INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE AND THE VELOCITY OF MONEY: A CENTURY OF EVIDENCE

We study common features in the income velocity of money, income, and interest rates for Canada, the U.S., the U.K., Sweden and Norway using annual data from 1870. The recently developed and refined techniques of testing for cointegration are employed.
The evidence suggests there is a unique long-run relationship in velocity but not in income and interest rates. Moreover, we find that only a model which includes institutional change proxies is properly specified. We argue that the evidence is best interpreted in the context of common historical developments in the respective countries' financial systems.     

Reflexive particularism and cosmopolitanization: the reconfiguration of the national

In this article we examine the cosmopolitanization of national memory cultures as a matter of reflexive particularism, referring to negotiations over ‘the national’ driven by the endogenization of European norms and discourses. Reflexive particularism emerges from a historically specific memory imperative that issues two demands – first, that national polities reckon with the Other, and second, that they engage with, critique and challenge exclusionary or heroic modes of nationalism. Our findings, based on the analysis of official discourse and 60 open group discussions conducted in Austria, Germany and Poland, suggest that reflexive particularism is manifested in an ongoing negotiation between variable modes of national belonging and cosmopolitan orientations toward the supranational or pan‐European. More specifically, reflexive particularism is expressed in co‐evolving articulations of Europeanness and shared European memory practices that include: affirmative and ambivalent perspectives; sceptical narratives about nationhood (for example those that emphasize legacies of perpetratorship); and a disposition to (ex)change perspectives and recognize the claims of Others.     

THE EFFECT OF DIRECT DEMOCRACY ON INCOME REDISTRIBUTION: EVIDENCE FOR SWITZERLAND

In political economics, the impact of institutions on income redistribution is mainly studied by comparing different forms of representative democracy. In this article, we analyze the influence of direct democratic institutions on redistribution first focusing on welfare and nonwelfare spending using yearly panel data for Swiss cantons. Then, we estimate a model, which explains the determinants of actually achieved redistribution measured by Gini coefficients. While our results indicate that less public funds are used to redistribute income, inequality is not reduced to a lesser extent in direct than in representative democracies for a given initial income distribution. (JEL D7, D78, I30, H75, H11)     

INTERRACIAL WORKPLACE COOPERATION: EVIDENCE FROM THE NBA

Using data from the National Basketball Association (NBA), we examine whether patterns of workplace cooperation occur disproportionately among workers of the same race. We find that, holding constant the composition of teammates on the floor, basketball players are no more likely to complete an assist to a player of the same race than a player of a different race. Our confidence interval allows us to reject even small amounts of same‐race bias in passing patterns. We find some evidence of own‐race bias in situations where the outcome of a particular play is less important. Our findings suggest that high levels of interracial cooperation can occur in a setting where workers are operating in a highly visible setting with strong incentives to behave efficiently. (JEL J15, J71, L23)     

THE LONG RUN BEHAVIOR OF THE INCOME VELOCITY OF MONEY IN FIVE ADVANCED COUNTRIES, 1870–1975: AN INSTITUTIONAL APPROACH

The income velocity of money in Canada, the United States, Great Britain, Norway and Sweden displays a U-shaped pattern over the last one hundred years. This paper presents and tests empirically an explanation for this secular pattern emphasizing the influence on velocity of institutional changes. The inclusion into a simple velocity function of institutional developments such as the process of monetization, the spread of commercial banking, financial development and the growth of economic stability improves the explanation of long-run movements in velocity provided by a regression of velocity on real permanent income per head and the interest rate.     

Segmentation and wage determination

Dans leurs écrits récents sur la segmentation socio-économique, les Américains ont utilise des données secondaires recueillies dans le secteur industriel, pour démontrer que les arguments qui veulent que les salaires soient fixés par la population active ou fonctionelle, étaient limités. A l'aide de données recueillies principalement dans des maisons de commerce canadiennes, cette étude explore les effets d'une notion alternative du fonctionnement de la segmentation, sur le processus d'établissement des salaires. En employant de nouvelles techniques de classification, on a identifié trois groupes économiques de base, et examiné les différents aspects de la fixation des salaires à l'intérieur de ces groupes économiques. On a particulièrement montré que la perspective de segmentation pouvait fournir une réinterprétation intéressante des profile réguliers de l'expérimentation des salaires.
Recent American literature on socioeconomic segmentation has employed secondary data gathered at the industrial level to demonstrate the limitations of functionalist or human capital explanations of earnings determination. In this paper, we utilize primary Canadian data collected from business establishments to explore the effects of an alternative operationalization of the segmentation notion on the wage determination process. Using some new classificatory techniques, we identify three basic economic clusters, or segments, and examine the distinctive aspects of wage determination within these economic groups. In particular, we show that the segmentation perspective can provide an interesting reinterpretation of standard experience-earning profiles.