Employment Implications of Improved Labour Productivity in the Australian Iron and Steel Industry*

The long-run employment and our put effects of increased productivity in Australian iron und steel industry are investigated. This work suggests that employment in the iron and steel industry will expand und there will be shifts in the occupational composition of employment. These results ure preserved in u sensitivity analysis in which different trade scenarios are assumed und variations in indutry input-output shares und other key parameters are made.     

Temporal causality and the dynamics of democracy,emigration and real income in Fiji

This study is the first to explore temporal causality between democracy, emigration and real income in Fiji within a multivariate cointegration model. We find three long run relationships between democracy, emigration and real income. In the long run there is evidence that migration and democracy Granger cause real GDP in Fiji; real GDP and democracy Granger cause migration from Fiji and that real GDP and migration Granger cause democracy in Fiji. In the short run we find unidirectional Granger causality running from migration to real GDP and from democracy to real GDP, but neutrality between democracy and migration in the short run. We also extend the analysis to examine the degree of exogeneity of the variables beyond the sample period through considering the decomposition of variance and impulse response functions.     

WHAT DETERMINES MIGRATION FLOWS FROM LOW‐INCOME TO HIGH‐INCOME COUNTRIES? AN EMPIRICAL INVESTIGATION OF FIJI–U.S. MIGRATION 1972–2001

This article examines the long-run and short-run determinants of migration from Fiji to the United States between 1972 and 2001 using a human capital framework, which is extended to take account of political instability in Fiji. In the long-run the authors find that differences in income levels, disparities in police strength, disparities in the number of doctors, costs of moving, and political instability in Fiji are all statistically significant with the expected sign. In the short run the cost of moving, lagged migration, political instability, and differences in both police strength and medical care are the main determinants of Fiji–United States immigration. ( JEL C22, F22)     

ARE LABOUR FORCE PARTICIPATION RATES NON‐STATIONARY? EVIDENCE FROM 130 YEARS FOR G7 COUNTRIES*

This paper applies a unit root test with a non‐linear threshold to examine whether labour force participation rates are mean reverting for G7 countries using annual data over a 130 year period. We find some evidence of mean reversion for just over half the sample; however, this result is sensitive to regime shifts. We also examine whether the labour force participation rate is trend reverting through employing a lagrange multiplier (LM) unit root test with one and two structural breaks in the intercept and slope. The LM unit root test provides no additional evidence in support of stationarity. On the basis of the unit root tests for mean reversion we conclude that there is at best mixed evidence that long‐term changes in unemployment rates translate into long‐term changes in employment rates and that the unemployment rate is a useful indicator of joblessness.     

A Measure of Competition Based on 10‐K Filings

In this paper we develop a measure of competition based on management's disclosures in their 10‐K filing and find that firms’ rates of diminishing marginal returns on new and existing investment vary significantly with our measure. We show that these firm‐level disclosures are related to existing industry‐level measures of disclosure (e.g., Herfindahl index), but capture something distinctly new. In particular, we show that the measure has both across‐industry variation and within‐industry variation, and each is related to the firm's future rates of diminishing marginal returns. As such, our measure is a useful complement to existing measures of competition. We present a battery of specification tests designed to explore the boundaries of our measure and how it varies with the definition of industry and the presence of other measures of competition.     

A GENERAL METHOD FOR CREATING LORENZ CURVES

A general method to construct parametric Lorenz models of the weighted‐product form is offered in this paper. Initially, a general result to describe the conditions for the weighted‐product model to be a Lorenz curve, created by using several component parametric Lorenz models, is given. We show that the key property for an ideal component model is that the ratio between its second derivative and its first derivative is increasing. Then, a set of Lorenz models, consisting of a basic group of models, along with their convex combinations, is proposed, and it is shown that any model in the set possesses this key property. We introduce the concept of balanced fit, which provides a means of assigning weights, according to the preferences of the practitioner, to two alternative objectives for developing Lorenz curves in practice. These objectives are generating an acceptable Lorenz curve and improving the accuracy of the density estimation. We apply the balanced fit approach to income survey data from China to illustrate the performance of our models. We first show that our models outperform other popular traditional Lorenz models in the literature. Second, we compare the results generated by the balanced fit approach applied to one of the Lorenz models that we develop with those generated by the kernel method to show that the approach proposed in the paper generates plausible density estimates.     

Estimating Current Cost Depreciation Expense Using Numerical Analysis and the STAPOL Technique: A Pedagogic Exposition

Current cost accounting (CCA) recommendations have led to complex measurement problems. This paper aims to provoke discussion of the use of numerical analysis and the STAPOL technique as a method for measuring current cost depreciation expense. The measurement method analysed has a scientific foundation, is simple to apply, and yields accurate results. With slight modification, the method analysed is also applicable to other areas of CCA characterized by intractable measurement problems. Unlike other papers which have used differential calculus to analyse the use of numerical analysis in accounting, the exposition in this paper depends on only a rudimentary knowledge of algebra.