Do Incomes Policies Restrain Wage Inflation? Some Evidence From Australia,Canada, and the United States*

The purpose of this paper is to reassess the impact of incomes policies on wages in Australia, Canada and the United States. These countries differ in institutional arrangements as well as in the form and timing of incomes policies adopted. Three methods of assessing the effect of incomes policies have been used: the simulation approach, the intercept-shift dummy variable approach, and the rotation approach. The results indicate that incomes policies exhibited considerable diversity in the effectiveness among the three countries. The results also show a consistent restraining influence of labour market variables on wage inflation.     

Profit rate equalization in the U.S. and Europe: An econometric investigation

Although the equality of profit rates has been a key concept in classical as well as neoclassical economics, there are few empirical studies ascertaining to what extent profit rates are equalized or a tendency toward equalization can be observed. Using recently published data, we estimate an econometric model of profit rate convergence for the United States and four European countries. We compare size and significance of interindustry profit rate differentials in Europe and the United States and examine the sensitivity of the results to the definition of the rate of profit and the time period considered.     

Are the budgets of state and local governments destabilizing? A six country comparison

This study uses estimates of the annual impact of changes in state and local government budgets during the period 1955–1965 for six countries: Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States. These, in turn, are compared with the GNP growth rate in order to evaluate the contribution to short-run stabilization.The conclusions are that the year-to-year impact of the state and local sector was substantially smaller than that of the central government; and this is true for countries like Germany and the United States, which have large state-local sectors, as well as for countries like Belgium and France, where the state-local sector is quite small. Also, the impact tends not to vary over the cycle as much as that of central government. Germany was the country where budgetary change made the largest contribution to economic stability, but the effects in all other countries except Belgium were also positive (albeit to a much smaller degree).     

环境污染赔偿责任保险制度可行性基础研究

作为环境污染责任保险之一的环境污染赔偿责任保险在美国、德国等西方发达国家以及巴西、印度等发达国家已趋于完善,并对环境的保护和纠纷的解决发挥了重要作用。然而,由于种种原因,该制度目前在我国只处于政策层面,尚没有上升为法律,在政策的指导之下,地方各自为战开展环境污染责任保险制度,虽然取得了一些成绩,但也存在诸多问题,迫切需要国家立法机关对制度制定统一的法律、法规,因此对其理论基础、实践基础等方面展开深入研究,对于环境污染赔偿责任保险制度的构建具有重要意义。     

基于货币需求的货币替代研究——以台湾为例

台湾曾经是日本的殖民地,且因地理位置的关系,所以日本一直都是台湾的主要贸易国家,以致于长期对台湾货币体系及外汇市场的影响力不亚于美国。然而过去对于台湾货币需求的研究,多半以美国作为主要对象国家来研究。现如今民众可多元地持有国际性资产,单一探讨美国的影响或许不够全面。本文根据1985-2008年的资料,研究美国和日本的货币性冲击对台湾货币需求的影响。首先通过台湾对美、日的贸易比重,编制有效汇率和有效利率,作为衡量来自两国货币性冲击的依据。其次以向量误差修正模型进行分析,找出台湾货币需求的长期均衡关系,发现台湾的货币需求与本国产出、本国利率、美日两国有效利率及有效汇率等存在显著长期均衡关系。简言之,台湾货币体系对来自美国和日本的干扰因素,具有高度的敏感性。     

Spatial contagion in the subprime crisis context: Adjusted correlation versus local correlation approaches

This paper investigates the influence of the spatial dimension on financial contagion in the subprime crisis based on adjusted and local correlation measures. Daily series of stock indexes of American and Asian countries are used from January 1, 2003, to December 30, 2011. We consider two groups of countries: the first group includes the United States and countries that are geographically close: Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, and Canada. The second group includes countries that are geographically distant from the United States: Hong Kong, India, Australia, Indonesia, Malaysia, South Korea, China, and Singapore. The results show that simple and adjusted correlations are not enough to explain the spatial effect of contagion. Using local correlations and polynomial regressions, the results show the existence of spatial contagion between the United States and all countries in the American region. As for countries that are geographically distant from the United States, we prove the existence of spatial contagion between only some groups of countries (United States/India, United States/Australia, United States/Indonesia, United States/Malaysia, United States/China). These results have international diversification, and within-industry implications.     

SOME COMPARISONS OF THE CANADIAN-U.S. INCOME DISTRIBUTIONS

This paper compares the income distribution of Canada and the United States as well as other characteristics of the population such as the labour force and income trends in the two countries in the post-war years. In both countries family income distributions show similar degrees of inequality and similar movements in real incomes through time. However, an examination of Canadian data suggests that differences do exist in underlying patterns. For example, there are greater earnings differentials between skilled and unskilled workers in Canada than in the United States while on the other hand in the United States greater differences exist between family incomes with heads in different age groups than is the case in Canada.     

BILATERAL MARKET STRUCTURES AND REGULATORY POLICIES IN INTERNATIONAL TELEPHONE MARKETS

We develop models of bilateral oligopoly with traffic exchanges to study the competition and regulatory policies in the international telephone markets. Under the requirement of uniform settlement rates, the proportional return rule (PRR) inflates the rates and hence neutralizes PRR's effect on calling prices. Retail competition and PRR increase net settlement payments. Market efficiency is improved when there are multiple channels for traffic exchanges. Using a panel of 47 countries that exchanged traffic with the United States between 1992 and 2004, we test the effects of bilateral market structures and the U.S. policies. The empirical results support our theoretical findings.     

Purchasing power parity and country characteristics: Evidence from panel data tests

We examine long-run purchasing power parity (PPP) using panel data methods to test for unit roots in US dollar real exchange rates of 84 countries. We find stronger evidence of PPP in countries more open to trade, closer to the United States, with lower inflation and moderate nominal exchange rate volatility, and with similar economic growth rates as the United States. We also show that PPP holds for panels of European and Latin American countries, but not for African and Asian countries. Our findings demonstrate that country characteristics can help explain both adherence to and deviations from long-run PPP.     

Going out of the Great Recession? Contrast between the United States and Europe: Proposed work from economic history, 1960–2014

In recent work, the authors have proposed to the United States a model that explains the trend behavior of the rate of profit from share surplus, capital productivity, and the coefficient of financialization. The main results of the explanatory model allow the authors to affirm that with the change of control of Keynesianism to neoliberalism since 1980, there has been a substantial fall in the profit rate to half the values achieved in the years of Keynesian regulation (1945–1973). This significant fall in the level of benefits is due to a substantial fall in capital productivity. The authors are currently working on adapting the explanatory model for the U.S. economy to the main countries of the European Union (Germany, France, Italy, United Kingdom, and Spain). The results show that the pattern of behavior of the variables described in the reference country—the world capitalist economic system, the United States—is repeated more or less precisely in the main countries of the European Union; Germany, France, Italy, United Kingdom, and Spain.     

THE INTERNATIONALIZATION OF AGRICULTURAL TECHNOLOGY: PATENTS, R&D SPILLOVERS, AND THEIR EFFECTS ON PRODUCTIVITY IN THE EUROPEAN UNION AND UNITED STATES

Multilateral indices of total factor productivity (TFP) allow efficiency comparisons between ten European Union countries and the United States from 1973 to 1993. Differences in TFP levels are then explained by land quality differences, public research and development (R&D) expenditures, education levels, private-sector patents, international spillovers of public R&D, and private-sector technology transfer. There is evidence that public R&D results in limited knowledge spillovers between the European countries and the United States. However, the use of international patent data from the Yale Technology Concordance shows not only that patents matter, but also that private sector technology transfer may be the dominant force in explaining TFP trends. The United States and the European Union countries with more advanced research systems (Netherlands, Denmark, France, and Belgium) converge in a high-growth club, while Germany, Luxembourg, Greece, Italy, Ireland, and the United Kingdom form the slow-growth group. Ignoring knowledge spillovers and technology transfer leads to biased estimates of R&D elasticities, which is hardly surprising since the private sector is now spending more than the public in some of these countries. Thus, the estimated rate of return to public agricultural R&D falls from over 60% in the closed economy model to 10% in the model that takes account of international spillovers. (JEL Q16)     

The International Economy — A Survey

In most of the major world economies the hesitancy evident toward the end of last year has dissipated and the cyclical upswing in economic activity was well advanced by the middle of 1976, with the recovery showing particular strength in the first half of 1976 inthe United States and in West Germany. Even so industrial production had not yet returned, by the end of June 1976, to the previous cyclical peak in any of the major economies. With the OECD countries in aggregate sure to achieve a real growth rate of 4 per cent in 1976, and quite possibly an appreciably higher rate, the attention of many national and international policy makers is turning to ways of moderating the recovery so that inflationary pressures can be minimised. For in spite of the depth of the 1974/75 world recession the outlook for inflation remains threatening, much more so than at the corresponding stage of the previous cycle in 1972. In the twelve months to May 1976 consumer prices rose by 9.0 per cent in all OECD countries and this figure is disturbingly high for the trough of a serious recession. World commodity prices have risen about 35 per cent in dollar terms in the past year; as in the 1973–74 boom the major economies are now moving into an upswing simultaneously, thus compounding possible demand effects on inflation; business investment has fallen sharply in all countries during the recession, and only in the United States is a strong recovery in investment currently in evidence. The rate of growth of wages has however moderated in most countries, reflecting weak labour market conditions, lower consumer price increases and in countries such as United Kingdom and Canada the successful implementation of incomes policies. With output increasing, the rate of growth of unit wage costs has in most cases dropped sharply.     

US–Japan Trade Frictions: The Past,the Present,and Implications for the US–China Trade War

The United States and Japan have been involved in trade frictions over a number of products including textiles, steel, automobiles, semi‐conductors, and agricultural products over the last 50 years. US–Japan trade frictions have taken basically two forms: (i) the United States attempting to restrict Japan's exports to the United States; and (ii) the United States attempting to increase its exports to Japan by “opening” the Japanese market. By putting pressure on Japan to adopt necessary measures, the United States sought to achieve two main objectives: (i) to reduce its trade deficit vis‐à‐vis Japan; and (ii) to protect and/or promote US industries. The United States failed to achieve the first objective, while some success was achieved for the second objective. The United States triggered a trade war against China with the objectives of: (i) reducing the bilateral trade deficit; and (ii) stopping unfair trade practices by Chinese firms such as violations of intellectual property rights and forced technology transfer. Based on the experiences from the US–Japan trade frictions, the United States may achieve some success for the second objective, but not for the first. The chances of achieving the second objective would increase if the United States cooperates with countries such as Japan and the European Union, which are faced with similar problems.     

海洋战略性新兴产业基础研究竞争力发展态势研究

以海洋生物医药产业为研究样本,采取文献计量和基础研究竞争力指数对海洋生物医药研究领域整体发展现状及主要国家的基础研究竞争力进行分析发现,该研究领域经历了3个发展阶段,并引起世界各国的广泛关注,尤其是美国已经成为该领域的一个研究重地。海洋生物医药产业作为一个外延性较广的跨学科研究领域,大学和科研机构是该研究领域的主力,很多研究成果发表在化学、医学和生物学领域重要SCI期刊（JCR1区或2区）上。此外,我国在海洋生物医药研究领域的活跃度呈不断上升态势,与4个标杆国家（美国、日本、西班牙和英国）的差距不断缩小;但是我国很多研究成果影响力较低,论文发表量、被引量匹配性（效率指数）与美国、日本、英国和西班牙等发达国家相比仍然存在着较大差距,要追赶它们尚待时日。研究成果对把握各国在海洋战略性新兴产业基础研究领域的竞争态势并明晰我国与海洋科技强国在该领域的差距具有现实指导意义。     

Impact of Immigrant Peers on Native Students’ Achievement: Evidence from Australia,Canada and the United States

This article examines how exposure to immigrant students affects the achievement of native students in Australia, Canada and the United States. Variation in the share of immigrant students across different grade levels within schools is exploited to identify the impact of immigrant peers. The study finds that the effects on native students’ achievements of exposure to immigrant peers differ between the three countries. While exposure has a positive impact on Australian natives, it has a negative impact on Canadian natives. Exposure has no effect on US natives. How immigrant students affect their peers is found to depend on institutional arrangements within the education system.     

Immigration and economic freedom of the US states: Does the institutional quality of immigrants' origin countries matter?

When people immigrate to the United States from countries with less economic freedom, they do not dampen economic freedom in their destination states. We use the Economic Freedom of North America report to rate the economic freedom of US states, and we group immigrants by how far below the United States their origin countries score in the Economic Freedom of the World report. Our major findings hold true even when states receive immigrants from countries with far less economic freedom. Most relationships between immigration and the US states' economic freedom scores are neither statistically nor economically significant.     

CROSS-COUNTRY EVIDENCE ON OUTPUT GROWTH VOLATILITY: NONSTATIONARY VARIANCE AND GARCH MODELS

This paper revisits the issue of conditional volatility in real gross domestic product (GDP) growth rates for Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Previous studies find high persistence in the volatility. This paper shows that this finding largely reflects a nonstationary variance. Output growth in the six countries became noticeably less volatile over the past few decades. In this paper, we employ the modified iterated cumulative sum of squares (ICSS) algorithm to detect structural change in the variance of output growth. One structural break exists in each of the six countries after identifying outliers and mean shifts in the growth rates. We then use generalized autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity (GARCH) specifications, modeling output growth and its volatility with and without the break in volatility. The evidence shows that the time-varying variance falls sharply in Canada and Japan, and disappears entirely in Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States, once we incorporate the break in the variance equation of output for the six countries. That is, the integrated GARCH (IGARCH) effect proves spurious and the GARCH model demonstrates misspecification, if researchers neglect a nonstationary variance. Moreover, we also consider the possible effects of our more correct measure of output volatility on output growth as well as the reverse effect of output growth on its volatility. The conditional standard deviation possesses no statistical significance in all countries, except a significant negative effect in Japan. The lagged growth rate of output produces significant negative and positive effects on the conditional variances in Germany and Japan, respectively. No significant effects exist in Canada, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States.     

中国对美“双重输出”格局及其新变化*

20世纪末以来，中美关系作为最重要的南北关系，很大程度上反映着世界格局的演进。客观上，中美分别作为产业资本第一大国和金融资本第一大国，其大国关系的实质乃中国对美“双重输出”：中国向美国输出廉价工业品和对美输出资本投资；美国向中国输出低成本资金和服务。双方因处于不同的发展阶段而形成战略上紧密的经济互补关系。但这一关系因2008年金融危机之后的中美“相向转型”--中国向金融资本经济升级，美国向实体产业回调--而渐进向互斥竞争转化。处于对立矛盾却难以对抗的中国客观上只能对内依次转嫁“输入型危机”所引发的制度成本，近期需要借生态文明和城乡统筹转向国家综合安全战略调整，使这种危机借助乡土社会实现软着陆。     

SYNCHRONIZATION OF ECONOMIC SHOCKS BETWEEN GULF COOPERATION COUNCIL AND UNITED STATES,EUROPE, JAPAN,AND OIL MARKET: CHOICE OF EXCHANGE RATE REGIME†

Using a structural vector autoregression (SVAR) with block exogeneity, this study examines the impacts of external shocks originating from the United States, the European Union, Japan, and the oil market as well as those of the regional shocks, on the oil‐rich countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), viewed as a prospective monetary union. It takes into account the implications of the shock impacts for selecting an appropriate common exchange rate arrangement. The SVAR variance decomposition and impulse response analyses strongly underscore the relative impacts of the global shocks over the regional ones. The findings imply that the world's two major currencies, the U.S. dollar and the euro, should figure highly in a GCC's common basket of currencies. Accordingly, a transitional movement to a more flexible exchange rate arrangement such as a basket peg may be desirable for these trade‐dependent economies in the long run, as is argued in the optimal currency literature for developing countries. (JEL E52, O52, C22)