Was the expansion of housing credit in Japan good or bad?

This paper shows, using data from the Family Income and Expenditure Survey, that housing credit has become increasingly available over time in Japan, especially since 2000, and that this has made it easier for Japanese households to purchase housing and enabled them to do so at an earlier age. However, it also shows that the greater availability of housing credit has increased households’ housing loan repayment burden, which has resulted in their cutting back on their other consumption expenditures and created the potential for retirement insecurity. Another concern is that the increasing availability of housing credit has been accompanied by a pronounced shift from fixed-rate to variable-rate housing loans. This is cause for concern given the low level of financial literacy that prevails among the Japanese population and the likelihood that interest rates on variable-rate housing loans will be raised sooner or later as monetary policy is tightened.     

从城市社区看社会分层与社会不平等——对天津市两个商品房社区的比较研究

依据对天津市两个居住区进行参与观察和个案访谈所获得的田野材料,通过比较研究的方法,揭示了社区的阶层化现状,勾画出不同社区居民之间的社会分层和不平等状况。并进一步指出,缩小城市区位差异、减少城市中的居住隔离不仅牵涉自然资源和社会资源的公平分配和使用,同时也关乎个体发展的代际公平。     

中国收入分配结构演变对国内旅游消费的影响

国内旅游是成熟旅游业的主体，其发展与经济水平高度相关。本文从居民收入及其分配结构演变角度，对20年来中国国内旅游消费及其特征进行理论性分析。     

逆向物流成本收益优化分析

伴随电子商务的兴起以及发展,逆向物流正成为企业获得可持续发展的新方式。近年来,可持续发展理念的贯穿使得逆向物流在学术界和企业界流行起来。本文在分析逆向物流概念的基础上,对逆向物流的成本以及收益进行了分析,并探讨了逆向物流的成本收益优化模型,并以此给出合理的可行性建议。     

闲暇经济理论综述及最新进展

随着国外发达国家相继进入后工业化社会,闲暇经济理论尽管还远未成型,但已经成为国外经济研究的新兴课题,本文按照闲暇经济理论的发展历史和研究方向,从两个方向综述了该理论的内容,一是依据对不同类型闲暇时间的研究来进行综述,二是在此基础上从闲暇被引入进各类函数和经济系统的角度综述了相关研究的主要成果.     

城乡居民收入差距现状分析与缩小路径研究

面对城乡居民收入差距有所扩大的现状,文章利用《湖南统计年鉴》内的数据测算了2004-2013年十年内城乡居民收入的泰尔指数,分析了经济发展不平衡、人力资源差别、房地产畸形发展等扩大居民收入差距的原因。通过对城乡居民收入泰尔指数变化的研究,探讨了发展城乡经济、加大财政投入、推进户籍制度改革等缩小居民收入差距的路径。     

Do oil tariffs lower wages?

An oil tariff has potential to alter the pattern of production and income distribution across productive factors. This paper use a general equilibrium model of production and trade with inputs of capital, labor, and international energy to examine the effects of an oil tariff. Under a range of conditions, higher energy prices created by oil tariffs would lower the ratio of wages to capital rents, and production of labor intensive goods would fall. This paper concentrates on the potential of oil tariffs to alter patterns of production and income distribution.     

An Application of an Integrated Transport Network– Multiregional CGE Model: a Framework for the Economic Analysis of Highway Projects

This paper develops a framework for the economic analysis of highway projects that is then used to estimate the dynamic economic effects of a highway project on the economic growth and the regional disparity in Korea. The framework is composed of a transport model and a multiregional Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) model. The transport model measures a change in interregional shortest distances and the accessibility due to the highway project. The CGE model estimates the spatial economic effects of the project on GDP, the price, exports, and the regional distribution of wages and population. The simulation allows policy makers to determine which highway development deserves the priority for investment, based on consideration of economic growth and regional economic equity in the long run. The simulation found that all the highway projects have positive effects on GDP and export growth as well as regional equity in terms of wage and population.     

Does computer penetration increase farmers’ income? An empirical study from China

The diffusion and adoption of modern information technology provide new chance for China to close urban-rural income gap. This paper uses China's provincial panel data from 2002 to 2013 to investigate the effect of computer penetration on rural residents' income. A public program aiming to connect every village with broadband Internet and other rural facilities provides plausibly exogenous variation in rural residents' availability and adoption of the broadband Internet, which is used to explore the instrument variable for rural computer penetration. The results show that rural computer penetration tends to increase rural residents' income over time, but the average effect remains limited. The dynamic panel threshold effects model, which allows for both the threshold variable and other covariates to be endogenous, is further used to explore the constraints of the income-increase effect of rural computer penetration. It shows that the effect is at least doubled over the average effect estimated from instrument variables method, once the digital divide causes are removed. Our findings have important implications for the government to increase rural residents' income and reduce urban-rural income gap by encouraging rural computer usage and removing the digital divide.     

Impact of commuting by workers on household dietary diversity in rural India

Drawing insights from the literature on transformation of rural non-farm employment, pathways from agriculture to nutrition, and linkages between migration and nutritional status of household, we seek to understand differences in dietary diversity across three mutually exclusive types of rural Indian households: where all members work in rural areas, at least one member commutes to urban areas, at least one member has no fixed place of work. Our analysis is based on a nationally representative data set from India for the year 2009–10 and we use propensity score matching methods. We find that as compared to households with no commuters, households with rural–urban commuters have higher dietary diversity; whereas households with no fixed place workers have lower dietary diversity. We also find differences in dietary diversity across households which differ by their primary source of income.