Endogenous fertility and human capital in a Schumpeterian growth model

This study develops a scale-invariant Schumpeterian growth model with endogenous fertility and human capital accumulation. The model features two engines of long-run economic growth: R&D-based innovation and human capital accumulation. One novelty of this study is endogenous fertility, which negatively affects the growth rate of human capital. Given this growth-theoretic framework, we characterize the dynamics of the model and derive comparative statics of the equilibrium growth rates with respect to structural parameters. As for policy implications, we analyze how patent policy affects economic growth through technological progress, human capital accumulation, and endogenous fertility. In summary, we find that strengthening patent protection has (a) a positive effect on technological progress, (b) a negative effect on human capital accumulation through a higher rate of fertility, and (c) an ambiguous overall effect on economic growth.     

Flames and Debates: Do Social Media Affect Satisfaction with Democracy?

Media plays an important role in defining the quality of democracy in consolidated democracy. Internet, in turn, can wield effects on democracy and many scholars have investigated such relationship. Moving from this literature we use Eurobarometer data to estimate the effect of Internet on the satisfaction with the functioning of democracy among European citizens. The results show that Internet usage, per se, has no effect on the satisfaction with democracy. However, the consumption of online news can make the difference, even though this effect is positive when users consume news from online traditional media while social media has a negative effect, which is mediated by the level of online disagreement and the potential emergence of flames.     

Political Distrust and Social Capital in Europe and the USA

Levels of rising political distrust in the USA and parts of Europe attracted political scientists’ attention in the 1990s, and urged them to look at possible consequences of this phenomenon for the functioning of democracies and social life. Approximately during the same period, from a sociological viewpoint, social capital theorists started studying the effects of declining social capital on political and economic life. In this article, we looked at the relationship between political distrust and social capital from an interdisciplinary perspective. We studied the relationship in six European countries from three regions (North-West, South and East), and the USA, and we were interested in the question of whether this relationship varies over the regions, or whether it is approximately the same everywhere. We used ISPP data from the 2004 wave, which included a range of social capital indicators and political distrust items. Social capital was subdivided into four dimensions, namely, networks (membership of organizations), interpersonal or social trust, social norms (citizenship norms), and linking social capital (political activities). First we studied the effect of political distrust on these four dimensions of social capital, while controlling for other variables such as political efficacy, political interest and a set of socio-structural background variables. One of our main findings was that the only significant effect of political distrust we found throughout all countries was a negative effect on one dimension of social capital, namely, interpersonal trust: the more people distrust politicians and people in government, the less they trust other people in general, even when controlled for all other variables. The reverse relationship led us to the same conclusion: the more people tend to trust people in general, the less they distrust politics, a result we found in all countries. This finding refutes the claim that there is no or either only a very weak relationship between political and social trust, as some have strongly argued before. Other important political attitudes connected to social capital were political interest and political efficacy, and for political distrust it was external efficacy. Significant socio-economic factors were religiousness and educational level for membership of voluntary organizations, educational level for interpersonal trust, religiousness for citizenship norms, and educational level and age for political activities. The reciprocal relationship was strongest in the USA and North-Western Europe, as were the explained variances of our (more extensive) regression models. In Southern and Eastern Europe other factors appear to be at work which influence both social capital and political distrust.     

Demography,Education, and Democracy: Global Trends and the Case of Iran

Reconstructions and projections of populations by age, sex, and educational attainment for 120 countries since 1970 are used to assess the global relationship between improvements in human capital and democracy. Democracy is measured by the Freedom House indicator of political rights. Similar to an earlier study on the effects of improving educational attainment on economic growth, the greater age detail of this new dataset resolves earlier ambiguities about the effect of improving education as assessed using a global set of national time series. The results show consistently strong effects of improving overall levels of educational attainment, of a narrowing gender gap in education, and of fertility declines and the subsequent changes in age structure on improvements in the democracy indicator. This global relationship is then applied to the Islamic Republic of Iran. Over the past two decades Iran has experienced the world's most rapid fertility decline associated with massive increases in female education. The results show that based on the experience of 120 countries since 1970, Iran has a high chance of significant movement toward more democracy over the following two decades.     

人力资本梯度升级的经济增长效应

人力资本梯度升级是指人力资本由低至高逐步跃迁的高级化过程,其可能通过促进产业结构升级、技术创新作用于经济增长。利用2000—2015年全国30个省级行政区面板数据,实证分析了人力资本梯度升级的经济增长效应。研究发现:人力资本梯度升级对经济增长有显著的促进效应,第三梯度人力资本对经济增长促进效应最强。人力资本梯度升级的经济增长效应存在时间和地区异质性:随时间的推进,人力资本梯度升级对经济增长的促进效应逐渐增强;东部和高经济发展地区人力资本梯度升级的经济增长效应要高于西部和低经济发展地区。基于以上结论,为推动经济长期增长进一步提出可行的对策建议。     

Social Capital,Government and Democracy Satisfaction,and Happiness in Turkey: A Comparison of Surveys in 1999 and 2008

Based on data from a 1999 and a 2008 European Values Survey, the main objective of this study is to explore the relationship between a variety of social capital indicators, satisfaction with government and democracy, and subjective well-being. Happiness and life satisfaction were used as outcome measures of subjective well-being. The indicators of social capital used in this study are general trust, trust in institutions, political engagement, concern for others, societal norms, and membership in volunteer organizations. The analyses reveal a significant increase in happiness, life satisfaction, and many social capital variables between 1999 and 2008. Generalized trust, trust in institutions, government satisfaction, and democracy satisfaction are positive correlates of well-being, although some relationships are significant only in 2008. Several demographic variables are also linked with subjective well-being such as income, employment status, age, gender, and education. We discuss the findings in relation to the significant societal, economic, and political changes experienced in Turkey between 1999 and 2008. Policy implications are also emphasized such as improved trust among individuals, trustworthiness of government institutions, and functioning of democracy.     

城市化与人力资本关系研究——基于我国261个地级以上城市非平衡面板数据

城市化与人力资本之间存在显著的影响关系,但衡量我国人力资本的不同变量,其影响效果和程度存在明显差异．而资源禀赋不同的地区影响也有所不同。采用2004—2010年我国261个地级以上城市非平衡面板数据,本文实证研究了城市化与人力资本水平之间的关系．并区分东、中、西部地区进行了进一步分析。结果表明．全国范围内．人力资本投资对城市化具有正向的推动作用．人口增长与人口密度已超过临界值,负外部性已经显现,第二产业仍是带动城市形成与扩张的主要产业：东部地区城市化对人才需求最大．城市类型并无显著影响．中部的高等教育投资和西部的中等教育投资分别与城市化存在显著的正向关系。     

On the Role of Human Development in the Arab Spring

This essay traces the effects of human development on political change, focusing on the events of the Arab Spring. Over the past generation, the Arab world experienced rapid progress in human development outcomes, including declining child mortality, extended schooling, and increasing status of women. These development gains penetrated most Arab states and subpopulations. The pathway from human development to political mobilization rests on three interlinked propositions. First, basic human development led to a significant increase in population needs and expectations, creating new policy challenges and reducing public dependency on regimes. Second, human development and new information technologies created new opportunities for political protest. Finally, the collective realization of human development gains resulted in new values conducive to regime change. Each proposition builds on theories of human capital accumulation over the life course that isolate the human dimension of national development. I provide provisional support for these pathways through cross‐regional comparison and evidence from specific populations and sub‐populations. I highlight the need for new study designs and datasets that further test this model.     

社会资本对受雇就业农民工职业地位获得的作用

本文以空位竞争模型中对劳动力市场中工作结构与奖励结构的假定为基础,进一步地在理论上推演出了社会资本对农民工职业地位获得作用的假设。对实地调查数据的分析发现:尽管职业流动的频率越高越不利于农民工获得专业技术或管理等较高职业地位,但对于社会关系的广度高的个体,职业流动频率对职业地位的晋升具有正向作用。该结果意味着职业流动频率高并不一定不利于农民工职业地位的获得,在缺乏社会关系广度下的频繁职业流动才是导致农民工水平职业流动的原因。     

Free education, fertility and human capital accumulation

This article analyzes the effect of free public education on fertility, private educational investments, and human capital accumulation at different stages of economic development. The model shows that, when fertility is endogenous, parental human capital levels are crucial for determining the effect of free education. At early stages of development when parental human capital is low, free access to basic education may provide the only chance to leave poverty. In contrast, at advanced stages of development when parental human capital is high, the availability of free education crowds out private educational investments, stimulates fertility, and may impede growth.     

Quality of Work and Aggregate Productivity

We inspect the relationship between quality of work and productivity. Using Spanish aggregate data for the period 2001–2006, we find that quality of work is an additional factor to explain productivity levels in sectors and regions. Consequently, quality of work is not only an objective per se, but it also may be a production factor able to increase the wealth of regions. In our work we use two alternatives definitions of quality of work, coming respectively from survey data and from a social indicators approach. Besides, we employ two different measurements of labour productivity, in order to test the robustness of our result. We estimate our model using a simultaneous equation model for our panel of data, and we find important differences in high and low human capital sectors. The former display a positive relationship between quality of work and productivity, while the latter show a negative relationship.     

The uncertain lifetime and the timing of human capital investment

I examine the effects of mortality decline on fertility and human capital investment decision of parents taking into account the uncertainty about child survival. I propose a model, where parents decide on their fertility before the uncertainty is realized, but they choose to invest only in human capital of their surviving children. The model implies a positive relationship between mortality and fertility and a negative one between mortality and educational investment. It has been argued elsewhere that as, in reality, most of the mortality decline occurred in infancy, it should not affect the human capital investment decision, which comes later in life. Thus, increased survival chances should not promote growth by raising the human capital investment. This paper argues the contrary and proposes a mechanism where mortality decline at any age before the teen years can promote growth by raising human capital investment regardless of the timing of the educational investment.      

陕西省不同人力资本投资方式与经济增长的实证分析

利用陕西省1995～2008年的相关数据,论证出陕西省物质资本存量和人力资本存量对经济增长的产出弹性分别为0.638和0.367,陕西省的经济增长主要是由物质资本的投入而拉动的。进一步研究人力资本不同投资方式与经济增长的实证关系。其中在职培训投资对经济增长的影响显著为正,卫生保健投资对经济增长的影响显著为负;而教育投资和劳动力迁移投资对经济增长的影响作用并不显著。提出合理的人力资本投资政策建议,提高人力资本的利用效率。     

Social Construction of Public Intellectuals in Vietnam: Current Situation and Possible Changes

In the literature on political support, much empirical effort has been devoted to the link between economic performance and satisfaction with democracy. Nevertheless, analyses are often inconclusive in their findings. This study tries to renew the interest in the topic by using multilevel models to analyse 108 surveys from the repeated cross-sectional Eurobarometer data between 1985 and 2013, and focuses on southern European countries which share political and economic characteristics. Thus, the article links economic trends to changes in satisfaction with democracy in Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain, also emphasizing the relevance of transformations in their political systems. The results demonstrate that low economic performance seems to negatively affect citizens’ satisfaction with democracy in the four countries and across the whole period analysed. This also holds true for different model specifications and when other potential factors such as the format and the performance of the institutional context are controlled for. By providing empirical evidence based on a longitudinal analysis, this article contributes to the wider debate on how economic conditions influence opinions about democracy.     

人力资本、社会资本与高校毕业生就业质量

利用多个高校的第一手调查资料,从工资水平、就业单位类型和主观满意度等三个方面测量毕业生的就业质量,并把大学生的人力资本分解为学术性人力资本和实践性人力资本,他们的社会资本分解为家庭经济性资本和家庭社会性资本,具体考察人力资本和社会资本是否以及如何影响大学毕业生的就业质量.研究发现,大学生的人力资本和社会资本对他们工资水平和就业单位类型产生正向作用,但对就业的满意度则呈负面影响;另外,与社会资本相比,人力资本对大学生就业质量的影响更显著,结合大学生就业质量现状,本文也讨论了研究结论的政策含义.     

Gender and the Politics of Death: Female Representation,Political and Developmental Context,and Population Health in a Cross-National Panel

There is considerable speculation that female political empowerment could improve population health. Yet, evidence to date is limited, and explanations for why political empowerment would matter and the conditions under which this might be enhanced or muted are not well understood. In this article, we draw on theoretical work on the politics of representation to frame an investigation of whether increases in the percentage of females in a country’s parliament influence mortality rates. We further examine whether the relationship is conditioned by extent of democracy and economic and social development. Through multivariate longitudinal regression, we analyze four indicators of mortality in 155 countries spanning 1990 to 2014 with controls for initial country conditions, time-stable structural predispositions to higher mortality, and a number of time-varying potential confounders. Results indicate that a high level of female representation—30 % or greater in our models—has large negative associations with mortality, that these are particularly strong in lesser developed and weak democratic contexts, that high female political representation effectively offsets liabilities associated with low development, and that the relationships are robust to various operationalizations of social development. In the end, our research provides a particularly thorough accounting of the relationship between female political representation and population health, particularly by specifying the conditions under which female representation is most salient. In doing so, the research suggests important links between issues of female empowerment, political context, and developmental trajectories of countries more generally.     

信息人力资本对农民工城市融合的影响：机理与实证①--以辽宁省农民工为例

本文基于2014年辽宁6县市农民工调查数据,运用 OLS 回归方法,实证分析了信息人力资本对农民工城市融合及其三个层面———经济融合、社会融合、心理融合的影响。结果发现,信息人力资本对农民工城市融合有正向显著的影响,对经济层面、社会层面的融合有显著的正向影响,对心理层面的融合影响不显著。此外,运用分位数回归方法分析了不同城市融合程度下,信息人力资本对城市融合的影响差异,发现在城市融合程度较低时,通过增加信息人力资本可以显著促进农民工城市融合。并运用结构方程模型进行稳健性检验,所得结果与 OLS 回归相吻合。相应的政策建议：为促进农民工城市融合,应该根据不同人群特点,有针对性地加强农民工信息人力资本培训,提高他们信息人力资本水平。     

Discrimination,Subjective Wellbeing,and the Role of Gender: A Mediation Model of LGB Minority Stress

ABSTRACT

The present study examined the link between discrimination and the three components of subjective wellbeing (positive and negative affect and life satisfaction) among a cisgender sample of lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) adults. Specifically, we investigated internalized homonegativity and expectations of rejection as potential mediators of the links between discrimination and subjective wellbeing among a sample of 215 participants. Results from our structural equation model demonstrated a strong, positive direct link between discrimination and negative affect. Discrimination also had small, negative indirect effects on life satisfaction through our two mediators. Interestingly, neither discrimination nor our two mediators were related with positive affect, demonstrating the need for future research to uncover potential buffers of this link. Finally, our model evidenced configural, metric, and scalar invariance, suggesting that our model applies well for both women and men. Practical implications and future directions for research are discussed.     

On the Compatibility of Islam and Gender Equality

Although the Muslim world is sometimes depicted as a homogeneous civilization lacking democracy and gender equality, Muslim countries show tremendous economic, political and cultural variation. In this paper, this variation is used to gain insight into the determinants of women’s labor market participation (LMP) in the Muslim world. We use data on 45 Muslim countries and apply SEM models to determine effects of modernization, democracy, cultural background, and state Islamization on women’s participation in the formal economy (absolute LMP) and on the share of women in the labor force (relative LMP). Women’s absolute LMP is higher in Muslim countries with higher levels of economic development and in the oil-exporting countries. For women’s relative LMP, practical democracy (the degree to which people actively participate in the system) takes in a key position. It has a strong positive effect on women’s relative LMP and mediates the effects of economic development (positive), formal democratic structures (positive) and state Islamization (negative) on women’s relative LMP. Results indicate that in these countries modernization may lead to empowerment of women by increasing their absolute LMP, but that for attaining gender equality the political opportunity structures is most important.     

跨国人才外流与中国人力资本积累--基于出国留学的视角

人才的跨国外流,究竟是促进了本国的人力资本积累,还是导致了本国人力资本的净损失？回答该问题,对中国在开放经济条件下实施合理的人才开放政策以推动经济增长具有重要意义。本文在开放经济框架内,将人才外流引入人力资本积累的内生决定模型,从理论上探讨了人才外流与本国人力资本积累的关系。在理论分析的基础上,本文进一步使用世界上60个国家和地区2000－2010年的面板数据进行了计量估计。实证结果表明：人才外流与中低收入国家和地区的人力资本积累呈倒“U”型关系,但与高收入国家和地区的人力资本积累线性负相关;人才外流对本国人力资本积累的影响受到本国技能劳动占比和其所生产产品替代弹性的影响。进一步鼓励和合理引导人才尤其是高层次人才的国际流动对提升中国的人力资本水平意义重大。