Political market failure? The effect of government unity on energy technology policy in industrialized democracies

When do governments implement technology policies that allow society to solve social problems at a lower cost? Focusing on the case of energy, we argue that in industrialized democracies, severe social problems provoke an effective technology policy response when the government is unified. A unified government can easily strike the bargains required to secure political support for new technology programs. We test this theory against data on public energy research and development (R&D) in 22 OECD countries, 1980–2006. We find that as government fractionalization increases in a country, the sensitivity of public energy R&D to wasteful energy use, which presents economic and environmental difficulties to the society, declines. The analysis reveals a new reason for ineffective technology policies and contributes to the broad literature on political market failure.     

通货膨胀背景下的中国经济增长

当前我国物价水平仍然较高,与改革开放以来的前几次通货膨胀有所类似.本次通货膨胀的原因也可归结为中国传统增长模式中常出现的“两难困境”,即长期以来,中国经济增长过度依赖于政府投资,银行信贷与货币的发放难以受到控制,经济高增长的同时始终存在着高通货膨胀的风险,而高通货膨胀所带来的企业生产成本的上升反过来又挤压企业经营利润,从而降低经济增长率.可以预计的是,在货币政策作用空间有限的背景下,此次通货膨胀的压力将持续一段时间.能否处理好总量和结构、抑制通货膨胀和促进经济增长的关系,关键取决于货币政策与财政政策的有机配合.     

Sounding the alarm: Impact of political instability on growth and fiscal health of the Indian economy

A noticeable change evident in the Indian political scenario since the eighties has been a sharp rise in the frequency with which governments have been ousted out of power. This augurs well for Indian democracy as it reflects a ‘political awakening’. Such changes in government, after an election reflect ‘orderly’: transfer of power and are inherent to the democratic form of governance. However, a close scrutiny of the political scenario at the state government level shows that there have been very frequent changes in government between elections. A high frequency of changes in government could be expected to result in frequent reversals or modifications in policy decisions and have a destabilizing effect on the economy. The present study is an empirical exercise undertaken at the level of state governments. It makes a first attempt to examine the impact of political instability on growth and on the fiscal health of the Indian economy. Received: September 25, 2000/Accepted: January 11, 2002 RID="*" ID="*" Sincere thanks to Professors Ajit Karnik and Abhay Pethe for their comments and suggestions. I would also like to thank the two anonymous referees for their insightful comments and suggestions, which have been of great help. The usual disclaimer applies.     

Political Instability, Uncertainty and Economics

This paper focuses on the relationship between political instability, policy–making and macroeconomic outcomes. The theoretical section explores various models that explain the effect of instability (and political uncertainty) on growth, budget formation, inflation and monetary policy. The empirical section discusses the evidence on the predictions generated by theoretical models. Preliminary to this discussion, however, is the analysis of a few general issues concerning the specification and estimation of econometric models with political variables. Some new results are then produced on the empirical relevance of theories of strategic use of fiscal deficit.     

降低我国地区间能源强度水平政策研究

经济对能源的依赖性和能源的供需矛盾已经成为阻碍我国经济持续发展的瓶颈之一。如何提高能源利用效率,降低能源消耗成为摆在我国面前的首要问题。本文从价格、结构、技术进步和地方政府行为等多角度因素进行分析,提出降低我国地区间能源强度水平和其差异的相关政策建议。     

促进河北低碳经济发展的财税政策研究

目前,河北"高碳经济"特征十分突出,发展低碳经济势在必行。从财税政策角度分析,河北要发展低碳经济,必需结合本省经济发展实际,在积极落实国家财税政策的同时,因地制宜采取具体措施,建立和完善支持河北经济社会低碳发展模式的财税政策体系。     

财政政策与货币政策相对有效性研究

本文从实证的角度 ,对我国财政政策和货币政策的相对有效性进行了研究。运用协整分析方法并通过邹氏检验 ,对整个数据期间进行了制度检验。结果显示1980年以前平均来说 ,财政政策比货币政策有效 ,而其后平均来说货币政策比财政政策有效。这一结论与我国建国以来宏观经济调控政策选择的基本情况相吻合 ,为对宏观调控的政策选择提供了有力的支持。     

A note on the closed-form solution to the Lucas–Uzawa model with externality

Ruiz-Tamarit [2008. The closed-form solution for a family of four-dimension nonlinear MHDS. Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control 32, 1000–1014] provides a closed-form solution to the two-sector model of endogenous growth with externalities. He assumes that the coefficient of the relative risk aversion is equal to the physical capital share, but this assumption is empirically and theoretically implausible. This note uses the result of Boucekkine and Ruiz-Tamarit [2008. Special functions for the study of economic dynamics: the case of the Lucas–Uzawa model. Journal of Mathematical Economics 44, 33–54] and derives a closed-form solution without setting the parametric assumption. The solution path is expressed in terms of the Gauss hypergeometric functions.     

国际金融危机与中国财政政策设计：功能、目标、力度

本文结合国际金融危机,从理论和实践两方面探讨了中国财政政策设计和实施中存在的一些重要问题。一是从财政政策的维持和纠偏两方面,揭示了财政政策的基本功能,提出财政政策应该分为稳定和再稳定两类政策;二是从财政政策的经济和社会目标两方面,分析了财政政策目标错位问题,提出了财政政策目标应从实现经济增长调整为促进充分就业;三是从财政政策力度计量方面,考察了政府预算账户存在的问题,提出了单独设立稳定账户的设想。     

政府收支规模、波动与经济增长

财政收入和支出的波动是宏观经济波动的重要来源,并对长期经济增长存在重要影响。本文分析了1981—2016年以来中国30个省级区域财政收入和支出及其细分项目的波动性对经济增长的作用。实证分析结果表明,产出波动性对长期经济增长存在显著的负向影响。政府收入的波动性对经济增长的影响为负,但政府支出的波动性提高则会促进经济增长。另外,财政收入的规模本身对长期经济增长存在负向影响。     

Feasibility and optimality of sustainable growth under materials balance

Pollution from consumption and production is an inevitable part of economic processes. We employ a materials balance approach and develop an endogenous growth theory, with recycling activity, to examine the evolution of the economic and environment systems. This paper provides feasibility and optimality conditions for sustainable economic growth with rising environmental quality. The fundamental condition of feasibility is that the flow of natural resources, which eventually returns to the environment as waste and pollution, has a negative growth rate in the long run.     

Factor taxation and labor supply in a dynamic one-sector growth model

This paper studies a class of AK-type growth models with factor income taxes, public capital stock and labor–leisure trade offs. While a higher capital tax rate reduces economic growth in the short run, the long-term growth effect is ambiguous and remains ambiguous even if the level of tax rate is larger than the degree of government externality. A higher labor income tax rate has ambiguous growth effects both in the short and long runs. However, if the intertemporal elasticity of substitution for labor supply is sufficiently small, a higher labor tax rate always lowers economic growth in the long run, despite the existence of productive government taxation.     

中国财政政策的顺周期性问题---基于预算平衡准则的实证考察

财政政策的顺周期性容易加剧经济运行的不稳定,是当前全面深化财税改革过程中的一个重要议题。本文对中国财政政策的周期性进行实证研究,得出中国财政政策也具有顺周期特性的结论。通过借鉴其他国家化解财政政策顺周期性的经验,提出以下政策建议：实施结构性预算平衡准则,促进经济繁荣期的财政盈余积累;建立权责发生制政府财务报告,提升政府债务的安全预警水平;逐步提升直接税比重,减缓经济运行的波动性。     

Dividends and leverage: How to optimally exploit a non-renewable investment

In this paper we model the situation where a non-renewable investment is given, for instance a resource reservoir, and show how to optimally trade-off between dividends and leverage, in order to maximize a performance indicator for shareholders, up to the bankruptcy time. We then study the way market risk (the volatility of the market price of the resource) impacts the optimal policies and the default risk of the company. The moments when the policies are rebalanced are analyzed and we give a measure of the agency costs which appear between the shareholders and the debt-holders.