comparative statics analysis of a fully closed city abstract this paper extends the existing comparative statics analysis about open or semiclosed cities notably that of w wheaton j econom theor 9 2 223 237 1974 to a fully closed city where urban land rent is redistributed to the city population specifically we examine the effects on changes in exogenous variables such as population size agricultural rent and initial endowments on endogenous variables such as welfare level city size and rent schedule most but not all of the existing results are reestablished surprisingly it is shown that in contrast to the existing literature and perhaps to intuition the city area may shrink when the city population increases the paper also extends the existing literature by analyzing the effect of the exogenous variables on the endogenous income and the demand for transportation it is shown that under plausible assumptions the quantity of transportation demanded declines with its price

averting crisis assessing measures to manage financial integration in emerging economies the asian crisis provides heterodox economists with the opportunity to investigate counterfactually whether the financial policies they have proposed would have averted the crisis the paper argues that neo liberal financial integration introduces distinct risks to emerging economies currency flight fragility contagion and sovereignty risks the paper presents the financial policies endorsed by the heterodoxy transactions taxes trip wires and or speed bumps convertibility restrictions the chilean model and a publicly managed mutual fund the paper considers whether these policies mitigate risks and whether they could have prevented the asian crisis and the transmission thereof the paper concludes with policies to avert future crises copyright 2003 oxford university press

corporate economic power and the state a longitudinal assessment of two explanations much has been written about the relationship between the economic resources of corporations and their ability to control politics in advanced capitalist democracies the resource that has received the most attention is economic concentration but there is little agreement about the precise form of concentration that matters in an attempt to find the most useful image of the state this study looks at the connection between the aggregate concentration of assets among the leading manufacturing firms as well as the rate of business investment and taxes on business time series regressions computed on u s national level data show that theories of the state that emphasize the independet activities of private investors are not supported instead the aggrgate concentration of assets as measured by the share of assets held by the leading 100 firms has a strong negative influence on effective corporate tax rates these results are consistent with the theory that heightened aggregate concentration helps corpor

political business cycles 40 years after nordhaus the aim of this article is to survey the huge literature that has emerged in the last four decades following nordhaus s rev econ stud 42 2 169 190 1975 publication on political business cycles pbcs i first propose some developments in history of thought to examine the context in which this ground breaking contribution saw the light of the day i also present a simplified version of nordhaus s model to highlight his key results i detail some early critiques of this model and the fields of investigations to which they gave birth i then focus on the institutional context and examine its influence on pbcs the actual research agenda finally i derive some paths for future research

assessing the impact of financial liberalisation on stock market volatility in selected developing countries this article argues for the importance of measuring stock market volatility following financial liberalisation in developing countries three alternative indices for measuring volatility are developed these are used to examine the view that financial liberalisation induces increased asset price volatility based on the limited data available this view is corroborated in the majority of countries investigated

corn models in the classical tradition p sraffa considered historically this paper deals with the historical plausibility and analytical validity of what has come to be termed the corn model the ongoing debate is firstly reviewed it is suggested that a definite answer should be based on the logic of the material produce comparisons although these do not lead invariably to a sound application of the corn model neither do they constitute per se a sign of classicism however it is shown that before and after ricardo corn models of various sorts and logical stringency were developed in order to cope with the problem of 1 the determination of the rate of profit in the only basic sector of the economy agriculture independent of any valuation and 2 its primacy over the overall economy copyright 1991 by oxford university press

marketing the third world the contradictions of portfolio investment in the global economy abstract while international portfolio investment pi in emerging markets has flourished during the 1990s the macroeconomic and political dilemmas introduced into these site economies by this development have not been adequately explored this paper presents a keynesian analysis of the effects of these inflows the paper argues that a dependence on pi can constrain the autonomy of macroeconomic policy and introduce increased risk in site economies the paper then applies this framework to recent mexican experience the paper concludes with a call for aggressive management of portfolio investment and outlines some measures toward this end

further evidence for sraffa s interpretation of ricardo samuel hollander 1973 1975 1979 has attracted much attention by disputing piero sraffa s famous corn model interpretation of ricardo s 1815 essay on profits john eatwell 1975 and more recently pierangelo garegnani 1982 in this journal have come to sraffa s defence at issue is sraffa s suggestion contained in the introduction to the first volume of his edition of ricardo s works that the rational foundation of ricardo s dictum that the profits of the farmer regulate the profits of all other trades is the assumption that the inputs and outputs of agricultural production are roughly homogenous and that the rate of profit in agriculture may therefore be conceived as a ratio of physical quantities independent of valuation sraffa 1951 p xxxi eatwell and garegnani base their defences of this proposition upon exegeses of the relevant text and correspondence in this short paper i will show that further evidence in support of sraffa s view may be found in a now little known article written by robert torrens which appeared in the edinburgh review of october 1819 1 that article which was ostensibly a review of four pamphlets of robert owen and which bore the running title mr owen s plans for relieving the national distress details a corn model theory of profits in much more explicit terms than does ricardo s essay on profits ricardo moreover was not only familiar with the article but wrote approvingly of it in several letters to j r mcculloch on 28 february 1820 he wrote

a comparative static analysis of urban structure in the setting of endogenous income abstract wheaton j econom theory 9 223 237 1974 thoroughly did a comparative static analysis of urban spatial structure for both the closed and the open city models his analysis presupposed the simple alonso type city model where per capita income is treated as an exogenous variable however in some research including that of wheaton amer econom rev 67 138 143 1977 and sasaki and co workers the land rent payment is distributed to each citizen and thereby per capita income is determined endogenously treating income level as endogenous makes a comparative static analysis so complicated that the sign of the effects is indeterminate without specifying a utility function in some cases and cannot be determined even with a specific utility function in some cases this paper performs a comparative static analysis in the setting of endogenous income and thereby clarifies which impacts cannot be qualitatively assessed until a utility function is specified

expectations the business cycle and the mexican peso crisis the 1994 95 peso crisis did not display characteristics which allow it to be easily captured by traditional crisis models models based on minsky s financial fragility hypothesis offer more persuasive accounts but have been supported by relatively little direct empirical evidence this paper provides such evidence with particular attention being paid to the role of domestic financial liberalisation in the process minsky s hypotheses about the evolution of expectations over the business cycle are tracked using business survey data in addition crisis indicators are constructed reflecting the changing vulnerability of the economy to shocks the findings support a minskyian interpretation of the crisis copyright 2006 oxford university press

good bye financial repression hello financial crash some unintended consequences of financial liberalization in latin america are analyzed in this paper intrinsic imperfectious in financial markets and the policy dilemmas they pose are reviewed first the stylized facts of southern cone experiments in financial liberization are then presented alternative ways of organlzing domestic capital markets under latin american conditions are discussed and an eclectic reform mongering program is proposed

defence spending and unemployment rates an empirical analysis disaggregated by race this analysis brings u s time series evidence to bear on the relationship of defense spending and unemployment rates results indicate that defense increases during the 1970s were associated with improvements in the overall unemployment rate however during the 1980s such increases were associated with a worsening of the unemployment rate furthermore upon disaggregation into black and white unemployment rates it was found that in general whites were helped by defense spending increases while blacks were hurt this evidence offers support for the claim that an increasing complex military production process will lead to diminished employment gains particularly for minorities who are not proportionately represented in the high tech industries that serve the military copyright 1990 by oxford university press

the political economy of financial internationalization in the developing world in the last decade a growing number of developing countries have opened their financial systems by liberalizing capital flows and the rules governing the international operations of financial intermediaries one explanation of this rush toward greater financial internationalization is that increasing interdependence generates domestic and foreign political pressures for capital account liberalization while we find evidence for that hypothesis we find that the proximate cause in developing countries more frequently is found in balance of payments crises politicians perceive that financial openness in the face of crisis can increase capital inflows by indicating to foreign investors that they will be able to liquidate their investments and by signaling government intentions to maintain fiscal and monetary discipline the argument is explored through case studies of chile indonesia mexico and south korea

developing countries changing nature of financial integration and new forms of external vulnerability the brazilian experience this article argues using the example of brazil that the changing nature of developing and emerging countries decs financial integration has created new forms of external vulnerability causing large and volatile capital and exchange rate movements despite sound fundamentals and a substantial reduction in its traditional external vulnerabilities the brazilian real has been one of the most volatile currencies over recent years the article argues that this has been the result of the surging exposure of foreign investors in an increasingly complex set of very short term domestic currency assets following a minskyan analysis we demonstrate that the changing nature of brazil s external vulnerability confirms both the inherent and endogenous instability of international capital flows and decs subordinate role in the international financial system we conclude with policy recommendations to reduce decs external vulnerability sustainably

professor garegnani s defence of sraffa on the material rate of profit in two articles 1973 1975 and in my economics of david ricardo 1979 i have given a blow by blow account of the evidence relating to ricardo s position on profits professor garegnani s 1982 criticisms do not lead me to retract much of his argument is based on circumstantial evidence and fails to make accurate use of what ricardo actually wrote on the matter although he is aware of the materials available the most useful path for me now is to review some of the key issues limiting myself however to an examination of the evidence presented by sraffa who originated the hypothesis which is in dispute there is no point in going further if this matter is not resolved

is the accumulation of international reserves good for development international reserves accumulation has been the preferred policy recently adopted by developing economies to achieve financial stability the aim of this policy is to increase liquidity and thus reduce the risk of suffering a speculative attack the main concern expressed in the literature has been related to its cost most of the studies conclude that the opportunity cost of international reserves accumulation is around 1 of gdp however these studies have not analysed whether this strategy is or could be more broadly supportive of development an issue that must be of central interest for developing economies the aim of this paper is to show that the stockpiling of international reserves is not optimal for developmental purposes and that there exist alternative policies that can be applied to achieve financial stability policy autonomy and a better performance in terms of development

two cases for sand in the wheels of international finance the incompatibility of pegged exchange rates international capital mobility and national monetary autonomy is a basic postulate of open economy macroeconomies in the present environment of high capital mobility and political uncertainty even the possibility that governments may utilize their policy autonomy can defeat efforts to peg the exchange rate this leaves two possibilities one is to fix the exchange rate irrevocably through monetary unification the other is to live with floating rates either way a case can be made for throwing sand in the wheels of international finance where monetary unification is not an option this is a may to make distinct national currencies tolerable and international money and capital markets compatible with modest national autonomy in monetary and macroeconomic policy for eu counties striving to create a monetary union it is the only politically and economically feasible way of completing the transition to stage iii of the maastricht process

spatial structure of a metropolitan area with an agricultural hinterland abstract a dual economy metropolitan model is evolved by incorporating both urban and rural sectors to explain the real growth factors of the urban area the competitive relations between urban and agricultural sectors in both labor and land markets are modeled such a dual economy urban model is also indispensable for evaluating the micro effects of industrial policies e g the policy for liberalization of agricultural products on the urban spatial structure comparative static analysis is performed to evaluate the effects of lowered transport cost heightened production efficiency lowered world price of agricultural product and increased metropolitan population

ricardo s early treatment of profitability reply to hollander and prendergast i will deal first with professor hollander s objection to my reading of ricardo s letter to malthus of i i august i8i4 and with his startling claim to have readily accept ed the corn calculation in ricardo s correspondence of i8i4 i986 p iq99 the passage from the letter in question begins individuals do not estimate their profits by the material production but nations invariably do works vi p i2i in my article i984 p 737 i took this as a response to malthus s point that in no case of production is the produce exactly of the same nature as the capital advanced consequently we can never properly refer to a material rate of produce works vi p i i 7 the salient features of ricardo s reply are first that he does not mention let alone defend the assumption of capital product homogeneity which casts doubt on sraffa s interpretation works i p xxxi and secondly that he does defend the measurement of profits the net social surplus in material terms hollander complains that the passage from ricardo in fact says nothing about the profit rate or profit share i986 p 4 his emphasis this is true and instead of drawing the inference that any previous reference by ricardo to a material rate of produce was based on the representation of the profit share in physical terms i984 p 737 emphasis added i should have said simply profit or net surplus this does not make a fundamental difference to my interpretation hollander also underlines my observation that ricardo did not restrict the material estimation of profits to the agricultural sector but ricardo s argument that nations invariably estimate profit in material terms can be read as a justification for using the technique in a more unusual context specifically in the treatment of agriculture which was after all the sector to which malthus was apparently referring when he made his objection about the material rate of produce works vi pp i i 7 8 i therefore stand by my interpretation or tortuous meandering as professor hollander so colourfully describes it i986 p i093 which brings me to the readily accept ed corn calculation that hollander would put in its place until hollander i983 the textual basis for attributing the calculation was confined to ricardo s letter of 25 july i 8 i 4 works vi pp i i 4 5 leaving aside temporarily the validity of this evidence it is relevant to consider hollander s reaction s to his discovery in hollander i973 the calculation is described as a rather casual and

the ricardo debates hollander and garegnani on natural price and output determination samuel hollander and pierangelo garegnani have debated the appropriate interpretation of david ricardo since 1973 without substantive agreement on at least one issue the interdependence of prices and output levels the debate has stalled because textual exegesis cannot solve a logical problem this paper demonstrates that such interdependence exists unless one makes one of two restrictive and un ricardian assumptions either output levels must be insensitive to wage rate changes or all industries must be subject to constant costs

on interpreting ricardo a reply to sraffians this paper seeks to clarify and defend aspects of the interpretation advanced in interpreting ricardo terry peach 1993 in the light of published criticisms by writers of a sraffian persuasion the principal areas of discussion include the corn model interpretation the labor theory of value and the invariable measure of value and the ricardo sraffa relationship copyright 1998 by oxford university press

robert torrens and ricardo s corn ratio theory of profits the main point at issue in the dispute started more than ten years ago by s hollander on sraffa s interpretation of ricardo s early theory of profits undoubtedly concerns the logic underlying the notion which ricardo entertained at that stage namely that it is the profits of the farmer which regulate the profits of all other trades ricardo to trower 5 march 1814 in ricardo 1951 73 vi p 104 as is well known the rational foundation for such statements by ricardo was according to sraffa that in agriculture the same commodity namely corn forms both the capital and the product therefore in agriculture the rate of profit is determined as a ratio between two quantities of corn without any question of valuation if there is to be a uniform rate of profit in all trades it is the exchangeable values of the product of other trades relatively to corn that must be so adjusted as to yield the same rate of profit as has been established in the growing of corn sraffa 1951 p xxxi hollander writes that it does not seem likely that ricardo intended to ascribe a determining role to the agricultural sector on the logic ascribed to him by sraffa 1979 p 146 it is remarkable that hollander concedes even more than is necessary for sraffa s case when he writes of his ricardo s assumption in the essay that corn alone enters the wage basket ibid he seems however to reconcile this with his general position by suggesting that the essay on profits constitutes an essay in persuasion p 118 and its policy orientation would justify ricardo s emphasis upon corn in the wage basket to get the message across regarding the effects of corn import restriction no general theoretical significance ought to be attached to such strong cases hollander 1979 p 146 i shall not deal here with the difficulties that hollander s reconstruction of what ricardo intended encounters on grounds of both logic and evidence for this see eatwell 1975 garegnani 1982 the purpose of the present note is to show that the logic which sraffa ascribes to ricardo is clearly spelled out in the second edition of torrens external corn trade 1820 where we find both the determination of the agri cultural rate of profit in physical terms as a ratio between two quantities of corn and the determination of the value of manufactured goods relative to corn using the given agricultural rate of profit remarkably in this work torrens goes out of his way to acknowledge his great indebtedness to ricardo s original and profound inquiry into the

modeling u s budgetary and fiscal policy outcomes a disaggregated systemwide perspective this paper develops and estimates a model of u s federal budgetary outcomes that allows for considerable disaggregation across spending categories while providing through cross equation coefficient restrictions substantially more statistical power than traditional approaches we identify significant top down fiscal policy effects on budgetary allocations primarily within the defense budget budgetary responses to macroeconomic conditions are generally countercyclical although middle class entitlements appear to react procyclically to inflation political control of congress influences budgetary outcomes with democrats giving higher priority to domestic spending programs the relative rate of public sector inflation affects spending growth consistent with baumol s disease public opinion affects defense and low income entitlement spending defense spending has also been influenced by perceived soviet threat as well as the level of armed conflict there appear to be small election year effects although not of the sort predicted by political business cycle models with a few exceptions administration specific impacts are relatively small and not systematically related to the party of the president

stock markets in africa emerging lions or white elephants abstract the number of stock markets in african countries has doubled over the last 7 years although these markets remain small and illiquid they are growing rapidly and will become an increasingly important part of many african economies using examples taken from experience in other developing regions and africa s recent past this paper evaluates the common economic criticisms of stock markets and the political pitfalls involved in their operation it concludes that the positive economic effects of bourses on african economies are far larger than any negative effects and argues that the political costs can be mitigated while political benefits can also be gained it finishes by suggesting reforms that can be put in place to reap more benefits and further reduce costs from stock markets on the continent

invested interests the politics of national economic policies in a world of global finance capital moves more rapidly across national borders now than it has in at least fifty years and perhaps in history this article examines the effects of capital mobility on different groups in national societies and on the politics of economic policymaking it begins by emphasizing that while financial markets are highly integrated within the developed world many investments are still quite specific with respect to firm sector or location it then argues that contemporary levels of international capital mobility have a differential impact on socioeconomic groups over the long run increased capital mobility tends to favor owners of capital over other groups in the shorter run owners and workers in specific sectors in capital exporting countries bear much of the burden of adjusting to increased capital mobility these patterns can be expected to lead to political divisions about whether or not to encourage or increase international capital market integration the article then demonstrates that capital mobility also affects the politics of other economic policies most centrally it shifts debate toward the exchange rate as an intermediate or ultimate policy instrument in this context it tends to pit groups that favor exchange rate stability against groups that are more concerned about national monetary policy autonomy and therefore less concerned about exchange rate stability similarly it tends to drive a wedge between groups that favor an appreciated exchange rate and groups that favor a depreciated one these divisions have important implications for such economic policies as european monetary and currency union the dollar yen exchange rate and international macroeconomic policy coordination