Portfolio stock adjustment and the real exchange rate: The Dollar-Mark (DM) and Mark-Sterling

The advent of “freely floating” exchange rates in the 1970's coincided with the emergence of what is known as “monetary” or “asset” models of exchange rate behavior where exchange ratesmove to equilibrate demand for stocks of monies. The fundamental monetary model assumes purchasing power parity holds in the long-run, and therefore exchange rates are determined by the same factors that determine relative prices, to wit, money stocks, real incomes, and nominal interest rates. Though early proponents of the monetary view clearly emphasized its long-run nature, empirical testing has by and large neglected this caveat. Thus a model developed for long-run equilibrium exchange rates has instead been tested many times over on short-run equilibrium rates. The latter require a distinct model of their own. This paper develops a short-run equilibrium exchange rate model based on deviations of the short-run exchange rate from its long-run equilibrium. The model differs in that all variables are cast in real terms. It also differs in that the monetary and current account exchange rate versions are shown to be subsets of the more general wealth/portfolio framework used here. The present model considers, in addition to stocks of monies, stocks of foreign assets, and stocks of domestic wealth.     

Impact of enforcing a statutory minimum wage on work and quality of life of vulnerable groups in Hong Kong

The statutory minimum wage (SMW) law was enforced in Hong Kong on 1 May 2011. To examine its impact, this longitudinal study measured the quality of life, job and pay satisfaction, monthly income, hourly rate and working hours of vulnerable groups (n = 253) before and after the legislation. The findings confirmed that the enforcement of the SMW induced a positive impact as intended. The introduction of the SMW induced a positive wage and employment effect on the vulnerable groups in Hong Kong without harming their employment rate. Job and pay satisfaction, as well as most domains of the quality of life (i.e., physical and psychological health, and environment), increased significantly. In general, the positive impact of the SMW was more prominent for employees who previously worked less than 18 hours a week and who had hourly rates less than 28 HKD. The implications of the findings are discussed in the social context of Hong Kong. Key Practitioner Message: ● Enforcing minimum wage induced a positive impact on quality of life, job and pay satisfaction, and a monthly income of vulnerable groups. ● The social relations (quality of life) decreased after implementing minimum wage for workers working longer than 18 hours a week. ● Longer working hours is a key factor for the increase of a monthly income among the vulnerable groups.     

Judgments about the capabilities of city councillors and support for female representation on city council

Building on an earlier analysis of this data set, this study investigates the association between respondents' gender-stereotyping of city councillors with respect to work-related capabilities and their support for female representation on city council under conditions of low information. The earlier research found substantial gender-stereotypic bias in respondents' judgments about the office-related capabilities of male and female city council members. This analysis finds that the more positively women's capabilities to perform in office are evaluated, the more support there is for increased female representation on city council. In general, being “qualified” gets a candidate support but being female, for the most part, does not garner additional support. The double bind of this situation, however, is that female candidates are at a disadvantage because voters (in the sample) see men generically as being more able to meet the demands of serving on city council and increased female representation on city council can not occur unless individual female candidates are elected.     

Local elected officials and environmental policy: Does rural matter anymore?

A survey was mailed to elected officials (mayors and city council) from a sample of 52 rural communities in Idaho and all 7 communities with populations above 20,000 to examine whether there is a relationship between environmental policy issues and various independent variables such as economic type, age, gender, rural/ urban, political ideology, and percentage of life lived in the current community. One-hundred and fifty-five (155) out of three hundred twenty seven (327) respondents returned the survey for a response rate of 47%. The findings reveal that while the rural/urban dichotomy consistently predicted for questions on “trust of information sources,” overall economic base was a better predictor of attitudes toward environmental issues and policy.     

挤出还是促进——地方财政分权、市场化与低保救助水平差异

利用2013年全国市级有关数据,采用回归方法构建两个递进实证计量模型,考察地方财政分权、市场化对城乡低保救助水平的影响.实证结果表明,地方财政自给度和市场化水平均对低保救助有非常显著的促进作用,农村低保救助相对城市对地方财政分权和市场化的敏感度更高,科教文卫支出对低保救助支出存在非常显著的良性互动关系.建议进一步完善事权与财政支出责任相匹配的机制,提高地方财政自给度,同时转变政府职能,厘清政府权责边界,提升地方市场化水平.     

A phased increase in the U.S. investment rate: Sacrifice times, T-year gains, and investment rate returns

We simulate a phased increase in the U.S. investment rate using a translog production function with technical progress (disembodied and/or embodied). We assume there will be an absorption lag implying that factors are underutilized during the transition to a higher investment rate. We find that the “sacrifice time” (the time that elapses until consumption surpasses the value it would have had under the initial investment rate) is roughly nine years. Across alternative specifications, phase-in periods, and absorption lags, the sacrifice time varies from seven to 13 years, and is insensitive to the percentage increase in the investment rate. With a three-year phase-in of a 20 percent increase in the investment rate with a one-year absorption lag, the average “ecade gain” in output (the percentage gain at the end of a decade) is roughly 4 percent; the decade gain in consumption, 0 percent; the five-decade gain, 10 percent in output and 6 percent in consumption; and the “investment rate return” (the internal rate of return on a permanent increase in the investment rate), 13 percent.     

我国失业保险金标准问题探讨

在全面总结我国二十年来失业保险金标准的确定和调整实践的基础上,评价分析了实际运行中存在的难以保障失业人员的基本生活;失业保险金未能按最低工资调整而调整;失业保险金标准与最低工资标准相比替代率较低;享受失业保险期限各地差距明显等问题。本文提出了重新确定和调整失业保险金标准的对策和建议。     

Unification of the Urban Minimum Living Standard in China: Using a Consumption Expenditure Percentile Method

ABSTRACT. The Minimum Living Standard Guarantee (MLSG) system in urban China was established in the 1990s. As a national income benefit program, this system has huge regional differences as a result of regional variation in economic development and the methods used to calculate the benefit. This article uses a consumption expenditure percentile method to measure and evaluate the benefit level of the MLSG system. The analysis shows that the consumption expenditure replacement rates in central cities are decreasing, but in prefectural-level cities, by contrast, they are increasing. The regional differences in replacement rates when comparing central cities are considerable and are even larger among cities at a prefecture level. Per-capita consumption expenditure is positively correlated with minimal living standards but negatively correlated with the replacement rate. Such variation in the value and operation of the MLSG system suggests an urgent need to implement a national unified scheme. The article proposes a single approach to calculating Minimum Living Standard benefits using a consumption expenditure replacement rate that would allow for local differences while providing national cohesion.     

Moderate wage increases and flexible labour contracts to protect employment in Colombian manufacturing

Based on conditional and unconditional demands for labour, we exploit the variations of real minimum wage across manufacturing subsectors to present evidence that this variable affects formal employment. The long-term elasticity of labour demand to the minimum wage is around –0.7. Accordingly, increases in the minimum wage lead to job losses for unskilled labour, mainly in plants with fewer than 100; thus, small increases in the minimum wage are desirable to protect employment. Labour demand is highly cyclical: the output elasticity is about 1.7. Thus, some flexibility in labour contracts is desirable to reduce the link between employment and variation of plants’ sales. Open-ended labour contracts might allow reductions of the nominal wage rather than inducing job losses during periods of severe slumps, as has happened during the COVID-19 pandemic.     

Exchange rate and wage policies in Central and Eastern Europe

After the eastern enlargement of the European Union (EU) and due to increasing labor market integration, wage determination in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) has become a key issue in European economic policy making. In addition, a controversial discussion concerning the monetary integration of CEE countries into the EMU has emerged. Both issues have earned particular academic and political interest because Eastern and Western Europe are at different stages of economic development and volatile international capital flows seem to require either a higher degree of wage or exchange rate flexibility. Based on the Scandinavian model of wage adjustment by Lindbeck (1979), we analyze the role of exchange rates in the wage determination process of the Central and Eastern European countries to identify which exchange rate strategy contributes to faster wage convergence in Europe. Panel estimations suggest that workers in countries with fixed exchange rates are likely to benefit in the long run from higher wage increases.     

Multicountry dynamic multipliers under fixed and floating exchange rates: An econometric analysis

The present paper attempts to analyze the dynamic multiplier effects of fiscal monetary policies for developed countries in a consistent framework of a global econometric model under both fixed and flexible exchange rate regimes. The paper first discusses the estimation of exchange rate functions for eight developed countries with special reference to “fundamentals” in economic performance such as international gaps in inflation, productivity, expected real rate of return, and so on. The results are then incorporated into the global model to derive and compare dynamic multipliers under both fixed and flexible exchange rate regimes. “Insulation effects” are observed in most cases in terms of both output and inflation, though this differs according to the country. Policy implications are discussed at the end.     

论阎连科小说的城市崇拜

城乡反差对峙既呈现我国现代性断裂的生活景观,也形成当代文学的一个书写母题.阎连科小说的城市崇拜具有时代意义.其城市想象以高楼和女人为象征,深蕴城市意识形态和性政治;其向城而生不仅有着物质的欲望,而且还有着文明的召唤,体现了一种"崇高的人性";而乡民进城是两种文化时空的穿梭和僭越,遭遇了城市"权力"视角的凝视、控制和排斥.     

试论方方小说人物形象的两大意向群落

凭借对生活的敏锐观察和现实生活的积淀,方方在其小说中塑造了大量城市中最普通的小人物形象,从而形成了其小说人物形象中的两大意向群落:一是城市普通工人,二是城市普通知识分子。方方描写了他们现实的生活贫困状况和无奈、矛盾的内心,显示了作者深厚的人文关怀。     

The impact of opening markets on Mexican male/female wage and occupational differentials

This article addresses the effect of a more open market under NAFTA on the economic status of Mexican women. It is assumed that increases in export processing and tourism, industries that have a high demand for female labor, will result from the agreement. The approach of this study is to use regression and correlation analysis to compare wage and occupational differences in two Mexican cities: Tijuana, on the U.S.-Mexican border, and Torreon, in the interior. A major findings is that the overall wage gap is statistically significantly lower where there is increased export processing activity, but there appears to be very little change in occupational segregation. Three additional impacts are: first, that labor force participation rates increase for both men and women, but proportionally more for women. Second, the higher labor demand appears to weaken the relationship between the job qualifications of education and experience and wages. Third, wages by gender are more equal, but for the labor force as a whole there is a greater level of wage dispersion.     

Money, real output, and deficit effects of coffee booms in Colombia

This paper develops a Vector Error Correction (VEC) model and uses the recently developed technique of ‘generalized’ impulse response analysis to test the empirical relationships in the Colombian economy between coffee revenues and a set of macro variables. We find that coffee price (revenue) shocks have exerted an important influence on money growth, inflation, and real exchange rates, and the direction of these effects are in line with some of the predictions of traditional Dutch Disease type models. The major difference between our results and the results of Dutch Disease type models arise in the effects of coffee booms on real output. We find that in the time horizon of 5 years after the boom, real output has increased in response to the effects of the coffee boom. The finding that coffee booms can result in positive long-run output effects is an important finding since it contradicts the traditional conclusion of Dutch Disease type models which envision an adverse long-run effect on output. We also find that the long-run effect of coffee booms is to reduce both current account and government deficits. These results illustrate strikingly that the term “Dutch Disease” is an unfortunately pejorative term that obscures the fact that coffee booms need not be viewed as a “disease” but as an extraordinary opportunity to strengthen internal and external balances.     

Aspects of a new world development strategy II: Factors affecting the long-term prospects of developing nations

This paper explores some quantitative dimensions of the interdependence of rich and poor regions in the context of the United Nations World Model. It extends the original work on that model in three ways: (1) by updating some of the key parameters and exogenous variables in the light of recent data; (2) by developing a “control” solution to be used as a point of reference in policy simulations; and (3) by exploring the sensitivities of each of two groups of regions— developed and developing—to changes in one another's growth rates. Goals of closing the income gap between developed and developing regions and of increasing income levels in the latter are discussed.     

最低工资管制的就业效应分析

非线性规划分析表明,最低工资管制的就业后果不仅取决于最低工资管制本身, 还取决于外部监管环境,当监管环境强化到一定程度时,最低工资管制的就业冲击会扩大。基于粤闽两省439家企业调查数据的实证分析表明,2008年提高最低工资标准对农民工的就业冲击明显强于2007年,但对城镇劳动力没有造成明显强化的冲击。进一步分析证明,农民工就业冲击的扩大主要源于《劳动合同法》引起的监管环境的强化,而城镇劳动力就业冲击没有扩大主要源于二元就业制度对城镇劳动力利益的优先保护。这提醒我们,《劳动合同法》对就业的影响很可能会通过强化最低工资管制等其他管制措施的效果来间接实现。     

Domestic violence against women: A field study in Turkey

Factors affecting domestic violence against women in four Turkish cities (Adıyaman, Sivas, Denizli and Kırklareli) having different socioeconomic structures, are analyzed in this study. These factors consist of social, cultural, economic and psychological factors. In contrast to what we expected based on earlier literature, family income level has a positive relationship with violence. Logistic regression analysis also revealed that being a university graduate and having a personal income decreases the prevalence of violence as expected. However, working women and women with children are more prone to domestic violence. Again, there is a strong association between the neighborhood where the family lives and the incidence of violence. The extent of male dominance, as measured by the question “How are decisions taken in the family” is also associated with domestic violence: woman is less likely to be abused in households where decisions are taken collectively. Likewise, families where women have to get permission from the husband to carry out certain activities, have an increased incidence of suffering from husband's violence. Psychological factors, like being abused or having witnessed violence as a child, are also significantly correlated with domestic violence.     

桂南城市群特色风貌塑造

"桂南城市群"指广西南部包括南宁、北海、钦州、防城港、崇左、玉林六市所构成的城市群,具有悠久的历史和鲜明的民族性。对桂南城市群特色风貌的塑造,有利于弘扬优秀的地方文化,改善区域人居环境和投资环境,加强城市与区域间的经济合作,打造城市品牌,增强城市竞争力,构建区域和谐社会。     

Economic globalization and violent civil conflict: Is openness a pathway to peace?

There has been little systematic assessment of the impact of globalization on armed conflict within states. Drawing from bargaining theories of conflict, we posit that the global marketplace functions as an “audience” that rewards or punishes the policy choices of states. Globalization, which connotes an increased exposure to this marketplace, increases the relevance of the “costs” that this “audience” may impose. These prospective costs thus encourage peace and stability, as states that are integrated into the global economy have more to lose by instigating and sustaining violent conflict within their borders. Employing a two-stage Heckman Model, we assess the impact of various facets of globalization, including access to information, trade, foreign investment and aid flows, on intrastate conflict within the developing countries for 1990–1996.