土地政策调整对经济发展和社会福利的影响

构建了一个土地对社会福利影响的分析模型,并用天津市的数据进行检验。研究结果表明：（1）政府对于土地供应量的控制减少了均衡资本量;（2）严格的土地政策会使单位资本产生的福利量减少;（3）土地政策的适时调整能使经济发展沿着社会福利最大化的路径发展。因此,土地政策的制定应该以社会需求为导向,并通过适时调整以实现社会福利最大化。     

资本项目开放、汇率政策对宏观经济与社会福利的影响——基于一般均衡的视角

本文基于新凯恩斯动态随机一般均衡框架,建立包含资本项目部分管制、汇率不完全传导和工资价格粘性等符合我国经济运行特征的模型框架,详细考察资本项目开放、汇率政策对宏观经济与社会福利的影响。数值模拟结果表明:加强资本项目或汇率管制能够减少汇率波动的冲击效应,提高货币政策对产出、通货膨胀的影响力度,总体上有利于宏观经济的稳定运行;适度的资本项目与汇率管制在当前有助于提升社会福利。考虑到我国经济和金融发展水平,我国应当保持适当的资本项目管制,审慎推进资本项目开放,同时进一步增加人民币汇率弹性,使人民币汇率及早调整至合理的均衡区间,通过主动扩大双向浮动区间,改变升值预期,有效缓解和应对未来美元波动带来的冲击,也为短期内改善我国出口贸易环境、长期内实现产业升级创造有利条件。     

Continuity and Change in Australian Economic Policy: The Social Welfare Services

Commonwealth social welfare programs can be divided into the social security system, for which the Commonwealth has constitutional responsibility, and programs of grants for services, which depend on Commonwealth exploitation of the Australian fiscal imbalance. Over the past decade federal enthusiasm for services has waxed and waned, resulting in considerable volatility of expenditure. Social security spending, on the other hand, has grown steadily. Until the end of full employment this growth was mainly due to real increases in social security rates and to the easing of entitlement conditions; since that time it has been largely due to demographic factors and to the increase in unemployment and associated increase in takeup rates. Both Liberal and Labor governments have adopted a more constrained attitude to social welfare expenditures since the end of full employment, but even so in most respects the Labor party has remained the more generous of the two.     

机器人技术进步对劳动力市场与社会福利的影响研究

通过构建模拟机器人技术进步对劳动力市场及社会福利动态影响的均衡模型,分析发现:短期内,机器人技术进步对低技能劳动者的薪酬和就业产生负面影响,对高技能劳动者和科学家群体的薪酬与就业产生正面影响,对社会总福利的影响具有不确定性.长期来看,机器人技术进步对所有劳动者的收益与福利都将产生负面影响.同时机器人技术进步会促进劳动者就业结构的转移,由低技能向高技能转移,由制造业向服务业转移.为了实现技术进步与经济增长的同步,需要政府进行适时干预,将技术进步的资本收益在不同劳动者群体中再分配以稳定就业与经济增长.为实现智能制造与就业稳定,政府应该稳步推进“机器换人”计划,不可一蹴而就.     

MQS对社会福利和市场结构的影响

多数文献通常都假设一国收入水平为均匀分布.且市场完全覆盖,以此分析最低质量标准(MQS)对社会福利的影响,并得出结论是,MQS会降低一国社会福利.通过拓展一国收入水平呈均匀分布的假设,且假定市场不完全覆盖,以一高收入国和一低收入国作为对比,探讨MQS对社会福利以及市场结构的影响.研究发现,MQS对社会福利的影响与一国的富裕程度有关.如果一国收入水平较高,则MQS的存在通常会降低其社会福利,且MQS数值越大,其社会福利损失越多;反之,MQS通常会提高其社会福利,且MQS数值越大,其社会福利提高越多.而且,MQS的存在会扩大厂商市场覆盖面,但也会减少其利润.较高的MQS还可能会导致一家厂商退出市场,从而形成独占市场结构.     

The State of the Welfare State

Books reviewed in this article:
J.M Wildeboer Schut, J.C Vrooman and P.T de Beer, On Worlds of Welfare: Institutions and their Effects in Eleven Welfare States
Jørgen Goul Andersen and Per H Jensen, Changing Labour Markets, Welfare Policies and Citizenship     

The Impact of the Welfare State on the Economic Status of Indigenous Australian Women

This article uses census data and Department of Social Security administrative records to examine the role of social security income in explaining the growth and relative improvement in the income status of indigenous Australian women. The real median income of indigenous women was 81 per cent of that of non-indigenous women in 1991 compared with 74 per cent in 1976. Much of the change has come about from an improvement in the position of indigenous women who were not in employment. The article argues that much of this improvement can be attributed to increased access to social security benefits for indigenous women and therefore needs to be qualified by the circumstances in which these women live.     

Evaluating Policy Impact: Working Out What Works

Randomised trials frequently produce surprising findings, overturning conventional wisdom. During the twentieth century, randomised trials became commonplace within medicine, saving millions of lives. Randomised trials within government can now be conducted more cheaply, using administrative data. Just as it might be considered unethical to conduct a randomised trial if a program is indisputably effective, it might be considered unethical not to conduct a rigorous evaluation if a program lacks evidence. Developed within a robust ethical framework, and alongside community consultation, better evaluation can help governments save money and address social disadvantage.     

食品价格上涨对我国城镇各阶层居民社会福利的不同影响

基于CHNS数据库2004年和2009年的数据,利用QUAIDS模型估计了食品价格上涨对我国各地区、不同阶层城镇居民社会福利的影响,研究发现:(1)食品价格上涨对城镇居民的社会福利造成了严重的负向冲击;(2)低收入者不但受食品价格冲击导致的社会福利损失更大,而且也更难以通过替代效应来进行缓冲;(3)不同省份的家庭受到的冲击有较大差别.经济较发达的省区和农业大省的城镇居民,受食品价格上涨的冲击较小;(4)中西部省区的低收入阶层,很可能是食品价格上涨中受冲击最大的群体,也是最需要救助的群体.这些结论说明,食品价格上涨对不同群体社会福利的影响具有异质性.     

The Macroeconomic Management of Increased Aid: Policy Lessons from Recent Experience

The authors investigate the macroeconomic challenges created by a surge in aid inflows. They develop an analytical framework for examining possible policy responses to increased aid, in terms of absorption and spending of aid—where the central bank controls absorption, through monetary policy and the sale of foreign exchange, and where the fiscal authority controls spending. Different combinations of absorption and spending lead to different macroeconomic consequences. Evidence from five countries that recently experienced an aid surge (Ethiopia, Ghana, Tanzania, Mozambique, and Uganda) shows no support for aid-related real exchange rate appreciation in these countries, but it does indicate that the fear of Dutch disease played an important part in the policy reaction to aid surges. Fiscal and monetary authorities should coordinate their responses to an aid surge, because an uncoordinated response—typically when the fiscal authority wants to spend aid while the central bank wants to avoid exchange rate appreciation—can have serious negative macroeconomic consequences.     

Australian Monetary Policy: Recent Experience and Some Current Issues

This article surveys Australia's recent monetary experience highlighting current problems in interpreting the stance of monetary policy. It then examines changes in the techniques of monetary policy stemming from deregulation and changing views of the authorities. Finally, money supply control, deregulation and broad money growth, and commercial bill financing are analysed so as to help to shed light on the current problems of interpreting monetary condition.     

Reassessing the Social Foundations of Welfare (State) Regimes

The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) was formed in 1964 to ‘create a forum in which the more prosperous member countries [of the United Nations] would come under pressure to agree to measures benefiting the less-developed countries’. More specifically, its formation was ‘a deliberate effort to use international bureaucracy and conference diplomacy to alter current norms affecting trade and development’. UNCTAD's founding reflected the growth in membership of the United Nations of newly independent states. A large number of the e´lites of these new entities keenly felt the iniquity of the world order which had ushered in their formal statehood. UNCTAD and the later call for a ‘New International Economic Order’ (NIEO) therefore were rejoinders to problems encountered by developing countries as a result of the creation and operation of the Bretton Woods system.     

The Corporate State,Economic Performance,and Social Policy

We use the Survey of Consumer Finances to analyze changes in U.S. household debt between 1989 and 2013. We focus on how income and debt levels have changed, and what this means for future economic growth and living standards. Prior to the Great Recession, U.S. households had record high debt levels and record low savings rates. Highly leveraged consumption boosted economic growth. However, large debt burdens have led many families to deleverage. Our study finds that deleveraging has been insufficient. Although debt payments have fallen relative to household income, this is mainly due to low interest rates. Debt levels, especially for home mortgages, remain high by historical standards and portend continued stagnation due to lower consumer spending.     

Welfare Migration: Is the Net Fiscal Burden a Good Measure of its Economic Impact on the Welfare of the Native-Born Population?

Migration of young workers (as distinct from retirees), evenwhen driven in by the generosity of the welfare state, slowsdown the trend of increasing dependency ratio. But, even thoughlow-skill migration improves the dependency ratio, it neverthelessburdens the welfare state. Recent studies by Smith and Edmonston(1977), and Sinn et al. (2003) comprehensively estimate thefiscal burden that low-skill migration imposes on the fiscalsystem. However an important message of this paper is that inan infinite-horizon set-up, one cannot fully grasp the implicationsof migration for the welfare state, just by looking at the netfiscal burden that migrants impose on the fiscal system. Inan infinite-horizon, overlapping generations economy, this netburden, could change to net gain to the native born population.(JEL F22, H3, J10)