Total factor productivity and macroeconomic instability

Total factor productivity (TFP) is an important component of growth for most countries. This article assesses the role of macroeconomic instability on TFP growth. We consider volatility in inflation, openness of an economy and financial market deepness as measures of macroeconomic instability. Empirical evidence provided from Turkey suggests that volatility of openness and financial market deepness reduce TFP growth, whereas volatility of inflation increases TFP growth.     

The exchange regime and trade balance in Turkey

Over the last 15 years, high trade deficits have become a source of external vulnerability for the relatively stabilized Turkish economy. This corresponds to the period where authorities have been following a floating exchange rate regime. Thus, this study aims to empirically show whether the adopted exchange rate regime has an impact on the trade balance for the period of 1987 Q1 to 2015 Q2. Estimation results indicate that there is a long-run relationship between the real effective exchange rate and trade balance under both fixed and floating regimes in Turkey, but there is no evidence for the J-curve hypothesis.     

OECD’s interim economic outlook,March 2017

The OECD’s overall projection for the global economy is for a modest pick-up in global growth. The bad news is that this remains too slow to make good on commitments and expectations, and has fragile foundations of sluggish productivity growth and rising inequalities. Further, a range of financial vulnerabilities have built up, and there is the threat of rising trade protectionism. To grow the global economy and share the prosperity, we need to introduce fiscal initiatives using the fiscal space gained by low or negative interest rates. These combined fiscal-and-structural initiatives to boost inclusive growth can support demand in the near term but also will address medium-term supply issues.     

固定汇率制度与浮动汇率制度下经济的自动稳定性

本文运用规范的开放宏观模型和比较静态分析方法,讨论了固定汇率制度或浮动汇率制度下、如果没有政策的干预,面对真实或名义瞬时冲击时的产出和物价的自动稳定性。分析表明,两种汇率制度下经济稳定表现与经济系统的结构参数有密切的关系,没有一个汇率制度在所有情形下都表现得最好。但对特定的发展中国家经济结构特征和外生冲击来源的可能性来说,相对于浮动汇率制度,固定汇率制度更利于经济的自动稳定。     

Formal Employment and Informal Work in Household Services

This article discusses whether employment increases are likely in household services. The conclusion is that until recently, employment increased due to a shift of service work from households to the formal economy (especially the public sector). The growing number of childless or single parent households means a growing demand for services from the formal economy. Still, it seems likely that the service employment growth will slow down and be substituted by work in the informal economy, due to the cost increases in the formal economy connected with low productivity growth in service activities.     

Portfolio autarky: A welfare analysis

A variant of the standard Heckscher-Ohlin model, a model of a two-country world economy populated by Samuelsonian overlapping generations, is presented and then used in a welfare analysis of two international economic policy regimes: A laissez-faire regime, characterized by free trade in goods and complete freedom of portfolio choice; and a portfolio autarky regime, characterized by free trade in goods and a prohibition, applicable world-wide, on the ownership of foreign assets (land). Using a ‘growth model’ version of the traditional welfare criterion, it is shown that the laissez-faire regime is optimal and that the portfolio autarky regime is not.     

Competition,agency and productivity

This article tests a set of hypotheses relating to agency and Schumpeterian views on how competition affects performance. A survey data set of Australian workplaces is used, with the change in labour productivity as the dependent variable. The results show strong support for the idea that intense competition raises productivity growth in managerial workplaces, but not in non‐managerial workplaces (i.e. where the principal owner also works). Testing the agency theories in more detail, we find no evidence that the number of competitors, the price elasticity of demand or a proxy for bankruptcy (pre‐tax losses) are the mechanisms behind the process. For non‐managerial workplaces the results indicate support for the idea that greater demand uncertainty reduces productivity growth. In contrast, for managerial workplaces, greater demand uncertainty tends to raise productivity growth.     

我国税收政策对经济增长的非线性效应研究——基于总量与结构效应双重视角的实证分析

全面分析与科学把握我国税收政策方向与节奏不仅事关政府宏观调控与驾驭经济能力的提升,更是实现有质量、有效益、可持续经济增长的关键。文章首先基于创新驱动经济增长的内生增长模型构建税收对经济增长影响的理论分析框架,然后采用MS-VAR模型与利用中国季度数据,从总量与结构双重视角实证考察我国税收政策对经济增长的影响,结果发现：一是当处于区制1时,无论是税收的总量抑或结构效应,均表现出非凯恩斯主义特征,但并不显著;二是当位于区制2时,税收对经济增长的总量影响表现为凯恩斯效应,而商品税与所得税对经济增长的影响存在显著差异。其中商品税与经济增长正相关,所得税与经济增长负相关。另外无论是税收的总量效应抑或结构效应,在继续维持各自区制内的稳定性方面表现都非常强,从一个区制向另一个区制发生转换的概率非常小。文章研究结论对于创新政府宏观调控方式与增强税收政策调控的前瞻性、针对性与有效性具有非常重要的理论与实际意义。     

Demand‐led growth with endogenous innovation

This paper contributes to the recent macro‐dynamics literature on demand‐led growth, drawing upon the seminal idea that the implications of Harrodian instability may be tamed by a source of autonomous expenditure in the economy. Contrary to the other contributions in this literature, real autonomous expenditure is not growing at an exogenously given rate, and partly consists of a flow of profit‐seeking R&D and innovation expenditures raising labour productivity through time. If the state of distribution, hence the wage share, is exogenously fixed and constant, the model gives rise to dynamics in a two dimensional state space, that may converge to, or give rise to a limit cycle around, an endogenous growth path. An exogenous rise of the profit share exerts negative effects on long‐run growth and employment, showing that growth is wage led.     

Telecommunications Policy Reform in Turkey

This paper, considering the economic effects of liberalisation in the telecommunications sector on the Turkish economy, makes use of the empirical studies on the linkages between regulatory regimes and telecommunications prices. Since Turkey is trying to liberalise the telecommunications sector by following the EU approach to liberalisation, the paper considers briefly the regulatory regimes in the telecommunications sectors of the EU and Turkey, determines the ad valorem equivalent of barriers to the telecommunications services sector in Turkey, and derives estimates of the welfare effects of adopting the EU rules and regulations in the Turkish telecommunications sector. It shows that there is tremendous scope for Turkey to benefit from adopting and implementing the legislative, regulatory and institutional framework of the EU telecommunications sector.     

Inflation and Output Growth Dynamics in South Africa: Evidence from the Markov Switching Vector Autoregressive Model

This paper introduces the possibility of asymmetry in the reaction of output growth to inflation shocks in South Africa by making use of the Markov-switching vector autoregressive model. Using quarterly data from 1969Q1 to 2013Q4, the empirical finding suggests that the reaction of output growth to inflation shocks is not only regime dependent but is also contingent on how the monetary authority reacts to such shocks. Two important regimes are identified; the high and low inflation volatility regimes. Consistent with the signal extraction theory, the output effect of inflation shocks is found to be significantly lower in the high inflation volatility regime compared to the low inflation regime.     

Fertility,intergenerational transfers and economic development

This paper develops a model of endogenous growth where agents are altruistic and value both the utilities of their parent and of their children. Individuals endogenously choose the number of their children, and arbitrate between financing education, leaving them some bequest and offering some gift to their parents. We establish the existence of three types of long run regime. Starting from a low level of human capital, an economy converges towards a stationary state associated with a constant output per worker, a high level of fertility and ascendant transfers. If the initial level of human capital is not too low, another stationary state jointly exists with a lower level of fertility and no transfer. Finally, starting from a high level of human capital, the economy experiences a steady growth of output per worker associated with a low fertility level and descendant transfers. We then assume that an economy is initially in the stationary underdevelopment regime with ascendant transfers, and we study the power of different policies to push the economy toward the growth regime. We successively consider a fertility control policy, an education subsidies policy, and the introduction of a pension system for the elderly.     

Cyclical dynamics in a Kaleckian model with demand and distribution regimes and endogenous natural output

We analyse the interaction of demand and income distribution in a dynamic Kaleckian model with endogenous natural output. Endogenous changes of the natural output level to changes in the demand-determined actual output level have featured prominently in discussions of hysteresis after the crisis of 2008. We consider wage-led and profit-led demand (PLD) regimes and goods market-led and labour market-led income distribution regimes. The stability of the steady state is related to the endogeneity of natural output level in certain regimes. Limit cycles arise when the strong flexibility of prices or wages to the output gap is combined with moderate natural output hysteresis. A Kaleckian model with a wage-led demand regime and anticyclical profit share is less unstable and pseudo-Goodwin cycles can arise in the PLD regime with a procyclical profit share.     

Wage-led versus profit-led demand: A comprehensive empirical analysis

This study investigates various economic factors’ impact in determining the relationship between functional income distribution and aggregate demand from both a theoretical and an empirical viewpoint. We base our analysis on a demand-driven growth model for an open economy that allows for either profit-led or wage-led regimes. Our results strongly indicate that a higher level of trade openness is associated with a lower probability of being wage-led. We find evidence that lower wage inequality makes an economy more wage-led and that countries with a greater private credit-to-gross domestic product (GDP) ratio are more likely to be profit-led.     

‘BAUMOL'S DISEASE’, PRODUCTION EXTERNALITIES AND PRODUCTIVITY EFFECTS OF INTERSECTORAL TRANSFERS

This paper presents a model that introduces in an unbalanced growth framework à la Baumol the hypothesis of an endogenous productivity growth due to a positive externality of the service sector on manufacturing productivity and a learning‐by‐doing process inside both sectors. The model shows that a policy aimed at keeping the ratio between outputs in the two sectors constant in real terms may improve the aggregate productivity performance of the economy, depending on the parameters' values. Then the model derives the dynamics of the intersectoral transfer which is necessary to keep the ratio between outputs constant, and verifies that the amount of the transfer turns out to be always lower than the output of the manufacturing sector, and only asymptotically approaches it.     

Antecedents of firm performance in emerging economies: Business groups,strategy, industry structure,and state support

A rich literature has investigated the antecedents of firm performance in developed economies, resulting in a consensus view that firm resources and strategy are the key determinants. Several arguments, however, suggest that in emerging economies other factors are more important for firm performance. This study analyzes the impact of firm strategy and industry structure as well as business group membership and state support on firm performance in an advanced emerging economy, Turkey. Using a data set compiled from a selection of the 1000 largest manufacturing firms in this country, the study employs several regression models to identify the main determinants of firm performance as measured by productivity and net profit margin. In contrast to studies of developed economies, the investigation finds that firm-related factors (competitive strategies) do not significantly influence performance; instead factors related to industry structure and business group membership are the strongest determinants of firm performance; further, state support interacts with business group membership and is positively related to productivity.     

我国财政政策非线性效应的理论探讨与检验

财政政策的非线性效应,是指财政政策不仅具有凯恩斯效应,还具有非凯恩斯效应。实证研究表明中国的财政政策存在显著的非线性效应:在短缺经济结束之前的1979—1982年、1987—1990年和1994—1995年,财政政策具有非凯恩斯效应;1996—2006年,经济开始受到有效需求不足的困扰,财政政策具有显著的凯恩斯效应;财政初始条件和财政调整幅度等主体预期因素不是财政政策非线性效应产生的必然原因。     

International Competition and Distributive Class Conflict in an Open Economy Kaleckian Model

This paper constructs an open economy Kaleckian model in which international competition affects the bargaining process between firms and workers, and investigates the effects of such bargaining on the macroeconomy. We show that the effects of a change in the bargaining power on aggregate demand depends not only on the demand regimes but also on which agents bears more of the burden arising from the international price competition. Moreover, if the real exchange rate has a small impact on the trade balance, the economy is stable, whereas if it has a larger impact on the trade balance, the economy is unstable.     

Deforestation,foreign demand and export dynamics in Indonesia

This paper presents a dynamic, heterogeneous firm model of investment in environmental abatement and exporting. The model highlights the interaction between firms' environmental investment and export decisions on the evolution of productivity and export demand in timber manufacturing industries. The model is structurally estimated using Indonesian timber manufacturing data that captures firm-level variation in environmental investment and export behavior. The results suggest that environmental abatement has little impact on productivity dynamics, but does encourage growth in export demand. Counterfactual experiments quantify the impact of policy change on trade and abatement decisions.