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Since the Global Financial Crisis, interest in financial cycles has risen significantly. While much of modern macroeconomics conceives financial crises as the results of exogenous shocks, Minsky's financial instability hypothesis posits that financial cycles are endogenous to the economic system. The main contribution of this paper is to use historical macroeconomic data for the United States (1889–2014) to econometrically test for endogenous Minsky cycles: the interaction of procyclical private debt-to-income ratios and a dampening effect of private debt on economic activity. We analyze corporate debt-gross domestic product (GDP) growth cycles, which feature in Minsky's original writings, and mortgage debt-GDP growth cycles as in some recent Minsky-inspired models. We find robust evidence of endogenous corporate debt-GDP cycles over the last 125 years. These results are driven by the pre-World War II (WWII), and post-1973 periods, which had a more liberal economic policy orientation. We find no evidence of mortgage debt-GDP cycles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates the impact of access to mobile money services on local economic activity. The analysis combines data from the early expansion of the mobile agent network in Kenya with a local-level measure of economic performance proxied by the intensity of nighttime lights. Leveraging the variation in areas that gained access to mobile money services at different times and the high resolution of the data, the paper shows that access to mobile money services increased local economic activity and that these effects increased over time. The positive effects are more pronounced for areas that were initially more affluent, urban, and better connected to infrastructure. These results suggest that mobile money can complement, rather than just substitute for, other alternatives that enable people to connect, trade, and allocate investments within their networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using U.S. Census firm-worker data, I document that firms' financial distress has an economically important effect on employee departures to entrepreneurship. The impact is amplified in the high-tech and service sectors, where employees are key assets. In states with enforceable noncompete contracts, the effect is mitigated. Compared to typical entrepreneurs, distress-driven entrepreneurs are high-wage workers who found better firms, as measured by jobs, pay, and survival. Startup jobs compensate for 33% of job losses at the constrained incumbents. Overall, the financial inability of incumbent firms to pursue productive opportunities increases the reallocation of economic activity into new firms. Authors have furnished an Internet Appendix, which is available on the Oxford University Press Web site next to the link to the final published paper online. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper derives a European Herfindahl–Hirschman concentration index from 15 micro-aggregated country datasets. In the last decade, European concentration rose due to a reallocation of economic activity toward large and concentrated industries. Over the same period, productivity gains from an increasing allocative efficiency of the European market accounted for 50% of European productivity growth while markups stayed constant. Using country-industry variation, we show that changes in concentration are positively associated with changes in productivity and allocative efficiency. This holds across most sectors and countries and supports the notion that rising concentration in Europe reflects a more efficient market environment rather than weak competition and rising market power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taking advantage of the implementation of the 2003 European Commission (EC) directive on financial reporting, we explore the impact of mandatory financial disclosure on mergers and acquisitions (M&A). We find robust evidence that the number (and volume) of private firms becoming an M&A target increases with mandatory disclosure. Analyses of cross-industry differences, deal-level data, and post-deal performance indicate that financial disclosure increases M&A activity by reducing information frictions in the market for corporate control. Authors have furnished an Internet Appendix , which is available on the Oxford University Press Web site next to the link to the final published paper online [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the effects of anticipations of tax changes on economic activity through the release of tax news in the media in the United States. I provide a measure of anticipations by exploiting the content of television news. This information typically flows faster than standard measures of gross domestic product, thus I propose a mixed frequency dynamic factor model to estimate both the economic activity latent factor and the effects of anticipated tax shocks on it. I find that one-month-ahead anticipations of tax cuts significantly stimulate current economic activity while those of tax increases produce the opposite effect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The U.K. economy experienced significant macroeconomic adjustments following the 2016 referendum on its withdrawal from the European Union. To understand these adjustments, this paper presents empirical facts using novel U.K. macroeconomic data and estimates a small open economy model with tradable and non-tradable sectors. We demonstrate that the referendum outcome can be interpreted as news about a future decline in productivity growth in the tradable sector. An immediate fall in the relative price of non-tradable goods induces a temporary "sweet spot" for tradable producers. Economic activity in the tradable sector expands in the short run, while the non-tradable sector contracts. Aggregate output, consumption, and investment growth decelerate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the unequal effect of Airbnb on the spatial organisation of economic activity in Madrid, Spain. Using establishment-level data from Madrid City Council and consumer-facing information from this short-term rental company, we find that Airbnb reshapes the urban space by encouraging tourist-oriented businesses, defined as businesses where tourists spend more than locals, at the expense of businesses primarily oriented to locals. These findings prove that short-term rentals do displace not only the local population but also resident-oriented businesses. Ultimately, our findings remain solid regardless of how we measure short-term rental activity and are not influenced by the growth of e-commerce or gentrification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Does the availability or variability of water matter for the economy? Does it meaningfully impact the growth and development trajectory of a country? It may seem surprising that answers to these most basic of questions remain elusive. The aim of this paper is to summarize recent work on the economic impacts of water scarcity and variability. The paper finds that there is strong evidence that variations in rainfall and water availability have significant impacts on particular sectors, such as agriculture, human capital, and even conflict. But paradoxically evidence of impacts on economic growth and other measures of aggregate economic activity remains ambiguous. The paper explains reasons for this anomaly and explores the pathways through which water impacts the economy. The paper provides a synthesis of key developments in the literature, identifies methodological gaps, and suggests policy solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the idea that in capitalist economies, external markets are the driving force behind long-run economic growth. To this end, a model is developed so that the dynamics of external demand, consumer spending, capital accumulation, income distribution and capitalists' net financial assets can be analysed together as a complete system. The model shows how, in the long run, if capitalists adjust spending to keep financial wealth at desired levels, and investment reacts to aggregate demand in a Harrodian fashion, then this can cause the rate of capital accumulation to gravitate towards the growth rate of external markets. This occurs even if external demand only accounts for a small share of total economic activity. Based on this framework, the paper argues for a reinterpretation of the relationship between profits and growth during the neoliberal period in the USA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to present an original approach to estimate the gender pay gap (GPG). We propose a model‐based decomposition, similar to the most popular approaches, where the first component measures differences in group characteristics and the second component measures the unexplained effect; the latter being the real gap. The novel approach incorporates model selection and bias correction. The pay gap problem in a small area context is considered in this paper, although the approach is flexible to be applied to other contexts. Specifically, the methodology is validated for analysing wage differentials by economic activities in the region of Galicia (Spain) and by analysing simulated data from an experimental design that imitates the generation of real data. The good performance of the proposed estimators is shown in both cases, specifically when compared with those obtained from the widely used Oaxaca–Blinder approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper builds on the concept of (shifting) involvements, originally proposed by Albert Hirschman (1982). However, unlike Hirschman, the concept is framed in class terms. A model is presented where income distribution is determined by the involvement of the two classes, capitalists and workers. Higher involvement by capitalists and lower involvement by workers tends to increase the profit share and vice versa. In turn, shifts in involvements are induced by the potential effect of a change in distribution on economic activity and past levels of distribution. On the other hand, as the profit share increases, the economy tends to become more wage led. The dynamics of the resulting model are interesting. The more the two classes prioritise the increase of their income share over economic activity, the more possible it is that the economy is unstable. Under the stable configuration, the most likely outcome is Polanyian predator–prey cycles, which can explain some interesting historical episodes during the twentieth century. Finally, the paper discusses the possibility of conflict and cooperation within each of the distribution-led regimes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bubbles are a topic of great importance and great controversy. This paper discusses alternative perspectives on the economic meaning and origin of bubbles. Drawing on historical approaches to bubbles, this article sets out a taxonomy of approaches used to explain the nature of bubbles. The paper also considers issues connected with the scientific thinking surrounding bubbles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On August 12-13, 2005, the department of finance at the Kelley School of Business, Indiana University, collaborated with the Review of Financial Studies to host a conference titled "The Causes and Consequences of Recent Financial Market Bubbles." This article begins with our overview of the themes and findings of the conference, and it ends with the questions that the literature has yet to answer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interest in regional economic issues coupled with advances in administrative data is driving the creation of new regional economic data. Many of these data series could be useful for nowcasting regional economic activity, but they suffer from a short (albeit constantly expanding) time series which makes incorporating them into nowcasting models problematic. Regional nowcasting is already challenging because the release delay on regional data tends to be greater than that at the national level, and 'short' data imply a 'ragged edge' at both the beginning and the end of regional data sets, which adds a further complication. In this paper, via an application to the UK, we investigate various ways of including a wide range of short data into a regional mixed-frequency vector autoregression (MF-VAR) model. These short data include hitherto unexploited regional value-added tax turnover data. We address the problem of the two ragged edges by estimating regional factors using different missing data algorithms that we then incorporate into our MF-VAR model. We find that nowcasts of regional output growth are generally improved when we condition them on the factors, but only when the regional nowcasts are produced before the national (UK-wide) output growth data are published. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of agricultural trade liberalization on economic activity and political violence in emerging countries. We use data on all preferential trade agreements (PTAs) signed between 25 low- and middle-income countries and their high-income trade partners between 1995 and 2013. We exploit the implied reduction in agricultural tariffs over time combined with variation within countries in their suitability to produce liberalized crops to find that economic activity increases differentially in affected areas. We also find strong positive effects on political violence, and present evidence consistent with both producer- and consumer-side mechanisms: violence increases differentially in more urbanized areas that are suitable to produce less labour-intensive crops as well as crops that are consumed locally. Our estimates imply that economic activity and political violence would have been around 2% and 7% lower, respectively, across countries in our sample had the PTAs not been signed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many coastal towns in England face a unique set of overlapping challenges: a longstanding socio-economic stagnation and environmental threats coming from the physical location. This paper examines coastal communities in the context of the left-behind debate. The consequences of de-industrialisation and failures in public policies recall other left-behind geographies. We look at a selection of case studies, apparently dealing with the decline of traditional coastal economic activities, but really affected by a decoupling of their socio-economic profile from their coastal specificity. More work is needed to nurture the existing coastal imaginaries, requiring regional coordination and a place-based approach to regeneration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues for the regular testing of people in groups that are more likely to be exposed to SARS-CoV-2, to reduce the spread of COVID-19 and resume economic activity. We call this 'stratified periodic testing'. It is 'stratified' as it is based on at-risk groups, and 'periodic' as everyone in the group is tested at regular intervals. We argue that this is a better use of scarce testing resources than 'universal random testing', as has been recently discussed globally. We find that, under reasonable assumptions and allowing for false negative results 30 per cent of the time, 17 per cent of a subgroup would need to be tested each day to lower the effective reproduction number R from 2.5 to 0.75, under stratified periodic testing. Using the same assumptions the universal random testing rate would need to be 27 per cent (as opposed to 7 per cent as argued by Romer (2020b)). We obtain this rate of testing using a corrected method for calculating the impact of an infectious person on others, and allowing for asymptomatic cases. We also find that the effect of one day's delay between testing positive and self-isolating is similar to having a test that is 30 per cent less accurate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although Africa has experienced rapid urbanization in recent decades, little is known about the process of urbanization across the continent. This paper exploits a natural experiment, the abolition of South African pass laws, to explore how exogenous population shocks affect the spatial distribution of economic activity. Under apartheid, black South Africans were severely restricted in their choice of location, and many were forced to live in homelands. Following the abolition of apartheid they were free to migrate. Given a migration cost in distance, a town nearer to the homelands will receive a larger inflow of people than a more distant town following the removal of mobility restrictions. Drawing upon this exogenous variation, this study examines the effect of migration on urbanization in South Africa. While it is found that on average there is no endogenous adjustment of population location to a positive population shock, there is heterogeneity in the results. Cities that start off larger do grow endogenously in the wake of a migration shock, while rural areas that start off small do not respond in the same way. This heterogeneity indicates that population shocks lead to an increase in urban relative to rural populations. Overall, the evidence suggests that exogenous migration shocks can foster urbanization in the medium run. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is concerned with the role of effective demand in Malthus's theory of accumulation expounded in his Principles of Political Economy. As is well known, Keynes praised Malthus for being a forerunner in identifying a lack of effective demand as a cause of depression in economic activity and a constraint on growth. There have since been many interpretations in the literature of Malthus's position by reference to his arguments against Say's Law in contending the possibility of "general gluts" and to his theory of capital accumulation. We begin by examining Malthus's conception of the supply-side factors that determine what we call, "potential accumulation", being accumulation that is not constrained by demand. The paper then considers the role of effective demand in Malthus's well known contention of the possibility of "general gluts" and, connectedly, in his theory of demand-constrained capital accumulation. On this basis, we then appraise whether Malthus's theory anticipates Keynes's principle of effective demand by reference to the debate on this question in the literature, showing that while Malthus lacked a meaningful saving-investment analysis, he does provide insights important to the modern demand-led approach to growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper offers a straightforward and descriptive contribution to the recent and busy debate on fiscal discipline made popular by the seminal Reinhart and Rogoff (2010 ; Growth in a time of debt. American Economic Review , vol. 100, no. 2, 573–78) paper, after policymakers have sought foundation and justification for a policy known as austerity measures, following on from the sovereign debt crisis of 2010. We revisit the debate on whether or not higher debt levels impede growth rates and offer a time series perspective of a corrected data set and a more recent higher-frequency source. We find that with further hindsight, and from a time series perspective, there is little to no support for the view that higher levels of debt cause reductions in economic activity. In contrast to Reinhart and Rogoff (2010) , we suggest that economic slumps tend to cause debt build-ups rather than vice versa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between research and development (R&D) investment and economic development is well established. Yet, at a global scale, the resource-rich countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council are consistent outliers in this relationship, combining rich-world national incomes with R&D expenditure of developing countries. This paper uses a case study on Kuwait to illustrate a particular form of developmental trap, a version of the resource curse, which makes it irrational for private business firms to invest in R&D and innovation. Based on an analysis of the literature and secondary data, focus groups, and an original survey of large manufacturing firms, we argue that a narrow focus on R&D-led diversification of economic activity ignores the systemic problems faced by Kuwait and, particularly, the unsuitable supply of skills and capabilities provided by the national education and training system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the importance of an "integrated approach" to the study of the effects of FDI on host countries. Macro-level work that examines countries at different stages of development and institutional capacity is needed to surface the role of local conditions and absorptive capacities; micro-level work, that is firm-level data in developed as well as developing nations, to understand the mechanisms that impart substance to the anticipated benefits; and theoretical work to guide the analyses. The paper summarizes likely motives for foreign direct investment and potential effects of FDI on local economies as well as recent findings from the macro literature on the role of complementarities between FDI and local policies, conditions, and institutions and summarizes new efforts to understand the micro mechanisms and channels by which host countries can benefit from multinational activity, within and between firm productivity increases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Notwithstanding the growing body of evidence documenting the persistent differences in the dynamism of economies, our understanding of their drivers is still rather limited. This paper contributes to closing this gap, shedding light on the role played by labour regulation and financial development in shaping the distribution of firm growth. Using unique harmonised micro-aggregated data for eleven countries, we look beyond differences in average growth rates and examine the impact that institutional factors have across the distribution of firms, showing that improvements in a country's institutional framework create both winners and losers, even when the economy as a whole benefits. Specifically, our results are twofold. First, we find that stringent employment protection legislation is linked to a less dynamic firm growth distribution in sectors which are labour and research intensive. This is reflected in a higher share of stable firms, as well as in slower growth and contraction at the extremes of the distribution. Second, a well-functioning financial system is associated with a more dynamic firm growth distribution in finance-dependent sectors. This is driven by faster growth among the best performing firms, faster contraction of under-performing ones, and a smaller share of stable firms in the middle. Overall, these results suggest that framework conditions have a heterogeneous impact along the distribution of firm growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Regional per capita income levels in the European Union display large variations and a strong centre-periphery gradient. This paper examines to what degree proximity to markets can explain this pattern. Using a New Economic Geography model, I derive an econometric specification relating income levels to a trade cost and price index weighted sum of the surrounding locations' GDP. I estimate this specification for a sample of 193 EU regions for 1975–1997 and find an important role for market access. However, its main benefits seem to come from increased incentives for physical and human capital accumulation and not from direct trade cost savings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper tests two major competing theories explaining the spatial concentration of economic activity, namely new economic geography theory (NEG) which emphasizes varying market potential, and urban economics theory (UE) in which the main emphasis is on producer service linkages. Using wage rate variations across small regions of Great Britain, the paper finds that it is UE theory rather than NEG theory that has most explanatory power. Evidence for this comes from encompassing both models within an artificial nesting model. Despite the popularity of NEG theory, this paper shows that although NEG works well using regional data, there is evidence that it does not necessarily provide the best explanation of local wage variations, since producer services inputs associated with UE theory and labour efficiency variations are important effects at a local level, and these are excluded from the formal NEG model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Across OECD countries productivity growth has slowed, not just in recent years but over the past four decades: the so-called productivity puzzle. This paper examines the differing productivity growth paths of some 85 British cities since the beginning of the 1970s, and explores how far these paths reflect differences across cities in the pace and nature of structural change. We find that while northern cities led productivity growth over 1971-91 southern cities then led after 1991. However, at the same time, the rate of productivity growth slowed across almost all cities between these two periods. We find evidence of considerable structural convergence across cities and a general tendency for the degree of specialisation to fall. This then leads to a decomposition analysis which identifies the relative contribution of between-sector (structural change) and within-sector effects to city productivity growth. The analysis reveals that structural change -- and especially the shift from manufacturing to services -- has had a negative impact on productivity growth across all cities, but that within-sector productivity developments while positive and outweighing structural change effects, have also declined over the past 45 years, as well as varying across cities. These findings point to the need for further research on the causes of this slowdown in 'within-sector 'productivity growth and why those causes appear to differ from city to city. They also point to the need for a 'place-based' dimension to policies aimed at improving national productivity performance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents the response of the author on the comments from Sebastian Edwards on an article regarding the economic development and minimization of foreign-resource requirements in underdeveloped countries. Ragner Nurkse in his now famous lectures on Some Aspects of Capital Accumulation in Underdeveloped Countries dealth at length with the issue of how a developing country could draw upon its surplus labor as a source of capital formation for economic development. My paper was essentially as elaboration of that theme: it shows how a labor-surplus developing country could attain both economic development and minimization of foreign-resource requirements for economic development. My paper was an essence an ideal, schematic formalization of that process. Edwards raises three sets of objections to my paper, all of which seem to stem from a basic misunderstanding of both the purpose and working of the model. The first issue that he raises relates to the question of substitutability between labor and capital in production in the context of a developing country. This is essentially an empirical issue, and one is likely to elicit different answers in the context of different countries at different levels of economic development.

Cash transfer programs are widely used in settings where child labor is prevalent. Although many of these programs are explicitly implemented to improve children's welfare, in theory their impact on child labor is undetermined. This paper systematically reviews the empirical evidence on the impact of cash transfers, conditional and unconditional, on child labor. We find no evidence that cash transfer interventions increase child labor in practice. On the contrary, there is broad evidence that conditional and unconditional cash transfers lower both children's participation in child labor and their hours worked and that these transfers cushion the effect of economic shocks that may lead households to use child labor as a coping strategy. Boys experience particularly strong decreases in economic activities, whereas girls experience such decreases in household chores. Our findings underline the usefulness of cash transfers as a relatively safe policy instrument to improve child welfare but also point to knowledge gaps, for instance regarding the interplay between cash transfers and other interventions, that should be addressed in future evaluations to provide detailed policy advice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we discuss regional income growth and inequality based on a new set of long-run data. The data cover 173 European regions in 16 countries, from 1900 to 2015. These data allow us to compare regions over time, among each other, and to other parts of the world. After some brief notes on methodology, we describe the basic patterns in the data in terms of some key dimensions: variation in the density of population and economic activity, structural change with a declining role of agriculture, the rise and fall of industry, and the long rise of services. We show how 'fundamentals' of institutions and geography affected income levels over the twentieth century, and describe how regional growth after 1945 turned from convergence and adjustment to shocks to divergence. In the long run we observe a U-shaped pattern of regional convergence followed by divergence, not unlike recent observations on personal income and wealth distributions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the effect of security-motivated trade restrictions on economic activity and political violence. We exploit the 2008 restrictions imposed by Israel on imports of selected goods to the West Bank as a quasi-experiment. We show that after 2008 (i) output and wages decrease differentially in manufacturing sectors that use restricted materials more intensively as production inputs, (ii) wages decrease in localities where employment is more concentrated in these sectors, and (iii) episodes of political violence are more likely to occur in these localities. This differential effect accounts for 16% of violent events that occurred in the West Bank from 2008 to 2012. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cryptoassets and related actors such as crypto exchanges and mining pools are now fully integrated into mainstream economic activity. A necessary corollary is that they have attracted heightened regulatory and investor scrutiny. Although some rules and obligations apply uniformly across all economic actors in a given sector, many others, such as antitrust laws and some financial regulations as well as investor decisions are informed by actors' relative economic size—meaning that those with larger market shares can become more attractive regulatory or investing targets. It is therefore a foundational issue to properly measure the economic footprint of economic actors in the crypto economy, for otherwise regulatory oversight and investor decisions risk being misled. This has proven a remarkably difficult exercise for multiple reasons including unfamiliarity with the underlying technology and role of involved actors, lack of understanding of the applicable metrics' economic significance, and the unreliability of self-reported statistics, partly enabled by lack of regulation. Acknowledging the centrality of cryptoasset size in a number of regulatory and policymaking areas and the fact that previous attempts have been incomplete, simplistic, or even plainly wrong, this paper presents the first systematic examination of the economic footprint of cryptoassets and their constituent actors—mining pools and crypto exchanges. We aim to achieve a number of objectives: to introduce, identify, and organize all relevant and meaningful metrics of crypto economic actors market share calculation; to develop associations between metrics, and to explain their meaning, application, and limitations so that it becomes obvious in which context metrics can be useful or not, and what the potential caveats are; and to present rich, curated, and vetted data to illustrate metrics and their use in measuring the shares of crypto economic actors in their respective markets. The result is a comprehensive guidance into the size of the crypto economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides evidence of various reactions of growth rates to changes in the composition of taxes and public spending in Europe. We use a quantile estimator to allow different slopes of fiscal variables, across countries and years. We find that sovereign spending should be encouraged in the medium term if growth is low, but the medium-term effect on the economic activity is not positive in situations of moderate or rapid growth. Human capital expenditure jeopardizes growth, if a country belongs to the group of under-performers, while the initial costs are progressively transformed into growth-friendly factors for the group of over-achievers. Welfare expenditure is unproductive in the medium term, but only above a given growth threshold. Higher direct taxes are more harmful for low-growth countries, since their effects are more persistent than for countries with high growth. Our findings are contrary the idea that one size fits all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the first assessment of the efficiency of the technology transfer operated by the French university system and its main determinants. The analysis is based on a detailed and original database of 51 technology transfer offices (TTOs) categorised by the type of university to which they belong, for the period 2003–07. Overall, we find a low level of efficiency and both intra- and intercategory efficiency variation. Analysis of the determinants shows that the efficiency of French TTOs depends primarily on the nature of the category (with universities specialised in science and engineering being most efficient), and on institutional and environmental characteristics. Both the age of the TTO and the size of the university have a positive effect. In terms of environmental variables, the intensity of R&D activity (both private and public) has a positive impact; however, in terms of growth rate, private R&D activity seems to be the main driver. Lastly, we find that the presence of a university-related hospital is detrimental to efficiency. An extended discussion of the results within the existing literature is also offered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some of the richest places in the world have very high historical border presence, and are often located in particular geographic environments. In this paper we compile grid-cell level data on borders between sovereign states in Europe and surrounding areas from 1500 until today to document that state borders tend to be located in rugged and mountainous terrain, by rivers, and where it rains a lot. Moreover, two commonly used measures of economic activity—night lights and population density—are higher in cells with more borders, in particular more stable borders. This result holds also when controlling for geography. However, by the same metric, cells with more borders than neighboring cells are less developed than those neighbors. These patterns are consistent with a theory in which state competition benefits long-run development, but these benefits accrue more to the center than the periphery of states. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: The main objectives of this paper are to find efficient but computationally simple estimators for the proportions of people in the labour force (economic activity rates) in Swiss communes and to estimate their mean‐squared error (MSE) over the sampling replication mechanism (the design MSE). This will be done by combining survey data with administrative data provided by the Swiss Federal Statistical Office. We find estimators with considerably greater efficiency than currently used direct estimators and that are easy to implement. We show that, under a generalized linear mixed model with logit link, the computationally expensive empirical best predictor does not perform appreciably better than a plug‐in estimator. Moreover, for moderate proportions of active workers, the empirical best linear unbiased predictor (EBLUP) based on a much simpler linear mixed model performs similarly to the above estimators. We propose new bootstrap estimators of the design MSE of the EBLUPs, which 'borrow strength' similarly to EBLUPs. Realistic simulation studies carried out under both model‐ and design‐based set‐ups indicate great gains in efficiency of the selected small area estimators over the traditional direct estimators and acceptable performance of the proposed bootstrap MSE estimators. In the application using the Swiss data, coefficient‐of‐variation reductions of the estimates obtained for the communes are remarkable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines change on the economics research frontier, and asks whether the current competition between new research programmes may be supplanted by a new single dominant approach in the future. The paper discusses whether economics tends to be dominated by a single approach or reflect a pluralism of approaches, and argues that, historically, it has alternated between the two. It argues that orthodoxy usually emerges from heterodoxy, and interprets the division between orthodoxy and heterodoxy in terms of a core-periphery distinction. Regarding recent economics, the paper maps out two different types of combinations of new research programmes as being synchronic or diachronic in nature. It treats the new research programmes as a new kind of heterodoxy, and asks how a new orthodoxy might arise out of this new heterodoxy and traditional heterodoxy. It discusses this question by advancing two views regarding how to different types of combinations in the new research programmes might consolidate along the lines of three shared commitments with traditional heterodoxy to form a new orthodoxy in economics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The overlapping of activities is an important dimension of time use that has previously received little attention in economic analysis. Most time-use studies have looked only at primary activities, ignoring the fact that individuals often perform two or more activities simultaneously. This seriously underestimates the time spent on several economic activities such as childcare and housework which are also performed as secondary activities. Using a two-adult household sub-sample from the 1992 National Australian Time Use Survey, this paper examines the incidence and determinants of overlapping activities among 3,966 adult male and female household members. It first shows that inclusion of overlapping activities in time-use measurements provides a better estimation of the economic contribution of individuals, especially in non-market production. Tobit models are then estimated to examine the effects of economic, social and demographic factors on the incidence of overlapped work activity. The findings, which are found to be robust, showed that gender, household life cycle and composition, education, cultural norms, employment status and level of income earnings influence the extent to which individuals, particularly women, perform secondary work activities. Conclusions are drawn in the final section of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper proposes a new interpretation of long swings in economic activity. Instead of deviations from a trend growth path explained by misperceptions, long swings are seen as detours in the path itself provoked by rare and deep changes in expectations of future productivity. And such changes are approximately captured by swings in stock markets. In a large sample of OECD countries, the paper finds long-term historical relationships between share prices and employment or the rate of unemployment. The results suggest that the recent strength of a nation's stock markets and the responsiveness of employment are related to its institutions. In particular, corporatist institutions are likely to impede or obstruct entrepreneurs from taking advantage of expected productivity improvements. In contrast, a well-developed stock market -- in addition to a young, well-educated labour force -- may help both in the creation of profit opportunities as well as in enabling and emboldening firms to increase hiring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Under the apartheid regime, South African business was marked by a high degree of concentration, both in terms of ownership and activities. Indeed, it could be argued that this concentration was both created by and reinforced by the exclusions linked to apartheid. In this paper, we identify the main changes that have characterized South Africa's big business since democracy in 1994 unbundled traditional conglomerates, transferred primary listing to overseas stock exchanges, and slowed the emergence of black-owned economic groups. These changes are related to key policy actions taken by the government, including liberalization, black economic empowerment (BEE) policies, and competition policies. We demonstrate that South Africa still maintains its own distinctive features, including the very large, although reduced, weight of a few conglomerates, while evolving toward structures more similar to Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) norms. Finally, we argue that the policy emphasis on ownership transfers, combined with limits in the enforcement of competition policies, has restricted the capacity to generate additional jobs and meet the ultimate objectives of BEE. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Existing measures of relative concentration rank industries according to their degree of concentration. However, two equally strongly concentrated industries can have completely different types of concentration. Therefore, the paper proposes a new statistical approach that classifies each industry into one of six different geographical patterns, five of which represent different types of concentration, ranging from urban concentration to strongly rural concentration. The statistical identification of each industry's geographical pattern is based on two Goodman–Kruskal rank correlation coefficients. The power of this new approach is illustrated by using German employment data on 613 different industries in 412 regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Negotiations to restructure sovereign debt are time consuming, taking almost a decade on average to resolve. In this paper, we analyse a class of widely used complete information models of delays in sovereign debt restructuring and show that, despite superficial similarities, there are major differences across models in the driving force for equilibrium delay, the circumstances in which delay occurs and the efficiency of the debt restructuring process. We focus on three key assumptions. First, if delay has a permanent effect on economic activity in the defaulting country, equilibrium delay often occurs; this delay can sometimes be socially efficient. Second, prohibiting debt issuance as part of a settlement makes delay less likely to occur in equilibrium. Third, when debt issuance is not fully state contingent, delay can arise because of the risk that the sovereign will default on any debt issued as part of the settlement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We study the role of perceived trade-offs between human lives and economic benefits in shaping policy views. In an online experiment with a representative sample from the United States conducted during the early Covid-19 pandemic, we provide randomised information on the medium-run costs of restricting economic activity to mitigate infections. A one standard deviation lower perceived economic cost of lockdowns increases support by about twice as much as having a Covid at-risk condition, and by half as much as being a Democrat. Varying projected health benefits has a similar effect. Personal exposure to health risks reduces people's responsiveness to cost-benefit considerations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the short-term effects of fiscal consolidation on economic activity in OECD economies. We examine contemporaneous policy documents to identify changes in fiscal policy motivated by a desire to reduce the budget deficit and not by responding to prospective economic conditions. Using this new dataset, our estimates suggest that fiscal consolidation has contractionary effects on private demand and GDP. By contrast, estimates based on conventional measures of the fiscal policy stance used in the literature support the expansionary fiscal contractions hypothesis but appear to be biased toward overstating expansionary effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

New Zealand’s academic research assessment scheme, the Performance-Based Research Fund (PBRF), was launched in 2002 with the stated objective of increasing average research quality in the nation’s universities. Evaluation rounds were conducted in 2003, 2006 and 2012. In this article, we use 22 different journal weighting schemes to generate output estimates of refereed journal article and page production for three 6-year periods (1994–9; 2000–5 and 2006–11). These periods reflect a pre-PBRF environment, a mixed assessment period, and a pure PBRF research environment, respectively. Our findings indicate that, on average, research productivity, defined in either article or page terms, has increased since the introduction of the PBRF. However, this outcome is due to a major increase in the quantity of articles and pages produced per capita that has more than off-set a decline in the quality of published outputs since the introduction of the PBRF. In other words, our findings suggest that the PBRF has failed to achieve its stated goal of increasing average research quality, but it has resulted in substantial gains in productivity achieved via large increases in the quantity of refereed journal articles. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The paper explores the links between the tolling of flows through infrastructure passageways and the nature of financial securities that capture the earnings from these flows. At the heart of this relationship is a distinctive class of property rights that enable the traversal of otherwise discrete private property holdings. The paper tracks the evolution of infrastructure as a category and of its property rights to reveal the peculiar nature of infrastructure privatisation. Important is the role of the state, the only institution capable of creating the property and regulatory conditions for an increasingly private sphere of economic activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the process of financial development over the last three to four decades from the perspective of the fundamental frictions (agency and collective) to which economic agents were exposed. A comprehensive statistical benchmarking analysis showed that financial development followed regular dynamics that can be largely explained by the underlying frictions. In particular, the sequencing, returns to scale, and shape of the developmental paths for various types of financial activities—including public debt, banking, insurance, asset management, and capital markets—broadly matched benchmark predictions. Reflecting financial innovation and the dynamic interaction between financial and economic development, financial development paths were also found to be strongly dependent on initial conditions. At the same time, policy differences, including the failure to improve the quality of the enabling environment and prevent financial crashes (the dark side of finance), were found to explain a sizable share of the deviations of individual country paths from the benchmarks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper will explore the nature and impact of universities and other higher education institutions (HEIs) on firms’ innovation and growth in an increasingly distributed and open innovation system, using a survey of some 400 firms in the UK. The analysis reveals significant differences in firms’ collaboration with HEIs across the UK and the value and impact that such collaborations have on a firm’s development. The nature and effects of such collaboration vary significantly between the type of firm involved and their location, and the analysis investigates this in relation to various aspects of innovative activity and firms’ performance. Much of the nature and effects of such collaboration are, as one would expect, counterintuitive and highlight the care we should place on assessing the role of universities and other HEIs in open innovation systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For two decades new economic geography has focused on ‘macro-heterogeneity’ across locations showing how this can be endogenously generated by the microeconomic decisions of identical people and firms. This paper argues that future research should look more deeply into finer ‘micro-heterogeneity’ across people and firms, shedding light on how the interactions between the two levels of heterogeneity affect the existence and the intensity of agglomeration economies. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Doubts have been raised about the benefits to an economy with high rates of GDP growth without at the same time accounting for distributional effects. This difference arises from the emphasis by some on the mean income, while others are concerned with the distribution around the mean. This paper assesses the per capita income that would be needed, if income were equally distributed to reach the same level of welfare, which is available from current distribution of the per capita GDP. This approach allows for the combination of both growth and distribution in ranking the success of some Latin American countries in their attempt to raise the living standard of the population. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]