The income efficiency of government expenditure on agricultural policy

Farming worldwide and national agricultural policies are in a profound crisis. Farmers everywhere are complaining about inadequate incomes. A large proportion of farms are threatened on both sides of the Atlantic, in the EC no less than in the USA. This situation has coincided with a period of intense state intervention in agriculture. Spending on agriculture has risen steeply both in the EC and in the USA. The question arises how much of this farm spending benefits farmers.     

公私医疗卫生支出与经济增长关系的实证分析

众所周知,医疗卫生支出不仅关系到一个国家社会福利政策的规划,还对经济增长具有不可忽略的促进作用。然而,现有文献对于医疗卫生支出与经济增长关系之间的研究结论却是众说纷纭。鉴于此,本文根据医疗卫生支出的支付主体,将其分为政府医疗卫生支出和居民医疗卫生支出,并通过建立双向固定效应模型对公私医疗卫生支出对经济增长的影响进行分析。结果显示：从全国平均水平来看,政府医疗卫生支出每增长100％,带动经济增长12．08％,居民医疗卫生支出每增长100％,带动经济增长15．85％;但与此同时,考虑到不同地区的经济发展非均衡化时,政府医疗卫生支出和居民医疗卫生支出带动经济增长的效应差异甚大,其中政府医疗卫生支出对经济增长呈现“倒U型”效应,而居民医疗卫生支出对经济增长呈现“阶梯型”效应。     

We will not make a drama out of a health care crisis: an examination of UK retailers' HIV/AIDS policies

Abstract Described as the greatest health crisis to face mankind in the modern era, the threat of HIV and AIDS in the workforce provides important challenges for consumer businesses that seek to balance divergent public opinions with the need to provide adequately for the health care requirements of their workforce. This research, based upon a survey that included 42 of the UK's largest retailers, identifies the many issues surrounding the development of a credible business response to this health issue. The research findings suggest that many retailers have taken cognisance of customer feeling in their development of policies in this area and that in some instances the development of HIV/AIDS policies in respect of staff has had more to do with politically correct posturizing than a commitment to the welfare of staff.     

The Distribution of U.S. Income and Food Expenditures

Food expenditure and income distributions over 1980–1985 are examined using two welfare criteria: less inequality and more available resources. Intertemporal changes in the distributions are studied from the perspectives of inequality, relative economic affluence, society's satisfaction with the distributions, asymmetries, and average propensities to spend. Major conclusions are that inequality has increased over time in both the income and food spending distributions, relative economic affluence has generally risen, society is less satisfied with the food spending distribution, and average propensities to spend on food have been constant.     

The Nordic Model of Economic Development and Welfare: Recent Developments and Future Prospects

The stylised evidence from the Welfare State Sustainability (WSS) ratios points to a decrease in the future sustainability of public welfare spending in the Nordic countries.     

浅谈公共支出中的效率与公平问题

公共支出的效率与公平面临两难困境,如何权衡其中的利弊关系到整个社会的福利.在效率优先的原则下,最大的实现社会公平,使每个社会成员的个人偏好都能得到最大的满足.合理运用公共支出项目,不断推动社会经济的增长.     

The Food Stamp Program in an Era of Welfare Reform: Electronic Benefits and Changing Sources of Cash Income

Linked survey data and Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) records are used to investigate the distinct roles played by food stamp benefits and cash income in the household budget at different times of the month. Using data from Maryland in 1993, household budgets and food spending patterns are found to differ qualitatively, depending on whether the main source of cash income is welfare benefits, Social Security or Supplemental Security Income, or labor market earnings. These differences have implications for understanding the Food Stamp Program during the welfare reform period as many households move from welfare to work.     

How great is Latvia’s success story?

The current state of Latvia can be best described in medical terms: the patient is pale, but alive. The fi nancial woes have been successfully resolved, but economic, social and political challenges remain. The crisis is continuing to affect the fabric of social and political life in Latvia. This paper looks at the economic, social and political consequences of the recent fi nancial crisis and the ensuing economic collapse in Latvia and suggests some remedial actions.     

What factors determine e-satisfaction and consumer spending in e-commerce retailing?

Evidently, the Internet has resulted in a fundamental shift in retailing practice, creating a shift in both consumer and business behavior, which has been compared to that of the Industrial Revolution. The purpose of this paper is to analyze customer satisfaction in e-commerce market. In particular, we determine the factors that affect customer e-satisfaction and the relationship between customer satisfaction and consumer spending in e-commerce retailing. We focus on how American based e-commerce firms are impacted by these developments and how marketing practices have reflected the developing e-commerce situation. The results show that customer satisfaction does have an impact on consumer spending in American based e-commerce retailers. Further, the relationship between customer satisfaction and consumer spending is positive, where higher e-satisfaction results in more spending in e-commerce. The results also show that there is a direct relationship among e-service quality, e- satisfaction and e-loyalty in terms of online spending by consumers. However, the analysis shows that e-commerce still faces challenges compared with traditional offline retailers since customers cannot feel and try the products, and may end up choosing the products that they do not want.     

Outsourcing, unemployment and welfare policy

The paper investigates the consequences of outsourcing of labor intensive activities to low-wage economies. This trend challenges the two basic functions of the welfare state, redistribution and social insurance when private unemployment insurance markets are missing. The main results are: (i) outsourcing raises unemployment and labor income risk of unskilled workers; (ii) it increases inequality between high- and low-income groups; and (iii) the gains from outsourcing can be made Pareto improving by using a redistributive linear income tax if redistribution is initially not too large. We finally derive the welfare optimal redistribution and unemployment insurance policies.     

The New Political Economy of EU State Aid Policy

Despite its importance and singularity, the EU’s state aid policy has attracted less scholarly attention than other elements of EU competition policy. Introducing the themes addressed by the special issue, this article briefly reviews the development of EU policy and highlights why the control of state aid matters. The Commission’s response to the current economic crisis notably in banking and the car industry is a key concern, but the interests of the special issue go far beyond. They include: the role of the European Commission in the development of EU policy, the politics of state aid, and a clash between models of capitalism. The special issue also examines the impact of EU policy. It investigates how EU state aid decisions affect not only industrial policy at the national level (and therefore at the EU level), but the welfare state and territorial relations within federal member states, the external implications of EU action and the strategies pursued by the Commission to limit any potential disadvantage to European firms, and the conflict between the EU’s expanding legal order and national.     

美国金融危机及应对策略

美国金融危机主要在于金融风险内生力量和外部环境两个因素,其所引发的世界经济衰退导致中国经济增长减速。从经济学的角度来分析,中国应该在扩大投资、促进国内消费、扩大政府支出、继续促进出口等方面,积极应对金融危机和经济衰退,同时要继续注重环境与生态的保护。     

Economic liberalisation,gender wage inequality and welfare

The article develops a 3-sector general equilibrium model appropriate for economies with female labour oriented export sector to examine the effects of economic liberalisation policies on gender based wage inequality. It is assumed that there exist disparities in efficiencies between male and female labour due to skewed access to education and health, and differences in their spending patterns leading to differential effects of respective wages on their nutrition. The results indicate that tariff cut may reduce gender wage inequality, but may have detrimental effects on welfare; while foreign capital inflow may accentuate the inequality, despite improving the welfare of the economy. However, government policies to increase the provision of education and health have favourable effects on gender wage inequality but may be welfare deteriorating. Thus, the article provides a theoretical explanation to empirical evidences of diverse effects of liberalisation on gender wage inequality and explains the possibility of a trade-off between gender inequality and social welfare.     

The Sino-Japanese War and the Formation of the State Enterprise System in China: A Case Study of the Dadukou Iron and Steel Works, 1938-1945

This article examines the formation of China's state enterprisesystem, using the case of the Dadukou Iron and Steel Works (DISW).I argue that the basic institutional arrangement of the DISW,and by extension other state-owned enterprises, consisted ofa bureaucratic governance structure, distinctive managementand incentive mechanisms, and the provision of social servicesand welfare. This arrangement took shape during the Sino-JapaneseWar, with the sustained systemic crisis and the nature and characterof the institutional endowments leading to the formation ofChina's state enterprise system. In considering implicationsfor understanding institutional change, I suggest that crisisshapes radical institutional change and that both path dependenceand path independence characterize such change.     

The Impact of the Recession on Competition Policy: Amending the Economic Constitution?

The strengths of the European competition regime are outlined before identifying challenges presented by the financial crisis. The argument moves from enforcement to systemic threats to the credibility of the economic models on which modern competition policy is based. It then turns from banking failures to the crisis in the European motor industry. It suggests that competition policy comprises an ‘economic constitution’ for the EU which is under threat, but registers the relative complacency of the competition agencies, and argues for a redefinition of policy. The conclusion suggests that the regulatory relationship between the state and the private sector will reflect scepticism about the market and that political changes in the UK and Europe offer radical choices between a reinforced or a marginalised competition policy which the competition policy ‘community’ needs to confront.     

Government Spending Composition in an Endogenous Growth Model with Congestion

We build an endogenous growth model in which government expenditure is divided into public consumption and investment in public capital, and where both components suffer from some degree of congestion. We demonstrate that the socially optimal growth rate is negatively related to the degree of congestion. As regards the optimal share of government spending on infrastructure, we prove that an increase in congestion leads to a decrease in this share and that the optimal share of government spending on output can increase or decrease with congestion. In addition, we compare the social planner optimum with the second‐best outcome and show that, in this second case, welfare is lower. In this framework, we derive a necessary condition, which must hold in the second‐best equilibrium, involving the income tax rate and the share of government spending on public investment.     

Improving Incentives in Health Care Spending

Although U.S. economic growth is likely to continue to be robust, the growth of private and public spending on health care presents long-run public policy challenges. To meet these challenges health care resources must be used more efficiently. Currently, there are few incentives to put health care dollars to the highest value use. This is true in both public and private spending. An important element of the problem lies in the tax-preferred treatment given to employer-provided insurance but not to out-of-pocket spending. The resulting bias towards first-dollar insurance coverage means that consumers are insulated from the real costs of the health care that they consume and have little reason to evaluate whether the benefits are greater than those costs. Moreover, they seldom have sufficient price and quality information to make informed decisions. Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) are a promising way to remove the tax-penalty for enrolling in catastrophic insurance and paying for routine care out of pocket. Given the information that they need, consumers would then have more choices and more control, strengthening their role in reducing waste, improving efficiency, and promoting competition. Coupled with other policies, HSAs can be a critical component in moving toward an efficient and equitable health care system. JEL Classification I11     

基于经济增长的中国最优消费规模:1978—2006

中国长期实行"重投资、轻消费"的政策,消费率一直偏低。以限制消费为代价的经济增长不仅无法实现社会福利最大化和居民效用最大化,而且也是不可持续的。消费不足导致经济增长乏力,然而消费过度会导致投资不足从而阻碍经济增长,因此经济中存在最优的消费规模。在检验消费规模和经济增长关系的基础上,建立消费的内生增长模型,利用1978—2006年间29年的经验数据,求得中国消费率的最优值为66.46%,据以提出扩大消费以扩大内需、促进经济增长的政策建议。     

From conflict to crisis in collaborative NPD

While manufacturer–supplier co-development of projects can contribute shared knowledge and expertise, such commitment also presents managerial challenges, particularly where crisis threatens the entire project. This paper explores how crisis is manifested, amplified, handled, and its outcomes in two longitudinal case studies, one between a food manufacturer and its packaging supplier and another between a window manufacturer and its software supplier. The analysis, the first to focus on co-development crisis, results in a better understanding of crisis episodes and in propositions around the crisis management challenges in co-developing new product projects.     

中国零售业如何应对金融危机的挑战

由美国引起的这场金融危机,已席卷全球,波及方方面面,从虚拟经济到实体经济、从国际到国内,从生产企业到流通企业,从进出口贸易到国内市场,无一不受波及和影响,都面临着考验和挑战。如何应付这场金融危机的冲击,是中国零售业必须面对的首要任务。