Tax‐deferred savings plans and interest deductibility

Abstract.  Programs that defer taxes on savings (e.g., RRSPs or 401(k)s) are supposed to move income tax systems closer to the more efficient consumption tax. Whether or not RRSPs move income tax systems away from or closer to a consumption tax depends on whether or not interest on debts incurred to make RRSP contributions is deductible for income tax purposes. If people optimize as assumed in simple life‐cycle models, then it may be that governments can convert a non‐linear income tax system to a proportional consumption tax system. I argue this is plausible for some Canadian households. JEL classification: H21, H24     

Exporting and performance: evidence from Chilean plants

Abstract.  Recent empirical evidence documents the superior characteristics of exporters relative to non‐exporters. Three explanations for this phenomenon have been proposed: self‐selection; learning‐by‐exporting; and conscious self‐selection. We test these three hypotheses using plant‐level data from Chile. We find that plants that enter international markets show superior initial performance compared with non‐exporters, consistent with self‐selection; we observe increases in productivity after plants begin to export, which is consistent with learning‐by‐exporting. We also find strong evidence supporting the idea that self‐selection is a conscious process by which plants increase productivity with the purpose of becoming exporters. JEL classification: F14; O54; D21     

Identification, weak instruments, and statistical inference in econometrics

Abstract.  We discuss statistical inference problems associated with identification and testability in econometrics. We consider inference in non-parametric models and weakly identified structural models (weak instruments). We point out that many ill‐defined statistical problems, such as non‐testable hypotheses, occur in these areas and are typically associated with asymptotic approximations. In non‐parametric models, such problems include testing moments and inference under heteroscedasticity or serial dependence of unknown form. For weakly identified structural models, difficulties are typically associated with improper pivots, and we review recent developments aimed at proposing more reliable procedures, including alternative proposed statistics, bounds, projection, split‐sampling, conditioning, Monte Carlo tests. JEL classification: C1, C12, C14, C15, C3, C5     

What drives the cross‐country growth and inequality correlation?

Abstract.  We present a neo‐classical model that explores the determinants of growth‐inequality correlation and attempts to reconcile the seemingly conflicting evidence on the nature of the growth‐inequality relationship. The initial distribution of human capital determines the long‐run income distribution and the growth rate by influencing the occupational choice of the agents. The steady‐state proportion of adults that innovates and updates human capital is path dependent. The output elasticity of skilled‐labour, barriers to knowledge spillovers, and the degree of redistribution determine the range of steady‐state equilibria. From a calibration experiment we report that a skill‐intensive technology, low barriers to knowledge spillovers, and high degrees of redistribution characterize the industrial countries with a positive growth‐inequality correlation. A negative correlation between growth and inequality arises for the group of non‐industrial countries with the opposite characteristics. JEL classification: E1, O4     

Canadian and U.S. financial markets: testing the international integration hypothesis under time‐varying conditional volatility

Abstract.  This paper evaluates the international integration hypothesis, that is, that risk‐adjusted anticipated returns are identical, even when financial instruments are traded in different countries. Under time‐varying conditional volatility, this hypothesis is tested by verifying the equality between domestic and foreign risk prices associated with a multi‐factor analytic specification. The maximum‐likelihood and Kalman‐filter estimates are used to assess the national risk prices and interpret the factors. Empirically, the integration of Canadian and U.S. financial markets depends on the risk prices of two factors, which are related to certain non‐monetary events and to the conduct of monetary policies. JEL classification: G15, C32     

Enrolment in Higher Education and Changes in Income Inequality

Using a cross‐section of countries, this paper empirically examines whether greater enrolment rates in higher education are associated with increases or decreases in subsequent income inequality as measured by the Gini coefficient. It finds a negative association between the two, suggesting that countries with larger enrolment rates saw their income inequality decrease relative to other countries. These findings are robust to the inclusion of several control variables and to limiting the sample to non‐OECD countries.     

Nash Equilibria in Pure Strategies

We consider an n ‐person non‐zero‐sum non‐cooperative game in normal form, where the strategy sets are some closed intervals of the real line. It is shown that if the pay‐off functions are continuous on the whole space and if for each pay‐off function the smallest local maximum in the strategy variable is a global maximum, then the game possesses a pure strategy Nash equilibrium.     

Are migrants more skilled than non‐migrants? Repeat,return, and same‐employer migrants

Abstract.  I examine the determinants of inter‐state migration of adults within western Germany, using the German Socio‐Economic Panel from 1984–2000. Migrants who do not change employers represent one‐fifth of all migrants and have higher education and pre‐move wages than non‐migrants. Skilled workers thus have a low‐cost migration avenue that has not been considered in the previous literature. Other migrants are heterogeneous and not unambiguously more skilled than non‐migrants. I confirm that long‐distance migrants are more skilled than short‐distance migrants, as predicted by theory, and I show that return migrants are a mix of successes and failures. Most repeat migration is return migration. JEL classification: J6     

Explaining the deteriorating entry earnings of Canada's immigrant cohorts, 1966 – 2000

Abstract.  Using the 1981, 1986, 1991, 1996, and 2001 Canadian Censuses, we explore causes of the deterioration in entry earnings of successive cohorts of immigrant men and women. Roughly one‐third of the deterioration is explained by compositional shifts in language ability and region of birth. We find no evidence of a decline in the returns to foreign education for either immigrant men or immigrant women but a definite deterioration in the returns to foreign labour market experience, most strongly among men from non‐traditional source countries. We can explain roughly two‐thirds of the male and one‐half of the female deterioration without any reference to entry labour market conditions. When we also account for entry conditions, our results suggest Canada's immigrants of the late 1990s would otherwise have enjoyed entry earnings equal to or higher than their counterparts of the 1960s.     

A test of the Hotelling rule using old‐growth timber data

Abstract.  The paper tests Hotelling's prediction that scarcity rent for a non‐renewable resource will rise at the rate of discount in a market equilibrium. We perform the test using data for old‐growth timber, a resource that is effectively non‐renewable. In contrast to previous studies, for this resource a measure of scarcity rent is directly observable in the form of stumpage price bids in timber auctions. We construct a model that allows for replanting and captures the institutional framework of the western U.S. timber market. The modified Hotelling rule that we derive is not rejected in several of our specifications.     

Distribution Dynamics and Cross‐Country Convergence: A New Approach

Distribution dynamics is a method for studying the evolution in time of an entire cross‐section distribution and has been initially employed to assess cross‐country convergence of per capita incomes. It has subsequently seen a widespread application in many different economic areas. When describing the law of motion of the distribution as a Markovian stochastic process, working in a discrete state‐space set up has several advantages, but the arbitrary discretisation of a continuous state‐space process has the undesired effect of removing the Markov property. This paper outlines a rigorous method for discretising a continuous state‐space Markov chain. The method is then applied to the distribution of per capita income across countries to reassess the (non‐) convergence phenomenon. It is found that the long run polarisation of per capita incomes across countries emerges even more dramatically than in previous studies.     

Preferential trade areas, multinational enterprises, and welfare

Abstract.  The effects of preferential trade areas (PTAs) on the investments by multinational enterprises and their implications for the welfare of members and non‐members are studied in a model with two types of firms: national firms and multinational firms. In the presence of multinational activity PTAs can create new investment as well as divert investment from non‐members to members. Both affect the welfare of members positively. More interestingly, if the investment creation effect of a PTA is sufficiently strong, then the PTA could be welfare enhancing for non‐members as well. JEL classification: F2, L1     

A Ricardian model of climate change in Canada

Abstract A comparative static 'Ricardian' model is used to establish relationships between climate and agricultural land value in Canada. From these relationships, agricultural costs of climate change scenarios are estimated. This study is motivated partly by evidence of potential agricultural benefits of climate change from a similar analysis of the United States by Mendelsohn, Nordhaus and Shaw, and partly by the void of Canadian studies. Furthermore, it extends the analysis to non‐uniform climate change scenarios. Its finding of a slightly positive upper bound on the agricultural benefits from climate change, within a wide margin of error, is motivation for further analysis.
Un modèle ricardien de changement climatique au Canada.  L'auteur utilise un modèle statique ricardien classique pour établir des relations entre le climat et la valeur des terres agricoles au Canada. A partir de ces relations, on calibre les coûts agricoles de divers scénarios de changement climatique. Cette étude a pris forme en partie en réaction aux résultats d'une analyse similaire de Mendelsohn, Nordhaus et Shaw aux Etats‐Unis, et en partie en réponse à un manque d'études de ce genre au Canada. Cet article étend les analyses aux scénarios de changements climatiques non‐uniformes. Les résultats suggèrent qu'il existe une sorte de borne positive supérieure aux avantages agricoles du changement climatique, à l'intérieur d'une marge d'erreur assez vaste. Voilà qui encourage à poursuivre les analyses.     

Multidivisional firms, internal competition, and the merger paradox

Abstract.  Traditional modelling of mergers has the merged firms (insiders) cooperate and maximize joint profits. This approach has several unappealing results in quantity‐setting games, for example, mergers typically are not profitable for insiders, but are profitable for non‐merging firms (outsiders). We take a different approach and allow for a parent company that can play each insider off one another. In quantity‐setting games, with our approach mergers are profitable for insiders, unprofitable for outsiders, socially beneficial, and involve (in a non‐monopolizing merger) a small number of firms. Finally, we find that the optimal strategy depends on whether firms compete in quantity or prices. JEL classification: L000     

The (Non‐)Equivalence of Input and Output Taxes Under Monopoly

The author argues that a government taxing a polluting monopoly by means of levies on output and inputs can implement the first‐best allocation through a continuum of tax profiles. Using this degree of freedom in the tax system, the government is, in general, able to transfer income from the firm to the public sector, so that the additional tax rate acts as a non‐distorting tax on profits. This transfer – and therefore public revenue – is the higher, the lower (higher) the input taxes are, and correspondingly the higher (lower) the output tax is, provided that the production function exhibits decreasing (increasing) returns to scale.     

The Differential Returns Offered by Mutually Owned and Proprietary UK Depository Institutions: 1993–2000

The study quantifies the differences in the level of return from investing in deposit (savings) accounts provided by depository institutions, which are either 'mutual' or 'proprietary'. It is shown that for most types of deposit accounts offered in the UK, mutual building societies provide higher returns than proprietary firms. Surprisingly, it is also shown that returns from deposit accounts issued by converted or non‐mutual building societies are, generally, lower than either mutual building societies or proprietary firms. These findings are consistent for interest rate data adjusted for the effect of non‐price product characteristics and for unadjusted interest rate data.     

Minimum wage impacts on youth employment transitions, 1993–1999

Abstract.  The longitudinal nature of the Master File of the Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics (SLID) for the period 1993–9, enables comparing transitions from employment to non‐employment for individuals affected by minimum wage changes with appropriate comparison groups not affected by minimum wages. This is based on the large number (24) of minimum wage changes that have occurred across the different provincial jurisdictions in Canada over the 1990s. The results indicate that the minimum wage increases have increased the transition from employment to non‐employment of employed low‐wage youths, who are at‐risk of being affected by a minimum wage increase, by around 6 percentage points (ranging from 4 to 8 percentage points). These disemployment effects in turn imply 'minimum wage' elasticities of about −0.4 (ranging from −0.3 to −0.5).     

An Empirical Analysis of Cost Efficiency in Non‐profit and Public Nursing Homes

Abstract *** :  This paper examines the issue of cost‐efficiency in Switzerland's nursing homes, an issue of concern to policy makers because of the rapid growth of elderly care expenditure and the aging of the population. The fact that nursing homes in Switzerland exist in different institutional forms, private for‐profit, government and non‐profit status, raises the issue of their relative cost efficiency. A panel data of 17 public and 19 nonprofit nursing homes operating over the 9‐year period from 1993 to 2001, in one of the 26 Swiss cantons, Ticino, is studied. Ticino's nursing homes are heavily regulated and monitored by the canton's authorities. However, given that in public firms there are more bureaucratic constraints and agency problems, one can expect a relatively low level of cost‐efficiency. In this paper the effect of institutional form on efficiency is studied using a translog stochastic cost‐frontier model. Several specifications are used to study the robustness of the results. The results suggest that the institutional form influences the efficiency of the studied nursing homes in that non‐profit foundations are likely to be more cost‐efficient than the nursing homes operated by government administration. The results also suggest that a great majority of the nursing homes in the sample do not fully benefit from scale economies. This implies that efficiency gains can be obtained with larger capacities or joint operations .     

The comparative advantage of public ownership: evidence from U.S. electric utilities

Abstract.  Studies of the performance effects of public vs private ownership have found mixed evidence. This paper draws on theory suggesting that public enterprise may have an advantage in producing goods and services whose quality attributes are difficult to specify a priori. Using a comprehensive data set of U.S. electric utilities to estimate cost functions, we find that while privately owned systems achieve lower costs in generation, public systems generally have an advantage in the end‐user‐oriented distribution function with its more non‐contractible quality attributes. Other evidence on quality differences by ownership type and by enterprise size supports this distinction. JEL classification: L33, L94