Einkommensschwache Personen: die jüngere Entwicklung in Deutschland

The article examines the structure and development of persons in low income households in Germany from 2011 to 2016. Low income is operationalised as a fixed percentage of median income of all households, similar to the EU’s risk of poverty definition. The low income population rose to 16 per cent in this period but this was the result of increasing average incomes. Above average levels of low income are seen in Eastern Germany and in the migrant population. Employed and retired persons are less affected than the unemployed or students. The increase in the numbers of low income households is mainly due to an increase in the number of migrants. The number of “poor” students has also increased.     

Would Freeing Up World Trade Reduce Poverty and Inequality? The Vexed Role of Agricultural Distortions

Trade policy reforms in recent decades have sharply reduced the distortions that were harming agriculture in developing countries, yet global trade in farm products continues to be far more distorted than trade in non‐farm goods. Those distortions reduce some forms of poverty and inequality but worsen others, so the net effects are unclear without empirical modelling. This article summarises a series of new economy‐wide global and national empirical studies that focus on the net effects of the remaining distortions to world merchandise trade on poverty and inequality globally and in various developing countries. The global Linkage model results suggest that removing those remaining distortions would reduce international inequality, largely by boosting net farm incomes and raising real wages for unskilled workers in developing countries, and would reduce the number of poor people worldwide by 3 per cent. The analysis based on the Global Trade Analysis Project model for a sample of 15 countries, and nine stand‐alone national case studies, all point to larger reductions in poverty, especially if only the non‐poor are subjected to increased income taxation to compensate for the loss of trade tax revenue.     

Trade Liberalisation and Poverty Reduction in Vietnam

This paper investigates the impacts of trade liberalisation on poverty reduction in Vietnam during the period of economic reform. Using a combined approach dealing with four transmitting channels from trade to poverty, the major findings are summarised as follows. First, Vietnam's trade liberalisation has fostered economic growth, which has helped to raise per capita GDP and reduce poverty. Second, trade liberalisation has directly benefited the poor through creating pro‐poor employment and raising wages. Third, another impact of trade liberalisation on poverty is income and substitution effects associated with reduced domestic prices of importables and increased domestic prices of exportables such as coffee and rice. Fourth, trade liberalisation has indirectly benefited the poor because it raises government revenue, which enhances the government's ability to subsidise the poor. Finally, although the poverty rate in Vietnam has been reduced impressively, there is an increasing disparity between urban and rural areas and, among the latter, concern does exist regarding ethnic minorities.     

低保制度是近贫人口的福利悬崖吗?——基于贫困脆弱性视角的实证研究

未能获得低保救助但贫困脆弱性较强的近贫人口,未来陷入贫困的可能性较大,且与低保家庭相比,还可能存在救助性福利缺失的悬崖效应。本文使用2014年中国家庭追踪调查数据,基于贫困脆弱性视角测量近贫人口的贫困程度,采用倾向得分匹配法探究低保制度是否对低保家庭与近贫人口的贫困脆弱性产生悬崖效应,并分析由悬崖效应引起的救助性福利缺失是否造成近贫人口对低保制度参与权与福利加成的不平等。结果显示:以各地区低保线为基点,近贫人口家庭人均收入高于低保线的部分累加至最低工资线与低保线差值的0.2至0.25倍的区间时,存在显著的悬崖效应与救助性福利缺失,参与权与福利加成方面存在不平等。因此,应将贫困脆弱性纳入到现行低保救助判别机制之中,以此完善对未来陷入贫困可能性的测量与识别;同时将存在救助性福利缺失的近贫人口纳入到低保制度,以此化解悬崖效应引起的不平等。     

农村贫困人口分布及其结构性扶贫对策的实证研究

本文根据ELES分析认为,总消费口径的2002-2004年农村贫困人口分别为2699万人、3827万人和3323万人,贫困人口的收入分布呈现“两端分化”的特征,即人均纯收入小于100元和收入400元以上的群体构成农村贫困人口的主体,这要求政府实行结构性的扶贫政策。为此,对最低收入者和最贫困地区加大财政转移支付力度,对贫困人口中的“较高”收入者和地区做好开发式扶贫,建立和完善农村社会保障体系和制度,增强贫困人口的创收能力应成为扶贫政策的根本目标。     

方言能力如何影响流动人口收入? ——基于中国劳动力动态调查数据

探讨流动人口的方言能力和收入关系对于理解人口流动的经济社会后果具有重要意义。基于方言的认同效应和替代效应,提出并证实了方言水平和收入的非线性关系命题:总体而言,流动人口的收入和方言水平呈倒U型曲线关系;同时,随着流动距离增大,两者关系由U型曲线转变为倒U曲线;当满足一定流动距离条件时,收入和方言水平的关系亦表现出一定的线性特征。上述关系在不同性别、教育程度、行业、区域样本中具有异质性。在控制了方言测量误差、工作经验和普通话水平等因素后,结论仍然是稳健的。研究表明,流动人口掌握适度的方言有利于实现收入最大化,这也为认识普通话推广和语言文化多样性保护的关系提供了参考。     

The role of training in reducing poverty: the case of the ultra‐poor in Bangladesh

Although microcredit is considered the main vehicle for increasing the income of the poor and alleviating poverty in Bangladesh, it is now well recognised that more than this is needed to reach the ultra poor in rural areas. Consequently, almost half of the Bangladesh population is in some way linked to non‐governmental organizations' development programmes, at the centre of which is poverty alleviation. The study reported here developed a comprehensive cross‐sectional intervention to examine whether the income of those who participated in the training programmes of non‐governmental organizations was related to that participation. The study was carried out in three leading organizations in three districts of Bangladesh using a quantitative associational research design. Three hundred responses were analysed using multiple regression analysis to elicit information from ultra poor clients who had received training. The results suggest that the post‐training income level of the trainees was negatively rather than positively related to the fact of their participation in training, the opposite of what human capital theory would lead us to expect.     

Why do migrants remit?

This paper examines primary incentives of remitting. Using estimated bilateral data on remittances, this paper demonstrates that a rise in the home (remittance‐receiving) country's gross national income (GNI) per capita leads to fewer remittances and that a rise in the host (remittance‐sending) country's GNI per capita motivates migrants to remit more. Real exchange rates and real interest rates have no effect on remittances. These results indicate that altruism is an important and critical component of motivations behind remittances. However, altruism alone does not appear to be a sufficient explanation of the motivations behind remittances. Other incentives such as loan repayment and investment play a non‐negligible role in this regard as well. The degree of altruism is higher for migrants from developing countries in comparison with migrants from developed countries, and it is higher when we define remittances as “personal transfers” rather than “personal transfers and compensation of employees.” The results of the vector error correction model show if remittances deviate from the equilibrium relationship, they will eventually revert.     

Retailers and Consumers: The Pass‐through of Import Price Changes

In this paper, we estimate pass‐through rates of import price changes to retail prices across retailers and consumers for apparel purchases in Germany for the period of 2000–07. We find that high‐price retailers do not pass through changes in the import price. Pass‐through rates for low‐price retailers are 53 per cent within three months. Consequently, pass‐through rates for low‐income households are 58 per cent, significantly larger than those for high‐income households. We then present one possible explanation for these observations in a theoretical model with endogenous vertical product differentiation due to bundling an ex ante homogeneous import goods with services. Following an import price change, retailers who sell a cheaper unbundled product change prices to a greater extent than retailers who sell a higher‐priced bundle of product and service.     

The Effect of Foreign Direct Investment on International Migration: Does Education Matter?

Using migration data in 1990 and 2000, we find that inward foreign direct investment (FDI) in non‐OECD countries affects the out‐migration of individuals with tertiary and secondary education to OECD countries originating the investments, but has no significant effect on the out‐migration of individuals with primary education. Distinguishing between linkage and home effects, our results show a dominant home effect of FDI for individuals with tertiary education, but a stronger linkage effect for those with secondary education. The existing stock of former migrants in foreign countries influences the out‐migration of individuals with primary education.     

Isolating the Network Effect of Immigrants on Trade

Within the migration–trade nexus literature, this paper proposes a more carefully defined measure of migration business networks and quantifies its impact on bilateral trade. Using cross‐sectional data and controlling for the overall bilateral stock of migrants, the share of migrants employed in managerial/business‐related occupations has a strong additional effect on trade. Those immigrants should be the ones directly involved in the diffusion and transmission of information relevant for companies trading with other countries. Their presence is found to increase the volume of trade, especially of imports, beyond the already known effect of immigrants or highly educated immigrants. When we control for the presence of highly educated immigrants, the share of immigrants in business network occupations shows a particularly large effect on trade in differentiated goods. We also find that highly educated individuals in business‐related occupations are those contributing to stimulate import and export by the largest margin. Business network effects seem particularly important in stimulating exports to culturally different countries, such as those with different language and legal origin.     

Temporary Migration and Bilateral Trade Flows

Empirical evidence on migration and trade has established that permanent migration promotes trade. This finding has been interpreted as proof for the role of migrants in reducing trade‐related transaction costs such as contract enforcement costs or information costs. This paper contributes to improving our understanding of trade‐related transaction costs by analysing empirically whether temporary migrants, like permanent migrants, have an impact on bilateral trade flows. Temporary migrants can be expected to be less integrated in the host country than permanent migrants. At the same time, their knowledge of the home country can, on average, be expected to be more up‐to‐date. Our findings therefore give insights as to the relative importance of knowledge on the host and the home country for trade‐related transaction costs. Using a gravity approach in our empirical analysis, we find that temporary migration has a positive and significant effect on trade and that temporary migration tends to have a stronger and more significant effect on both imports and exports than permanent migration. Interestingly, the role of temporary migrants in reducing trade costs does not appear to be associated with their skills.     

Structural Change,Economic Crisis and International Labour Migration in East Asia

Increased international labour migration was one important dimension of structural change and globalisation in East Asia from the mid 1980s. Large international movements of mainly unskilled contract labour occurred in response to widening wage gaps between more and less developed countries in the region as the former experienced rapid structural change. Labour importing countries increasingly relied on unskilled migrant workers in less preferred jobs, in both export‐oriented and non‐tradable goods industries. The Asian economic crisis dramatically influenced the context in which international labour mobility had occurred in the pre‐crisis period. Important issues included a possible reversal in role of international migration in structural change, both among unskilled contract workers and more skilled migrants, and replacement of migrants by unemployed local workers. The paper argues that the Asian economic crisis did not reverse the fundamental trend toward greater reliance on unskilled migrant workers in agriculture, manufacturing and service industries. Business and professional migration remained significant and even rose in some countries during the crisis. However, several countries were forced to develop a more coherent policy towards migrant workers, in light of the social impact of the crisis.     

The Long‐run Relationship Between Trade and Population Health: Evidence from Five Decades

In recent years, the increase in international trade has sparked a debate about the impact of international trade on population health. To date, however, there has been very little econometric research on the relationship between these two variables. This paper examines the long‐run relationship between trade openness and population health for a sample of 74 countries over five decades, from 1960 to 2010. Using panel time‐series techniques, it is shown that international trade in general has a robust positive long‐run effect on health, as measured by life expectancy and infant mortality. This effect tends to be greater in countries with lower development levels, higher taxes on income, profits, and capital gains, and less restrictive business and labour market regulations.     

199O年代后期我国省际人口迁移区域模式研究

主要根据 2 0 0 0年人口普查资料 ,多视角地考察了 1990年代后期我国省际人口迁移的区域模式及其特征 ,发现我国中、西部地带人口主要选择迁向东部地带的基本区域模式虽然十分稳定 ,但也发生了一些比较明显的变化 ;1996年人均国民生产总值 80 0 0元和 6 0 0 0元 ,分别是 1990年代后期省际人口迁移比较有意义的人口迁入、迁出收入“门槛”线     

Income and social communication: The demographics of stock market participation

This paper analyses the determinants of stock market participation decisions using officially compiled aggregate stock account opening data in China. Different from the literature that often focuses on one particular dimension, our paper systematically evaluates the relative importance of disposable income, demographic variables, macroeconomic factors, stock market conditions and social communication on both the level and the change of the participation rate. We find that the level of the participation rate is predominately determined by the income factor, followed by various measures of social communication. Social communication plays the most important role in the change of the participation rate, acting as a multiplier to stimulate stock market participation. The effects are more pronounced in high‐income, high‐education, high‐population‐density groups and during the bull market period.     

Open Skies over the Middle East

The dynamism of air traffic markets in the Middle East obscures the persistence of restrictions on international competition. But how important are such restrictions for passenger traffic? This paper uses detailed data on worldwide passenger aviation to estimate the effect of air transport policy on international air traffic. The policy variable is a quantitative measure of the commitments under international agreements. The paper analyses, for the first time, not only bilateral agreements, but also plurilateral agreements such as the one among Arab states. The analysis finds that more liberal policy is associated with greater passenger traffic between countries. Higher traffic levels appear to be driven by larger numbers of city‐pairs being served, as well as by more passengers travelling along given routes. To demonstrate the quantitative implication of the estimates, two liberalisation scenarios in the Middle East are evaluated. Deepening the plurilateral agreement among Arab states would lead to a 30 per cent increase in intraregional passenger traffic. Widening the agreement to include Turkey would generate significantly larger gains because current policy vis‐à‐vis Turkey is much more restrictive.     

Population Pessimism and Economic Optimism in the Asian Giants

The timing of China’s and India’s demographic transitions and the implications of alternative fertility scenarios are explored here using a global economic model incorporating full demographic behaviour and measures of dependency that accurately reflect the changing proportion of workers, rather than working‐aged, in the total population. The baseline scenario confirms that demographic change in India may yield significant gains to future real per capita income, resulting from a continuing sharp decline in its total dependency ratio. For China, these gains are largely in the past, although the positive contribution of declining youth and working‐aged dependency to future per capita income will continue to offset the negative impact of rising aged dependency through to 2030. Whilst a policy change to foster higher fertility rates and hence more rapid population growth in China might ultimately ease its dependency burden, in the short run it will increase it. In any case, such a course is contradictory to the goal of delivering improvements in real per capita income. For India, we confirm that the benefits of further fertility reductions, in the form of increased real per capita income, are substantial.     

Changing consumption patterns in rural Bangladesh

Bangladesh is one of the most densely populated countries in the world. Despite rapid urbanization, more than 75% of the people still live in rural areas. The density of the rural population is also one of the highest in the world. Being a poor and low‐income country, however, Bangladesh's main challenge is to eradicate poverty by increasing equitable income. The gross domestic product of Bangladesh is growing steadily, and the country has outperformed many low‐income countries in terms of several social indicators. Bangladesh has achieved the Millennium Development Goal of eliminating gender disparity in primary and secondary school enrolment. A sharp decline in child and infant mortality rates, increased per capita income, and improved food security have placed Bangladesh on the track to achieving the status of a middle‐income country in the near future. All these developments have influenced the consumption patterns of the country. This study explored the consumption scenario of rural Bangladesh. Data were collected through direct observations and semi‐structured interviews. Information regarding the consumption of food, clothing, housing, education and medical facilities were collected, and qualitative methods were applied to the data analysis. The findings of this study suggested that the consumption patterns of rural Bangladeshis are changing over time along with economic and social development.     

On Income Convergence among China,Hong Kong and Macau

Hong Kong and Macau were reunited with China in the late 1990s as two special administrative regions (SARs). Over the last half century, they were China's good examples of economic development, windows of openness and investors. Owing to historical reasons, China lagged far behind Hong Kong and Macau in terms of per capita incomes. However, rapid economic growth in China over the last three decades must have brought about a significant convergence of the three economies. China's economic success has benefited from the integration of its two SARs and the coastal provinces, especially Guangdong, in terms of technological spillover, massive investment and trade. The economic trickledown, direct investment and trade must have been important drivers of economic integration and income convergence. This paper aims to analyse the trend and studies the determinants of income convergence between China and its two SARs. Both parametric and non‐parametric techniques are employed to quantify the pace of convergence on per capita incomes in Hong Kong, Macau and the Chinese provinces over a period of more than 40 years. We find no evidence of convergence in the pre‐reform period, but strong evidence of both absolute and conditional β‐convergence in the post‐reform period. Over the reform period, the pace of convergence is less than 1 per cent per annum without controlling for trade and more than 2 per cent conditional on trade.