Inflation in Argentina during the 2000s

The paper presents a neo-structuralist econometric analysis of the monthly inflation rates. The model breaks down the CPI into different components based on their price-formation mechanisms. The basic breakdown defines three components: PFLEX (fruits and vegetables, 3.6% of the basket), PREGUL (prices regulated by the government, 20.1% of the basket) and PFIX (the rest of goods and services, 76.3% of the basket). PFIX is the focus of the econometric analysis while PFLEX and PREGUL are considered exogenous. The explanatory variables are the monthly rates of: the price of bovine cattle at the domestic market, the international soy price, the price by ton of imported intermediate goods, the nominal exchange rate, the average wage of workers that are registered in Social Security and the productivity, measured by the GDP by employed worker. There was an informal indexation mechanism in the labor market. Average monthly wages rose at annual rates that were almost always higher than the sum of past annual inflation plus the annual increase in productivity. The over-indexation of the unit labor cost was the main inflationary factor in the period. The inertial component, represented in the model by the previous monthly rate, determines 60% of the current rate.     

阿根廷金融危机中银行差异性研究——基于面板数据的实证分析

危机中导致银行体系出现困难的三个主要的风险因素是:银行资产负债表上不断上升的美元化趋势;对政府贷款的日益增加和银行存款的流失。但是不同类型的银行在这三个方面存在着明显的差异--那就是,面对宏观经济波动的冲击,并不是所有的银行所受的损失都一样大。而且,针对1998年～2001年所进行的面板数据估计表明,存款者能够辨别出银行风险的高低。因此,在这场由挤兑引发的银行危机中,并不是所有的银行都表现出了一样的行为。     

Motorcycle helmet use in Mar del Plata,Argentina: prevalence and associated factors

Injuries resulting from motorcycle crashes constitute a growing problem in Argentina and other Latin American countries. The problem is aggravated because helmet use is not widespread. This observational study analysed the prevalence of helmet use and related factors in a city in Argentina. The sample consisted of 2542 observations of motorcyclists. The results show an incidence of helmet use of 69.8% for drives and 43.4% for passengers. Helmet use was greater among women. Environmental and temporal conditions were related with the rate of helmet use. The findings indicate a considerable increase in helmet use with respect to prior years, providing evidence in favour of government policies. However, the number of motorcycles in circulation has tripled in the past five years, and therefore, the public health impact of injuries due to motorcycle crashes persists.     

Does the currency board matter? US news and Argentine financial market reaction

Using a Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroscedasticity (GARCH) model, we study the effects of the US monetary policy and macroeconomic announcements on Argentine money, stock and foreign exchange markets over the period January 1998 to July 2007. We show, first, that both types of news have a significant impact on all markets. Second, there are noticeable differences in reaction for different subsamples: Argentine money markets were more dependent on US news under the currency board than after it was abandoned as the floating exchange rate partly absorbs spillover effects from the US. Finally, we find that the US-dollar-denominated assets react less to US news than peso-denominated assets, which suggests that the currency board was not completely credible during its final years.     

Scopes of intervention and evolutionary paths for argentinian universities transfer offices*

ABSTRACT

The majority of researches on knowledge and technology transfer from universities focused on the topic of processes which can improve the efficiency of the commercialization of R&D results. Furthermore, the different channels of transfer have been studied mainly independent of each other. This article develops a more strategic approach and proposes an integrated view of 16 channels of transfer organized around four core competences and considering their main form of governance. The empirical analysis is based on data gathered through a survey and an interview on a sample of 29 Argentinian National Universities publicly funded. The findings highlight four types of strategies – integral, network, entrepreneurial and undetermined – and two main types of potential evolutionary paths. The ability to differentiate the scopes of the intervention of universities transfer activities has implications for universities as well as for policymakers.     

Port choice in a competitive environment: from the shipping lines' perspective

The present era of globalization and regional competition has witnessed the increasing influence of the global operations of the shipping lines on port development and the declining monopoly of ports. This warrants the need for an identification of the port selection criteria from the perspective of the shipping lines. Hence, an attempt is made to determine the port choice from the perspective of the shipping lines. Moreover, most port operators have designed their strategies based on the ‘stated preference’ of the shipping lines. However, the stated preference approach can have several shortcomings such as the shipping lines would tend to overstate their demands for services at the port. This directs for an examination of the port choice of the shipping lines based on a revealed preference approach. The ‘revealed preference’ approach aims at judging the port choice of shipping lines purely from their ‘actions’ rather than what they actually ‘state’. The empirical study in this article is based on a survey conducted among major shipping lines operating in Singapore and Malaysia. The findings have shown port charges and wide range of port services to be the only significant factors in their port choice. Moreover, the results show no consistency between the stated and revealed preferences of shipping lines.     

Reasons of Power: Explaining Non‐cooptation in Participatory Budgeting

Research on the use of participatory budgeting (PB) in urban politics has, perhaps not surprisingly, found that PB participants are often coopted by the government. From a realist perspective, however, it is more surprising that cooptation does not always occur and the mechanisms of non‐cooptation are still not well understood. Previous research has often explained successful outcomes in terms of the ideology of incumbents or the strength of social movements demanding participation. In contrast to both these explanations, this article suggests that an important part is played by the political interest of political elite actors in the independence of PB participants from the government. Presenting the case of PB in Rosario, Argentina, the article finds that three conditions made it rational for political actors not to coopt participants. First, a legitimacy crisis created incentives to invest in a new field of state–civil society interaction. Second, state actors involved in the creation of the field came to invest in the meanings and values of the field. Third, the field of PB could produce legitimacy for the government by being perceived as independent. The article reasons that we can expect these mechanisms of non‐cooptation to be at work in much the same way in other places under similar circumstances.     

阿根廷的金融开放与金融危机

阿根廷是美国赞扬的金融自由化典范,银行证券业向外资开放的力度大,但其爆发金融危机造成的破坏也格外严重。本文论述了阿根廷金融危机与经济全球化进程,特别是与金融开放和资本市场自由化的联系,分析了阿根廷吸引跨国银行投资,对于本国金融体系稳定所产生的影响,资本外逃如何给民众存款造成重大损失。本文还论述了中国应如何吸取阿根廷的教训,慎重对待外资收购、兼并和MBO,特别是"入世"后银行证券业的开放,更好维护本国经济金融安全,防范风险。     

Firms’ linkages with public research organisations in Argentina: Drivers, perceptions and behaviours

This paper analyses firms’ drivers for linking to public research organisations (PRO) (first goal) and compares perceptions and behaviours of linked vs. unlinked firms (second goal). We used an original firm database constructed from a representative survey with information for linked and unlinked firms for year 2005 in Argentina. Drivers were estimated using a Probit model, while differences in perceptions and behaviours between linked and unlinked firms were assessed with propensity score matching techniques. For our first goal we found that (i) firms’ knowledge bases were not drivers for linking to PRO and (ii) networking capabilities matter but there is a substitution effect between interacting with PRO and interacting with other economic agents in the market when firms aim at exchanging information rather than doing joint research. These findings may imply that current linkages are not exploiting properly their knowledge potential; it may be worth designing a division of labour among PRO in their functions in PRO-industry interactions. For our second goal: we found that (i) linked firms invest more in innovative activities; (ii) they are more prone to patenting; (iii) both groups of firms value similarly PRO research outputs available at arm length (i.e. without direct linking). Given the asymmetric development on appropriability tools between PRO and firms and the fact that all firms benefit from PRO research outputs, the higher predisposition of linked firms towards patenting, suggests that special attention should be placed at analysing the risks of a private appropriation of publicly created knowledge.