Valuing environmental and health risk in agriculture: A choice experiment approach to pesticides in Italy

The widespread use of pesticides in agriculture shows a complex ramification of multiple negative externalities, ranging from food safety-related effects to the deterioration of farmland ecosystems. Recent research has demonstrated that the assessment of the economic implications of such negative processes is fraught with many uncertainties. This paper presents the results of an empirical study recently conducted in Northern Italy aimed at estimating the economic value of reducing the wide-ranging impacts of pesticide use, by deploying a Choice Experiment approach. The experimental design provides a meaningful tool to assign monetary values to the negative environmental effects associated with agrochemicals use. In this connection, the paper addresses in particular the reduction of farmland biodiversity, groundwater contamination and harm to human health. The resulting estimates confirm that, on average, respondents demonstrate a substantial willingness-to-pay a premium for agricultural goods (in particular, foodstuffs) produced in environmentally-benign ways.     

A comprehensive analysis of farmland value determination: a county-level analysis

This study develops a comprehensive model of farmland value determination to analyze the effects of various economic variables such as net farm income, government payments, macroeconomic factors, and demographic conditions on farmland values for the counties along the Snake River valley in Idaho. Land values, net farm income, and population show considerable variation among the counties. Therefore, use of county level cross-sectional and time-series data helps to assess the impacts of various factors on land values more accurately. The empirical results show that net farm income, wheat yield, population, and credit availability have positive effects, and property tax rates, interest rates, and debt to asset ratio have negative effects on farmland values.     

Corruption and growth in Africa

A major concern in the development of African economies is the impact of corruption on economic growth and while there is general agreement on its detrimental effects, there is considerable debate over its nature and importance. In particular there is little work on the interaction between corruption, government expenditures and how this influences economic growth in countries in the region. This paper takes an endogenous growth model, extends it to include different categories of government spending and then introduces the possibility of corruption, which is allowed to have different effects on each of the categories. The results confirm the negative effect of corruption and military spending, but also show that corruption interacts with military burden, through indirect and complementary effects, to further increase its negative effect. The policy implications are that the effects of corruption on economic growth are worse than was thought in countries which have high military burdens.     

湛江市农地利用绩效与农业结构调整

文章分析了湛江市农地利用现状,从农地利用效率、农地利用集约度和农地利用效益只个方面选取20个因子建立了农地利用绩效评价指标体系,计算了湛江市1996-2006年的农地利用绩效指数,并与农地结构和农业种植结构进行了相关性分析.结果表明:湛江市农地利用效率、利用集约度和利用效益都有不同程度的提高,农地利用绩效呈明显增长态势,绩效指数从0.4439增长到0.8640;农地利用绩效与农地利用结构以及农业种植结构密切相关.文章最后提出了农业结构调整和提高农地利用绩效的对策.     

城市化与耕地资源的协调性研究--以江苏省为例的实证分析

研究城市化与耕地资源的协调问题,对于在快速城市化的进程中缓解资源的退化问题具有重要的意义。本文首 先借鉴经济与环境的协调度模型测算江苏城市化与耕地资源的协调度,并对其时序特征进行了简要的分析。然后,结合江苏 的经济发展状况对城市化与耕地资源协调度与经济发展间的关系作深层分析,并运用江苏省1979～2000年的统计数据估计 了协调度与经济发展间的数量关系模型。最后,得出了相应的研究结论和政策启示,即城市化与耕地资源的有效协调必须以 土地利用方式的转变和整理开发为保障。     

Learning by doing,organizational forgetting,and the business cycle

This paper supplements a learning-by-doing real business cycle model with endogenous organizational forgetting. Empirical evidence shows that the accumulated experience decay rate is not constant over the business cycle, but that forgetting is a function of economic activity. Learning reinforces the effects of productivity shocks, and organizational forgetting exacerbates their impact and increases their persistence. This is of particular interest when a negative productivity shock hits the economy, as the increasing speed of forgetting aggravates the negative shock and delays recovery.     

An empirical study of income growth and manufacturing industry pollution in New England, 1980-1990

This paper is an empirical examination of how a community's income growth is affected by polluting manufacturing activity. The hypothesis I test is that this activity has two conflicting effects: first, industrial investment encourages economic growth through the creation of employment and other positive economic spillover effects and, second, the associated pollution causes out-migration of residents. I hypothesize that a community that is initially relatively wealthy will experience relatively more out-migration of its higher income residents, who are assumed to have a lower tolerance for pollution. Thus, such communities will grow less in response to such investment compared to its poorer neighbors. Therefore, in my econometric model the marginal effect of pollution on income growth is allowed to vary with initial incomes. I use a unique data set that incorporates Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) and census tract-level data for New England for the years 1980 and 1990. The estimated effect of pollution on growth is negative, on average, and is more negative in initial incomes. In an effort to measure the out-migration effects of pollution, I use a separate measure of toxic pollution. I find that, holding constant total pollution, ‘toxic’ pollution has a more negative effect on growth for wealthier communities. These results are consistent with the above hypotheses.     

Economic policy uncertainty and real output: evidence from the G7 countries

We use economic policy uncertainty index, and impulse response based test to assess the impact of economic policy-related uncertainty on real economic activity. We use monthly data, over the period from 1985:1 to 2015:3, and impulse response functions to investigate how the economies of the G7 countries respond to positive and negative economic policy uncertainty shocks of different magnitudes. We find that economic policy uncertainty is countercyclical, that the effects of uncertainty shocks increase with size and that the responses of real output to positive and negative economic policy uncertainty shocks are country specific. Our research is important for policymaking and in favour of policies that remove economic uncertainty and its negative effects on the economy. We argue that some control over yellow journalism, a transparent tax system and a set of predictable fiscal and monetary policies can minimize the social costs of economic policy uncertainty.     

政府公共资本投资的长期经济增长效应

本文首先建立一个包含政府公共资本投资的两部门内生增长模型,并把公共资本投资分为政府物质资本投资和人力资本投资,从而对公共资本投资的长期经济增长效应进行理论分析。结论是,两种形式的公共资本投资对长期经济增长都可能具有正效应也可能具有负效应,取决于民间经济主体消费跨时替代弹性大小。其次,我们利用向量自回归分析框架,对我国1978—2004年间公共资本投资对长期经济增长的影响作实证分析。结论是,我国两种形式的公共资本投资与经济增长之间存在着长期均衡关系,其中政府公共物质资本投资对长期经济增长的正影响更为显著,而政府公共人力资本投资对长期经济增长的正影响较小,且在短期内不利于经济增长。这一结论对我国今后科学制定财政政策和选择公共投资领域都具有重要意义。     

Oil shocks,US economic uncertainty,and emerging stock markets

This paper investigates the impacts of oil price shocks and US economic uncertainty on emerging equity markets within a structural VAR model. I find that both precautionary oil demand and US economic uncertainty shocks have significant negative effects on emerging stock returns, whereas aggregate demand shocks cause a sustained rise of the returns. In particular, the direct effects of oil shocks on emerging stock returns are amplified by the endogenous response of US economic uncertainty. Variance decomposition analysis shows that oil market fundamentals and US economic uncertainty are an important determinant of emerging equity returns, accounting for 35% and 24% of their long-term variations, respectively. The heterogeneous impacts of structural shocks on individual emerging markets, however, suggest that a well-diversified portfolio can be obtainable.     

Government spending and economic growth in the OECD countries

Using panel data from 1995 to 2011 for 34 OECD countries, we examine the effects of government consumption spending, public social spending, and public investment on economic growth. We use a generalized method of moments estimation technique to solve inconsistency problems with fixed effects and random effects panel estimation. We find that an increase in public social spending has a significant negative effect on subsequent economic growth. Government consumption spending and public investment have no significant effect on subsequent economic growth.     

国际贸易与全要素生产率——基于中国省际面板数据的门槛回归分析

利用中国30个省际区域1998年至2012年的数据,采用门槛回归分析方法检验国际贸易对全要素生产率影响的门槛效应,结果发现正门槛效应的存在,即对于经济不发达地区,国际贸易与全要素生产率是显著负相关,随着经济发展水平的提高,这种关系由负转为无影响,然后由无影响转为正影响,正影响又会随着经济发展水平越过一个更高的门槛由小变大。     

The tempest: Short- and long-term consequences of a natural disaster for children׳s development

This paper analyzes the short- and long-run consequences of a natural disaster on children׳s education and health. The particular focus lies on variation in idiosyncratic shocks to households using housing damages caused by a super typhoon as a proxy. Relying on individual panel data and a setting in which typhoons are a relatively rare event, we find negative and persistent effects on children׳s education but no effects on children׳s health. Effects on education are likely driven by a shift in parental investments made to cope with the economic consequences of typhoon damages. Subgroup analysis suggests that results are stronger for girls, children with no older siblings, children from poor families, and families with no strong family or social network.     

Income Shocks,Inequality, and Democracy*

In this paper, motivated by contradictory evidence on the effect of income on democracy, we investigate the hypothesis that it is income shocks – major income fluctuations relative to the trend – rather than marginal year‐on‐year variation in income levels that lead to non‐trivial changes in the quality of political institutions. Empirical results provide support for this hypothesis, and show how income inequality plays a crucial role in the effects of economic shocks on democracy. In particular, negative income shocks reveal a positive effect on democracy in countries with high inequality, and vice versa.     

Public investment and budgetary consolidation in Portugal

In this paper we find that public investment in durable goods has a positive effect on long-term economic performance in Portugal. We also find that these positive effects are not strong enough for public investment to pay for itself in the form of future tax revenues. Therefore, cuts in public investment in durable goods, although costly in terms of long-term economic performance seem to be an effective way of alleviating pressure on the public budget. It is important to note, however, that this general result contrasts sharply with the evidence found in this paper for public investment in equipment, a small component of public investment in durable goods, as well as with evidence elsewhere for public investment in transportation infrastructures. For these, the effects on output are strong enough for public investment to pay for itself. Therefore, cuts in these two types of public investment, would have negative long-term economic effects as well as negative long-term budgetary effects. Clearly, not all public investment is created equal. We would like to thank the editor as well as two anonymous referees for unusually useful comments and suggestions. The usual disclaimers apply.     

Social trust,institutional and political constraints on the executive and deregulation of markets

Social trust is frequently claimed to be conducive for economic reforms. Likewise, the scope of policy liberalization is influenced by the political power structure as manifested in institutional and political constraints on the executive (IPCE). However, social trust and IPCE are possibly intertwined in their effects on economic liberalization. This paper empirically explores the relationship between social trust, IPCE and the scope of economic deregulation as measured by the first difference in the regulation subindex of the Economic Freedom of the World index. The results provide evidence in favor of a positive association of social trust with deregulation and of a negative association between institutional or partisan veto-points and deregulation. Yet, according to our analysis IPCE are an obstacle for economic deregulation only in relatively low trusting environments and social trust unfolds a particular strength as driver of deregulation with increasing levels of IPCE.     

相机抉择政策、经济增长与地区产出波动

本文旨在研究地方政府的相机抉择政策对经济增长和产出波动的实际影响。本文首先从预算软约束和晋升激励的角度分析这一政策的作用方式，然后用模型测度出相机抉择政策，并以2000—2013年的省际面板数据进行实证检验。研究表明，相机抉择的确刺激了地方经济增长，但却带来了明显的产出波动。不过相机抉择政策具有明显的时滞，其真实效果集中凸显在政策实施的两年后。因此，我国应加强公共财政制度的建设，使相机抉择政策在规则的框架下更为合理地使用。     

Internal Quota-Allocation Schemes and the Costs of the Mfa*

This paper suggests that schemes used within developing countries to allocate textile export quota among domestic producers typically have more severe negative effects on developing-country economic performance than the MFA export quotas themselves. We summarize allocation schemes in 16 countries, highlighting common “lock-in” and “rent-dissipation” effects of such schemes. We then use a global general-equilibrium model to evaluate the effects of MFA removal with and without these additional effects. Results indicate that estimates of gains to developing countries from an MFA removal increase sharply when internal quota-allocation schemes are taken into account.     

Stock and credit market expansion and economic development in emerging markets: further evidence utilizing cointegration analysis

This paper empirically investigates the relationship between equity and credit market development and economic growth, in a sample of five very important ‘emerging’ markets. In particular, employing a multivariate time-series methodology to test for long-run trends and causality between variables that proxy for stock market development, credit market development and economic development. The results seem to suggest that equity markets have a role to play only in relatively liberalized economies, like Chile and Mexico. In financially repressed economies, like India, the equity market does not affect real sector growth. Furthermore, the banking crises in the 1980s and 1990s in Chile and Mexico resulted in a negative relation between economic growth and the credit market. In South Korea, equity and credit markets both affect economic growth, but not vice versa. In countries where the nature of the stock market has been speculative, like Taiwan, a negative relationship is detected between equity market development and economic development.     

环境规制竞争对经济增长效率的影响:基于省级面板数据分析

利用1992-2008年中国31个省级面板数据,检验了环境规制竞争对生产率增长及其构成的影响。结果发现,SO2减排对生产率增长及其构成有正向影响,说明SO2的减排竞争将会促进经济增长效率的提高。相反,工业COD减排对生产率增长及其构成存在不利的作用。这种不利影响不是由省际间环境规制竞争引起,而是由废水治理策略不当造成的。这些研究结果似乎表明,环境规制竞争并非是发展地方经济的"良策"。