Introduction to the Special Issue on Jobs and the Future of the US Economy

This special issue of the Review presents selected and revised papers from the October 2010 Conference on Jobs and the Future of the US Economy held at Howard University. It includes several bold ??outside the box?? proposals for addressing the endemic conditions of unemployment and racism in the U.S. economy. These include augmented and targeted Keynesiani deficit finance, functional finance, a federal jobs guarantee, industrial policy, realignment of the federal budget, and financing jobs programs with a Tobin tax. Additional papers examine the historical and political experience with the struggle against unemployment. The goal of this special issue of the Review is to help broaden and intensify the national debate over today??s jobs crisis.     

Vietnam's Rice Policy: Recent Reforms and Future Opportunities

The present paper examines the economic consequences of the most recent reform of Vietnam's rice policy, the removal of the rice-export quota. The reform is analyzed in light of domestic policy barriers, such as restrictions on cross-sectoral land mobility, as well as international policy barriers, such as distortions introduced by preferential trade agreements. The analysis expands and amends a global computable general equilibrium model to represent these features. The analysis shows that the export quota has been a very restrictive policy tool that has kept Vietnamese rice production and exports well below potential. Both the domestic and international policy constraints contribute to this situation.     

The Indonesian Environmental Impact Management Agency (Bapedal): Its Role,Development and Future

This paper looks at the setting up and initial growth of the new Indonesian Environmental Impact Management Agency (Bapedal). Coming into being at a crucial time in the development of Indonesia's overall environmental management policy, Bapedal is the first national specialised environmental regulatory body to be established in Indonesia with implementation powers to monitor pollution and the negative impacts of development on the environment. As with any new agency in Indonesia, it has faced some major hurdles in its early development. However its ultimate success as an agency is of crucial importance if Indonesia is going to effectively handle its growing environmental problems over the next decade.     

The Indonesian macroeconomy and the yield curve: A dynamic latent factor approach

We develop a fine representation of the term structure of interest rates in Indonesia and create a link between the yield curve and macroeconomic fundamentals. We construct a state-space representation of the yield curve as a function of three time-varying parameters: level, slope, and curvature factors. The model is then expanded to include three macroeconomic variables: real activity, inflation, and interest rates. We find that the dynamic latent factor model provides a very good fit to characterise the Indonesian yield curve in terms of the statistical properties for each maturity, and in terms of the properties of three latent yield-curve factors. With regards to the relationship to the macroeconomy, we find that there is a large amount of idiosyncratic variation in the yield curve movements. Therefore, macroeconomic variables can only explain small dynamics in the yield curve.     

Indonesian Monetary Policy During the 1997–98 Crisis: A Monetarist Perspective

This paper defends the IMF's strategy of targeting base money (M0) in 1997–98 against the criticism by Grenville (2000) that it was destined to fail because M0 is mainly demand determined and the demand for it was increased by a large and unpredictable amount by the banking panic. Grenville contends that Indonesian monetary policy should have aimed at domestic price stability. It is argued here that the growth of M0 far exceeded what could be justified by last resort lending to accommodate the banking panic, and that rapid inflation could only have been avoided by preventing most of the expansion of the public's cash holding that actually occurred. Achieving a modest target for domestic inflation would not therefore have been very different in practice from setting tight limits on the growth of M0. In contrast, both these policies would have been very different from the loss of control over M0 that actually occurred.     

Indonesian politics in 2010: the perils of stagnation

In the first year after President Yudhoyono's re-election, Indonesian politics continued to evolve in largely familiar patterns. Contrary to the expectations of some observers, Yudhoyono's strong popular mandate and his Democratic Party's newly won parliamentary plurality did not result in significant changes to the president's cautious style of governing or the fickle nature of president–parliament relations. Most political parties also opted for continuity over change, electing or re-electing established figures as leaders despite high levels of public dissatisfaction with their performance. The fact that the 2009 election failed to generate any new momentum for reform does not augur well for the remainder of Yudhoyono's second term. Although the basic parameters of Indonesia's democracy remain intact, political developments during 2010 have also confirmed a pattern of stagnation that is likely to see Indonesia barely muddle through as a reasonably stable yet low-quality democracy.     

对推行经营者股票期权有关问题的思考

股票期权是对我国现行经营者报酬制度的一项补充，是将企业经营者的收益与企业长期发展相结合的有效途径。本文对我国现行经营者报酬制度的弊端和股票期权对经营者的长期激励作用，以及现阶段推行股票期权过程中存在的主要问题作了分析，并提出相应的建议。     

On-Site Effects of Imperata Burning by Indonesian Smallholders: A Bioeconomic Model

Periodic burning of the vast Imperata grassland areas of Indonesia is thought to have a number of negative consequences, both on and off site. We assess on-site biophysical and economic consequences by adapting a bioeconomic model to conditions prevalent in the Indonesian uplands. Burning is shown to exacerbate soil degradation both directly through loss of soil nutrients and indirectly through erosion. Despite this, it is demonstrated that burning is the most profitable method of Imperata control in an upland ‘shifting cultivation’ system Changing factor prices may alter this A 25% reduction in herbicide prices would make herbicide use more attractive than burning. If off-site costs are considered, Imperata control with herbicide may be preferable to burning.

Upland cropping within an Imperata fallow system is marginally profitable under prevailing economic and biophysical conditions Abandonment of these upland areas by smallholders, or adoption of more productive farming systems, seems inevitable.     

证券发行核准制与注册制的比较分析

证券发行审核制度是各国对证券发行实行监督管理的最重要内容之一,其目的在于防止不良证券进入市场,保护投资者利益,并保持证券市场运行的高质、高效.而注册制和核准制是证券发行审核制度的两种最主要的方式,因此,深入分析研究两者的内涵、区别及适用性对证券市场的稳定和发展极具重要意义.     

二元经济转换:实物模型与货币模型

二元经济是发展经济学研究的一个主题。本文首先评述了经典的二元经济模型：刘易斯一费景汉一拉尼斯模型和乔根森模型，指出它们的逻辑矛盾出自于古典假设和新古典方法的冲突，同时都是一种关于实物经济的模型，本文称之为“实物模型”；借鉴国民核算体系的统计方法，本文从宏观角度提出一种二元经济转换的货币模型和货币量值的生产函数，讨论有效需求与二元经济转换的关系，最后对中国的数据做了实证检验。     

世贸组织和多边贸易体系:现存的问题和未来的构架

多边贸易体系正处在十字路口 世界贸易组织和多边贸易体系正处于十字路口.世界贸易组织在多哈会议前以及多哈会议上所做出的决定都将对这个贸易体系未来的走势产生重要的影响.     

Deployment of Indonesian migrants in the Middle East: present situation and prospects

"This paper examines the Indonesian overseas employment program. It is limited to overseas deployment through the official channels, i.e. organised by licensed labour suppliers and approved by government authorities. The main destination of this official labour migration is the Middle East. Indonesian officials have indicated that the government aims to increase overseas employment and to shift deployment from houseworkers to better skilled workers. It is argued in the paper that, in view of a shrinking labour market for migrants, even limited realisation of these hopes would depend upon some distinct changes in the overseas employment program."     

Indonesian politics in 2012: coalitions,accountability and the future of democracy

Indonesia is a successful but flawed democracy: while the electoral process has worked well, the quality of democratic governance is less encouraging. Missing from the equation between elections and democracy is political accountability. Parties’ obsession with coalition building as a route to political power has made it difficult for voters to attribute success or failure to elected officials. Coalition government allows politicians to send contradictory messages, and in 2012 religious minorities – which are neither banned nor protected – have paid a heavy price for the lack of accountability and leadership. In Jakarta an outsider, Joko Widodo, won the gubernatorial election despite facing an incumbent backed by a broad coalition. His victory illustrates that coalition building does not guarantee success, and that the electorate is mature enough not to be swayed by appeals to religious and ethnic sentiment. This gives heart to those hoping to strengthen democracy and democratic values in Indonesia.     

Long-term Evolution of Productivity in a Sample of Philippine Rice Farms: Implications for Sustainability and Future Research

We investigate long-term productivity trends in a representative intensive rice cropping system using periodic farm level survey data spanning more than 20 years of the Green Revolution in two rice bowls of the Philippines. Estimation of production functions with year dummy variables shows substantial declines in productivity from the early 1980s to the mid-1990s. Examination of secondary data shows, however, that the survey years were unrepresentative of long-term trends and were unduly influenced by exogenous yield shocks. Correction for these effects removes the productivity decline, but shows that productivity has stagnated. A renewed emphasis on increasing crop genetic yield potential may be necessary in order to improve productivity and restore the contribution of this important farming system to poverty alleviation.     

美国对外负债的可持续性与国际货币体系的未来

要回归到某种形式的固定汇率制度,需要对国际资本流动进行全面且国际性的管制,乃至各国放弃管理货币制度下行使的金融主权。从经济、政治和政策上考虑,这两种要求都无法实现。欧元、日元、人民币甚至把合成货币(SDR)都考虑在内,也难以想像在可以预测的未来(21世纪中叶为止)能够出现替代美元的货币。美国的对外资产和负债之间有正的投资回报差额,这一差额在长期内将一直存在。只要这种回报差额持续存在,并且对外资产和负债占GDP的比率能够按照一定的速度扩大,那么即便美国的贸易收支逆差占GDP的比率维持在4%左右,其对外纯负债占GDP的比重维持稳定状态的可能性也是很大的。因此,以美元为中心的、由多数主要货币构成的现行浮动汇率制度具有很强的可持续性,以至于完全有可能在今后继续存在。     

Price Rigidity and Industrial Concentration: Evidence from the Indonesian Food and Beverages Industry

This paper investigates the relationship between industrial concentration and price rigidity in the Indonesian food and beverages industry. A Cournot model of firm behavior is used in which prices adjust according to a partial adjustment mechanism. The model is applied to panel data of the Indonesian food and beverages industry over the period 1995–2006. The results suggest that industrial concentration has a positive effect on percentage price changes. Furthermore, the speed of price adjustment is higher when the per unit cost of production rises.