Modelling exchange of probabilistic opinions

Summary. This paper studies how communication or exchange of opinions influences correlation of beliefs. The paper focuses on a situation in which agents communicate with each other infinitely many times without observing data. It is an extension to the ‘Expert Problem’ in Bayesian theory, where the informational flow is asymmetric. Moreover, this paper generalizes the existing literature of communication that employs the common prior assumption (CPA) by allowing for heterogeneous beliefs. Some basic convergence results are shown in contrast with the results obtained under the CPA. Furthermore, several economic implications of the basic results are provided. Received: August 27, 2001; revised version: April 16, 2002 RID="*" ID="*" The results presented in this paper are taken from my Ph.D. thesis at Stanford University. I gratefully acknowledge the inspiration obtained from innumerable discussions with Mordecai Kurz about this subject. Also, I appreciate comments from Kenneth J. Arrow, Peter J. Hammond, Maurizio Motolese, Carsten K. Nielsen, Ho-Mou Wu and the anonymous referee.     

Physical Search

Unidirectional search is an evolutionarily stable outcome in an economy where homogenous buyers and sellers can either move or stay. It is more efficient than bidirectional search. In unidirectional search, it is more efficient if the more numerous agents move and the less numerous agents stay, than vice versa.     

Pensions reforms,workforce ageing and firm-provided welfare

This paper investigates the impact of an exogenous increase in the legal retirement age on the firms’ propensity to provide welfare services voluntarily to their employees. To this purpose we exploit a unique information derived from the Rilevazione su Imprese e Lavoro (RIL), a survey conducted in 2015 on a large and representative sample of Italian firms. Applying different regression models we show that firms which were forced to give up previously planned hirings because of the Law 201/2011 (the so-called ‘Fornero pension reform’), increased the probability of providing welfare services at workplace. By referring to the sociological, human resource management and economic literature we then argue that a sudden increase in the legal retirement age may motivate the employers to establish welfare schemes as a way to cope with an ageing workforce. Our findings also hold when propensity score matching methods are used in order to control for sample selection issues.     

云南花卉产业发展中若干问题的探讨

A few problems exist in flower industry development in Yunnan province. The key problem is flower production with sell set in system unqualified, product quallty problem; wrong model in specification of quality in product, undeveloped and developed technology of quality standard system hasn‘t been used. To change present condition, combining local present condition, we can enhance the macroscopic management and put forward to peasant the policy suggestion to guide the development of Yunnan province flower industry.     

积极财政政策执行效果及隐忧问题研究——H省执行情况个案分析

基于凯恩斯主义国民收入决定理论 ,通过对H省经济运行数据的实证模拟 ,分析H省积极财政政策的执行情况 ,并结合H省省情和我国国情 ,我们得到了九个基本命题 :命题 1∶H省经济处于投资陷阱之中 ,因而货币政策无效 ,财政政策充分有效。命题 2∶H省的财政政策乘数为 5 596,投资需求拉动乘数为 2 3 945,消费需求拉动乘数为2 2 0 1 5,财政支出回馈乘数为 0 2 2 66。命题 3∶H省国债转贷与补助资金拉动的经济增长率为 :1 988年 0 6个百分点 ,1 999年 0 9个百分点 ,2 0 0 0年 0 6个百分点 ,2 0 0 1年 0 5个百分点。命题 4:乘数愈大 ,积极财政政策的效果愈大 ,但积极财政政策退出造成的负作用也愈大 ,总需求和经济增长对积极财政政策的依赖程度也愈强。命题 5,民营化程度愈低 ,投资的利率弹性愈低 ,货币政策愈无效 ,反之亦然。命题 6,民营化程度愈低 ,财政依赖程度愈强 ,反之亦然。命题 7:我国的积极财政政策必然会退出 ;退出的最佳方式是淡出 ;维持现有国债规模是淡出的最可能的形式 ,是一个聚点均衡。命题 8:H省的民营化程度低于全国的平均水平 ,财政依赖程度高于全国的平均水平 ,自主性增长动力尤显不足。命题 9:如果没有激励民间投资的有效措施出台 ,积极财政政策淡出将使H省经济增长速度下滑。     

The optimal portfolio for the two-pillar mandatory pension system: the case of Poland

In the recent decade, there has been observed across the Central and Eastern European states the regulatory trend towards the increase of the non-financial (first) pension pillar size at the expense of the financial (second) pillar. It tends to question the consequences of this shift for the future retirement benefits. Applying the portfolio approach we address this issue by running a series of simulations to find out how to allocate pension contributions between both pillars in an optimal way. Our study contributes to the existing literature as follows. First, we do not perform the assessment of the predetermined regulatory solutions, but we look for an optimal one. Moreover, we allow our optimal rule to be time-varying, if necessary, which would be a true novelty in this research area. Second, we do not base our estimates on historical trends; rather, we apply the long-term economy’s projection to account for the society’s ageing impact, which is a crucially important factor for the solvency of the pension system. Adapting some of the simulation assumptions to fit the Polish case, our results confirm that current regulations underestimate the role of the capital pillar and the optimal allocation between both pillars should be time-varying.     

制度缺失与中国经济体制改革面临的三大问题

经济体制改革以来,由于制度缺失的存在,致使经济体制改革在取得辉煌成就的同时,也面临着市场化改革所带来的严峻经济问题,这些问题突出地表现在以下三个方面:一是日益凸现的失业问题;二是财富分配不公问题;三是国有资产流失问题。制度缺失导致的这三个问题,加重了改革的社会成本,危害了社会公平,破坏了经济效率,因此必须采取相应的治理措施。     

通过加总推出的总供给曲线

总供给曲线的推导是宏观经济学中的最重要内容之一。在大多数宏观经济模型中 ,在推导总供给曲线时 ,加总问题 (aggregationproblem)往往被忽略。一般认为 ,总供给曲线是各企业供给曲线的简单算术和或是一个代表性企业供给曲线的简单放大。但是 ,在现实中 ,各个企业是不同的。只有在非常严格的条件下 ,总供给曲线与企业供给曲线在性质上才是等价的。考虑到中国经济的制度性特点并在解决加总的一系列技术问题的基础上 ,本文推导出了在企业劳动生产率服从均匀分布情况下的总供给曲线。通过这种方法推出的总供给曲线具有许多传统总供给曲线所不具有的新性质。笔者希望本文能为进一步研究处于微观经济和宏观经济之间的往往被忽视的一块重要领域 (“中观经济领域”)做出贡献。     

陕西实施农村养老保险制度的经济分析及措施

随着我国人口老龄化的加剧，老年人特别是农村老年人的养老问题日益突出，本文主要通过对陕西农村养老现状和所存在问题的分析，提出了建立农村养老保险制度的建议，旨在于试图为我国农村养老保险制度的实施提供一些借鉴。     

中国就业歧视现象及其危害分析

近年来，由于就业人口的增多、就业压力增大等原因，中国的就业歧视现象呈现出愈演愈烈的趋势。就业歧视不仅破坏了平等竞争的就业环境，而且还将危害社会的正常发展，给社会的正常秩序带来不安定的隐患。