WEEE和RoHS的行业指引效应研究

探析了欧盟“双绿指令”WEEE和RoHS实施后对我国机电行业的指引效应。指出在绿色壁垒日益严格的国际贸易环境下，我国以牺牲劳动者福利和污染环境为代价获得的产品价格竞争力已经面临巨大困境。因此，应及时调整对外贸易的策略，树立绿色理念，积极促进产业升级，提高出口产品的附加值。完善相关法律体系，使单纯的价格优势逐步转变为科技与环保优势。     

The Disciplinary Effect of the Single Market on Swedish Firms

In the 1980s it became increasingly clear that the European Community market was still segmented by national borders because of non-tariff barriers to trade. A major objective of the Single Market Program in 1992 was to remove these barriers, thereby enforcing intra-union competition. In this paper, a panel of Swedish firm-level data is used to evaluate whether domestic market power has been curtailed as a consequence of the SMP and of the Swedish membership in the European Union in 1995. Evidence of increased competition emerges, as price-cost margins have declined in industries with high non-tariff barriers prior to 1992. JEL Classification Numbers: F15, L11, C33     

货币政策操作需要考虑银行资本监管吗

持续宽松的货币政策与巴塞尔协议下银行资本监管的共同作用,可能是本次美国次贷危机产生和经济持续波动的主因之一。巴塞尔协议下的银行资本监管,较大地改变了信贷资金的流向和经济运行规律,从而必然影响到货币政策发挥作用的基础条件与传导途径。本文结合经济周期对银行资本约束下的IS-LM模型进行了扩展分析,发现银行资本约束会通过影响银行信贷渠道使货币政策产生非对称性效果,从理论上论证了货币政策的操作必须考虑银行资本监管。本文还运用随机前沿分析(SFA)方法检验了2000～2009年我国货币政策与银行资本监管联合效率,表明在引入银行资本监管后货币政策实现经济目标的联合效率下降。因此,为了达到稳定物价与产出的总体目标,在货币政策反应函数中必须考虑银行资本及其监管状况。     

Has Inflation Persistence Changed under EMU?

This paper analyzes the persistence of inflation in the euro area and, in particular, whether the persistence properties have changed since the start of European Monetary Union(EMU). For that purpose, we compare pre‐ and post‐EMU inflation persistence, use rolling‐window estimates of persistence, and apply tests specifically designed to detect break dates near the end of the sample period. In contrast to previous research, we find that inflation persistence has fallen significantly since the start of EMU. Persistence of consumer price inflation, which is central to the European Central Bank's policy mandate, has fallen more than the persistence of deflator inflation. The drop in inflation persistence is consistent with the results from a simulated small New Keynesian model with a shift toward a more aggressive monetary policy stance.     

Regulation of international roaming in the European Union—Lessons learned

This paper analyzes the evolution of prices and competition in intra-EU international roaming markets. It addresses three main research questions: (i) to what extent have market forces by themselves brought competition to retail roaming markets? (ii) Has the evolution of market dynamics in wholesale roaming improved competition? (iii) Is wholesale regulation sufficient to lead to a reduction in retail roaming prices? Data show that there has been little price-based competition both at wholesale and retail levels, despite prices being well above costs and the significant margins allowed by regulation. Available data from the period preceding the entry into force of the first EU roaming regulation also point to the same conclusion. Lack of competitive pressure in retail roaming markets and inelastic demand give little incentives for retail roaming service providers to lower prices. Wholesale international roaming markets have complex competition dynamics. They are characterized by the reciprocity of wholesale roaming agreements and traffic internalization inside transnational groups. These circumstances limit price competition at the wholesale level. The traditional regulatory approach applied to electronic communication markets has been primarily focused on wholesale regulation. However, empirical evidence shows that even if wholesale charges are reduced, retail roaming markets continue to operate at very high retail margins (for example, more than 200% retail mark-up over wholesale charges for data roaming services and incoming calls). This proves that in international roaming markets wholesale charge reductions are not necessarily passed on to retail prices. It can thus be inferred that wholesale price regulation alone is in most cases not sufficient to ensure that benefits are passed through to end users.     

Market Integration Without Policy Integration: A Comparison of the Shortcomings of Mercosur and the Eurozone

ABSTRACT

The major problem of Mercosur has been the lack of any policy coordination, which has resulted in periodic crises among member countries. It was thought that the Eurozone parts of the European Union represented a more mature institution, because member countries were willing to waive sovereignty over a major policy instrument (monetary policy), while maintaining independence over fiscal policy. The result of this, however, has led to even greater distortions than had there been no macroeconomic coordination at all.     

The poor outside the lamplight: on the prevalence of poverty among population groups not included in household surveys

Poverty rate calculations are often based on household surveys that exclude some of the groups most vulnerable to poverty such as the homeless. This paper documents the nature of the excluded groups and the quantitative importance of their omission for the Czech Republic. Our study combines European Union Statistics on Income and Living Conditions data for 2011 with information from the 2011 Population Census. Our preferred estimate indicates an increase in the poverty rate by almost one percentage point. The paper contributes to accurately identifying the most vulnerable members of the society, which is essential for setting effective social policies.     

Dynamic Cost Inefficiency of the European Union Meat Processing Firms

We apply dynamic data envelopment analysis (DEA) to estimate dynamic cost inefficiency for a sample of European Union (EU) large meat processing firms over the period 2005–2012 and decompose this into the contributions of technical and allocative inefficiency. The estimation of dynamic inefficiencies controls for adjustment costs associated with firms’ investments. We further contribute by measuring dynamic cost inefficiencies and their components with regard to own region group (managerial inefficiencies) and the gap between the pooled frontier and the region-specific frontier (programme inefficiencies). Results show that technical inefficiency tends to be the largest component of cost inefficiency when both conducting the analysis for the EU as a whole and estimating a region-specific frontier. Results suggest significant differences in cost, technical, and allocative inefficiencies between meat processing firms in eastern, western and southern EU countries. We also find that the gaps between the pooled and region-specific frontiers tend to be small to negligible, which suggests that the main source of pooled inefficiencies are shortcomings in managerial practices rather than differences in region-specific conditions.     

The contribution of granular and fundamental comparative advantage to European Union countries' export specialisation

This paper analyses the contribution of fundamental comparative advantage (a country-specific component) and granular comparative advantage (a firm-specific component) to European Union countries' export specialisation. We find that, on average, granular comparative advantage may explain export specialisation in 29% of industries, which account for 47% of total exports. We also show that 60% of the variation in export specialisation across countries and industries may be explained by granular comparative advantage. These results highlight that some outstanding firms may play a very important role in explaining European Union countries' export specialisation.     

Building responsive supervision over smaller banks in Europe: an insight from the Principal-Agent perspective

Abstract

The Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM) is an administrative arrangement of national assistance to the ECB in exercising its exclusive supervisory competence. It sets two systems of assistance: ECB Direct Supervision (for large banks) and Indirect Supervision (for smaller and medium-sized banks) supervision. This paper analyzes dynamics between the ECB Banking Supervision as the principal and NCAs as its agents in the system of ECB Indirect Supervision. It identifies six formal (statutory) accountability and control mechanisms which are put at the ECB’s disposal to monitor the way how the NCAs carry SSM supervisory tasks when exercising the ECB’s exclusive supervisory competences under the SSM Regulation.