving growth: neither can generate sustained growth alone. Our model has important implications for the effectiveness of alternative growth-promoting policies, for interpretating the empirical relationship between growth and schooling, and the relationship between growth and intergenerational wage dispersion.     

Environmental policy and growth when inputs are differentiated in pollution intensity

Environmental policy affects the distribution of market shares if intermediate goods are differentiated in their pollution intensity. When innovations are environment-friendly, a tax on emissions skews demand towards new goods which are the most productive. In this case, the tax has to increase along a balanced growth path to keep the market shares of goods of different vintages constant. Comparing balanced growth paths, we find that tightening the policy stance spurs innovation, because it increases the market share of recent vintages, and promotes environment-friendly technological progress. As a result the cost of environmental policy in terms of slower growth is weaker.