Editor's Feature

This study makes a number of observations about the way in which the current crisis in particular, but economic crises more generally, are reported upon by the media. Considering terminology used to describe the financial crisis of 2007/2008 by employing a dataset of 956 articles from The Economist, we study what terms are used, why, and how they evolve. We consider how the frequency of negative emotional terms and the frequency of negative economic terms increase from the period of no-crisis to the period of the crisis. Increasing incidence lowers levels of consumer confidence. We predict that as the crisis evolves the nature of the terminology used to describe it will change, and that the present crisis will receive a special name, like the "Great Depression" of the 1930s. We explore a number of possibilities, and conclude that the preferred name will be the "Credit Crunch."     

美国金融危机的祸起:政府还是市场——基于芝加哥学派理论和奥地利学派理论的思考

美国金融危机犹如海啸一般正在席卷着全球,全球经济将面临着衰退的危险。各国政府纷纷出动采取了各种政策以防止衰退,同时经济学家和一些学者都试图解释这次危机的成因。笔者将运用芝加哥学派的理论和奥地利学派的理论以及他们思想的精髓分析当前金融危机的成因以及相应的应对方法。通过分析,笔者发现当前存在的一些对金融危机的解释是不合理、不全面的,没有触及到根本。而政府目前的应对方案也是差强人意的。造成美国金融危机的罪魁祸首是美国人的过度消费,而应对这次金融危机,美国政府的扩大财政支出政策也是无济于事的,不能从长期解决问题,美国政府应该利用这次机会改变美国人的消费理念,从而回到古典经济学家所倡导的节俭美德,节俭可以创造财富,这样才能保持长期的繁荣。     

Mutation of HRM practices in Russia: an application of CRANET methodology

This article describes the challenges facing established practices and patterns of human resource management (HRM) during the economic recession. It is based on the results of the CRANET survey, administered in Russia in the third quarter of 2008, on the 2008 CRANET data available for Bulgaria and on survey of companies' executives, implemented in the first half of 2010. We found that Russian HRM practices that are based on low formalization of performance assessment, great versatility of payment arrangements, and high flexibility of working and contractual arrangements enabled companies to adapt to the recession conditions without massive layoffs.     

Assessing the efficacy of rational budgeting approaches: fiscal recovery planning and municipal budgetary solvency

ABSTRACT

This study assesses the effects of financial recovery planning on the budgetary solvency of US cities. Budgetary solvency is the ability of governments to meet their service responsibilities and other financial obligations in a fiscal year. Financial recovery planning, which is based on rational decision-making theory, is designed to help cities recover from fiscal stress by facilitating diagnosis of fiscal problems, and the implementation of short- and long-term fiscal recovery strategies. Using data from a national survey of cities and multi-year audited financial reports, the results of the regression analyses show that planning is associated with stronger budgetary solvency, but its effectiveness varies across cities. Specifically, planning helps majority of fiscally struggling cities, but not those facing extreme fiscal decline.     

对经济衰退阴影下蓝色壁垒问题的理性审视

在全球经济衰退的阴影下,贸易保护主义抬头的可能性正在增强,新的贸易冲突难以避免,以SA8000为代表的蓝色壁垒将成为贸易保护主义信手拈来的武器。本文认为我国客观存在劳工权益受到侵犯的问题,我国劳工并未获得与"中国制造"同步增长的权益;在经济衰退的威胁下,我国以劳动密集型产品为主的出口企业面对的不仅仅是订单减少的问题,更要面对新的贸易壁垒——蓝色壁垒,因此应抓住当前机遇,化"危"为"机",促进对外贸易的持续健康发展。     

Furloughing*

Over nine million jobs were furloughed in the United Kingdom during the coronavirus pandemic. Using real-time survey evidence from the UK in April and May 2020, we document which workers were most likely to be furloughed and we analyse variation in the terms on which they furloughed. We find that women were significantly more likely to be furloughed. Inequality in care responsibilities seems to have played a key role: mothers were 10 percentage points more likely than fathers to initiate the decision to be furloughed (as opposed to it being fully or mostly the employer's decision) but we find no such gender gap amongst childless workers. The prohibition of working whilst furloughed was routinely ignored, especially by men who can do a large percentage of their work tasks from home. Women were less likely to have their salary topped up beyond the 80 per cent subsidy paid for by the government. Considering the future, furloughed workers without employer-provided sick pay have a lower willingness to pay to return to work, as do those in sales and food preparation occupations. Compared with non-furloughed employees, furloughed workers are more pessimistic about keeping their job in the short to medium run and are more likely to be actively searching for a new job, even when controlling for detailed job characteristics. These results have important implications for the design of short-time work schemes and the strategy for effectively reopening the economy.     

South Pacific tourism in the mid-1980s

The Pacific Islands have weathered the world economic recession well, but not without changes in their approach to tourism. Poor economic conditions coupled with US airline deregulation caused considerable reassessment. The fear of recession, together with optimism concerning the future resulted in new services (while others were going out of business), a spate of hotel construction plans (even in areas with low occupancy rates) and a softening of attitudes towards tourism. The possibility of a huge Pacific Basin (Rim) market strongly influenced these development policies.     

论20世纪90年代日本的景气刺激对策

日本泡沫经济崩溃以后，政府为了刺激经济景气在1992至2000年期间，曾10次推行刺激对策，追加了130多万亿日元的公共投资，但由于种种原因，投资乘数效果降低，经济长期处于低迷，景气刺激对策及其效果值得研究和深思。     

日本经济衰退的新古典经济分析

日本持续经济衰退与30年代的经济大萧条都表现出零利率加通货紧缩的特征。用新古典经济学方法分析日本经济的衰退，寻求相应的政策治理途径，从短期看，仍需在货币政策和财政政策上采取双扩张政策，其中财政政策更具比较优势；从长远看，改革的重点仍在于结构性调整和制度创新。     

日本经济走势分析

千年伊始，饮受衰退洗礼的日本经济有了一定的起色，于是人们便对日本经济的走势产生出各种各样的判断。归纳起来有3种看法，并各有各自的根据，对此进行深入分析有助于我们对日本经济走势做出正确的判断。决定日本经济势的关键因素是日本政府采取的主要政策、措施及其效果和美国经济的走势。经过分析并结合日本经济目前的状况，得出的结论是：目前日本经济将难以增长并可能再次陷入衰退。