III. Weltwirtschaft und Wirtschaft einzlner Länderund und Gebiete

Ohne Zusammenfassung     

Die Struktur der Herstellkosten bei Vollautomation und permanenter Erzeugung

Ohne ZusammenfassungMit 1 Textabbildung     

Business cycles and productivity growth: Are temporary downturns productive or wasteful?

This paper investigates the relationship between the structure of the business cycle and total factor productivity (TFP) growth in U.S. manufacturing. Previous empirical studies on cycle-growth interactions have been conducted at the aggregate level, and have produced mixed results. In contrast, we examine the dynamic linkages between temporary employment shocks and TFP at the industry level, using the NBER Productivity Database. Given the substantial differences in factor intensities, costs and the nature of innovation and productivity-enhancing activities across industries, there are good reasons why cycle-growth interactions may be more readily captured at the sectoral level. We construct an exactly identified Vector Autoregressive model for employment and TFP growth, and find strong support for the “opportunity-cost” view of business cycle-productivity growth interaction. This result suggests that recessions can lead to TFP growth through reorganization and restructuring effects. On the other hand, we find little support for the notion that temporary booms increase TFP through “learning-by-doing” effects. The responsiveness of TFP to employment shocks also seems to be related to the degree of job reallocation within individual industries and the capital intensity of the industry in question. This is further evidence in favour of the view that employment shocks can trigger reorganization effects. Finally, we suggest possible future avenues for this research, including the adjustment of TFP measures to allow for variable factor utilization over the cycle.     

Dividend taxation and intertemporal tax arbitrage

We analyze the effects of changes in dividend tax policy using a life-cycle model of the firm, in which new firms first access equity markets, then grow internally, and finally pay dividends when they have reached steady state. We find that unanticipated permanent changes in tax rates have only small effects on aggregate investment, since macroeconomic dynamics are dominated by mature firms for which dividend taxation is not distortionary. Anticipated or temporary dividend tax changes, on the other hand, create incentives for firms to engage in inter-temporal tax arbitrage so as to reduce investors' tax burden. For example, a temporary tax cut – the type most likely to be enacted by policymakers – induces firms to accelerate dividend payments while tax rates are low, which reduces their cash holdings and makes them capital-constrained when large investment opportunities arise. This can significantly lower aggregate investment for periods after the tax cut.     

Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions in Fisheries: The Case of Multiple Regulatory Instruments in Sweden

The fishing sector is a candidate for efficient climate policies because it is commonly exempted from greenhouse gas taxes and the fundamental problem of using a common pool resource is far from optimally solved. At the same time, fisheries management has other objectives. This study uses Swedish fisheries to analyse how the fishing sector and its climate impact are affected by regulations aiming at: (1) solving the common pool problem (2) taxing greenhouse gas emissions and (3) maintaining small-scale fisheries. The empirical approach is a linear programming model where the effects of simultaneously using multiple regulations are analyzed. Solving the common pool problem will lead to a 30 % reduction in emissions and substantially increase economic returns. Taxing greenhouse gas emissions will further reduce emissions. Policies for maintaining the small-scale fleet will increase the size of this fleet segment, but at the cost of lower economic returns. However, combining this policy with fuel taxes will reduce the size of the small-scale fleet, thus counteracting the effects of the policy. If taxation induces fuel-saving innovations, it is shown that this will affect not only emissions and fleet structure, but also quota uptake.     

Financial Crisis and its Asymmetric Macroeconomic Impact on Eurozone Member Countries

The purpose of the paper is to analyze the dynamics of EMU (The Economic and Monetary Union, i.e., the group of European countries who use the common currency euro) and to analyze the fallout from the recent financial and economic dynamics. Both the impact on the eurozone as a whole and on individual member countries will be evaluated. The first 11 years of Eurozone experience will be discussed and evaluated in the second section. The third section will then be devoted to analyzing the fallout from the recent financial and economic dynamics. Both the impact on the eurozone as a whole and on individual member countries will be evaluated. The last section concludes and provides some ideas for future development of eurozone.     

Is small really beautiful? A review of the concept of niches in innovation

This article reviews the concept of innovation niches through three categories: strategic niche management (SNM), specialised markets and niches formed as a technology declines. In the literature, innovation niches generate interest from both innovation and marketing perspectives. This review focuses predominately on the former from which the niche types have been adopted and analysed. Mostly, contributions since 1980 have been included, representing the period of academic interest in innovative small firms, while both temporal and locational filters were applied to the study. It is noted that SNM has been proposed as a means to protect potentially useful innovations from full market competition, while specialist niches supply technologies to few customers in more stable environments. Incumbent technologies at the stage of decline may also retreat to niches where they can still remain competitive. Finally, it is suggested that further research on innovation niches would extend our understanding of technology dynamics.