Income transfers of Chinese rural migrants: some empirical evidence from Jinan

This paper explores the determinants of migrant remittances to rural households using data on male migrant workers drawn from the Jinan Municipality in Shandong province in the summer of 1995. The majority of migrants are found to retain close links with their rural households with 85%?remitting some income in the 12 months preceding the survey date. The transfers accounted for over a third of urban labour earnings. A number of models are used to undertake the estimation of remittance functions. No evidence of altruistic behaviour is uncovered and evidence for exchange and coinsurance theories is mixed. Labour earnings proved the most robust determinant of the level of remittance and the remittance/wage elasticity calculated is found to be at the top end of the range of estimates obtained in the literature.     

Income inequality in China: causes and policy responses

The phenomenal economic growth in China has been accompanied by a rapid increase in income inequality. This paper reviews the historical trends and patterns of income inequality in China, discusses the potential causes underlying rising income inequality, and applies the functional distribution of income approach in understanding China’s income inequality. This analytical approach highlights how rising return to capital relative to wage incomes can be an important source for increasing income inequality in China. The paper provides the evidence which shows that the rapid economic growth in China has been relying on a model that pays high returns to various kinds of capital including financial capital and real estate, while the ownership of capital is very unequal. This finding prompts us to rethink about the causes of China’s income inequality and to formulate appropriate policies based on the new way of understanding this pressing issue of income distribution in China.     

Federal transfers, environmental policy and economic growth

We study the effects of commonly used cross-country transfer programs on uncoordinated national environmental policies, economic growth and natural resources in a federal economy. Natural resources are a federation-wide public good. In each member country, production degrades the environment, but clean-up policy can improve it. Clean-up policy is financed by taxes on polluting firms’ output and cross-country redistributive transfers. We solve for a symmetric Nash equilibrium among national governments. Transfer policies that lead to higher pollution taxes make existence harder, and are harmful not only to growth but also to the environment. The best way to improve environmental quality is to implement a taxation system that stimulates growth and broadens tax bases to finance national clean-up policies.     

Welfare change and the elimination of the shortage economy in Russia: some representative-household results1

The welfare consequences of eliminating the shortage economy for the representative Russian household are quantitatively assessed. Before price liberalization, households either bought goods and services at state prices and paid searching and queuing costs, or they bought on parallel markets at higher monetary prices. An equation is derived that permits empirical evaluation of the extent to which welfare gains from eliminating searching and queuing costs offset welfare losses from falling real consumption. Available data suggest that when regime change was initiated in Russia in 1992, welfare gains from eliminating shortage were substantial and may have completely offset welfare losses from falling real consumption.     

收入分配的首要问题:差距过大还是分配不公

目前我国的收入分配问题包括收入差距过大和收入分配不公两个方面,收入差距过大不等于收入分配不公;收入分配的首要问题不是收入差距过大,而是收入分配不公;当务之急是采取切实可行的有效措施,重点解决好目前令人担忧的收入分配不公的问题,把我国的收入差距控制在合理适度的范围之内。     

Intergenerational transfers,demographic transition,and altruism: Problems in developing Asia

This paper develops a three‐period overlapping‐generations model where middle‐aged agents care about not only their own lifetime utility but also their old parents' and children's well‐being. The doubly altruistic agents choose amounts of intergenerational transfers to their old parents and children as well as private savings. The government specifies amounts of public transfers from working adults to the dependents. The model also takes the effects of demographic transition on the burdens of supporting the elderly and children into account. Using 23 countries' data from the National Transfer Accounts (NTA ), we estimate the degrees of filial and parental altruism and adjust them for their respective life expectancy and fertility rates. The findings suggest that people in developing countries are more parentally altruistic than those in developed ones while the adjusted degree of filial altruism tends to be low in developing Asia. Our welfare analyses reveal that the developing Asian countries must introduce more comprehensive public welfare programs for the elderly to maximize social welfare. Moreover, their low adjusted degree of filial altruism may trap the developing Asian countries at the low levels of public old‐age support and social welfare as the further demographic transition ensues.     

Income tax policy and lifetime labor supply

A progressive income tax structure provides incentives for individuals to alter their rate of work and their age of retirement. Compared to a zero tax or proportional tax equilibrium, progressive taxation induces individuals to take less leisure in the form of retirement in exchange for more leisure during the worklife, especially at high wage levels. The imposition of a special pension tax provision on top of a progressive tax structure offsets the distortion on leisure alternatives imposed by progressivity. Indeed, the pension tax deferral provision can neutralize the impact of tax progressivity on the work profile over life. The magnitude of these tax inducements in the U.S. tax structure are non-trivial and therefore are expected to alter labor supply decisions over the lifetime. The model finds empirical support using data from the Social Security Newly Entitled Beneficiaries Survey.     

市场化收入差距:变化机理与政策含义

本文从微观角度讨论了市场经济内生的导致收入分配差距扩大的机理,在些基础上分析了市场化收入分配差距变化的若干特点,考察了“倒U型曲线”假说与比较优势理论和科学性内涵和局限性,并提出了若干政策建议。     

企业所得税征管:问题与对策

我国企业所得税征管环节存在不少亟待解决的问题,如税源监控不到位,服务意识待提高;汇算清缴制度不规范;纳税评估流于形式等.因此,应对纳税人科学分类,加强日常监控;核实税基;优化服务以降低纳税成本;规范企业所得税征管环节的各项管理;强化纳税评估,提高信息化程度,为企业营造出公平的纳税环境.     

农民的增收问题及其出路

资金短缺及其农村正规金融机构的缺失制约了农民的投资选择,因而也扭曲了农村的投资结构及其产业结构,而正是这种比例失衡的产业结构导致了家庭经营纯收入的低增长。本文认为,家庭之间通过生产、加工、销售和购买等环节的专业化合作,成立服务于农户家庭的纵向一体化或横向一体化组织,将有助于提高农户家庭的信用,从而鼓励正规金融机构进入农村市场,推动农村金融市场的逐步完善,继而缓解农民的流动性约束,优化农村的投资结构,实现农民家庭经营纯收入的增长。     

Income distribution,fiscal policy,and delays in stabilization

This paper presents an explanation of the cycles of large fiscal expansions and macroeconomic stabilizations that are frequently observed in developing countries. In the model, different coalitions form and change depending on the position of three groups over the degree of redistribution and the timing of debt repayment. I show that seemingly unsustainable fiscal policies arise from a coalition of the poor and the rich when the distribution of income is highly unequal. When income is distributed more equally, instead, the patterns of fiscal policy and of the trade balance are consistent with the standard predictions of representative agent models. These features of the model seem consistent with available empirical evidence.     

Housing demand in Russia: Rationing and reform1

In a number of articles Alexeev (1988a) and (1988b) shows that in the former Soviet Union the administrative rationing of housing was partially replaced by market forces acting through the second economy. This paper uses a much richer dataset to update his analysis for Russia to consider housing demand in 1992, the last year of the administrative allocation system. Almost immediately after the survey used for this analysis Russia began to privatize the housing stock as part of its movement towards a market economy. The questions we ask are: Were households really able to beat the system, as argued by Alexeev and, if so, were they still able to do so in 1992? Our answer to the second question is that in 1992 households were not able to beat the system. Income had no observable effect on housing demand. Furthermore, we do not think that the difference in our empirical results and Alexeev's is due only to the broader economic changes that occurred since his estimation or the richer dataset available to us. Indeed, our answer to the first question is that there are good reasons for arguing that Alexeev's estimates of the income elasticity of housing demand are biased upwards.     

Macroprudential policy and the inward transmission of monetary policy: The case of Chile,Mexico, and Russia

This paper studies whether domestic macroprudential policy may attenuate the inward transmission of monetary policy shocks from the United States to domestic bank lending growth in three emerging market economies—Chile, Mexico, and Russia. Identification relies on banks’ heterogeneous exposure to prudential policies and the fact that foreign monetary policy shocks are exogenous from the perspective of these economies. After analyzing the effects of the aggregate domestic prudential policy stance, we focus on specific prudential policies targeting mortgage and consumer loans, as well as foreign‐currency deposits. Although our overall results are mixed, we find evidence that the strength of international monetary policy spillovers varies depending on the stance of domestic macroprudential policy. In particular, a tighter reserve requirement stance over foreign‐currency deposits in Chile dampens the effect of an international monetary policy shock on domestic local‐currency lending, but reinforces that on foreign‐currency lending, whereas in Russia, it dampens the effect on both local‐currency and foreign‐currency lending, although to different degrees. Prudential policies targeting the asset side of banks’ balance sheets, such as mortgage loans or consumer credit, are found to amplify international monetary policy spillovers in some cases and attenuate it in others, depending on the country context.     

Monetary policy rules and directions of causality: A test for the euro area

Abstract

Using a VAR model in first differences with quarterly data for the euro zone, the study aims to ascertain whether decisions on monetary policy can be interpreted in terms of a “monetary policy rule” with specific reference to the so-called nominal GDP targeting rule (Hall and Mankiw, 1994 Granger, C.W.J. “Investigating Causal Relations by Econometric Models and Cross-Spectral Methods.” Econometrica, 1969, 37 (3), 424–438.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; McCallum, 1988 McCallum, B. “Nominal GDP Targeting”, Shadow Open Market Committee, October 21, 2011. [Google Scholar]; Woodford, 2012 Taylor, J.B., Williams, J.C. “Simple and Robust Rules for Monetary Policy”, NBER Working Paper No. 15908, April, 2010. [Google Scholar]). The results obtained indicate a causal relation proceeding from deviation between the growth rates of nominal gross domestic product (GDP) and target GDP to variation in the three-month market interest rate. The same analyses do not, however, appear to confirm the existence of a significant inverse causal relation from variation in the market interest rate to deviation between the nominal and target GDP growth rates. Similar results were obtained on replacing the market interest rate with the European Central Bank refinancing interest rate. This confirmation of only one of the two directions of causality does not support an interpretation of monetary policy based on the nominal GDP targeting rule and gives rise to doubt in more general terms as to the applicability of the Taylor rule and all the conventional rules of monetary policy to the case in question. The results appear instead to be more in line with other possible approaches, such as those based on post Keynesian analyses of monetary theory and policy and more specifically the so-called solvency rule (Brancaccio and Fontana, 2013 ———. Macroeconomics, 2nd ed., Pearson Education Company, ch. 30. [Google Scholar], 2015 Brancaccio, E. The Central Banker as “Regulator” of Conflict. In G. Fontana and M. Setterfield (eds.), Macroeconomic Theory and Macroeconomic Pedagogy. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, 295–308.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]). These lines of research challenge the simplistic argument that the scope of monetary policy consists in the stabilization of inflation, real GDP, or nominal income around a “natural equilibrium” level. Rather, they suggest that central banks actually follow a more complex purpose, which is the political regulation of the financial system with particular reference to the relations between creditors and debtors and the related solvency of economic units.     

Monetary policy design in the european union: Problems and possibilities

The main goal of this paper is to estimate if the money supply and interest rate in the various European Union countries are exogenous or endogenous. This analysis turns is essential since, if both variables happened to be endogenous, the search for another variable to be used as a proximate target could be tried. Some authors have suggested that the exchange rate is likely to be that variable.     

Trade,aid and migrations: some basic policy issues

The link between trade policy and international migration is explored using data from the United States and Europe. "We conclude that restrictive trade policies in industrialised countries have most likely added to migration pressures. We then turn to the broader question of the effects of income growth in the sending countries on the propensity to migrate. We argue that, in relatively poor countries, an increase in income will be associated with higher migration flows. For middle income countries, however, income growth will lead to lower migrations. In the medium run, therefore, the relationship between development levels, as measured by GDP per capita, and the propensity to migrate follows an inverse-U pattern. Econometric analysis of aggregate migration flows from Southern Europe provides considerable support for such conjecture."