Firm heterogeneity and immigrant wage assimilation

This article investigates the role of job mobility in immigrant wage assimilation. I use longitudinal linked employer–employee data for Portugal to estimate the immigrant wage catch-up in log wage regressions with both individual and firm fixed effects. I show that moving to firms with higher wage premiums accounts for approximately 30% of the immigrant wage catch-up in the first years.     

Sovereign default risk in OECD countries: Do global factors matter?

We study the determinants of sovereign default risk for a group of 23 OECD countries using quarterly data spanning the period between 2000:Q1 and 2016:Q3. Applying the recently developed panel dynamic heterogeneous common correlated effects estimator of Chudik and Pesaran (2015) our study innovates in considering potential endogeneity issues and cross-sectional dependence. We control for both global risk appetite and monetary policy stance, as well as country risk ratings. The results show that common factors are the main drivers of solvency risk for our set of countries. Specially relevant, we find that macroeconomic determinants are not significant predictors of long-term sovereign spreads.     

基于动态面板数据模型分析FDI的环境效应

外商直接投资在对中国经济增长起到积极推动作用的同时,我们也不可忽视其可能会对我国环境造成的影响。文章通过构建环境污染综合指数,并且以东中西部为三个横截面建立动态面板数据模型来分析外商直接投资对各个地区环境的影响。结果显示,外商直接投资和东部中部地区的环境污染指数之间有正相关关系,和西部地区的环境污染指数之间是一个负相关关系。     

Foreign direct investment: the role of institutional and cultural determinants

Using panel data for 29 source and 65 host countries in the period 1995–2009, we examine the determinants of bilateral FDI stocks, focusing on institutional and cultural factors. The results reveal that institutional and cultural distance is important and that FDI has a predominantly regional aspect. FDI to developing countries is positively affected by better institutions in the host country, while foreign investors prefer to invest in developed countries that are more corrupt and politically unstable compared to home. The results indicate that foreign investors prefer to invest in countries with less diverse societies than their own.     

The synergistic effect of insurance and banking sector activities on economic growth in Africa

It is widely understood that the insurance and banking sectors of every economy perform some functions in driving economic growth. What is not yet well documented is whether their roles are complimentary or substitutive. With the aid of the dynamic panel generalized method of moments (GMM) estimation technique, this paper evaluates the synergistic effect of both sectors on economic growth in a panel of 10 African countries that are responsible for most of the activities in the continent’s financial sector. The insurance-banking-growth nexus was also examined through bootstrap panel causality tests. The results show that the life insurance market and the banking sector, as well as the non-life insurance market and the banking sector, are complimentary. We find that, overall, the relationship between the insurance and banking sectors in Africa is a complimentary one and that their synergistic impact on economic growth is positive. The feedback hypothesis was also confirmed in the relationship between the insurance sector and economic growth and between the banking sector and economic growth.     

Government spending multipliers in contraction and expansion

This paper investigates the impact of government spending on output and the size of the spending multiplier during periods of output contraction and expansion. It also investigates the impact of spending when the economy hits the nominal zero lower bound. It uses a panel of 21 advanced countries over the period of 1979–2011, applying a TSLS estimation technique. We find a spending multiplier of close to 1 during expansion and values of up to 3 during contractions. However, our results do not indicate a difference in the impact of spending during nominal zero lower bound periods.     

Do housing prices promote total factor productivity? Evidence from spatial panel data models in explaining the mediating role of population density

The issue of what to promote in total factor productivity (TFP) in urban areas has been widely discussed in academia and housing prices and population density are confirmed to be two of the most essential driving factors. However, research into the interaction of housing prices and population density with TFP has been neglected, with no previous studies taking spatial factors into consideration, which may bias the results. From this perspective, using spatial panel data models and employing instrumental variables to solve the endogenous problem, this study examines the impact of housing prices on TFP through the mediating effect of population density for 283 Chinese cities during the period 2000–2013, and confirms that the mediating effect accounts for 18.70 % of the total effect. The results show the positive and significant association of housing prices with TFP and the inverted U-shape of population density. The underlying logic is that housing prices change population density by attracting people with high purchasing power and discouraging those unable to afford housing, whereas increased density helps to promote productivity since the settled inhabitants always have highly developed work skills and are well educated. The influencing mechanism of housing prices on TFP through population density is analyzed, namely the spillover effect. We find that the spillover effect exists in the eastern and central regions, as well as first, second, and third tier cities, while for western regions and fifth tier cities, population mobility and increased in housing prices slows their economic development. There is no evidence of any spillover effect in fourth tier cities. A discussion and suggested policy implications are also provided.     

What drives cross-country differences in export variety? A bilateral panel approach

A worldwide event like the 2020 Coronavirus outbreak can only reinforce the interest in modelling trade diversification as a key factor in countries’ vulnerability to external shocks. This paper adopts a detailed relative framework to study the determinants of product-level export variety in a large bilateral panel of developing and developed economies (16,770 country pairs in the period 1988–2014). We find that country pairs characterized by large differentials in productivity and in the makeup of the labour force differ in export variety patterns. This result holds after controlling for other endowments and for trade costs. Further, productivity plays a significant role in the reduction of export variety dissimilarities between countries belonging to different income groups. Hence, without successful technological convergence the low-income economies will not be able to reduce their exposure to export risk.