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After the failures of manpower planning, research shows that investment in primary and general secondary education yields greater returns than investment in more costly vocational/higher education. To be more effective, investment in vocational education should be more influenced by the individual with greater private sector provision. Macroeconomic policy is the key to reducing unemployment and, it can be argued, the EU has adopted the policy of lifelong education without sufficient reference to research in the field. (Contains 4 tables and 1 figure.)

The case for education can be made from many perspectives. This paper makes the case for education based on economic outcomes. Surveying the most recent empirical evidence, it shows the crucial role of education for individual and societal prosperity. Education is a leading determinant of economic growth, employment, and earnings in modern knowledge-based economies. Ignoring the economic dimension of education would endanger the prosperity of future generations, with widespread repercussions for poverty, social exclusion, and sustainability of social security systems. Policy-makers interested in advancing future prosperity should particularly focus on educational outcomes, rather than inputs or attainment.

All of the authors seem to share the perception that one can no longer expect much from macroeconomic policies. The authors of this paper share this opinion, but this should not be interpreted as the skeptical view that macroeconomic policies are ineffective on employment. They saw from the Korea's two crises how contrasting outcomes could result from different macroeconomic policy responses. The recent Great Recession might have become another Great Depression had the bold boosting policies not been provided. By nature, however, boosting policies cannot continue forever. Monetary policy is constrained by inflation, and fiscal policy is constrained by public debt sustainability. It is also notable that macroeconomic policies are supposed to be used to correct the cyclical part, as opposed to the "natural" part, of the unemployment rate fluctuation. Although no one knows the exact level of the natural rate in each country, policymakers need to bear in mind that unemployment rates in many crisis-hit countries became permanently higher. Therefore, if the unemployment rate does not significantly fall despite the two years of recovery in production, it is reasonable to begin to suspect that a substantial portion may be attributable to a rise in the natural rate, which is not to be dealt with by macroeconomic policies. Some countries, in which the unemployment rate is "unacceptably high" (Haveman, Heinrich, & Smeedling), may need to continue temporary policies that help boost employment. For this purpose, the authors find the argument that direct hiring credits are more cost-effective in job creation than general stimulus convincing because they directly alter the incentives of firms to hire. Similar policies were experimented with in Korea during the crisis periods in the form of employment subsidies for incumbent workers and young interns trying to enter the labor market. The authors' concern about these sorts of policies is not their effectiveness on employment, but their long-term implications. For this reason, policymakers should also make efforts to streamline structural labor market policies. Structural policies will not be able to generate visible effects on employment in the near future. Nevertheless, they deserve to be pursued to enhance labor market efficiency and (possibly) to reduce the natural rate of unemployment, especially when the necessary room for enacting discretionary macroeconomic policies has been eroded. (Contains 3 footnotes.)

This paper estimates the extent and magnitude of US college and university enrollment responses to unanticipated changes in macroeconomic activity. In particular, we consider the relationship between enrollment, economic growth, and inflation. A time series analysis known as a vector autoregression is estimated and impulse response functions are calculated to measure the enrollment response to these economic shocks. The results suggest that enrollment patterns differ by gender and are consistent with economic theory. (Contains 4 figures, 4 tables and 5 notes.)

The present paper studies the general equilibrium implications of two types of education policy in an overlapping generations model. We examine education transfers, which augment inherited private education spending, and public investment on economy-wide human capital, which provides externalities to individual human capital accumulation. The government determines jointly the tax rate and the allocation of tax revenues among the two types of education policy. The optimal division of public spending between the education policy instruments and the associated tax rate depend on the elasticities of human capital accumulation with regard to education transfers and public investment on economy-wide human capital. (Contains 4 figures and 12 notes.)

The purpose of this paper is, first, to highlight the role of the relationships between universities, institutions and firms in different regional development processes working towards a knowledge economy, and, second, to draw some implications for local policy makers. Adopting the regional innovation system (RIS) approach, the authors analyse selected regions--Cambridge (UK), Baden-Wurttemberg (Germany), Goteborg, (Sweden), Singapore, Milwaukee (USA) and Pittsburgh (USA)--which in the last two decades have undergone a process of economic and industrial renewal. From their analysis of the regional transformation process, they classify three different regional development paths defined respectively as "RIS-into", "RIS-from" and "RIS-through" processes. Some common features emerge. In the process of regional development cooperation among universities, institutions and firms is essential. In particular, local universities play a crucial role in providing highly-educated people, research and spin-off activities. Thus universities are able to foster knowledge spillovers and interact constructively with firms. These interactions are nurtured and promoted by local policy makers. (Contains 1 figure and 2 tables.)

Provides comments by Nobel laureate Paul A. Samuelson, Harold W. McGraw Jr., William D. Nordhaus, Orley Ashenfelter, Robert M. Solow, and Stanley Fischer on Samuelson's introductory textbook "Economics," as presented at the 1998 American Economic Association meetings in Chicago (Illinois). (CMK)

This paper surveys the first stage in the development of models of endogenous growth over the two decades between 1952 and 1973, including seminal works by Arrow, Frankel, Phelps, Uzawa, and others as faculty and graduate students who interacted in the Stanford–Chicago–MIT–Yale Nexus. The paper also deals with American Economic Association (AEA) and Econometric Society (ES) conference sessions over the period 1964–1968 on growth, technical progress, and innovations and with the contributions in the 1967 Shell volume, in addition to dissertations, working papers, and book chapters by those involved in the “first wave” over the period 1965–1973. Finally, the paper considers the initial efforts at building more sophisticated models based on technical progress, human capital, increasing returns and imperfect competition, and the incompatibility between increasing returns with competitive equilibrium. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of labour incomes on economic activity and growth in Poland. The thesis of this paper is rooted in the hypothesis of underconsumption and it claims that a proportion of labour incomes to the domestic product exerts an influence on the structure and the value of the aggregate demand and thus it eventually has an effect on economic activity. The simple empirical analysis provided refers to macroeconomic data for the period 2010-2019; recent data at the time of the analysis and a very illustrative period with respect to the thesis. The analysis supports the thesis; relatively low growth of labour incomes is followed by low rates of economic growth and investment and higher rates of unemployment. However, reasons behind the fluctuations in the participation of employees in the domestic product are far from being obvious. Market, economic policy and regulatory aspects of the problem deserve further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taking into account the circumstances that Kosovo has faced since the 1990s until now, we can say that significant steps have been taken to advance the country's economic development, but it is still regarded as a country that is not economically developed enough, with a deep negative trade balance and an unfavorable macroeconomic policy to ensure a faster development trend, despite recent economic growth that has been insufficient to affect this. For analysis, we took the life and non-life insurance sector, which turns out to be undeveloped and participates in the financial sector with only 2.7%, so it is a symbolic indicator that speaks for itself about the development of the insurance sector. This industry is characterized by a low level of development, and the main motive is to analyze the development trend of this sector while comparing it with the countries of the region.The purpose of this paper is to identify and examine gross written premiums in the insurance sector in the Western Balkans. In this paper, we will analyze the trend of the gross written premium in the insurance sector in Kosova compared to the countries of the Western Balkans. The sample contains data such as the number of inhabitants, the total gross income at country level, the income per capita, the gross written premium, the rate of insurance density, and the penetration rate for the countries of Kosova, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia for the period 2010–2021.The empirical research is done by collecting data from the official reports published on an annual basis by the financial institutions of the countries in the region as well as the World Bank. A research paper is classified as an exploratory, descriptive, or explanatory study. Comparative analysis and descriptive statistics will be the methodologies applied in this paper.The analysis of these data shows that the development of the insurance market in Kosova and the countries of the Western Balkans from 2010 onwards, despite the new market entries of branches of large groups, has not been characterized by real strategies for the exploration of new segments of the market and an increase in demand. The insurance sector needs to be influenced by strategic approaches that move from transaction value to product lifetime value and from product life cycle to customer life cycle. The commitment to create an attractive environment for business initiatives and foreign investments, in addition to being a constant challenge for underdeveloped economies, should also be a strategic goal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to evaluate proficient perceptions within business assessments in South Africa, where such perceptions play a significant role in the evaluation process, encompassing the selection of standards and the establishment of evaluation frameworks. The evolving economy of South Africa is marked by fluctuating economic circumstances and potential growth, compounded by inadequate benchmarks and a scarcity of relevant market information. Forecasting growth rates are further complicated by macroeconomic uncertainties, leading to a reliance on proficient perceptions when industry-specific guidelines and easily comprehensible alternatives to the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM) are lacking. A mixed-methods strategy is employed in this study, combining quantitative and qualitative data, along with surveys set benchmarks for business assessments. The outcomes reveal that modifications based on judgment are necessary for variables like organizational size due to the absence of CAPM alternatives. This study stresses the importance of translating scholarly discoveries into practical applications, emphasizing the challenges and uncertainties that call for proficient perceptions in business evaluations. It advances the comprehension of these obstacles and proposes that further exploring macroeconomic variables and industry-specific guidelines could offer valuable insights. The study suggests that biases in evaluations, influenced by client interests, present a promising area for future inquiry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: In view of the fact that the economic future of the region is the European Union, this research paper studies the economic progress of the Western Balkan countries towards the EU, based on the performance of macroeconomic indicators. The purpose of the research paper is to analyse the macroeconomic indicators of the Western Balkan countries, the assessment of the economic growth per capita during the period 2000-2020, the expectations for the future, and the measurement of the economic progress of such countries towards the European path. Design/Methodology/Approach: Through panel data using several econometric models, the consideration of the Maastricht criteria in achieving convergence between the Western Balkan countries and the European Union countries, is examined. Using the indicator of economic growth and the GDP per capita in purchasing power parity, the direct significance of the Maastricht criteria in the real convergence between these countries is measured. Findings: Empirical results showed that there is a relationship between real and nominal convergence, with the nominal convergence being considered a prerequisite for achieving real convergence. Practical Implications: The agenda for the idea of European expansion should become a genuine economic policy based on economic parameters measured and analyzed with research and scientific methods. As the study highlights different aspects of economic growth promoters, the quality of institutions is one of the critical indicators that mobilize macroeconomic factors to ensure economic growth in WB countries. Originality/Value: This paper provides a fine scientific and research example in analyzing the convergence process. The results can serve as a good guide for policymakers in navigating the right path to EU membership. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The core idea behind government debt is to fund fiscal deficit, which is anticipated to drive economic investments. To a larger extent, this is not the case, as evidenced in the Nigerian context, where debt has risen so high with investment levels declining, thus questioning the government's ability to manage and sustain its debt to pursue vital investment needs. This study aimed to investigate the threshold effect of debt sustainability on investments amidst macroeconomic swings from 1981 to 2020. In this regard, the threshold autoregressive regression (TAR) was used because it gave information on the optimal threshold of debt sustainability that would attract investments. Also, the Granger causality test was carried out to show the direction of causality among the variables. This paper concentrated on debt service to revenue and total debt stock to GDP as debt sustainability measures while investment was decomposed into public, private, and foreign investments. The paper yields that, based on the multivariate TAR analyses, the main threshold variables, that is, debt service to revenue and total debt stock to GDP, had a non-linear relationship with public, private, and foreign direct investments amidst changes in macroeconomic variables such as exchange rate, inflation, and monetary policy rate. The threshold coefficient of debt service to revenue indicated that public and foreign direct investments declined during low thresholds while private investment increased. However, the opposite prevailed when debt service to revenue exceeded the threshold values. However, the Granger causality test showed that debt service to revenue Granger caused total debt stock to GDP and exchange rate Granger caused debt service to revenue ratio, implying that exchange rate swings could affect the government's ability to service debt which in turn explains the non-linear relationship between debt sustainability and investments. Hence, it was concluded that Nigeria's lack of debt sustainability was associated with revenue generation, which explains why the models did not follow a linear path. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research paper deals with the global macroeconomic policies that are required to be framed and analysed to achieve sustainable economic development. The concepts of Global Supply Chains (GSCs) and their interlinkages with international trade and development have been studied at length. It is observed that a substantial share of the production processes is taking place in developing countries. The paper also deals with government policies and governance issues and their implementation including inclusive growth for sustainable economic development. The study concludes that there is no single best model or policy mix that works for all countries and the paths to inclusive growth must be contextualised and adapted to country-specific challenges and ambitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Introduction: The rise of the internet has revolutionized the way businesses operate and people interact globally, without exception, including Islamic finance. This paper aims to investigate whether or not the level of internet users, economic growth, exchange rate, labor force, and poverty are the determinants of the increase of the Islamic Finance Index (IFI) in Indonesia and Malaysia. Methods: This study employs quantitative methodologies, specifically utilizing panel data regression techniques. Due to limitations in the availability of certain variables, an unbalanced panel regression is conducted, encompassing quarterly data from 2013 to 2022. Results: Empirical evidence indicates a significant relationship between internet users and other macroeconomic variables concerning IFI. Specifically, internet users contribute to the progress of IFI, while labor force and poverty also notably influence IFI. However, the remaining macroeconomic variables do not demonstrate significance in this context. Conclusion and suggestion: By analyzing and delving into the link between internet users, macroeconomic factors, and Islamic finance, this study fills the literature gap which will be a guide for both policymakers and academics to grasp what dominant variables to prioritize for the acceleration of Islamic finance rectification in both Indonesia and Malaysia, aligned with the increasing rate and impact of internet users. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the liquidity effect of the U.S. QE on the sovereign yield spreads of commodity-exporting countries by employing the two-stage least squares approach. The key contributions of the paper are in terms of our empirical findings. First, our results show that the U.S. QE has an economically and statistically significant liquidity effect in terms of both the HPW illiquidity measure and the TIPS liquidity premium. This is of policy importance because adjusting for the liquidity premium is a key stage in modeling inflationary expectations. Second, our results show that the U.S. QE reduced the liquidity premium with improved market liquidity and hence reduce sovereign yield spreads of most commodity-exporting countries. This finding is of macroeconomic importance as reduced sovereign yield spreads have been shown to lead to higher real activity and higher credit activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Australian Government's White Paper ' Australia in the Asian Century' is the first large-scale official look in the twenty-first century at economic change in Asia and how it affects Australian opportunities and challenges. This paper comments on the analysis embodied in and the objectives defined by the White Paper, especially as it relates to Australian resources. This paper generally endorses the aspirations of the White Paper and notes that their achievement is going to require efforts and changes beyond those that are currently contemplated. It comments briefly on six things: the development context of twenty-first century Asian growth; growth and structural change in Asia and Australia's terms of trade; macroeconomic management of a resource-intensive Australian economy; restoring productivity growth; excellence in education; and linking Australia to Asian opportunity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to examine the impact of selected macroprudential policy instruments on financial stability. We focus on six euro area economies (Belgium, Cyprus, Germany, Spain, Ireland and the Netherlands) over sixteen quarters (from 2015 Q1 to 2018 Q4) by using the research method of panel econometrics. The following three banking sector aggregate balance sheet variables exhibit the expected impact on credit growth and cyclical fluctuations of the economy: common equity tier one ratio, coverage ratio, and interconnectedness ratio. Moreover, common equity tier one ratio, loan-to-deposit ratio, and leverage ratio exhibit the expected impact on house price growth. Based on our empirical findings, a case can be made for the usage of carefully crafted macroprudential policy instruments that target selected financial and macroeconomic variables with the ultimate goal of attaining the stability of the financial system as a whole. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pakistan is grappling with a significant debt crisis and seeking assistance from the IMF and allied nations to alleviate the situation. This has aroused the interest of the academic community to understand the intricacies of the debt trap and explore potential solutions. This study examines how foreign debt affects the economic growth of Pakistan by analyzing selected macroeconomic variables for the period 1990-2020. The results of dynamic autoregressive distributed lag models show that Pakistan's economic growth performance is significantly and adversely impacted by debt servicing and exchange rate fluctuations. From the Granger causality results, it is evident that there is a neither unidirectional nor bidirectional causal relationship between GDP and foreign debt. This rejects the notion of a direct relationship between the two, as proposed by previous studies. The study also finds that foreign debt negatively affects the economic performance of Pakistan's economy via its effects on inflation, exchange rate and debt servicing. The paper offers useful policy recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Albania has managed to maintain a positive economic growth and macroeconomic stability over the past decade, but its high level of public debt, with an increasing trend over the last three years, has been seen as very worrying in the eyes of many domestic and foreign economists. When it comes to debt, both public and private debt must be taken into account. Private debt analysis takes on particular importance because private debt is associated with financing business projects and increasing consumer demand, which serve economic growth and improve the country's macro- economic parameters. This paper aims to study the role of public and private debt on economic growth in Albania for the period 2014-2018, as well as the main determinants of these two indicators. The methodology used is based on econometric regression analysis. The results showed that public and private debt has a statistically significant impact on economic growth in Albania. The research question of this paper is: Does private and public debt have an impact on economic growth in Albania? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]