Rural-to-urban migration, human capital, and agglomeration

A new general-equilibrium model that links together rural-to-urban migration, the externality effect of the average level of human capital, and agglomeration economies shows that in developing countries, unrestricted rural-to-urban migration reduces the average income of both rural and urban dwellers in equilibrium. Various measures aimed at curtailing rural-to-urban migration by unskilled workers can lead to a Pareto improvement for both the urban and rural dwellers. In addition, the government can raise social welfare by reducing the migration of skilled workers to the city. Moreover, without a restriction on rural-to-urban migration, a government's efforts to increase educational expenditure and thereby the number of skilled workers may not increase wage rates in the rural or urban areas.     

Integrating public demands into model-based design for multifunctional agriculture: An application to intensive Dutch dairy landscapes

The contribution of agriculture to the welfare of society is determined by its economic, social and environmental performance. Although theoretical discussions can be found in the literature, few reports exist that integrate the social demand for multifunctional agriculture in the evaluation of the sustainability and the global welfare of society. This paper presents a methodology that combines economic valuation, integrated modelling, stakeholder analysis, and multi-criteria evaluation. It consists of three steps to determine: (1) social demands for multifunctional agriculture; (2) feasible technical alternatives available from the supply part of the market; (3) the net utility of alternatives for society measured as the change in social net benefit, i.e. the sum of changes compared to the current situation expressed in utility of market and non-market net benefits. Market net benefits are represented by their monetary value. Quality Function Deployment combined with Analytic Network Process (QFD/ANP) were used to estimate the non-market net benefits. The methodology is applied to the case study of a dairy-farming based agricultural landscape in the Northern Friesian Woodlands, The Netherlands. Social net benefit depended on land use, i.e. pasture management regimes on each of the agricultural fields and on presence or absence of hedgerows around the fields. Changes in market net utility were expressed in terms of changes for farmers, consumers and government. Changes in non-market net utility were expressed in terms of changes in landscape quality, nature value and environmental health for Dutch society as a whole, as estimated from European public surveys (Eurobarometer). The complete solution space defined by the market and non-market net benefits of landscapes with alternative patterns of land use was estimated to offer insight in the trade-off between market and non-market performance and enable selection of ‘icon’ landscapes to target or avoid. Improvement of the current landscape towards the social optimum would involve changes in pasture management resulting in higher gross margin for farmers, slightly relaxing current environmental restrictions, which could be reached at lower levels of subsidies in agri-environmental programs. In addition to such overall optimum the results demonstrate the trade-off between market and non-market benefits and the characteristics of current, utopian and dystopian landscapes. The approach provides an alternative to current economic valuation methods which focus on assessment of economic value as an input to analysis. Here, economic value emerges as the trade-off between market and non-market functions which is an output of the analysis.     

Political economy of taxation,debt ceilings,and growth

This study presents voting on policies, including labor and capital income taxes and public debt, in an overlapping-generations model with physical and human capital accumulation, and analyzes the effects of a debt ceiling on a government's policy formation and its impact on growth and welfare. The results show that the debt ceiling induces the government to shift the tax burdens from the older to younger generations, but stimulates physical capital accumulation and may increase public education expenditure, resulting in a higher growth rate. Alternatively, the debt ceiling is measured from the viewpoint of a benevolent planner and lowering the debt ceiling (i.e., tightening fiscal discipline) makes it possible for the government to approach the planner's allocation in an aging society.     

中国城市政府公共支出效率分析——基于四阶段DEA方法的实证研究

本文以2008年中国内地126个地级以上城市为样本数据,利用四阶段DEA方法,对中国城市公共支出效率进行了实证分析。结果显示:如果不对外部环境因素加以控制,则经典的DEA方法将会高估城市公共支出效率;在控制外部环境因素影响后,样本城市公共支出效率得分为0.353,表明在保持支出不变下,通过改善组织管理、优化支出规模及结构,公共服务供给水平可提高约64%,城市公共支出效率还有很大的提升空间;经济发达、较大的辖区面积是城市公共支出效率提升的有利条件,而人口增加对公共品供给产生的拥挤效应不利于城市公共支出效率提升。     

跨越竞争丛林与范式重构：全球治理改革进程中的疫苗产业创新治理

疫苗作为新冠疫情防控的最关键手段之一,已在各国抗疫中发挥积极影响。疫苗研发、生产、注射意愿以及全球分配的公平性与可及性等一系列问题日益受到世界关注。分析全球治理改革中,疫苗作为一种全球公共产品的创新治理问题,讨论疫苗产业发展特征与创新规律演化,剖析西方国家疫苗产业创新治理困境以及“竞争丛林”逻辑,阐释中国行动方案及对全球治理改革的贡献。最终提出疫苗产业创新治理机制对推动全球治理改革的政策含义。     

公共财政框架下我国预算制度改革研究

从预算史演进的角度看,在我国现实背景下政府预算与公共预算具有不同内涵。就民主化取向而言,政府预算决定了预算是面向政府内部并直接支持政府行为的;公共预算决定了预算是面向公民,直接支持公民的行为与福利的。我国公共预算制度体系建设的总体目标在于打造能够内在统一民主理念和法治要求的预算制度体系;可以围绕打造统一预算和提升立法机构预算地位、完善预算监督两条主线推进改革。     

政府公共工程招投标腐败举报研究

政府公共工程招投标领域内,参与投标人为达到自身的某种目的常常采取行贿等非法手段。这种腐败违法行为不仅严重败坏了社会风气,且给政府公共工程建设带来极大破坏。消除这种行为,除了需要相应的监管部门付出很多努力外,与招投标违法举报人的举报积极性密切相关,举报人提供的线索在查处腐败案件中起关键的作用。充分发挥举报人的积极性,是查处腐败案件的重要突破口,也是做好工程建设预防寻租腐败等发生的重点和难点。该文从政府公共工程招投标腐败举报问题出发。从举报人是否属于当事人的角度进行分类,研究了它们的异同点,并对举报人与被举报人之间利益进行博弈分析,在此基础上提出了完善政府公共工程招投标腐败举报制度的途径。得出结论是,提高举报人积极性的努力方向有两条：其一是降低举报人的举报风险;此外就是增加举报人在举报活动中的预期收益。     

经济学视域下的公共政策分析:批判与反思

当前主流经济理论对公共政策的分析主要是基于其广泛适用的规则和假设,在进行演绎式分析推理过程中,其所使用的抽象效率标准将公平分析几乎完全排除在外,从而使公共政策在很大程度上失去了其应有的价值判断。现实中,社会性个体基于契约理性追求角色意义上的目标及其协调,因此,公共政策首先应考虑的是目标定位与一致认可,这必然要兼顾公平与效率,并全面考虑人类行为的伦理、经济和法律方面,这是人作为一切社会关系的总和的必然产物和要求。政府公共政策及其引导下的集体行动是对个体角色目标的协调一致的表现和结果,因此公共政策只有能够满足诸多个体实现不同的个人目标,才有被认可并得到执行的可能。由此可见,公共政策首先应当有其价值判断,该价值判断建立在共识判断的基础之上。     

公众健康权与药品专利权:利益冲突及其政策选择

药品专利权与公众健康权的冲突由来已久,通过政府药品管制及现存法律制度提供的强制许可与平行进口路径,并不能得到有效解决冲突。政府基于责任伦理在国民收入第二次分配中的补偿机制,应当是现阶段公众健康权实现的较为可行的政策选择。     

村级公共服务需求制度创新——以成都为例

本文以成都村级公共服务改革实践为例,首先初步分析了成都市村级公共服务供给现状,然后以农村居民对村级公共服务的实际需求为研究视角,重点分析了成都市在推进村级公共服务需求制度创新方面所取得的成效。最后在总结成都村级公共服务改革实践经验的基础上,进一步提出了完善我国村级公共服务需求制度的对策与建议。