modeling the effects of adjustment programs on income distribution abstract this paper introduces the general structure of the micro macro economywide simulation model maquette used in several case studies on the impact of adjustment policies on the distribution of income the description of the maquette emphasizes how the short and medium run effects of adjustment packages are incorporated in a general equilibrium model and explains the common structure and variants in the specification and estimation of relationships in product factor financial and foreign exchange markets simulations are used to illustrate the role of differences in assumptions about market adjustment mechanisms e g fix price or flex price closed or open financial system on the effects of adjustment policies on the distribution of income adjustment to an external shock through devaluation or through fiscal retrenchment is then contrasted for an economy with different degrees of financial and foreign trade openness the simulations show that assumptions about macroeconomic closures and behavioral parameters matter a great deal in determining the productive and distributive effects of a shock and a country s adjustment to that shock

methods for including income distribution in global cge models for long term climate change research abstract the consequences of climate policy and the impacts of climate change vary among different types of households depending on their income level expenditure pattern and other socioeconomic characteristics global economy environment models that are used to assess climate change issues traditionally do not distinguish households by income or other attributes to facilitate progress in this area we review and assess literature on methods to include household heterogeneity in global long term computable general equilibrium cge models we distinguish among three categories of approaches 1 the explicit modeling of multiple household types within the cge framework 2 micro simulation modeling and 3 direct modeling of income distribution for each of these approaches we describe the method key assumptions limitations and several prominent examples from the literature moreover we discuss data needs including the contents of household survey data their availability and processing we conclude with an overview of what each method could provide for global long term climate related research

international integration risk and the welfare state how does international integration affect the welfare state does it call for a leaner or an expanded welfare state international integration may affect the distortions caused by welfare state activities but also the risks motivating social insurance mechanisms this paper addresses these potentially counteracting effects in a fully specified intertemporal two country stochastic endowment model focusing on the implications when product market integration reduces trade frictions across national product markets it is shown that lower trade frictions may increase the marginal costs of public funds which gives an argument for reducing steady state public consumption however tighter integration of product markets unambiguously leads to more variability in private consumption and this gives a case for expanding the social insurance provided via state contingent public sector activities automatic stabilizers jel classification e30 f10 h11

the demand for coal among china s rural households estimates of price and income elasticities abstract china s residential sector has experienced rapid electrification and gasification among rural households however coal still accounts for a large share of energy use especially in the north use of coal for cooking and heating brings large health and pollution risks from a theoretical viewpoint economic tools such as taxes and subsidies have the potential to play a crucial role in addressing this issue in this paper a provincial level dataset is used to estimate the price and income elasticities of aggregate coal demand by rural households we find that coal is a non giffen inferior good for the rural household sector this means that future income growth may help to induce switching from coal demand is becoming more price elastic as rural incomes grow we also find that rural residential coal demand is more price and income responsive in the south than the north perhaps because of fewer substitution options in the north our results provide benchmarks and parameters for policy simulation research

analysis of the energy access improvement and its socio economic impacts in rural areas of developing countries abstract access to modern energy is one of the most basic requirements for development in rural areas of developing countries there are a large number of people who do not have access to lpg and depend on traditional biomass such as wood crop and dung for cooking in addition energy has numerous and complex links with poverty reduction therefore it is important to estimate the impacts of energy access improvement on socio economic situation in the rural areas of developing countries quantitatively this study focuses on socio economic impacts of cooking demand through changes in stoves adopted by the rural households we have developed an energy economic model of rural areas in india to analyze the links between energy income and health hazard applying both opportunity cost for using fuelwood and exposure to resipirable suspended particulate matter rspm as a result of the analysis there is a positive relation between the opportunity cost and the average rspm exposure of women in the rural areas following to increase in the opportunity cost that is income the cost of an improved wood stove becomes relatively lower first than that of a traditional wood stove and then a gas stove attains price competitiveness it is achieved that the average rspm exposure is below the who and japanese criteria for suspended particulate matter spm 190 and 100 g m3 at the opportunity cost of us 9 and 15 gj respectively

downscaling heterogeneous household outcomes in dynamic cge models for energy economic analysis abstract downscaling methods for dynamic computable general equilibrium models are developed and analyzed the methods produce outcomes for a variety of different household types by downscaling the aggregate quantities from an economic growth model with a representative household this approach uses household survey data and long term population projections for different household types to compare the performance of the downscaling methods vs a general equilibrium model with multiple household groups under a variety of conditions including demographic change technological change and a carbon tax both recursive dynamic and forward looking downscaling methods produce results that approximate well a multiple household model run the recursive dynamic downscaling method is applied to an illustrative example estimating impacts of a carbon tax on aggregate co 2 emissions and the energy demand of different household groups for a middle of the road development scenario

model projections for household energy use in india energy use in developing countries is heterogeneous across households present day global energy models are mostly too aggregate to account for this heterogeneity here a bottom up model for residential energy use that starts from key dynamic concepts on energy use in developing countries is presented and applied to india energy use and fuel choice is determined for five end use functions cooking water heating space heating lighting and appliances and for five different income quintiles in rural and urban areas the paper specifically explores the consequences of different assumptions for income distribution and rural electrification on residential sector energy use and co2 emissions finding that results are clearly sensitive to variations in these parameters as a result of population and economic growth total indian residential energy use is expected to increase by around 65 75 in 2050 compared to 2005 but residential carbon emissions may increase by up to 9 10 times the 2005 level while a more equal income distribution and rural electrification enhance the transition to commercial fuels and reduce poverty there is a trade off in terms of higher co2 emissions via increased electricity use

factor mobility risk and redistribution in the welfare state economic integration reduces the costs of factor mobility producing efficiency gains and contributing to equalization of net factor returns this raises the cost of income redistribution policy thus threatening a basic function of the welfare state a simple model of costly factor mobility under uncertainty shows that greater factor mobility enables factor owners to pool industry specific region specific or occupation specific risks due to uncertain technology or terms of trade economic integration may thus reduce some of the potential social insurance benefits of redistributive policy

the case for international tax co ordination reconsidered tax co ordination its desirability and redistributional implication in a world of high capital mobility governments may be tempted to undercut each other s capital income taxes to attract capital from abroad since such tax competition may have detrimental effects for all countries european policy makers have debated the introduction of a minimum capital income tax rate within the eu this paper develops an applied general equilibrium model to estimate the effects of such tax co ordination on resource allocation income distribution and social welfare the model allows for the concern of policy makers that a rise in capital taxes within the eu may cause a capital flight out of europe capital flight will indeed reduce the welfare gain from tax co ordination within western europe but a positive net gain will remain although it is likely to be well below 1 of gdp the gain from co ordination will be unevenly distributed across european countries due to differences in economic structures and in the social preference for redistribution moreover even if the median voter s gain from tax co ordination may be small the gains for the poorer sections of society may be quite large peter birch sorensen

distributional and regional economic impact of energy taxes in belgium we analyse the macroeconomic and distributional effects of increased oil excises in belgium by combining a regional computable general equilibrium cge model with a microsimulation framework that exploits the rich detail of household level data the link between the cge model and the microlevel is top down feeding changes in commodity prices factor returns and employment by sector into a microsimulation model the results suggest that policymakers face an equity efficiency trade off driven by the choice of revenue recycling options when the additional revenue is used to raise welfare transfers to households the reform is beneficial for lower income groups but output levels decrease in all regions however when the energy tax revenue is used to lower distortionary labour taxes the tax shift is slightly regressive in this case national gdp is hardly affected but regional production levels diverge the impact of the environmental tax reform on income distribution depends strongly on changes in factor prices and welfare payments whereas sector composition is an important determinant for regional impact variation

impact of off farm income on household energy expenditures in china implications for rural energy transition abstract this study examines the impact of off farm income on rural household energy expenditures paying special attention to clean energies such as electricity and gas and non clean energy such as coal we use instrumental variable approaches to address the endogeneity issues of off farm income and analyze household survey data collected from rural gansu henan and shandong provinces of china econometric results show that off farm income promotes rural energy transition in particular off farm income significantly increases both electricity and gas expenditures but decreases coal expenditure of rural households further analyses reveal that the energy transition effects generated by off farm income are more pronounced for households in shandong where the economy is relatively better developed relative to henan and gansu our findings highlight the importance of income diversification through off farm activities by farm households to enhance clean energy accessibility and boost sustainable rural economic development

future energy system challenges for africa insights from integrated assessment models although africa s share in the global energy system is only small today ongoing population growth and economic development imply that this can change significantly here we discuss long term energy system developments in africa using results of a recent model inter comparison study on global climate policy we focus on africa s role in the wider global energy system and in global climate mitigation the results show a considerable spread in model outcomes emphasizing the large uncertainty regarding africa s energy future without climate policy africa s share in global energy related co2 emissions is projected to increase to 3 23 by 2100 emissions become significant on a global scale only after 2050 in none of the model projections the international ambition to provide universal modern energy access by 2030 is achieved furthermore although the continent is currently a large net exporter of oil and natural gas towards 2050 the model projections emphasize that africa needs most of its resources for its rapidly growing domestic demand however the projected rapid expansion of their energy system also implies that africa gains importance in global mitigation action an important challenge is to align the increasing investments in the energy system with climate policy and potential revenues from international carbon trading

the sectoral structure of poverty during an adjustment period evidence for indonesia in the mid 1980s the authors examine the structure of poverty in indonesia by sector of employment and how it changed during the adjustment period 1984 to 1987 they find that while aggregate poverty decreased during the period the gains to the poor were quite uneven across regions and sectors gains to the rural sector in key regions were quantitatively important to indonesia s success in alleviating poverty they found most poverty exists and most gains in alleviating poverty were made in the rural farming sector these gains were associated with crop diversification and continued growth in off farm employment the government s adjustment program favored rural areas and were crucial to indonesia s evident success at maintaining momentum in alleviating poverty however one should not underrate the favorable conditions in indonesia when adjustment started

does the source of capital affect capital structure prior work on leverage implicitly assumes capital availability depends solely on firm characteristics however market frictions that make capital structure relevant may also be associated with a firm s source of capital examining this intuition we find firms that have access to the public bond markets as measured by having a debt rating have significantly more leverage although firms with a rating are fundamentally different these differences do not explain our findings even after controlling for firm characteristics that determine observed capital structure and instrumenting for the possible endogeneity of having a rating firms with access have 35 more debt copyright 2006 oxford university press

optimal unemployment insurance in ge a robust calibration approach abstract a simple monte carlo calibration approach is implemented in a ge model with uninsurable employment risk to quantitatively study the optimal replacement rate of a public unemployment insurance ui scheme the optimal ui sampling distribution is found to be bimodal

commodity prices trade and poverty in uruguay abstract the 2006 2008 food price spike raised concerns about the impact of high commodity prices on poverty in developing countries this paper addresses these concerns in relation to uruguay a small country that exports agricultural commodities and imports fuels applying a general equilibrium model we find that as a whole an increase in commodity prices has a positive effect on the economy of uruguay benefits obtained through a growth in export activities are partially outweighed by an increase in crude oil prices in this context extreme poverty increases as in other countries the increase in food prices affects the already poor population who become even poorer this fact highlights the need for policies that mitigate the negative effects of price shocks

the imf s role in structural adjustment in the 1980s conditional lending for structural adjustment in developing countries moved the imf beyond its role of macroeconomic crisis management fund supported adjustment programmes have often been flawed by a lack of distributional analysis and by poor sequencing of reforms notably premature financial liberalisation as a result they have caused avoidable hardship in addition the attempt to taper out aid as part of the reform programme leads to avoidable reductions in post stabilisation growth an important role for the fund in poststabilisation environments is to provide credible signals to private investors as macroeconomic crises spread across latin america and africa during the 1980s the imf became much more involved in low income countries whereas following its interventions in developed countries the fund had rapidly withdrawn post crisis in the low income countries its involvement became continuous this was partly because stabilisation often took longer however additionally by the 1980s it was already evident that whereas those poor countries which had adopted market based development strategies were developing those which had adopted inward oriented high regulation strategies were in decline unlike the economic crisis of 1998 the crises of the 1980s were concentrated among the inward orientated hence a reasonable diagnosis was that the crises were not merely manifestations of fiscal imbalance but that many other policies needed reform the task thus went beyond the conventional one of rectifying a crisis to reorienting a development strategy the fund joined with the world bank in an attempt to induce these reforms through sustained conditional lending hence the imf moved beyond its traditional role of short run macroeconomic crisis management fund and bank conditions were linked through cross conditionality but with the fund as the lead agency on many areas of policy this gave the fund a critical role in structural adjustment the fund s instrument for concessional lending in low income countries is its extended structural adjustment facility esaf in 1997 the board of the fund commissioned an external review of its esaf programmes in which we participated the report of the evaluation botchwey et al 1998 suggested three lines of criticism of fund adjustment programmes and these form the basis of our analysis in this paper the first is that through flawed design the programmes have sometimes had adverse consequences for the poor either directly through reducing incomes or indirectly through reductions in social service provision our criticism is of the sequence sometimes adopted by fund

optimization of india s power sector strategies using weight restricted stochastic data envelopment analysis abstract india s power sector has a significant impact on the country s development and climate change mitigation efforts optimization of energy planning is therefore key to achieving the overall planning goals the hierarchical multi objective policy optimization is a policy centric multi level bottom up iterative approach designed from a developing country perspective utilizing the optimality principle of dynamic programming it is applied to the indian power sector by grouping the strategies into three portfolios namely power generation mix demand side efficiency group and supply side efficiency group each portfolio is optimized taking into account the objectives of cost minimization and comprehensive risk and barrier reduction the portfolios are further combined and optimized at a higher level with respect to higher level objectives namely economic growth energy equity energy security and climate sustainability this paper focuses on the second level optimization utilizing data envelopment analysis dea both the deterministic and stochastic variations have been analysed and the results compared in respect of unrestricted as well as restricted weight models the analysis shows that weight restricted stochastic dea model is most appropriate for efficiency optimization of power sector strategies the methodology can be effectively used for energy planning in developing countries

modeling household cooking fuel choice a panel multinomial logit approach we use three rounds of a rich panel data set to investigate the determinants of household cooking fuel choice and energy transition in urban ethiopia we observe that the expected energy transition did not occur following economic growth in ethiopia during the decade 20002009 regression results from a random eects multinomial logit model suggest that households economic status price of alternative energy sources and education are important determinants of fuel choice in urban ethiopia the results also suggest the use of multiple fuels or fuel stacking behavior by households we argue that policy makers could target these policy levers to encourage transition to cleaner energy sources

energy and carbon taxes and their distributional implications this paper studies the equity effects of energy and carbon taxes as policy instruments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and fulfil the legally binding reduction targets adopted in the 1997 kyoto protocol to the united nations framework convention on climate change unfccc the equity effects of taxes on energy products are studied in the broader context of a revenue neutral environmental fiscal reform the paper shows that carbon or energy taxes are mildly regressive and that impacts on low income households are less than expected the distributional implications depend on various issues such as whether the type of fuel being taxed heating transport and in particular how the revenues are recycled back to the economy the importance of compensation and mitigation measures is also discussed

what do we know about carbon taxes an inquiry into their impacts on competitiveness and distribution of income abstract the kyoto protocol to the united nations framework convention on climate change unfccc has set legally binding emissions targets for a basket of six greenhouse gases and timetables for industrialised countries it has also incorporated three international flexibility mechanisms however the articles defining the flexibility mechanisms carry wording that their use must be supplemental to domestic actions this has led to the open debates on interpretations of these supplementarity provisions such debates ended at the resumed sixth conference of the parties cop to the unfccc held in bonn july 2001 and at the subsequent cop 7 in marrakesh november 2001 the final wording in the bonn agreement reaffirmed in the marrakesh accords at least indicates that domestic policies will have an important role to play in meeting annex b countries emissions commitments carbon taxes have long been advocated because of their cost effectiveness in achieving a given emissions reduction in this paper the main economic impacts of carbon taxes are assessed based on a review of empirical studies on existing carbon energy taxes it is concluded that competitive losses and distributive impacts are generally not significant and definitely less than often perceived however given the ultimate objective of the framework convention future carbon taxes could have higher rates than those already imposed and thus the resulting economic impacts could be more acute in this context it has been shown that how to use the generated fiscal revenues will be of fundamental importance in determining the final economic impacts of carbon taxes finally we briefly discuss carbon taxes in combination with other domestic and international instruments

poverty and growth impacts of high oil prices evidence from sri lanka the sharp rise in oil and food prices in 2007 and 2008 caused negative impacts on poverty and economic growth in many oil and food importing developing countries some analysts believe that these countries are under stress again due to a rise in crude oil prices to a two and a half year high in march 2011 which has also been partly responsible for higher food prices in recent months however there is a limited body of empirical evidence available from developing countries on the impact of high oil prices on growth in general and household poverty in particular in this study sri lanka is used as a case study and a computable general equilibrium cge approach is adopted as an analytical framework to explore the growth and poverty impacts of high oil prices the results suggest that urban low income households are the group most adversely affected by high global oil prices followed by low income rural households in contrast estate low income households are the least affected out of all low income households the energy intensive manufacturing sector and services sector are affected most compared to the agricultural sector

on measuring energy poverty in indian households summary the relationship between energy and poverty is obvious and goes both ways recognizing this this paper provides a short overview of different approaches to measuring energy poverty it then presents a novel two dimensional measure of energy poverty and energy distribution that combines the elements of access to different energy types and quantity of energy consumed an assessment of the extent of energy poverty and changes in energy distribution pattern are analyzed by applying this measure to indian household survey data for 1983 2000 the analysis shows a significant reduction in the level of energy poverty and a rapidly developing subcontinent the new measure is a good complement to conventional monetary measures and is general enough to be applied to other developing countries

the role of decentralized distributed generation in achieving universal rural electrification in south asia by 2030 this study is motivated by the goal of achieving universal energy access by 2030 and looks at electricity access for rural households in the south asian region the message access model is employed to assess the cost effectiveness of centralized and decentralized distributed generation ddg technologies delivery mechanisms are modelled to include mini grid and stand alone systems and the analysis includes an estimation of rural household electricity demand from lighting and appliances we assume two future demand scenarios with a minimum threshold and a higher threshold of electricity consumption of 65 and 420 kw h per household per year respectively we find that the cost of delivering electricity by centralized generation and grid distribution is up to four times the cost of stand alone and mini grid ddg options in the case of minimum threshold demand scenario these results are robust to alternate assumptions regarding costs of technologies we also estimate that public subsidy bill for kerosene can be substantially reduced if all households switch to electricity as their primary source of lighting thus promoting ddg options can reduce capital investments needed to meet access goals significantly and have an important role to play in meeting the goal of universal electrification by 2030

when black meets green a review of the four pillars of india s energy policy abstract india is one of the most important global players in the energy sector in terms of production and consumption the way in which the country shapes its energy policy not only affects india itself but also the global climate action on the one hand india led by pm narendra modi declares the commitment to pro climate actions including the enhancement of the energy efficiency and renewable capacity on the other hand the development of india s conventional energy sector coal was indicated as one of the reasons for the us exit from the paris agreement this dilemma lead to a discussion on the shape of india s energy policy seen from the climate s standpoint in this context the article discusses the pillars of india s energy policy presented by modi in 2016 the main energy pillars access efficiency sustainability and security are juxtaposed with the previous indian strategic documents concerning the energy sector including electricity national electricity policy of 2005 draft national energy policy of 2017 a climate energy policy analysis is extended by legal comments on indian energy law as a result the article draws a picture of india s energy policy and climate agenda in black conventional energy and green renewable capacity colours

agricultural growth poverty and nutrition in tanzania abstract rapid economic growth does not appear to have significantly improved poverty and nutrition outcomes in tanzania we link recent production trends to household incomes using a regionalized recursive dynamic computable general equilibrium and microsimulation model results indicate some inconsistency between recent growth and poverty measurements in tanzania we also find that the structure of economic growth may have constrained the rate of poverty reduction agricultural growth has been driven by larger scale farmers who are less likely to be poor and has been concentrated among crops grown in specific regions of the country slow expansion of food crops and livestock also explain the weak relationship between agricultural growth and nutrition outcomes we find that accelerating agricultural growth particularly in maize strengthens the growth poverty relationship and enhances households caloric availability while also contributing significantly to growth itself

pollution taxes and revenue recycling abstract discussions of environmental policy and the tax system have emphasized the value of pollution tax revenues which can be used to reduce other tax distortions in the economy however by raising private marginal production costs environmental taxes also tend to reduce gdp and exacerbate the welfare costs of conventional taxes for environmental taxes in consumption goods industries the net welfare change from these two effects is negative unless this good is a relatively weak substitute for leisure an estimate for the optimal pollution tax with full revenue recycling is 63 to 78 of marginal environmental damages

distance and private information in lending we study the effects of physical distance on the acquisition and use of private information in informationally opaque credit markets using a unique data set of all loan applications by small firms to a large bank we show that borrower proximity facilitates the collection of soft information leading to a trade off in the availability and pricing of credit which is more readily accessible to nearby firms albeit at higher interest rates ceteris paribus analyzing loan rates and firms decision to switch lenders provides further evidence for banks strategic use of private information however distance erodes our lender s ability to collect proprietary intelligence and to carve out local captive markets suggesting that the requisite soft information is primarily local the author 2010 published by oxford university press on behalf of the society for financial studies all rights reserved for permissions please e mail journals permissions oxfordjournals org oxford university press

road fuel demand and regional effects of carbon taxes in sweden abstract this study estimated national and regional level gasoline and diesel demand elasticities in sweden using county level panel data from 2001 to 2018 the estimated elasticities were used to calculate county cost effect of the swedish co2 emission reduction policy in the transport sector the national level elasticities were estimated by employing general method of moments gmm estimators while county level elasticities were calculated by considering the weight of each fuel type share at county and national levels own prices per capita income and per capita vehicle stocks were statistically significant at national level in determining gasoline and diesel demand the calculated regional price elasticities showed variation between counties with the highest being almost 4 times higher than the lowest in absolute terms a simulation of fuel taxes to achieve the swedish 2030 emission target for the transport sector under the national and regional price elasticities indicated minor differences at the national level with respect to co2 taxes costs and regressivity in the taxes the results showed considerable differences at the regional level where costs and carbon tax payments can be considerably higher for some counties with the use of national price elasticities and the opposite is the case for other counties

how robust are estimates of the rebound effect of energy efficiency improvements a sensitivity analysis of consumer heterogeneity and elasticities abstract economy wide rebound effects may undermine climate policies relying on energy efficiency improvements however available rebound estimates diverge widely we illustrate the crucial role of model assumptions of household heterogeneity and elasticities a computable general equilibrium model of the austrian economy incorporates multiple household groups with heterogeneous preferences and analyzes how improving efficiency by 10 affects household fossil fuel consumption in the base model economy wide rebound is 65 different household groups show direct rebound of 8 12 thus economy wide rebound is mainly advanced by indirect rebound a sensitivity analysis using monte carlo simulation varies elasticities between household groups namely substitutability between material and energy goods and between different energy goods in 160 simulation runs the economy wide rebound emerges as rather robust by contrast direct rebound varies widely among household groups and attains 30 where reciprocal feedback between groups builds up in the base model a fossil fuel tax rate of 43 neutralizes the economy wide rebound when elasticities in 180 simulation runs are varied this tax rate spans from 15 to 80 thus rebound estimates and derived policy advice such as specific rates and numbers should be treated with great caution unless elasticity parameters are reliable and account for heterogeneous consumer preferences

an integrated economic and distributional analysis of energy policies most public policies particularly those in the energy sphere have not only efficiency but also distributional effects however there is a trade off between modelling approaches suitable for calculating those impacts on the economy for the former most of the studies have been conducted with general equilibrium models whereas partial equilibrium models represent the main approach for distributional analysis this paper proposes a methodology to simultaneously carry out an analysis of the distributional and efficiency consequences of changes in energy taxation in order to do so we have integrated a microeconomic household demand model and a computable general equilibrium model for the spanish economy we illustrate the advantages of this approach by simulating a revenue neutral reform in spanish indirect taxation with a large increase of energy taxes that serve an environmental purpose the results show that the reforms bring about significant efficiency and distributional effects in some cases counterintuitive and demonstrate the academic and social utility of this approximation

welfare impacts of china s accession to the world trade organization data from china s national rural and urban household surveys are used to measure and explain the welfare impacts of changes in goods and factor prices attributable to accession to the world trade organization wto the price changes are estimated separately using a general equilibrium model to capture both direct and indirect effects of the initial tariff changes the welfare impacts are first order approximations based on a household model incorporating own production activities calibrated to household level data and imposing minimum aggregation the results show negligible impacts on inequality and poverty in the aggregate however diverse impacts emerge across household types and regions associated with heterogeneity in consumption behavior and income sources with possible implications for compensatory policy responses

distributional impacts of climate change mitigation in indian electricity the influence of governance abstract studies that examine the distributional impacts of climate change mitigation policies often neglect the influence of institutions that implement these policies this study examines the short term consumption side distributional impacts of expanding low carbon electric supply in the state of maharashtra india with a focus on the influence of regulatory discretion in pricing households welfare impacts from economy wide electricity price shocks are simulated against a baseline that is calibrated to actual household economic and electricity service conditions including actual electricity budgets block tier prices and supply rationing industrial price impacts are propagated to households using a leontief input output analysis regulatory pricing decisions are evaluated based on social welfare metrics for economic efficiency and income inequality the analysis reveals new linkages between climate change mitigation electricity policy and income distribution low income households can be shielded from mitigation impacts without losses in aggregate welfare to the extent that regulators can recover mitigation costs through industrial price increases regulators flexibility to distribute costs across households is constrained by industrial customers migration off the grid reduced supply interruptions to the rural poor from the resulting demand contraction are a potential co benefit of mitigation distributional impacts therefore depend on other electricity policies that are driven by the political economy of the sector

biofuels and economic development a computable general equilibrium analysis for tanzania abstract biofuels could offer new economic opportunities for low income countries we use a recursive dynamic computable general equilibrium model of tanzania to evaluate different biofuels production options and estimate their impacts on growth and poverty our results indicate that maximizing the poverty reducing effects of biofuels production in countries like tanzania will require engaging and improving the productivity of smallholder farmers evidence shows that cassava based ethanol production is more profitable than other feedstock options cassava also generates more pro poor growth than sugarcane based systems however if smallholder yields can be improved rather than expanding cultivated land then both sugarcane and cassava out grower schemes generate similar pro poor outcomes we conclude that in so far as the public investments needed to establish a biofuels industry are consistent with other development needs then producing biofuels will enhance economic development in countries like tanzania

adjustment growth and income distribution in indonesia during the decade of the 1970s and until 1982 the growth performance of the indonesian economy was very good with gdp growing at 7 2 percent per annum oil exports provided the major engine of growth for the entire economy during that period in addition within agriculture growth was fueled by the boom in paddy production which converted indonesia from the largest rice importing country in the world to virtual self sufficiency by the mid 1980s paddy production increased at an annual rate of 7 1 percent between 1978 80 and 1983 4 the two oil price booms of 1973 and more particularly 1979 fueled a major expansion of the economy which lasted until the crisis the predominant role of the oil sector is clearly revealed by recalling that earnings from crude oil and petroleum products accounted for two thirds of all export earnings one fourth of total gnp and 70 percent of government domestic revenues in 1982 oil prices peaked in 1982 and revenues from this sector started to contract reducing drastically the basis and prospects for economic growth

fuel demand elasticities for energy and environmental policies indian sample survey evidence india has been running large scale interventions in the energy sector over the last decades still there is a dearth of reliable and readily available price and income elasticities of demand to base these on especially for domestic use of traditional fuels this study uses the linear approximate almost ideal demand system la aids using micro data of more than 100 000 households sampled across india the la aids model is expanded by specifying the intercept as a linear function of household characteristics marshallian and hicksian price and expenditure elasticities of demand for four main fuels are estimated for both urban and rural areas by different income groups these can be used to evaluate recent and current energy policies the results can also be used for energy projections and carbon dioxide simulations given different growth rates for different segments of the indian population

economic and demographic determinants of household energy use in turkey this paper analyzes several economic and socio demographic factors which affect households energy choices in turkey the data is obtained from the household budget surveys hbs conducted by the turkish statistics institute tuik the multinomial logit model is used to identify households energy choices the most important finding of the study is that monthly income of households or household welfare in general has significant effect on energy choices it is also important to note that ages of persons have influence on energy choices indeed health concerns easiness in use was found as criteria referred to particularly by household heads at age 50 and over when making energy choices as far as settlements are concerned the most salient characteristic of urban dwellers vis a vis rural dwellers is their dominant preference for natural gas while rural dwellers have their choice for more conventional fuels

a comparability analysis of global burden sharing ghg reduction scenarios the distribution of the mitigation burden across countries is a key issue regarding the post 2012 global climate policies this article explores the economic implications of alternative allocation rules an assessment made in the run up to the cop15 in copenhagen december 2009 we analyse the comparability of the allocations across countries based on four single indicators gdp per capita ghg emissions per gdp ghg emission trends in the recent past and population growth the multi sectoral computable general equilibrium model of the global economy gem e3 is used for that purpose further the article also compares a perfect carbon market without transaction costs with the case of a gradually developing carbon market i e a carbon market with gradually diminishing transaction costs

poverty and income distribution during adjustment issues and evidence from the oecd project drawing lessons from country studies the authors examine the effects of adjustment policies on the distribution of income in chile cote d ivoire ecuador indonesia malaysia and morocco after analyzing the issues that must be confronted in designing adjustment programs with a focus on poverty they synthesize the main conclusions of the different country studies with simulation exercises they explore the effects of the design of the adjustment packages on poverty and on the sustainability of the measures undertaken in these countries these exercises show considerable diversity in the evolution of income distribution during adjustment they also expose the fatal flaws of narrowly designed adjustment programs adjustment programs whether focused on efficiency or on welfare will fail when they do not recognize the interdependence of the three criteria of efficiency welfare and political feasibility adjustment programs must be carefully packaged to fit country circumstances taking into account both the political and economic environments

gender implications of biofuels expansion in africa the case of mozambique summary we use a gendered dynamic cge model to assess the implications of biofuels expansion in a low income land abundant setting mozambique is chosen as a representative case we compare scenarios with different gender employment intensities in producing jatropha feedstock for biodiesel under all scenarios biofuels investments accelerate gdp growth and reduce poverty however a stronger trade off between biofuels and food availability emerges when female labor is used intensively as women are drawn away from food production a skills shortage among female workers also limits poverty reduction policy simulations indicate that only modest improvements in women s education and food crop yields are needed to address food security concerns and ensure broader based benefits from biofuels investments

reducing fuel subsidies and the implication on fiscal balance and poverty in indonesia a simulation analysis abstract there is an urgent need for phasing out fuel subsidies in indonesia due to a severe budget deficit and a worsening of income distribution fuel subsidies of which almost 72 are enjoyed by the 30 of the richest income groups have consumed on average 63 8 of the total subsidies between 1998 and 2013 this paper aims at evaluating the relationship between existing fuel subsidies and fiscal balance and at analysing the poverty impact of phasing out fuel subsidies applying a cge microsimulation this study found that removing 25 of fuel subsidies increases the incidence of poverty by 0 259 percentage points if this money were fully allocated to government spending the poverty incidence would decrease by 0 27 percentage points moreover the 100 removal of fuel subsidies and the reallocation of 50 of them to government spending transfers and other subsidies could decrease the incidence of poverty by 0 277 percentage points however these reallocation policies might not be effective in compensating for the adverse impacts of the 100 removal of fuel subsidies if economic agents try to seek profit through mark up pricing over the increase of production costs

co2 taxes equity and the double dividend macroeconomic model simulations for austria abstract this paper investigates the impacts of co2 tax schemes on co2 emissions equity and macroeconomic indicators in austria with the macroeconomic model dynk aut our scenarios focus on non ets co2 emissions and comprise different tax rates and revenue recycling options lower labor taxes lower vat and lump sum payments the short term comparative scenario analysis indicates that co2 taxes without recycling lead to significant co2 emission reductions at moderate economic costs equity impacts on households depend on the indicator used but can be regressive without recycling most recycling schemes can achieve a double dividend i e emission reductions and increases in gdp lump sum payments are less efficient than reducing the vat or labor taxes equity impacts are progressive with lump sum payments rather proportional with lower vat and regressive with lower labor taxes a combination of recycling schemes and or a restriction of lump sum payments to lower income households can minimize the trade off between equity and efficiency our simulations suggest that well designed co2 tax schemes could be a crucial and socially acceptable element within a comprehensive policy package to achieve ghg emission targets for non ets sectors in austria

household fuel use in developing countries review of theory and evidence because of recent concerns about the negative externalities of traditional fuel use on the environment and health the issue of the household fuel transition in developing countries from dirty fuels towards clean fuels has received growing research attention this paper provides an up to date survey of the economic literature on household fuel use in these countries first we present the conceptual and theoretical frameworks then we discuss the empirical results that show how a wide range of factors drive the household fuel transition finally we suggest priorities for policy initiatives and highlight areas of future research

an integrated supply demand model for the optimization of energy flow in the urban system this research aims to develop a bottom up integrated supply demand model to assess the optimal performance of urban energy systems to this end an optimization model founded on the principles of microeconomics was developed and deployed using mathematical programming in this model the urban energy system is treated as an economic actor in the market seeking to establish an effective energy system to improve its overall resource efficiency with minimum total cost of the system the model leads the system to achieve supply and demand energy commitments which include alternative energy and energy efficiency targets in this paper we apply the model to address the electricity deficiency in delhi india as a case study the results suggest that the saving at the end user level could reach about 220 gwh per annum in the near future through improving energy end use efficiency in the domestic sector besides this the installation of about 40 mw from waste to electricity plants and generating approximately 210 gwh electricity from the rooftop solar pv by 2030 could enable a sufficient surplus for the power supply sector to meet the city s electricity demand in the near future even though the system has some inherent limitations stemming from the assumptions of microeconomics and challenges related to data needs the model can help the local actors from governments to property owners to find the best solutions for their energy needs such a modeling framework could address an organization s sustainable performance at the urban level through the resource use optimization minimization of waste cleaner technologies and pollution limits which are used in achieving co benefits and a broad range of eco industrial development eid goals

female labor force participation and household dependence on biomass energy evidence from national longitudinal data this research received financial support from the food policy institute at the australian national university

minimum wages and household poverty general equilibrium macro micro simulations for south africa summary the poverty reducing effects of minimum wages depend on its effectiveness in targeting the poor and the extent to which job losses and price increases offset income gains we develop a general equilibrium microsimulation model to simulate the economywide effects of minimum wages in south africa we find minimum wages lead to a marginal decline in poverty and overall inequality however job losses are more likely to affect the poorest among minimum wage workers while rising production costs reduce overall household welfare the policy is not an effective anti poverty tool in south africa given poor targeting and adverse price effects which are often unaccounted for in policy simulations

distributional impacts of carbon pricing a general equilibrium approach with micro data for households article i nfo many policies to limit greenhouse gas emissions have at their core efforts to put a price on carbon emissions carbon pricing impacts households both by raising the cost of carbon intensive products and by changing factor prices a complete analysis requires taking both effects into account the impact of carbon pricing is determined by heterogeneity in household spending patterns across income groups as well as heterogeneity in factor income patterns across income groups it is also affected by precise formulation of the policy how is the revenue from carbon pricing distributed as well as the treatment of other government policies e g the treatment of transfer payments what is often neglected in analyses of policy is the heterogeneity of impacts across households even within income or regional groups in this paper we incorporate 15 588 households from the u s consumer and expenditure survey data as individual agents in a comparative static general equilibrium framework these households are represented within the mit usrep model a detailed general equilibrium model of the u s economy in particular we categorize households by full household income factor income as well as transfer income and apply various measures of lifetime income to distinguish households that are temporarily low income e g retired households drawing down their financial assets from permanently low income households we also provide detailed within group distributional measures of burden impacts from various policy scenarios

cyclicality of credit supply firm level evidence abstract we quantify fluctuations in bank loan supply in the time series by studying firms substitution between loans and bonds using firm level data any firm that raises new debt must have a positive demand for external funds conditional on the issuance of new debt we interpret firms switching from loans to bonds as a contraction in bank credit supply we find strong evidence of this substitution at times that are characterized by tight lending standards depressed aggregate lending poor bank performance and tight monetary policy we show that this substitution behavior has strong predictive power for bank borrowing and investments by small firms

determinants of household energy consumption in india improving access to affordable modern energy is critical to improving living standards in the developing world rural households in india in particular are almost entirely reliant on traditional biomass for their basic cooking energy needs this has adverse effects on their health and productivity and also causes environmental degradation this study presents a new generic modelling approach with a focus on cooking fuel choices and explores response strategies for energy poverty eradication in india the modelling approach analyzes the determinants of fuel consumption choices for heterogeneous household groups incorporating the effect of income distributions and traditionally more intangible factors such as preferences and private discount rates the methodology is used to develop alternate future scenarios that explore how different policy mechanisms such as fuel subsidies and micro financing can enhance the diffusion of modern more efficient energy sources in india

producing biofuels in low income countries an integrated environmental and economic assessment for tanzania this paper jointly evaluates the greenhouse gas emissions and economic impacts from producing biofuels in tanzania sequentially linked models capture natural resource constraints emissions from land use change economywide growth linkages and household poverty results indicate that there are economic incentives to convert unused lands to sugarcane ethanol production but only grasslands not forests have a reasonable carbon payback period there are also strong socioeconomic reasons to involve smallholders in feedstock production in order to reduce rural poverty especially since our results indicate that biofuels have little effect on food production yet smallholders require more land than large scale plantations and so face more binding natural resource and emissions constraints overall environmental constraints alter the socioeconomically optimal biofuel strategy for tanzania by limiting potential poverty reduction unlike previous studies our integrated assessment suggests that a mixed farming system with greater emphasis on large scale plantations is more appropriate for producing sugarcane ethanol in tanzania

risks and redistribution an individual level analysis much of the disagreement in the debate about globalization and its present or absent effects on the welfare state stems from competing assumptions about the individual level determinants of redistributional preferences this article calls for and provides testing of these causal mechanisms at the individual level traditional accounts suggest that risks at the industry level are important determinants of redistributional preferences this article argues that risks at the occupational level should also be considered a comprehensive new data set is used to test whether and what types of risks in the labor market play an important role in shaping preferences statistical analyses of public opinion surveys european social survey show strong evidence for the assumed causal mechanism contrary to much of the literature but in line with this article s claims it is the occupational rather than the industry level that is most important the article lays out implications of these findings

domestic technology consumption economies of scale and poverty evidence from sri lanka while it is well known that new technologies enhance consumer welfare the manner in which these technologies impact the ability to realize economies of scale in consumption is not well understood we use sri lankan household data to examine how the adoption of new technologies by households positively impacts their ability to achieve household economies of scale this suggests that new technologies not only deliver a greater variety of consumption goods to consumers but they may also play an important role in enabling large households to escape poverty by lowering the per capita costs of maintaining a given standard of living given the importance of consumption economies of scale in the measurement of poverty this study provides some insights on the extent to which the number of poor households changes when food consumption scale economies due to technology adoption in the domestic sphere are incorporated

relationship lending and the transmission of monetary policy abstract repeated interactions allow lenders to uncover private information about their clients decreasing the informational asymmetry between a borrower and his lender but introducing one between the lender and competing financiers this paper constructs a credit based model of production to analyze how learning through lending relationships affects monetary transmission i examine how monetary policy changes the incentives of borrowers and lenders to engage in relationship lending and how these changes then shape the response of aggregate output the results demonstrate that relationship lending prevails in equilibrium smoothes the steady state output profile and induces less volatile responses to certain monetary shocks

optimal fiscal policy in open economies with labour market distortions abstract we set up a general equilibrium model with unemployment owing to distortions in the labour market it is shown that a public expansion financed by a distortionary income tax may give rise to a decrease in unemployment even if public goods are pure waste such an expansion may give rise to an increase in welfare if it is associated with a decrease in unemployment since part of the gain from a fiscal expansion is achieved at the expense of welfare in other countries non cooperative policies tend to be too expansionary

sources of growth a reconsideration and general equilibrium application to indonesia abstract a computable general equilibrium cge model of indonesia is developed in which total factor productivity growth in manufacturing is endogenously determined productivity growth is conceptualized as human and social capital accumulation mediated by learning and institutional development stimulated by the trade regime these factors are modeled as externalities determined by export growth and capital equipment imports the model is used to analyze the gains deriving from the externalities and subsidies that amplify their effects leading indonesia to acquire korea like institutions sooner the growth and fiscal implications of such counterfactual simulations are analyzed in a realistic general equilibrium framework with a fully articulated public sector

loan syndication and credit cycles cyclicality in the supply of business credit has been the focus of a considerable amount of research this cyclicality can stem from shocks to borrowers collateral which affect firms ability to raise capital if agency and information problems are significant ben s bernanke and mark gertler 1989 or it can stem from shocks to bank capital which affect the supply of bank loans if agency and information problems limit the ability of banks to raise additional capital bernanke 1983 both of these channels may have been at work during the financial crisis that started in 2007 ran duchin oguzhan ozbas and berk a sensoy 2010 show that firms with more collateral were better able to withstand the contraction in credit and victoria ivashina and david scharfstein 2010 show that reductions in bank capital had an adverse effect on lending in this paper we examine cyclicality in the supply of credit in the context of modern forms of banking often referred to as the originateto distribute model in particular we are interested in the role of syndicated lending in traditional bank lending the focus of most models of banking banks originate and hold loans on their balance sheets this exposes banks to risk but provides them with strong incentives to screen and monitor borrowers douglas w diamond 1984 over the last 20 years however the development and growth of the syndicated loan market has enabled a bank to originate a loan but retain only a fraction of it on average the originating bank or lead bank retains about a third of each syndicated loan and sells the remaining share to a syndicate of investors which includes banks and institutional investors such as pension funds mutual funds hedge funds and sponsors of structured loan syndication and credit cycles

anatomy of poverty during adjustment the case of the philippines recent discussions of development policy have emphasized the need for macroeconomic adjustment programs that give attention to poverty and social concerns conventional adjustment programs applied in developing countries are considered to have no human face as they focus almost exclusively on promoting economic efficiency and bringing an economy to a stable and sustainable growth path in particular observers have claimed that the poor have disproportionately borne the pain of transitional costs of adjustment especially when the transition has been longer than initially expected indeed increases in poverty as well as sharp cuts in government expenditures on social services including health nutrition education and infrastructure programs benefiting the poor have accompanied the implementation of adjustment policies in a number of less developed countries ldcs on the other hand country cases where the transition apparently has not been antipoor even in the short run also exist indonesia s experience with adjustment in the 1980s for example appears to be one such case 2 in general the available evidence indicates that changes in living conditions in the short run do not appear to be systematically related to the presence or absence of adjustment programs 3 the lack or the poor quality of data especially on social and human development indicators in ldcs hampers the analysis of the link between adjustment policies and poverty alleviation moreover because the transition in many countries is an ongoing process the impact of the adjustment is still in the making thus available information gives only a partial and possibly even misleading picture of the full effects of adjustment policies on the poor s standard of living even when reliable data are available the analysis has to move beyond simple correlations and establish counterfactual situations specifi

the effect of urbanization on energy use in india and china in the ipets model abstract urbanization is one of the major demographic and economic trends occurring in developing countries with important consequences for development energy use and well being yet it is only beginning to be explicitly incorporated in long term scenario analyses of energy and emissions we assess the implications of a plausible range of urbanization pathways for energy use and carbon emissions in india and china using the integrated population economy technology science ipets model a computable general equilibrium cge model of the global economy that captures heterogeneity in household types within world regions and into which we have introduced income effects on household consumption preferences we find that changes in urbanization have a somewhat less than proportional effect on aggregate emissions and energy use a decomposition analysis demonstrates that this effect is due primarily to an economic growth effect driven by the increased labor supply associated with faster urbanization the influence of income on household consumption is strong and indicates a potentially rapid transition away from traditional fuel use and toward modern fuels such as electricity and natural gas results also indicate important directions for future work including the implications of alternative types and driving forces of urbanization over time a better understanding of possible changes in consumption preferences associated with income growth and the urbanization process and modeling strategies that can produce disaggregated household consumption outcomes within a cge framework

energy transition poverty and inequality in vietnam this paper investigates energy transition energy poverty and energy inequality in vietnam employing a longitudinal dataset of a nationally representative household survey we use the data on residential energy expenditure of more than 9 000 households over the period 2004 2016 we find a transition from traditional energy to modern energy but this transition varies across regions between ethnic and welfare groups and between rural and urban population the poor and ethnic minority households still rely heavily on traditional energy sources such as coal and biomass to meet their energy demands electricity poverty has decreased but energy cost poverty has increased in addition energy inequality tends to decrease at a more significant rate than income and consumption inequalities we propose a national program for energy poverty alleviation be established to devise policies to lower households energy costs further assistance to the poor and ethnic minority households is also recommended so that they can afford a higher level of electricity consumption

macroeconomics financial variables and computable general equilibrium models abstract this paper surveys micro macro computable general equilibrium cge models that incorporate asset markets and product and factor markets recent models are designed to analyze the impact on economic performance and the distribution of income in developing economies of structural adjustment and stabilization programs implemented in response to macro shocks these financial cge models add a loanable funds market incorporating a variety of assets to a cge model that already incorporates flow equilibria in product and factor markets these financial models start from tradefocused cge models and also draw on earlier work with micro and macrostructuralist models in specifying the interactions between financial variables and the real side of the economy the paper also compares these models to dynamic macro models both short run adaptive models with lagged adjustment mechanisms and longer run forward looking models the paper discusses the theoretical problems such models face in reconciling micro focused cge models with macro models incorporating dynamic behavior

when does unreliable grid supply become unacceptable policy costs of power supply and outages in rural india abstract despite frequent blackouts and brownouts extension of the central grid remains the indian government s preferred strategy for the country s rural electrification policy this study reports an assessment that compares grid extension with distributed generation dg alternatives based on the subsidies they will necessitate and costs of service interruptions that are appropriate in the rural indian context using cross sectional household expenditure data and region fixed effects models average household demand is estimated the price elasticity of demand is found to be in the range of 0 3 to 0 4 interruption costs are estimated based on the loss of consumer surplus due to reduced consumption of electric lighting energy that results from intermittent power supply different grid reliability scenarios are simulated despite the inclusion of interruption costs standalone dg does not appear to be competitive with grid extension at distances of less than 17 km however backing up unreliable grid service with local dg plants is attractive when reliability is very poor even in previously electrified villages introduction of energy efficient lighting changes these economics and the threshold for acceptable grid unreliability significantly reduces a variety of polices to promote accelerated deployment and the wider adoption of improved end use efficiency warrant serious consideration

from linear fuel switching to multiple cooking strategies a critique and alternative to the energy ladder model abstract promoting sustainable development requires evaluating the technical and policy options that will facilitate the adoption and use of energy efficient and less polluting cooking stoves and practices the transition from traditional to modern fuels and devices has been explained by the energy ladder model that suggests that with increasing affluence a progression is expected from traditional biomass fuels to more advanced and less polluting fuels in this paper we evaluate the energy ladder model utilizing data from a four year 1992 96 case study of a village in mexico and from a large scale survey from four states of mexico we show that an alternate multiple fuel model of stove and fuel management based on the observed pattern of household accumulation of energy options rather than the simple progression depicted in the traditional energy ladder scenario more accurately depicts cooking fuel use patterns in rural households the multiple fuel model integrates four factors demonstrated to be essential in household decision making under conditions of resource scarcity or uncertainty a economics of fuel and stove type and access conditions to fuels b technical characteristics of cookstoves and cooking practices c cultural preferences and d health impacts this model also allows better estimates of the expected fuelwood demand and indoor air pollution in rural households

monetary policy and regional availability of debt financing the relative availability of bond and bank financing should affect the firm s external financing and investment decisions we define a measure that proxies for the regional borrowing inflexibility to substitute between bank and bond financing debt inflexibility debt inflexibility tilts the firm s financial structure towards equity and reduces investment the impact is stronger during the period of tight monetary policy particularly for smaller firms and firms without banking relationships debt inflexibility increases the sensitivity of cash holdings to cash flows reduces the likelihood of dividend payment and makes the firm more likely to pay equity in mergers and acquisitions

are carbon taxes good for the poor a general equilibrium analysis for vietnam summary we evaluate effects of an environmental tax using a general equilibrium model linked to a household database the burden of the tax applied mainly to energy is passed forward by non tradable industries and backward by tradable industries facing fixed world prices the tax is thus equivalent to a real exchange rate appreciation and since export industries are labor intensive reduces employment and increases poverty especially when labor supply is responsive to wages the use of revenues to increase transfers to households can offset poverty increases but does not create jobs thus the tax will likely conflict with other development policy objectives

sovereign stress and smes access to finance evidence from the ecb s safe survey abstract we study the effect of sovereign stress on smes capital structure using restricted access data from the european central bank we find that during the sovereign debt crisis and controlling for borrowers quality firms in stressed countries became more likely to be denied credit to be credit rationed and to face higher loan rates less creditworthy firms were not more likely to become credit constrained suggesting no flight to quality in lending we also find that in order to make up for the decline in bank credit firms in stressed countries began relying considerably more on retained earnings and government subsidies

resource development and inequality in indigenous societies concern has been expressed both by indigenous people and by academic analysts that large scale resource development may sharpen inequality in what are relatively egalitarian indigenous societies much of the academic literature suggests that resource development does indeed have this effect but such claims are usually based on very limited empirical evidence in addition the literature is lacking in conceptual frameworks which allow the concept of inequality to be adequately specified take into account the quite different forms of income which resource development can generate explain rather than simply document specific changes in income distribution and on this basis provide grounds for policy prescription this article seeks to develop such a framework

welfare state retrenchment the partisan effect revisited this paper aims to shed light on the role of the ideology of political parties in shaping the evolution of the welfare state in 18 developed democracies by providing empirical findings on the determinants of social programs entitlements and social spending over the period 1981 1999 the paper shows that structural change is a major determinant of the extent of social protection our results suggest that overall spending is driven up by structural change on the other hand strong structural change has a negative influence on welfare entitlements measured by net replacement rates of sickness insurance or unemployment benefits partisan influence plays an important role in the dynamics of the welfare state left wing governments strengthen the positive effect of shocks on aggregate social expenditure while right wing governments undertake even stronger cutbacks in replacement rates as a reaction to structural change

reducing subsidies on household fuels in india how will it affect the poor kerosene and lpg are widely used in households in india for lighting and cooking these fuels have historically been subsidized as part of the restructuring of the energy sector the government is committed to limiting these subsidies this paper examines the impact of reducing energy subsidies on the welfare of the poor the paper uses data from nationally representative surveys of over 100 000 households the paper concludes that the case for reducing lpg subsidies is strong although the kerosene subsidy is an inefficient means of subsidizing fuel use by the poor reduction in it will need to be supported by other policies that would limit the adverse impacts

introduction the welfare economics of the welfare state outsiders to economics might be forgiven for thinking that welfare economics provides the theoretical underpinnings for the welfare state but although the language is suggestive the link between theoretical welfare economics and policy recommendations concerning the role of the public sector the optimal degree of redistribution and social insurance etc is not obviously a very strong one economists who use a welfare theoretic framework for thinking about economic and social problems might be led to advocate a night watchman state which would mainly be concerned with the provision of public goods or alternatively to argue for a crucial role of the public sector as a redistributive system as in the welfare state what is the welfare state it is always tempting to avoid issues of definition but in this case it seems appropriate to point out that the concept is in fact used in at least two different ways some use it to denote a subsection of the public sector concerned with redistribution via social security and social assistance and the provision of those social goods which have a strong redistributive element like health care and education others use the term in a much wider sense to characterize the economic and social policies of a country that gives high priorities to equality and individual protection against social hazards to illustrate the difference in usage according to both definitions unemployment insurance would definitely come under the heading of welfare state policies whereas macroeconomic policies that are designed to prevent or reduce unemployment would be included in the second definition of welfare state policies but not in the first i am inclined to take the wider view of the welfare state primarily because i feel that the more narrow definition introduces a number of rather awkward borderlines between the various areas of economic policy in the following i first consider what bearing the neoclassical version of welfare economics has on the design of welfare policy i then discuss

economic and welfare influences of an energy excise tax in jiangsu province of china a computable general equilibrium approach abstract in recent years although china s energy intensity has gradually decreased the total consumption of energy commodities has increased sharply levying an excise tax on energy commodities is one of the keys to control energy consumption this paper constructed a computable general equilibrium model to simulate levying an energy excise tax in jiangsu province which is one of china s strong economic provinces with lower endowments of energy resources the results show that the energy excise tax is beneficial for energy saving while levying energy will cause economic and welfare declines when at a level tax rate of 5 10 and 15 the loss of gdp will reach 0 27 0 66 and 1 13 respectively and the incomes of inhabitants and enterprises alike will decrease when the energy tax revenue used to compensate for the welfare losses suffered by inhabitants or enterprises there is a double dividend effect energy saving and increasing income moreover the simulation indicated that a 5 improvement of energy efficiency brings about a backfire phenomenon with an increase of 142 in energy consumption however when considering the cost of energy efficiency improvements the rebound effect will be significantly decreased policy suggestions are further recommended to help improve the energy policy in regard to reducing energy consumption

accounting for household heterogeneity in general equilibrium economic growth models abstract we describe and evaluate a new method of aggregating heterogeneous households that allows for the representation of changing demographic composition in a multi sector economic growth model the method is based on a utility and labor supply calibration that takes into account time variations in demographic characteristics of the population we test the method using the population environment technology pet model by comparing energy and emissions projections employing the aggregate representation of households to projections representing different household types explicitly results show that the difference between the two approaches in terms of total demand for energy and consumption goods is negligible for a wide range of model parameters our approach allows the effects of population aging urbanization and other forms of compositional change on energy demand and co 2 emissions to be estimated and compared in a computationally manageable manner using a representative household under assumptions and functional forms that are standard in economic growth models

urban and rural energy use and carbon dioxide emissions in asia the process of urbanization has been shown to be important for economic development environmental impacts and human wellbeing particularly in developing countries in this paper we compare structure data sources and scenario results of four integrated assessment models that are capable of analyzing different aspects of urbanization the comparison focuses on residential sector energy use and related co2 emissions based on a set of urbanization scenarios for china and india important insights from this model comparison include that i total fossil fuel and industrial co2 emissions at the regional level are not very sensitive to alternative rates of urbanization and are largely dependent on the linkage between urbanization and economic growth via differentiated labor productivity in urban and rural areas ii alternative urbanization pathways may yield different results for the share of solid fuels in residential energy use thereby affecting the number of people relying on these fuels and the associated adverse health impacts and iii alternative economic growth scenarios can only be assessed for their welfare implications if urban and rural household are distinguished even though that distinction does not always strongly affect aggregate outcomes which is often due to two effects that compensate each other in total it can be concluded that urbanization and heterogeneity of households and consumers are clearly relevant for distributional effects and associated health and social impacts

political regimes and income inequality abstract we construct a theoretically motivated model of income inequality through a pooled regression on an international panel we demonstrate that political regime whether extractive redistributive or reinvestment oriented correlates with within country income inequality

adjustment incomes and poverty in morocco abstract although fiscal and balance of payments problems began in 1976 morocco did not introduce its stabilization program until 1983 the combination of a short term stabilization program devaluations reductions in public investment and slower growth in domestic credit and government employment and medium term structural adjustment measures liberalizing trade agriculture and financial markets reduced internal and external deficits while maintaining economic growth and preventing an increase in poverty model simulations of three alternative approaches show that the macroeconomic policy adopted could have been better but only slightly they also show that the timing of the program was suited to the exogenous shocks morocco faced and helped to keep the social costs of adjustment low although additional macroeconomic measures and higher direct taxes on high income households could have reduced them even further

how will demographic characteristics of the labor force matter for the global economy and carbon dioxide emissions abstract in many regions including the united states europe japan and china the proportion of the elderly in the population has been increasing in the past decades and will continue to do so in the coming decades the aging process implies reduced labor supply thus affecting economic growth and greenhouse gas emissions this study explores whether and to what extent age and gender specific labor force participation rates affect regional and global economies and associated emissions using a computable general equilibrium cge model assuming that labor supply is proportional to the population size will underestimate future economic growth and carbon dioxide co2 emissions in india but overestimate economic growth and emissions substantially in the key aging regions of united states european union japan russia and china further results show that participation of the elderly population in the labor market has the potential to considerably mitigate the negative impact of aging on the economy although their effects differ across regions

seniority and monopsony in the academic labor market workers with high seniority usually have higher wages than workers with low seniority and the same total labor marke t experience in contrast the results of this paper indicate that higher seniority is associated with lower salaries for university professors the author documents this finding for national surveys a nd individual institutions and explains it as due to monopsonistic discrimination by employers copyright 1993 by american economic association

the gender dimensions of economic adjustment policies potential interactions and evidence to date abstract many developing countries have implemented stabilization and structural adjustment programs over the last 20 years the success of these programs depends critically on individual level responses to changing economic incentives access to control of and an ability to move productive economic resources between sectors is determined in part by gender if an individual s gender impedes their ability to fully participate in the economic adjustment process by inhibiting resource access control or movement adjustment will be impaired this paper discusses the potential gender dimensions of structural adjustment policies and examines the evidence to dale