what drives deregulation economics and politics of the relaxation of bank branching restrictions this paper investigates private interest public interest and political institutional theories of regulatory change to analyze state level deregulation of bank branching restrictions using a hazard model we find that interest group factors related to the relative strength of potential winners large banks and small bank dependent firms and losers small banks and the rival insurance firms can explain the timing of branching deregulation across states during the last quarter century the same factors also explain congressional voting on interstate branching deregulation while we find some support for each theory the private interest approach provides the most compelling overall explanation of our results

migrants in a guest worker system a utility maximizing approach this paper examines the behavior of utility maximizing migrants in a system of guest worker migration their pattern of leisure and commodity consumption at home and abroad is analysed and related

economic development and income inequality further evidence on the u curve hypothesis abstract internationally comparable data on inequality and income are utilized to reassess the empirical status of kusnets u curve hypothesis the hypothesis seems well supported when both developed countries dcs and less developed countries lcds are included in the sample however the position changes rather dramatically if the sample is restricted to lcds and very small support for the hypothesis is then observed also a simple comparison indicates that some of the support reported in earlier studies may have been due to the use of conventional gross domestic product per capita in general results based on gini coefficient seem less favorable to the hypothesis than those derived from household income shares

an empirical study of optimal taxation on australian financial institutions abstract the paper estimates direct and cross price elasticities for a complete model of ten stochastic financial asset share equations and derives ramsey s optimal tax rates for ten major financial transactions in australia for the period 1967 1968 to 1984 1985

some models for estimating technical and scale inefficiencies in data envelopment analysis in management contexts mathematical programming is usually used to evaluate a collection of possible alternative courses of action en route to selecting one which is best in this capacity mathematical programming serves as a planning aid to management data envelopment analysis reverses this role and employs mathematical programming to obtain ex post facto evaluations of the relative efficiency of management accomplishments however they may have been planned or executed mathematical programming is thereby extended for use as a tool for control and evaluation of past accomplishments as well as a tool to aid in planning future activities the ccr ratio form introduced by charnes cooper and rhodes as part of their data envelopment analysis approach comprehends both technical and scale inefficiencies via the optimal value of the ratio form as obtained directly from the data without requiring a priori specification of weights and or explicit delineation of assumed functional forms of relations between inputs and outputs a separation into technical and scale efficiencies is accomplished by the methods developed in this paper without altering the latter conditions for use of dea directly on observational data technical inefficiencies are identified with failures to achieve best possible output levels and or usage of excessive amounts of inputs methods for identifying and correcting the magnitudes of these inefficiencies as supplied in prior work are illustrated in the present paper a new separate variable is introduced which makes it possible to determine whether operations were conducted in regions of increasing constant or decreasing returns to scale in multiple input and multiple output situations the results are discussed and related not only to classical single output economics but also to more modern versions of economics which are identified with contestable market theories

entry into the market for large transport aircraft abstract european governments have been accused of unfair trading practices in providing subsidies for market entry in the large commercial aircraft industry a capacity game is calibrated for 1987 to 2006 showing that the disadvantage of late entry is overcome only after a long time hence market entry is unlikely without government subsidies the scale and scope effects of production outweigh the output reducing effects of a monopoly government supported market entry as an anti monopoly policy yields higher consumer welfare overall welfare is lower due to large losses in producer surplus

comparative productivity of korean manufacturing 1967 1987 this paper compares productivity levels in south korean manufacturing with those in the usa for 13 manufacturing branches the comparison is based on specific industry of origin purchasing power parities value added per hour worked in korean manufacturing rose from only 4 5 percent of the us level in 1967 to more than 18 percent in 1987 total factor productivity rose from only 9 percent in 1967 to 26 percent of the us level in 1987 at a more detailed level especially the leather metals and machinery industries have reached high productivity levels some of which approach levels in european manufacturing the considerable labour productivity gap between korea and the united states can partly be explained by capital intensity structural effects size effects and levels of education

comparative productivity the ussr eastern europe and the west this paper compiles comparative measures of output per worker in 1975 in four socialist and seven western market economy wme countries and explores sources of observed differences between the two groups of countries in that regard such differences seem explicable only partially by reference to differences in per worker capital stock and farm land a residual disparity of 25 to 34 percent in favor of wme countries appears to testify to superior efficiency in the latter copyright 1987 by american economic association

frontier projection and efficiency decomposition in two stage processes with slacks based measures abstract in the prior literature on measuring the efficiency of two stage processes there are both radial and non radial methods of efficiency measurement in some cases non radial methods which allow all inputs intermediate measures and outputs to change non proportionally are more appropriate than radial methods but they do not ensure stage efficiency or allow for the efficiency decomposition of two stage processes based on slacks based measure sbm this paper develops both envelopment based and multiplier based models to obtain simultaneously both the frontier projection and the efficiency decomposition specifically we propose the variable intermediate measures sbm vsbm model to evaluate the system efficiency of two stage processes and consider the following three properties of the vsbm model 1 we derive the efficient dea frontier projection based on the vsbm model 2 we address potential conflicts in this model with respect to the intermediate measures 3 we prove that the system inefficiency is equivalent to the sum of inefficiencies of the two stages furthermore we derive the efficiency decomposition of two stage processes based on the dual of the vsbm model finally we apply our proposed approach to real data of us commercial banks and extend our approach to settings in which the assumption of variable returns to scale vrs holds or there are more general network structures

network dea pitfalls divisional efficiency and frontier projection under general network structures abstract data envelopment analysis dea is a method for measuring the efficiency of peer decision making units dmus recently network dea models been developed to examine the efficiency of dmus with internal structures the internal network structures range from a simple two stage process to a complex system where multiple divisions are linked together with intermediate measures in general there are two types of network dea models one is developed under the standard multiplier dea models based upon the dea ratio efficiency and the other under the envelopment dea models based upon production possibility sets while the multiplier and envelopment dea models are dual models and equivalent under the standard dea such is not necessarily true for the two types of network dea models pitfalls in network dea are discussed with respect to the determination of divisional efficiency frontier type and projections we point out that the envelopment based network dea model should be used for determining the frontier projection for inefficient dmus while the multiplier based network dea model should be used for determining the divisional efficiency finally we demonstrate that under general network structures the multiplier and envelopment network dea models are two different approaches the divisional efficiency obtained from the multiplier network dea model can be infeasible in the envelopment network dea model this indicates that these two types of network dea models use different concepts of efficiency we further demonstrate that the envelopment model s divisional efficiency may actually be the overall efficiency

what impact does the choice of formula have on international comparisons in this paper an empirical comparison of a number of alternative multilateral index number formulae is undertaken the magnitude of the effect of choosing one formula over another is ascertained using an appropriate cross sectional data set constructed under the auspices of the eurostat oecd purchasing power parity programme to this end a new indicator is proposed that facilitates the measurement of the difference between two sets of bloc consumption shares each computed using a different multilateral comparison method jel classification c31 c43 c81 e31 f31 o57 quel impact est ce que le choix des formules a sur les comparaisons internationales ce memoire propose une comparaison empirique d un certain nombre de formules de nombres indices multilateraux on tente de jauger la magnitude de l impact du choix d une formule plutot qu une autre en utilisant une base de donnees transversales appropriee construite sous l egide du programme de parite du pouvoir d achat eurostat ocde on propose un nouvel indicateur qui facilite la mesure de la difference entre deux ensembles de patterns de consommation chacun calculea l aide d une methode de comparaison multilaterale differente

intercountry inequalities in income and index of net social progress evidence from recent data abstract intercountry income inequality is computed from real gdp data that became available recently from phase iv of international comparisons project similar inequality measures are also calculated for index of net social progress proposed by estes 1983 and for conventional gnp per capita although the three indicators are strongly and positively correlated intercountry inequality indices derived from these are rather dramatically different

economic information versus quality variation in cross country data data quality in the penn world tables varies systematically across countries that have different growth rates and are at different stages of economic development thus intro ducing measurement error correlated with variables of economic interest we explore this problem with three examples from the literature showing that the problem appears to be minor in growth convergence regressions but serious in estimating the effect of income volatility on growth and in a cross country lest of the permanent income hypothesis the results suggest at the least a need for performing appropriate sensitivity tests before draw

consumer electricity and gas prices across australian capital cities structural breaks effects of policy reforms and interstate differences abstract we detect and analyze the most significant structural changes in the quarterly growth rate of consumer electricity and gas prices in australia and estimate their corresponding seasonal effects to do so we apply the general modelling framework of the bai perron breaking regression to all available quarterly data for capital cities individually and australia as a whole 1989q3 2017q2 retail energy prices in most australian states were deregulated in the 2000s we find that increases in average quarterly growth rates of electricity and gas prices consistently occurred in the third september quarter and find very few instances of increases in any other quarters of the year in the post deregulation period price increases are significantly higher than in the pre deregulation era results for some capital cities are stark in perth third quarter growth in electricity prices has been five times higher after the structural break in australia as a whole third quarter growth in gas prices has been three times higher after the structural break we discuss several possible explanations for energy price rises in the period since deregulation

another perspective on changes in international inequality from 1950 to 1980 abstract real income data derived from the third phase of the international comparisons project are used to compute theil s population weighted indices of intercountry inequality for several years between 1950 and 1980 contrary to some recently reported results a substantial increase in inequality is observed internationally comparable consumption data indicate consumption inequality increased more than income inequality

tariffs transfers and the real exchange rate the deviation of exchange rates from purchasing power parities ppp s has recently become the subject of theoretical and empirical attention the massive body of data collected and presented by the international comparisons project icp under the direction of kravis heston and summers khs 9 11 has permitted new empirical investigation of an old topic and has stimulated the construction of theoretical models to account for observed patterns in the icp project and the related literature the focus is on the ratio of the exchange rate to the ppp the concept of this ratio is closely related to the concept of the real exchange rate which is defined as the actual exchange rate multiplied by the ratio of an index of foreign prices to an index of domestic prices the term real exchange rate a term widely employed in both economics journals and in the financial press is frequently used to describe changes over time in a particular country and its calculation requires only time totime changes in exchange rates and price indexes the ratio of the exchange rate to the ppp on the other hand refers to a comparison of the levels of the exchange rate and the ppp at a moment in time and its calculation requires the availability of a ppp survey of the kind performed by the icp the purpose of the present paper is to analyze the effects of tariffs and transfers on the real exchange rate of a small country in this theoretical endeavor we shall hold constant the prices in foreign countries in this context it can easily be seen that the real exchange rate and the ratio of the exchange rate to the ppp are identical concepts provided that the expenditure weights used in the index of domestic prices are the same as those used in the calculation of the ppp

a note on two stage network dea model frontier projection and duality abstract in chen cook kao and zhu 2013 it is demonstrated as a network dea pitfall that while the multiplier and envelopment dea models are dual models and equivalent under the standard dea such is not necessarily true for the two types of network dea models in deriving divisional efficiency scores and frontier projections as a reaction to this work we demonstrate that the duality in the standard dea naturally migrates to the two stage network dea formulas are developed to obtain frontier projections and divisional efficiency scores using a dea model s and its dual solutions the case of taiwanese non life insurance companies is revisited using the newly developed approach

motivations for market restructuring evidence from u s electricity deregulation abstract the purpose of this paper is to examine whether electricity restructuring was brought about due to the public interest theory that regulatory changes are undertaken to benefit society or the interest group theory that groups hoping to gain from deregulation lobby for regulatory changes from 1996 to 2002 eighteen states developed restructuring programs targeted at improving efficiency through the use of increased wholesale trading abolition of cost of service regulation measures to open electricity production to non utility entities and the unbundling of transmission and distribution results indicate some evidence of the public interest theory and strong evidence of the interest group theory

the adoption of state electricity regulation the role of interest groups this paper examines the adoption of state electricity regulation around the beginning of the 20th century i model this decision as a hazard rate to determine what influenced the adoption of state regulation i find that adoption is positively correlated with capacity shortages greater wealth and lower residential electricity penetration rates these results suggest that state regulation responded to regulatory inefficiencies and residential consumer interests in addition adoption rates were higher in states that had a strong industrial and coal mining presence these results are consistent with the interest group and contracting theories of regulation states began replacing municipal regulation of electric utilities with state regulation in 1907 despite the long history surprisingly little is known about the causes of the regime shift in this paper i estimate a hazard model that defines the probability of adopting state regulation as a function of variables that measure the potential benefits and costs of a number of interest groups the shortage of installed capacity and concurrent levels of electricity prices and profits the results shed light on which theories of regulation are most consistent with the data i find evidence that is consistent with the interest group theory of regulation which began with peltzman 1976 and the contracting theory of regulation attributed to priest 1993 the interest group theory of regulation centers around private interest group competition regulators respond to the pressures of interest groups one testable implication of the interest group theory is that if state regulation benefited a certain class of consumers such as residential consumers at the expense of another class of consumers the

deriving the dea frontier for two stage processes data envelopment analysis dea is a method for measuring the efficiency of peer decision making units dmus recently dea has been extended to examine the efficiency of two stage processes where all the outputs from the first stage are intermediate measures that make up the inputs to the second stage the resulting two stage dea model provides not only an overall efficiency score for the entire process but as well yields an efficiency score for each of the individual stages due to the existence of intermediate measures the usual procedure of adjusting the inputs or outputs by the efficiency scores as in the standard dea approach does not necessarily yield a frontier projection the current paper develops an approach for determining the frontier points for inefficient dmus within the framework of two stage dea

an extended cross country time series analysis of the volume and quality of consumption abstract the approach of finke and theil 1985 is extended to include four countries ireland japan luxembourg and west germany for which consumption data are available at a less detailed level

a new cross country tabulation of the quality index of consumption abstract cross country data are used to tabulate a quality index of consumption for each of 30 countries ranging in affluence from the u s to india as well as the real income relative price and residual components of the quality index

accounting for u s regional real exchange rates we examine the relationship between the relative price of nontradables and real exchange rate movements for fixed exchange rate regimes using bls cpi data we show that purchasing power parity holds strongly for tradables across u s regions as a result nontradables play a central role in u s regional real exchange rate movements indeed changes in the relative price of nontradables explain up to 80 of regional real exchange rate changes over medium and long run horizons we also argue that nontradables can account for a large portion of real exchange rate changes internationally with high nontradables expenditure shares

dollar gnp estimates for central and eastern europe 1970 90 a survey and a comparison with western countries abstract in this paper a survey of the dollar gnp estimation methods used in the last 20 years for centrally palnned economies is made none of the different approaches is deemed to be fully satisfactory an explanation is offered as to why the construction of a better method would be impossible at this time the most realistic 1990 per capita gnps for practical use are indicated varying between about 4000 for romania 8000 for czechoslovakia in addition by examining the structure of the economy in terms of contribution to gdp of agriculture industry and services and comparing east and west in this respect the hypothesis is put forward that the technological and organizational evolution of eastern economies basically stopped in the early 1970s

implications of ownership regulation and market structure for performance evidence from the u s electric utility industry before and after the new deal this study evaluates the impact of variations in regulation ownership and market structure in the u s electric utility industry during the period surrounding the new deal when considerable institutional variation provided a natural experiment for analysis a simultaneous equations model of electricity supply and demand is developed and estimated for the years 1930 and 1942 with firm and market level data collected on utilities serving cities of population 50 000 or more the paper offers evidence that regulation public ownership and competition served to reduce electricity prices and enhance allocative efficiency during the period under examination

world food demand long term projections of global food demand are heavily dependent on which functional form of the food demand equation is used given that real incomes can change substantially over the long term key elements are the dependence of the income elasticity on income which ensures that the food budget share always lies within the 0 1 range and the role of income inequality this article analyzes these issues proposes a new functional form that deals with them and presents estimates of income and price elasticities for food in 138 countries copyright 2012 oxford university press

aggregate demand shifts income distribution and the linder hypothesis the intraindustry trade literature emphasizes nonhomothetic preferences and incomes as important determinants of aggregate demand and trade patterns the authors provide evidence for such preferences particularly that the structure of income driven demand shifts is related to indices of linder type product characteristics and that income distribution is a significant factor in determining aggregate expenditures these results imply that as general income levels rise the relative volume of trade in manufactured consumer goods should rise and the total volume of trade should rise independent of changes in the intercountry difference between income levels copyright 1996 by mit press

a study of economic and financial flows abstract a multi sector and multi activity duality based allocation model is used to study the behaviour of economic and financial flows and their stability in australia for the period 1959 iii to 1983 iv the findings indicate the existence of allocative instability and reject the unitary income elasticity hypothesis financial flows are however independent of growth of national disposable income

the ussr before the fall how poor and why this essay appraises the scholarly findings on the level of consumption and output in the ussr compared with that in the west such aggregative calculations are onerous for any country and not very surprisingly have encountered particular difficulty where such a strange society as soviet communism has been in question predictably the results have been controversial but properly viewed they still provide illuminating perspective on the extraordinary events that have lately transpired in the ussr