Factor accumulation in Canada before the Great Depression: investment and immigration dynamics

The links between economic growth, investment and migration are explored to determine if one of the mobile factors of production, capital or labor, led the other to accumulate in Canada during several boom episodes over 1870 to 1927. The results of an econometric analysis, using time series techniques, suggest that rising per capita incomes led to increased domestic investment and net immigration, and that foreigners joined the investment booms after domestic residents invested in Canadian development first.

Migration and rural poverty in China

We analyze two complementary household datasets from China's poor areas to examine whether the poor migrate and whether migration helps the poor. We find an inverted-U-shaped relationship between household endowments and the likelihood of migration. Over time, the poor are more likely to migrate. Using household panel data and taking prior village migration networks as an instrument, we find that having a migrant increases a household's income per capita by 8.5 to 13.1 percent, but that the overall impact on poverty is modest because most poor people do not migrate. Migrants remit a large share of their income and the amount of these remittances is responsive somewhat to the needs of other family members. Journal of Comparative Economics 33 (4) (2005) 688–709.     

Transaction costs and recorded remittances in the post-Soviet economies: Evidence from a new dataset on bilateral flows

Labour migrants' remittances are a rapidly growing phenomenon in the countries of the former Soviet Union. The size and growth of remittances in the countries of the recipients brought the issue under the scrutiny of researchers and policymakers. In this paper we investigate the main factors behind the growing volume of remittances in the post-Soviet space. By applying panel data techniques we found that a reduction in transaction costs and a depreciation of the currency in the host country were the main factors that influenced the growth of recorded remittances. The size of transaction costs remains a significant predictor of the volume of formal remittances, even after correcting for endogeneity using an instrumental variable estimator. The inverse relationship between transaction costs and recorded remittances suggests that migrants switch from informal channels to formal channels to send remittances when costs are low. Thus lower transaction costs may help curb the proportion of informal flows and lead to increased use of remittances in the formal economy.     

The dynamics of parallel economies. Measuring the informal sector in Mexico

The existence of parallel economies that operate in the shadows of informality within most Latin American countries is widely recognized by the economic literature. However, its composition, size and effects on economic growth are still open questions. In this paper, we estimate the size and the evolution of the Mexican informal economy in the last three decades using a vector error correction model. In addition to the standard explanatory variables traditionally used in the currency demand approach, we include remittances given their relevance in the Mexican economic system. The results indicate that informality prior to the late 1980s accounted for at least two thirds of GDP, while stabilizing around one third of GDP in the last decade. Furthermore, our estimates provide evidence of a positive long-run relationship between informality and economic growth.     

人力资本跨区迁入的影响因素分析

20世纪90年代我国人力资本的跨区迁入,明显地受到来自经济系统因素的影响。本文从经济的市场化角度利用因子分析方法得出,地区之间经济发展在整体水平上的差异和经济形态的多元化影响了人力资本的迁入,并且其影响的作用程度按高低排序依次为:港澳台经济发展因子、整体经济水平因子、经济多元化因子和国有经济发展水平因子。正是上述因素在地区之间发展的差异形成了人力资本迁入模式上的不同特征。     

Temporal causality and the dynamics of democracy,emigration and real income in Fiji

This study is the first to explore temporal causality between democracy, emigration and real income in Fiji within a multivariate cointegration model. We find three long run relationships between democracy, emigration and real income. In the long run there is evidence that migration and democracy Granger cause real GDP in Fiji; real GDP and democracy Granger cause migration from Fiji and that real GDP and migration Granger cause democracy in Fiji. In the short run we find unidirectional Granger causality running from migration to real GDP and from democracy to real GDP, but neutrality between democracy and migration in the short run. We also extend the analysis to examine the degree of exogeneity of the variables beyond the sample period through considering the decomposition of variance and impulse response functions.     

Reexamining the interaction between innovation and capital accumulation

In endogenous growth models with innovation and capital accumulation Arnold [J. Macroeconomics 20 (1998) 189] and Blackburn et al. [J. Macroeconomics 22 (2000) 81] show that long-run growth of per capita income is independent of innovation activities; it is solely determined by preferences and the human capital accumulation technology. As a result, government policies do not affect long-run growth. This paper develops an endogenous growth model with innovation and (physical and human) capital accumulation to show that long-run growth depends on both innovation and capital accumulation technologies as well as on preferences and that government taxes and subsidies can have effects on the long-run growth rate.     

Structural economic dynamics: an alternative approach to North-South models

This paper isolates the mechanisms responsible for the difficultiesfacing poor regions in growing faster than rich ones. The analysisof uneven development is carried out in a framework where changesin demand composition are consistent with Engel's Law. The standpointof the analysis is the interaction between technical progress—whichproduces responses in per capita income—and changes ofper capita consumption. The paper focuses on one case in whichpreferences are homothetic and there is capital dependence,showing that the latter assumption is sufficient to explainthe inequalities between poor and rich regions. When dealingwith the case of non-homothetic tastes, adverse movements inthe terms of trade and the international demonstration effect,which are both due to the inelastic demand for goods producedby poor regions, are the mechanisms responsible for uneven development.     

金融发展、资本积累与内生增长:一个评述

本文以资本外溢AK内生增长模型为基础,对金融发展、资本积累与经济增长关系的理论研究和经验分析作了一个文献综述.理论研究表明:金融发展通过提高储蓄转化为资本比率、改善投资配置效率和改变储蓄率等途径促进资本积累和经济增长;金融发展与经济增长之间呈互相促进、互为因果的双向关系,并形成金融发达、经济高增长和金融欠发达、经济低增长的双重均衡.经验分析显示,金融发展与经济增长之间呈显著正相关关系,这证实了金融发展与内生增长理论的预测.     

Selective immigration policies, human capital accumulation and migration duration in infinite horizon

An increasing literature fosters selective immigration policies as a tool to increase human capital in both source and destination countries. These policies are supposed to prompt incentives to education, and–if selection is sufficiently severe–to increase the human capital stock in source countries. Nonetheless, when compared to open migration, selective policies make returns to education uncertain, and they may harm incentives to invest in human capital. As a consequence, they may reduce the human capital stock even though selection is “severe”. Moreover, when repeated migration is possible, they backfire on migration duration. We obtain our results in an infinite-horizon model that, unlike the current literature, places no restriction on the number of possible migration spells and allows for the possibility of a forced emigration.     

李嘉图等价定理及其在中国的适用性分析

李嘉图等价定理认为,政府的财政收入形式的选择,不会引起人们经济行为的调整。但是,现代经济学家们并非完全同意李嘉图的见解,无论是对其必要条件的检验还是对其结论的检验都存在着争论。而通过实证分析我国1989—2004年的政府发债分别与消费和投资的关系,可以得出结论：从历史数据来看,李嘉图等价定理在我国并不适用。     

我国民营资本嵌入创新孵化的壁垒、模式与策略

通过定性研究探讨民营资本参与创新孵化产业的问题,发现应当正视民营资本进入创新孵化的社会歧视,尊重民营资本的资源配置规律,以商业化视角制定及优化其运作模式。在分析我国创新孵化传统模式弊端,总结民营资本进入壁垒的基础上,提出民营资本参与创新孵化的实物期权型、服务期股型、整体嵌入型与阶段嵌入型商业模式,并给出其考虑维度及演进规律。研究通过适当的创新孵化商业模式设计,力图达成区域经济增长、行业技术进步、民间资本获益、创新型企业发展的多赢局面。     

A few signatures matter: Barriers to entry in Italian local politics

Competition for public office is an essential feature of democracy but having many candidates competing for the same position might lead to voter confusion and be counterproductive. In current democracies, ballot access regulations limit citizens’ right to become candidates, seeking to balance this trade-off by discouraging frivolous contenders. This paper examines the causal effect of signature requirements – a widespread ballot access regulation – and finds that their impact goes beyond this goal. I use data on Italian local elections and apply a regression discontinuity design (RDD) to estimate the effects of these requirements on electoral competition, candidates’ selection, voter participation and administrative efficiency. I find that signature requirements reduce the number of candidates running for office, decrease electoral competition, lead to a more experienced pool of candidates, and reduce voter turnout. The positive effects of this policy are observed in municipalities with fragmented political systems, where signature requirements lead to fewer wasted votes and fewer spoiler candidates. The downside is observed in municipalities with concentrated political systems: signature requirements increase the frequency of uncontested races and reduce voter participation. Findings reveal how this barrier to entry impacts key dimensions of democracy and indicate that designing efficient electoral institutions requires a clear understanding of local political contexts.     

Asymmetric adjustment costs and the dynamics of housing supply

This paper examines aggregate dynamics on the supply side of the housing market. The representative firm's intertemporal profit maximisation problem is considered under asymmetric adjustment costs. The hypothesis of asymmetric adjustment costs is also examined empirically using Irish data. Several interesting insights into the dynamics of housing supply are uncovered. These include support for the proposition that the adjustment costs of expanding housing output are greater than those associated with a contraction, evidence of threshold points beyond which adjustment starts to speed up and also the existence of a continuum of equilibria between these thresholds where no adjustment occurs at all.     

The impact of foreign and domestic remittance types and senders on education outcomes

Migration and remittances are very important for Nepal, yet the country continues to be plagued by low financial development. Increases in human capital investments, such as enrollment of school‐aged children, are a possible gain from the country's labor movements, which can be leveraged further through an understanding of the microeconomic processes involved. This study examines how remittances from both household and nonhousehold members affect school enrollment rates for children in Nepalese families. We analyze the positive and negative impacts of migration and remittances separately and consider both the type and location of the remittance sender using the Nepal Living Standards Survey (NLSS‐III) of 9,335 school‐aged children. We find enrollment more associated with an exogenous process and use this to estimate marginal effects in which remittances significantly increase children's school enrollment by about 2% points in most cases. These results suggest policymakers should encourage domestic migration (which allows proximity between senders and recipients of remittances as well as less family disruption).     

Money, endogenous fertility and economic growth

This paper analyzes the issue of money superneutrality through an intertemporal optimizing model of capital accumulation with endogenous fertility, i.e. endogenous population growth. Two elements of this setup invalidate money superneutrality: (i) a demand for fertility that depends on real money balances, and (ii) an inverse relation between capital–labor ratio and population growth. Higher monetary growth increases fertility, since it reduces its opportunity cost, and hence diminishes capital intensity, and per capita output. This reverse Tobin effect is matched by an increase in aggregate capital and output growth rates. In this framework, the optimal monetary growth rule is a “distorted Friedman rule”.     

The role of export subsidies in balance-of-payment crises

This paper investigates the effects of export subsidies when capital goods are imported for use in production of export goods. Export subsidies increase the demand for foreign capital at the expense of domestic consumption. The increase in the capital stock raises the real wage rate while leaving the real rental rate unchanged. However, if the speed of capital accumulation exceeds the savings rate, deterioration of the trade balance may occur. We show thereby that export subsidies can be linked to balance-of-payment crises.     

Inflation and capital accumulation in an OLG model with money in the production function

This article analyses the consequences of the money supply growth rate on capital intensity and economic growth in an overlapping-generations model with real balances entering the production function. Within this theoretical framework, anticipated inflation generates an ambiguous effect on capital–labour ratio, because two forces work simultaneously in opposite directions: one driving towards a pure Tobin effect (due to the OLG demographic structure of the economy) and the other pushing down the capital stock (due to the productive role of real balances). Despite the unclear effects exerted on capital intensity, higher monetary growth rates unambiguously reduce real money demand, consumption, total wealth and welfare.     

风险投资支持环境的比较分析及借鉴

本文对照并借鉴美国成功的经验，从人才环境、资本市场、政策环境、法律环境等四个方面详细分析了促进风险投资发展所需的支持环境，结合实际讨论了我国现阶段风险投资环境建设中存在的差距和问题，并在此基础上提出了相应的建议。     

Economic development,human capital and technical change: the question of machinery revisited

A systemic element of prevailing economic growth and development is the massive introduction of machinery into the production process. The introduction of new technologies became decidedly a debated issue in economic analysis because of the dual character of technology, which simultaneously creates and destroys employment, advances and deteriorates labor skills. This paper attempts to introduce the relative issues and to assess the extent to which the introduction of machinery into the labor process improves human capital or simplifies labor skills and forms a stream of unskillful laborers.