Monetary policy and food inflation in South Africa: A quantile regression analysis

Although optimal monetary policy stabilizes food inflation theoretically, empirical studies remain limited not only in the context of volumes and the estimation approaches, but are focused on selected advanced and emerging countries to the neglect of Africa where poverty and dominance of food in the consumption basket are more pronounced. We provide empirical evidence in the context of South Africa using quantile regressions. Rising food prices are destabilized even further by restrictive monetary policy; a finding that has ramifications for inflation targeting, especially given that a quarter of the country’s population is food poor.     

Catching up with the Americans

This paper develops an international version of the consumption-based capital asset pricing (CCAPM), which we refer to as “catching up with the Americans.” Previous CCAPM research develops the concept of “catching up with the Joneses,” where a representative economic agent exhibits higher marginal utility of consumption as a result of higher past per capita consumption in his own country. Catching up with the Americans, on the other hand, is an international habit-preference hypothesis. It extends the idea of catching up with the Joneses by stating that consumers of non-U.S. countries gain higher marginal utility of consumption as a result of higher past American consumption growth. Contrary to much of the CCAPM literature, we test this version of the model using long bond rates rather than equity returns. However, like most of the previous research on the CCAPM, the catching up with the Americans model fails to explain the relationship between consumption and asset returns.     

An analysis of option pricing under systematic consumption risk using GARCH

An issue in the pricing of contingent claims is whether to account for consumption risk. This is relevant for contingent claims on stock indices, such as the FTSE 100 share price index, as investor’s desire for smooth consumption is often used to explain risk premiums on stock market portfolios, but is not used to explain risk premiums on contingent claims themselves. This paper addresses this fundamental question by allowing for consumption in an economy to be correlated with returns. Daily data on the FTSE 100 share price index are used to compare three option pricing models: the Black–Scholes option pricing model, a GARCH (1, 1) model priced under a risk-neutral framework, and a GARCH (1, 1) model priced under systematic consumption risk. The findings are that accounting for systematic consumption risk only provides improved accuracy for in-the-money call options. When the correlation between consumption and returns increases, the model that accounts for consumption risk will produce lower call option prices than observed prices for in-the-money call options. These results combined imply that the potential consumption-related premium in the market for contingent claims is constant in the case of FTSE 100 index options.     

Household Surveys,Consumption, and the Measurement of Poverty

Household surveys are playing an increasingly important role in the measurement of poverty and well-being around the world. The Living Standards Measurement Study, which was begun in the World Bank under the guidance of Graham Pyatt in 1979, has played an important role in this movement. Its surveys are widely used within the Bank to measure consumption-based poverty, and survey data are now the exclusive basis for the global poverty counts. This paper discusses a number of unresolved issues in using consumption-based surveys for measuring well-being, including the choice of a money-metric versus welfare-ratio approach, the collection of suitable price information, the effects of measurement error on estimation, and methods for correcting per capita consumption for the demographic structure of the household.     

Costs of financial instability, household-sector balance sheets and consumption

Extant work on costs of financial instability focuses on fiscal costs and declines in aggregate GDP following banking crises. We estimate effects of banking and currency crises on consumption in 19 OECD countries, showing consumption plays an important role in the adjustment following a crisis, and effects are not captured solely by the impact of crises on standard consumption determinants, income and wealth. Additional effects, attributable to factors such as time-varying confidence, uncertainty and credit rationing, are aggravated by high and rising leverage, despite financial liberalisation easing liquidity constraints. High leverage implies that banking crises taking place now could have greater incidence than in the past.     

Got milk? The rapid rise of China’s dairy sector and its future prospects

This paper synthesizes recent research and new empirical findings to build a more comprehensive understanding of developments in China’s dairy sector. China’s tremendous rise in dairy demand has been driven by several mutually reinforcing factors: including rapid income growth, promotion by the government and dairy industry, changes in urban lifestyles, and the development of new, more sophisticated marketing channels. Domestic milk output has grown to satisfy rising demand largely by increasing the dairy herd. Substantial increases in productivity have been achieved through technology adoption, but there is evidence that the torrid growth has created inefficiencies because adaptations to marketing rules, infrastructure, and institutions have not kept pace with the changing environment. These results suggest there is ample room for future growth in both domestic milk production and dairy demand, but multinational firms and imported products will likely play and increasing role as China’s dairy market continues to develop.     

浅谈大学物理实验教学内容的改革

针对大学物理实验教学改革的背景，介绍了外延式与内涵式更新、渐进式与突进式更新的策略，同时注重物理实验时代性与先进性，改革实验教学内容，以利于大学物理实验教学，激发学生的学习积极性，培养学生的创新能力。     

Environmental standards as barriers to trade

This paper examines the case of a good, polluting in consumption, whose pollutive content is restricted by a government with strong environmental policies. When foreign producers are unable to comply with the restrictive environmental standard of such a country, to which they wish to export, they often allege that those standards constitute illegal barriers to free trade. An example of such a good is gasoline, excessively pollutive formulations of which are prohibited from importation into the United States by the 1970 Clean Air Act. Rather than banning them, such imports should be taxed, along with the domestically produced substitute good, according to their respective pollutant contents. This would foster economic efficiency and should be more acceptable to foreign producers than the outright prohibition mandated by the Clean Air Act. The results of this paper reaffirm the argument in a previous article in this journal (Socio-Economic Planning Sciences 29 (1995) 187), though the countries’ roles in the two papers are reversed, that free trade and Pigouvian environmental policies increase international welfare.     

论资源依赖型产业集群的提升——以江苏省东海县硅资源产业发展为例

资源型企业在资源富集地区具有空间集群现象。资源依赖型产业集群发展一般要经历起步期、成长期、转型期和蜕变期四个阶段。在转型期,产业的发展有两个走向:一是由于资源开发殆尽,产业走向衰落;二是由于注意到资源的可持续利用,并及时实现技术转型,产业竞争力得以提升。江苏省东海县硅资源产业是资源依赖型产业集群的一个典型。     

资源型地区产业结构升级优化的制度创新——以延安市为例

市场力量主导的诱致性产业结构和诱致性制度变迁有可能因市场的自发性而使一个社会的经济脱离发展轨道,而政府力量主导的强制性制度变迁,有可能因其设计出来的制度不符合产业发展的规律,而使一个经济社会形成唯政府意志的产业结构。而将两种制度变迁相互间有机地结合起来,以自然演化(市场原则)的产业结构为基础,并配合政府遵从自然演化原则科学设计出的产业结构有可能达到产业结构的合理性标准。延安的能源化工产业在其产业结构中占有重要的地位,但目前产业集群尚未形成,三次产业结构也不尽合理,为此,要通过制度创新来推动产业结构的升级和优化。