Non-scale endogenous growth effects of subsidies for exporters

We built a general equilibrium endogenous growth model in which final goods are produced either in the relatively skilled-labour intensive exports sector or in the relatively unskilled-labour intensive domestic sector. We show that, by affecting the technological-knowledge bias, subsidies explain the simultaneous rise in the exports sector, the skill wage premium and the economic growth rate. Then, to shed light upon the causal nexus between production-related subsidies and exports, we use a Portuguese longitudinal database (1996–2003) and implement a propensity score matching approach. Empirical results seem to prove the theoretical predictions: subsidies generate the rise in the wage premium of exporters and the increase in the relative size of export sector, even if no impact of subsidies is found in the capacity of transforming domestic firms into new exporters.     

政府补贴、行业竞争与企业出口技术复杂度

政府补贴作为经济发展的"有形之手",在我国出口技术结构升级中扮演何种角色呢?其内在影响机制又是如何呢?文章基于中国工业企业数据和中国海关统计数据库,利用倾向得分匹配法(PSM)和倍差法考察了政府补贴和行业竞争对企业出口技术复杂度的影响效应及渠道.研究表明:政府补贴抑制了企业出口技术复杂度的提升,而行业竞争促进了企业出口技术复杂度的提升;不同竞争程度的企业样本中,政府对低竞争行业的企业出口技术复杂度的抑制效应显著高于中高竞争行业,这说明行业竞争度的提高有利于纠正政府补贴对出口技术复杂度的抑制效应.进一步的影响机制分析表明:政府补贴促进出口技术结构升级的渠道为研发激励效应,且这种激励效应只在中高竞争行业样本中是显著存在的;从成本渠道考察发现,政府补贴有利于企业出口价格指数的降低,从而对出口技术复杂度的提升产生显著的成本扭曲效应.文章的结论意味着,不能一味地对企业进行补贴,而应该构建有效的激励机制与成本倒逼机制,让企业通过内生动力而非价格竞争形成企业出口技术复杂度的升级.     

A Dynamic Model of the Choice of Technology in Economic Development

In this overlapping-generations model, there is unemployment in the manufacturing sector. Manufacturing firms engage in oligopolistic competition and choose technologies to maximize profits. With capital as a fixed cost of production, increasing returns in the manufacturing sector exist. In the unique steady state, first, when individuals become more patient, the savings rate increases while the level of an individual’s income decreases. Second, an increase in population or percentage of income spent on manufactured goods does not change steady-state technology while the level of an individual’s income decreases. Third, an increase in the wage rate leads manufacturing firms to choose more advanced technologies and the steady-state capital stock increases. Finally, an increase in the level of subsidies to technology adoption does not change steady-state technology.     

Can Production Subsidies Explain China's Export Performance? Evidence from Firm‐level Data*

This paper analyses the relationship between production subsidies and firms’ export performance using a very comprehensive and recent firm‐level database and controlling for the endogeneity of subsidies. It documents robust evidence that production subsidies stimulate export activity at the intensive margin, although this effect is conditional on firm characteristics. In particular, the positive relationship between subsidies and the intensive margin of exports is strongest among profit‐making firms, firms in capital‐intensive industries, and those located in non‐coastal regions. Compared to firm characteristics, the extent of heterogeneity across ownership structure (SOEs, collectives, and privately owned firms) proves to be relatively less important.     

Real effects of banking crises: Imports of capital goods by developing countries

We examine the hypothesis that banking crises have real effects on developing economies by reducing imports of capital goods. We test this hypothesis by estimating a model for the determinants of imports of capital goods by a panel of developing economies during 1961 to 2010. Our results suggest that not only do banking crises have statistically significant and economically important effects on imports of capital goods, but these effects increase the longer a banking crisis lasts. Imports of capital goods are a critical component of the capital stock and the production process in developing economies and, thus, our results highlight one important channel through which banking crises may hamper the growth prospects of these economies.     

Export demand elasticities and productivity as determinants of growth: estimates for Mauritius

In this article, we combine the export led and import led growth hypotheses in a growth model in which the importation of foreign capital goods and the demand elasticities of own export products explain the growth opportunities and the technical progress of developing countries. This model, based on imported capital goods, uses Mauritius’ data on capital investment, employment, export partners’ growth and terms of trade to estimate price and income elasticities of export demand, total factor productivity growth and economies of scale. These elasticities are then used to assess how the growth in export partners’ income is converted into domestic growth. The implications of the presence of low or high export demand elasticities are discussed by relating them to various strands of trade and growth literature. Based on the results of this estimation, we also calculate steady state growth rates, engine and handmaiden effects of growth as well as the dynamic steady state gains from trade for this latecomer export economy. The implications of steady state results are also discussed in the light of the Mauritian employment and growth perspectives.     

关税、货币政策与中国实际均衡汇率

加入WTO后 ,降低进口品关税等措施将影响人民币均衡汇率水平 ,同时开放经济下国内货币政策、财政政策等宏观经济政策调整也会改变均衡汇率水平。本文运用动态一般均衡的方法 ,探讨中国在加入世界贸易组织之后 ,关税税率调整、货币供应量增长率改变、财政政策调整等措施对实际均衡汇率的长期效应。把货币引入生产函数和消费者的效用函数 ,我们扩展了由Turnovsky提出的两商品资本积累模型 ,利用参数赋值(calibration)的方法进行了均衡状态下的比较静态分析。研究发现降低进口品关税使人民币面临贬值压力 ,而政府增加税收 ,减少对贸易品的消费则有利于人民币的保值和升值。实证研究结果表明 :国外实际利率水平下降 ,实际货币供应量增长率降低都将引起人民币均衡汇率贬值。     

The Transfer Problem and Real Exchange Rate Overshooting in Financial Crises: The Role of the Debt Servicing Multiplier*

We develop a real model of exchange rate overshooting due to a debt servicing multiplier. Borrowers of foreign capital are bound by noncontingent contracts to pay the world rate of return following an adverse shock. This is onerous, since the marginal product of capital is less than the world rate of return and the shock causes some capital to become extra‐marginal. If the resultant debt servicing shortfall is met by taxes on workers, this reduces their demand for nontradable goods, which feeds back onto their wage, reducing their demand for nontradable goods, etc. In the short run, when extra‐marginal projects are “stuck” in the economy, the real exchange rate can overshoot. This mechanism may help to explain overshooting of exchange rates in the 1997 Asian financial crisis.     

Globalization and inter‐industry wage differentials in China

This paper explores the relationship between globalization and inter‐industry wage differentials in China by using a two‐stage estimation approach. Taking advantage of a rich household survey dataset, this paper estimates the wage premium for each industry in the first stage conditional on individual worker and firm characteristics. Alternative measures of globalization are considered in the second stage: trade openness and capital openness. A disaggregation of trade into trade in final and intermediate goods shows that increases in import (export) shares of final goods reduce (increase) the wage premia significantly, whereas imports or exports of intermediate goods do not explain differences in industry wage premia. This finding is supported by stronger effects for final goods trade in coastal than noncoastal regions. Our results also show a positive relationship between capital openness and industrial wage premia, though this finding is less robust when potential endogeneity issues are allowed for.     

Capital accumulation and real exchange rate behavior in a small open economy with credit market frictions

Summary. We consider the nature of the relationship between the real exchange rate and capital formation. We present a model of a small open economy that produces and consumes two goods, one tradable and one not. Domestic residents can borrow and lend abroad, and costly state verification (CSV) is a source of frictions in domestic credit markets. The real exchange rate matters for capital accumulation because it affects the␣potential for investors to provide internal finance, which mitigates the CSV problem. We demonstrate that the real exchange rate must monotonically approach its steady state level. However, capital accumulation need not be monotonic and real exchange rate appreciation can be associated with either a rising or a falling capital stock. The relationship between world financial market conditions and the real exchange rate is also investigated. Received: October 3, 1997; revised version: October 23, 1997     

THE MEASUREMENT OF REAL INCOME

This paper is about the theory of the measurement of real income. By "theory of measurement" I mean the characterization of statistical terms as variables in a model, just as real consumption is characterized as an indicator of utility and the consumer price index is characterized as the cost of attaining a given level of utility in the economic theory of index numbers developed by Konus, Frisch and others half a century ago. I identify five logically distinct and internally-consistent concepts of real income: maximum sustainable consumption, consumption plus the output of new capital goods, consumption plus the increase in the capital stock where capital can be measured in two quite separate ways, and the sum of actual consumption and consumption forgone in the investment process. The last of these concepts is the most appropriate as a guide to producing long time series of real income for measuring a country's rate of economic growth.     

The ‘real’ explanation of the PPP puzzle

This article shows that global financial markets cannot, by themselves, achieve net transfers of financial capital and real interest rate equalization across countries and that the integration of both global financial markets and global goods markets is needed to achieve net transfers of capital and real interest rate equalization across countries. Thus, frictions (barriers to mobility) in one or both of these markets can impede the net transfer of capital between countries, produce the Feldstein and Horioka (1980) finding of high-saving-investment correlations and prevent real interest rates from being equalized across countries. Moreover, frictions in global goods markets can explain why real exchange rates deviate from purchasing power parity (PPP) for extended periods of time and can therefore also explain the PPP puzzle. Consequently, we are able to resolve two of Obstfeld and Rogoff’s (2000) ‘6 major puzzles in macroeconomics’ with essentially the same explanation.     

Understanding the Effect of Productivity Changes on International Relative Prices: The Role of News Shocks

The US real exchange rate and terms of trade have been found to appreciate when US labour productivity increases relative to the rest of the world. This finding is at odds with predictions from standard international macroeconomic models. In this paper, we find that incorporating news shocks to total factor productivity (TFP) in an otherwise standard open‐economy sticky‐price dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model with variable capital utilization can help the model replicate the above empirical finding. Labour productivity increases in our model after a positive news shock to TFP because of an increase in capital utilization. Under some plausible calibrations, the wealth effect of good news about future productivity can increase domestic demand strongly and induce an increase in home goods prices relative to foreign goods prices.     

On the Transmission Mechanism of Monetary Constraints to the Real Side of the Economy

Contrary to the predictions of the theory underlying international finance, inflows of capital triggered by financial liberalisation have neither equalised real interest rates nor increased income growth in many emerging economies. We explain this puzzle by developing a model that combines the balance‐of‐payments constraint approach to economic growth with a less stringent version of the real interest rate parity hypothesis. The model’s foundations are based on robust empirical findings or well‐established macroeconomic models. We show that a perverse combination of income elasticities of demand for imports and exports generates slow income growth and high real interest rates. As domestic income grows and imports rise faster than exports, the real exchange rate is expected to depreciate in order to clear the balance of payments (or the foreign exchange rate market). An incipient capital outflow arises and interest rates increase. Faster adjustment in capital rather than in the goods market therefore generates a higher real interest rate differential between the domestic small open‐economy and the rest of the world. The long run analysis shows that a constant degree of risk aversion implies a positive equilibrium real interest rate differential that affects economic growth. A permanent increase in default risk driven by persistent current account imbalances thus impacts on long run growth. The model’s results are illustrated with evidence from the three major Latin America economies: Argentina, Brazil and Mexico.     

ENDOGENOUS MARKET STRUCTURES AND STRATEGIC TRADE POLICY*

I characterize the optimal export promoting policy for international markets whose structure is endogenous. Contrary to the ambiguous results of strategic trade policy for duopolies, it is always optimal to subsidize exports when entry is endogenous, under both quantity and price competition. With homogenous goods the optimal export subsidy is a fraction 1/ε of the price, where ε is the elasticity of demand (the exact opposite of the optimal export tax in the neoclassical trade theory). Analogously, I show the general optimality of R&D subsidies and of competitive devaluations to promote exports in foreign markets where entry is endogenous.     

利用外国直接投资与贸易条件分析

通过大量数据说明。中国FDI主要流向劳动力密集型出口部门。这种流向特征一方面导致中国出口消费品的超额供给,另一方面又带动了对资本、技术等密集型产品的进口FDI需求的增长,使中国的贸易条件趋向恶化。要改善中国的贸易条件,应当进一步加强对外资流向的引导,从根本上增加外资流向资本技术密集型部门和服务业的比重,降低流向一般制造业的比重。     

China's economic growth and its real exchange rate

The shocks that underlie China's comparatively rapid growth include gains in productivity, factor accumulation and policy reforms that increase allocative efficiency. The well-known Balassa–Samuelson hypothesis links productivity growth in tradable industries with real appreciations. Yet it relies heavily on the law of one price applying for tradable goods, against which there is now considerable evidence. In its absence, other growth shocks also affect the real exchange rate by influencing relative supply or demand for home product varieties. This paper investigates the pre-conditions for the Balassa–Samuelson hypothesis to predict a real appreciation in the Chinese case. It then quantifies the links between all growth shocks and the Chinese real exchange rate using a dynamic model of the global economy with open capital accounts and full demographic underpinnings to labor supply. The results suggest that financial capital inflows most affect the real exchange rate in the short term, while differential productivity is strong in the medium term. Contrary to expectation, in the long term demographic forces prove to be weak relative to changes in the skill composition of the labor force, which enhances services sector performance and depreciates the real exchange rate.     

补贴对中国企业出口行为的影响——基于配对倍差法的经验分析

文章利用配对倍差法控制内生性后,基于新新贸易理论,利用1999-2007年中国工业企业微观数据,经验分析了补贴对企业是否出口及出口规模的影响。分析结论是,补贴显著提升了企业的出口可能性和出口规模;相对于未补贴企业,补贴企业出口概率增长率高出30%-110%,出口规模增长率高出30%-50%;对外资企业的影响大于本土企业,对私营企业的影响大于国有企业;但补贴对出口规模的影响在入世后特别是近年来才显现。这意味着补贴对出口的影响可能存在门槛效应。从政策层面看,尽管政府可以通过补贴等政策手段帮助企业走出国门,但要在国际市场实现持续增长仍要靠企业自身的核心竞争力。     

FDI对出口贸易结构影响的实证分析——以江苏省为例

本文利用江苏省1993-2011年的样本数据,实证分析了FDI与工业制成品出口额总体和内部结构两个层面之间的关系以探究FDI对出口贸易结构的影响。文章通过协整检验、Granger因果检验以及误差修正模型实证分析得出了：FDI促进了江苏工业制成品的出口额、内部的资本和技术密集型工业制成品出口额的增长,反映出FDI促进了江苏出口贸易结构的优化,即FDI是江苏出口贸易结构优化的一个重要影响因素。最后,文章提出了一些江苏合理利用外资以促进出口贸易结构优化的政策建议。     

Protection and Exchange Rates in a Small Open Economy

In a small‐open‐economy model with two tradables and one nontradable, if a price index of these three goods is stabilized and the exchange rate is flexible, conditions are obtained in the cases of two and of three or more factors for an export subsidy or an import tariff to result in currency appreciation. In the case of three or more factors, conditions are obtained under which either an export‐subsidy or an import‐tariff policy (or a combination) can take the place of a flexible exchange rate in accommodating the necessary resource allocation to an exogenous capital outflow, generalizing Keynes’s 1931 proposition.