Fiscal policy analysis in the euro area: Expanding the toolkit

The absence of historical quarterly fiscal data has limited the analysis of the macroeconomic impact of fiscal policies in the euro area, including the interactions of fiscal and monetary policies. To overcome this gap, we construct a quite disaggregated euro area quarterly fiscal database for the period 1980Q1–2012Q4, based on a rich set of input fiscal data taken from national sources. We discuss how this dataset has allowed and can allow the profession to tackle new policy-relevant research topics. We also provide stylized facts on the cyclical properties of main euro area fiscal aggregates, focusing on the recent economic crisis period.     

On the behavioural relevance of optional and mandatory impure public goods

Impure public goods combine a private good with a public good. Often, impure public goods have a charitable or ethical dimension, giving ethically motivated consumers a convenient option to contribute to public goods through the marketplace (in addition to direct donations). Impure public goods could potentially promote ethical giving or alternatively hinder charitable behaviour. We implement an economics experiment with a between-subject design to test the behavioural relevance of impure public goods with only a token (i.e. small) contribution to a public good. Contributions to the public good are negatively affected by the presence of impure public goods with token contributions. We explore one mechanism to offset this negative impact by making the token impure public good mandatory. We observe higher average contributions and several positive impacts on charitable behaviour, which supports the claim that this mechanism can potentially offset the negative impact of impure public goods.     

How income and tax rates provoke cheating – An experimental investigation of tax morale

Anecdotal evidence suggests that tax morale diminishes with income and with levels of taxation. We designed an experiment that enables identification of causal effects. Subjects carry out a sequence of real effort tasks. The income earned varies with individual differences in effort (combined with variances related to skill or luck) and with the exogenously given length of the tasks. For each task, subjects privately roll a die, whose value determines the tax rate, which is then reported by subjects. This provides subjects with an incentive to cheat. Tax morale diminishes with higher effort, which might find ethical justification, but also with longer tasks, which would not. We implement treatments that vary the range of taxation. Contrary to widespread belief, participants’ tax morale is invariant to these treatments. Our findings are best explained by a psychological force that tempts rich people to cheat more. This force does not seem to be related to fairness ideals that are prominent in theories of distributional justice nor to absolute levels of taxation.     

The effect of conflict history on cooperation within and between groups: Evidence from a laboratory experiment

We study cooperation within and between groups in the laboratory, comparing treatments in which two groups have previously been in conflict with one another, in conflict with a different group, or not previously exposed to conflict. We model conflict using an inter-group Tullock contest, and measure its effects upon cooperation using a multi-level public good game. We find that conflict increases cooperation within groups, while decreasing cooperation between groups. Moreover, we find that an increase in the gains from cooperation only increases cooperation between groups when the two groups have not previously interacted.     

Better stuck together or free to go? Of the stability of cooperation when individuals have outside options

How do outside options affect cooperation? We examine the stability of cooperation and the reasons for exit in public projects with stochastic outcomes, imperfect monitoring and an exit option. We find that treatments with high barriers to exit generate higher welfare overall as they foster stability and prevent inefficient separation of pairs. There is excessive exit in treatments with low barriers to exit, driven in part by an overestimate of the likelihood that the peer will leave and a desire not to be left alone in the public project. We contrast long-term “strategic” and short-term “egoistic” drivers of exit and find that short-term cost-benefit considerations play a more important role in treatments with lower barriers to exit.     

UNEMPLOYED BUT OPTIMISTIC: OPTIMAL INSURANCE DESIGN WITH BIASED BELIEFS

This paper analyzes how biased beliefs about employment prospects affect the optimal design of unemployment insurance. Empirically, I find that the unemployed greatly overestimate how quickly they will find work. As a consequence, they would search too little for work, save too little for unemployment and deplete their savings too rapidly when unemployed. I analyze the use of the “sufficient‐statistics” formula to characterize the optimal unemployment policy when beliefs are biased and revisit the desirability of providing liquidity to the unemployed. I also find that the optimal unemployment policy may involve increasing benefits during the unemployment spell.     

Intergenerational redistribution in a small open economy with endogenous fertility

For pay-as-you-go financed pension systems, claims may be calculated according to individual contributions (income) or the number of children of a family. We analyse the optimal structure of these parameters in a model with endogenous fertility. It is shown that for both structural determinants there exists no interior solution of the problem of intragenerational utility maximisation. Thus, pure systems are always welfare maximizing. Furthermore, children-related pension claims induce a fiscal externality that tends to be positive. The determination of the optimal contribution rate shows that the widely accepted Aaron-condition is in general a misleading indicator for the comparison of fully funded and pay-as-you-go financed pension systems. Received March 12, 1996 / Accepted January 27, 1997     

Posting Signs on the Bog: Fixing and Unfixing H.D., Imagiste

This article aims to reassess the modernist poet H.D.'s early poetry and to challenge certain critical readings of the early poetry in relation to H.D.'s expression of self. It argues that H.D.'s Sea Garden should not be dismissed as a false start, as a place where H.D. was trapped in a restrictive imagist aesthetic, but that the dramatic lyric as used in this collection of poetry enabled her to explore her bisexual self in multiple and multiplying (not split) selves, as both in a state of flux and as enduring through time. It examines H.D.'s work alongside other writers such as Tennyson and Woolf, drawing out common metaphorical structures and patterns and suggests that Woolf and H.D. in particular, were producing literary forms and representations which provide a radical challenge to processes of categorization—a challenge to the notion of category itself.     

张学良与东北新建设及其启示

分析了张学良主政东北时发出“东北新建设”号召的历史背景;从整顿金融业,发展农业、民族工业以及交通运输业等方面,阐明了实施东北新建设的主要内容,论述了张学良在推进东北新建设、实现经济现代化过程中做出的重大贡献;从历史与现实结合的角度阐述了张学良实施东北新建设对今天我国社会主义现代化建设的启示。