productive energy use and economic growth energy physical and human capital relationships abstract ecological and biophysical economists and historians of economics consider that availability of energy inputs has played a key role in driving economic growth in industrialized and emerging economies nevertheless being very sensitive to structural characteristics or stages of economic development the strength of this link differs among countries this study analyzes the role of energy in economic growth from a geographical standpoint by estimating an aggregate translog production function with human and physical capital and productive energy use as production factors within a growth framework panel data of 38 major countries for the period from 1995 to 2007 were used the strength of the link between energy and growth is analyzed for the whole sample and the following relevant country groups oecd bric nafta east asian east european and eu15 countries obtained results show that the calculated productivity elasticities with respect to energy use are positive for all country groups bric countries have higher elasticities around 0 37 and eu15 countries have lower elasticities around 0 12 weak substitutability relationships between energy and capital are observed for all groups except for bric and east european countries which show complementarity relationships

a positive theory of social security based on reputation we construct a general equilibrium model in which a pay as you go social security system can be adopted and sustained as a political and economic equilibrium we alalyze the welfare implictions of this system and compare general equilibrium welfare measure to the commonly used notion of actuarial fairness

structural change in factor substitution in finnish manufacturing the possibility of structural change in finnish factor substitution relations between energy and nonenergy factors is analyzed the standard generalized leontief klemf cost function is modified so that the substitution parameters related to electricity and fuel factors may shift to new levels over time the initial point of transition is 1974 during which the first energy crises took place likelihood ratio tests confirm that there has indeed been a statistically significant change in energy versus nonenergy substitution our estimates imply stronger substitutability for most input pairs after the energy crisis

separability functional form and regulatory policy in models of interfuel substitution abstract counter intuitive results such as positive own price elasticities have been found in some studies of interfuel substitution this paper examines three possible reasons for this problem first including energy materials in petroleum and coal aggregates is found to contribute to incorrect signs second the mathematical properties of the translog function contribute to concavity violations in contrast the linear logit model of cost shares is found to provide more sensible estimates of own price elasticities across alternative model specifications finally natural gas curtailment policies and environmental regulations are found to be significant factors influencing us industrial fuel demand although omission of these factors does not directly contribute to curvature violations

an analysis of technological change factor substitution and economies of scale in manufacturing industries in india the biases of technological change factor substitution and economies of scale in four major manufacturing industries viz cement electricity and gas cotton textiles and iron and steel in india are examined the translog cost functions are estimated using annual time series data covering the period 1960 61 to 1982 83 the study reveals that technical change has been biased towards the use of labour and materials and against the use of capital and energy in electricity and gas industries in cotton textiles the technological change has shown the opposity biases significant economies of sclae exist in the production of electricity and gas enough evidence of substitution possibilities among factors of production in all the four industries was also found

a median voter model of social security this paper presents a theoretical median voter analysis of the determination of the level of social security the framework for the analysis is a continuous time overlapping generations model with nonaltruistic households facing borrowing constraints in the capital market a majority voting equilibrium is shown to exist in which the median voter is liquidity constrained the desired level of social security for each voter is a declining function of the preexisting level of social security as a consequence in a sequence of votes on social security beginning with a zero level the program initially overshoots its steady state value copyright 1989 by economics department of the university of pennsylvania and the osaka university institute of social and economic research association

industrial energy substitution during the 1980s in the greek economy abstract factor substitution in greek manufacturing during the 1980s is examined using pooled data in static and dynamic translog expenditure share models inputs are capital labor electricity and non electrical energy liquid solid gas own price elasticities for capital and labor are inelastic but for electricity more elastic 0 90 results indicate substitutability among factors in the short run in the long run electricity and capital are complements as are labor and non electrical energy greek manufacturing is predicted to continue decreased consumption of liquid fuels to the year 2000 continuing the electrification begun in the 1970s

rebound effect in china evidence from the power generation sector abstract when talking about energy conservation rebound effect re is always concerned which defined as the increasing energy consumption relative to the counterfactual predicted by technological progress because of efficiency induced decrease in the real price of energy services in this paper we try to find a way to figure out the re through calculating the substitution relations accord with the definition based on the trans log cost function and considering the asymmetric impact on energy cost share equation the paper applies allen uzawa substitution elasticity to establish the price oriented analysis diagram of fossil energy consumption re using time series data applying the joint method of the dynamic ols dols and the seemingly unrelated regressions sur the re in china s electricity generation sector is estimated the results showed that the re is 11 6 in china s electricity generation sector if allowing for asymmetric price effects which indicates that china s power generation sector generally displays a feature of energy saving

systemic politics and the origins of great power conflict why do great powers fight one another this obviously central and seemingly simple questionleadsdirectlytooneofthemostfrustrating gaps in the empirical literature on international conflict great powers are states whose interests and capabilities extend beyond their immediate neighbors more so than other states they shape and respond to thestructureoftheinternationalsystem thatstructure is typically implicated in systemic wars which evolve from the interactions of all of the major states in the system yet somehow if the conflict literature is to be believed those same states cease to be driven by systemic interests and systemic imperatives in the long stretches of time between systemic wars in typical statisticalmodelsofconflict theyarepooledwithallofthe other states in the system under the assumption that theyrespondinthesamewaytothesamestimuli which aretypicallybothlocalanddyadic 1 becausenoonecan predict with certainty whether a given crisis between great powers will be resolved without bloodshed or explodeintoasystemicwar however arguingthatonly systemic wars have systemic causes is unsustainable the main barrier to understanding the systemic origins of great power conflict is that systemic theories of international politics are notoriously vague in the

the determinants of aggregate energy use in west germany factor substitution technological change and trade this paper examines the determinants of production related energy use in west germany over the period 1976 1994 the approach is to estimate a system of share equations for energy capital low skilled labor high skilled labor and materials in the west german production sector taking account of biased technological change and increasing trade orientation while technological change is found to be energy saving increased openness is energy using i e tends to increase the energy share factor substitution biased technological change and trade contribute to the year to year volatility of energy intensity in the proportion 66 30 4 the results are robust across several specifications examined

long run effects of unfunded social security with earnings dependent benefits this paper examines the effects of unfunded social security with bequests fertility and human capital by considering a mix of earnings dependent and universal social security benefits we show that social security is more likely to promote growth by reducing fertility and increasing human capital investment if its benefits are more dependent on individuals own earnings through simulations we find that the differences in the effects of social security resulting from variations in the benefit formula can be too substantial to be ignored we also investigate the welfare effect in calibrated economies c 2003 elsevier b v all rights reserved

incentives for investment in energy efficiency an econometric evaluation and policy implications technical studies suggest that there exist many opportunities to improve energy efficiency and that a substantial proportion is profitable by current business standards this study deals with the question why so many of these profitable opportunities are not used reasons for not implementing profitable opportunities are idetified and their effect is estimated on the basis ofa survey among dutch firms designed specifically for this study the reasons that prevail indicate what policy measures may accompany energy taxes in the pursuit of energy efficiency improvement in addition energy efficiency elasticities are estimated as well as the factors that determine the elasticities these too indicate opportunities for government policy if it wants to improve the effectiveness of energy taxes

general deterrence between enduring rivals testing three competing models general deterrence unlike immediate deterrence has rarely been analyzed in a systematic comparative manner we outline a research design for doing so by studying the circumstances under which in a set of enduring rivalries challengers are likely to initiate militarized disputes we indicate the conceptual and operational steps necessary to make and empirically compare predictions stemming from three often competing theoretical frameworks rational deterrence a general model of rational conflict initiation and a cognitive psychological model of behavior emphasizing risk orientation and misperception the results of probit analysis on a pooled time series of enduring rivalries since 1945 provide support for hypotheses from each of the different theoretical models

a dynamic analysis of interfuel substitution in u s industrial energy demand using data for 1960 92 to analyze interfuel substitution in the u s industrial sector a dynamic linear logit model is shown to provide superior global properties than a comparable dynamic translog model confirming earlier static results by t j considine 1989 the linear logit model provides a direct unbiased estimate of the rate of dynamic adjustment indicating a median response lag of less than two years excluding fuels used for nonenergy purposes yields larger estimates of the price elasticities for coal and oil and indicates generally greater potential for interfuel substitution than when using aggregate data

the cyclical and secular behaviour of the labour input comparing efficiency units and hours worked summary a monthly labour input series designed to correct for the fact that all hours worked are not of the same quality is constructed and its properties compared with unadjusted hours worked this efficiency units series is constructed from bls data on hours worked and earnings by age and sex the cyclical fluctuations displayed by the efficiency units series are smaller on average than those displayed by hours worked although the difference is not large however the secular behaviour of the series is quite different hours worked per capita displays a significant positive trend while efficiency units per capita does not

dynamic multilevel modelling of industrial energy demand in europe previous studies of industry level energy demand have not accounted for the hierarchical nesting of industries within a system that also adequately allows for country specific determinants of energy demand the principal contribution of this paper is therefore to analyse energy demand for european industries over the period 1995 2009 using a dynamic multilevel model that accounts for this hierarchical data structure among other things we find firstly that our dynamic multilevel model suggests that if industry income and the industry energy price increase by 10 long run energy demand will increase by 8 1 and fall by 6 8 respectively secondly we find that the corresponding long run income and price elasticities are substantially larger in a standard dynamic model of industry level energy demand which does not account for the hierarchical data structure our results therefore suggest that not accounting for the hierarchical data structure results in unreliable estimates of energy demand elasticities from a policy perspective we argue that it is imperative that future industry level energy demand studies account for the hierarchical structure of the data this is to prevent energy policy making being based on industry level evidence that substantially inflates the responsiveness of long run energy demand to income and price changes

capital energy substitution and the multi level ces production function abstract this paper has clarified a misconception in sato s multi level ces production function and used the function in testing for capital energy substitution in taiwanese manufacturing the empirical results show that capital and energy are substitutes and the aes estimates differ little from those derived from the translog approximation

quasi fixed inputs in u s and japanese manufacturing a generalized leontief restricted cost function approach in this paper a generalized leontief variable cost function is develope d which permits analytical derivation of steady state levels of quasi fixed inputs and capacity output and does not require specification of a numeraire input this framework is then used to evaluate the fa ctor demand patterns of japanese and u s manufacturing based on bot h one quasi fixed capital input and two quasi fixed capital and la bor input specifications and both static and dynamic optimization t he findings provide evidence of considerable flexibility of demand re sponses in japan which may have contributed to japan s relatively st rong economic performance in the volatile 1970s copyright 1988 by mit press

do manufacturing firms react to energy prices evidence from italy abstract the reaction of energy demand to price changes is a key policy issue as it describes the economy s response to changes in market conditions or to policy interventions the issue is even more important for the italian economy highly exposed to energy price changes given its almost complete fossil fuel related energy dependence environmental sensitivity and highly fragmented industrial structure besides the policy issue there is also an important methodological debate concerning the best way to evaluate energy demand elasticities looking at alternative models data and elasticity definitions after a discussion of the main methodological issues and the related empirical literature this paper presents an estimation of factor and fuel demand elasticities for italian industrial firms by using a microeconomic panel in a two stage translog model using cross price and morishima elasticities we obtain information on the magnitude and asymmetry of firms responses to price changes moreover the use of a micro dataset allows the high heterogeneity of italian firms to be considered the results are discussed according to technology intensity sector and firm size our findings show that energy is the most elastic input for all sectors and that capital and energy are substitutes in the low technology sector and weak complements in all others estimated interfuel elasticities show a high degree of demand sensitivity to fuel price changes and the vast majority of cross price elasticities exhibit substitutability appropriate fiscal policies can thus be identified to give an effective impulse in influencing the industrial energy mix by changing relative prices these findings constitute an important foundation for analysing energy demand by italian industrial firms given that empirical literature is particularly rare on the italian case study

the demand for capital labor and energy in european manufacturing industry before and after the oil price shocks the price and substitution elasticities for factor inputs capital labor fuels and electricity are estimated for total manufacturing industry on the basis of a pooled crosscountry time series analysis for nine west european countries the impact of the economic disturbances in the 1970s on the price sensitivity of demand is analyzed by estimating a translog cost function for two separate periods 1960 72 and 1973 80 hicks neutral technical change is rejected for both periods the results indicate some quite significant changes in the elasticities over the two periods

energy efficiency and economic growth a retrospective cge analysis for canada from 2002 to 2012 abstract the efficiency with which energy is used by firms and households has widespread impacts on economic activity which in turn has implications for environmental quality and energy security using a novel method that could be used for other jurisdictions we estimate the impact of energy efficiency improvements on canadian gdp employment economic structure and welfare from 2002 to 2012 we use a counterfactual back casting method with a sectorally and regionally disaggregated dynamic recursive computable general equilibrium model in effect reverse calibrating the model from observed data to isolate the effects of energy efficiency we estimate that total energy efficiency improvements in canada during this period increased gdp by 2 0 0 19 yr employment by 2 5 0 24 yr and household welfare by about 1 5 0 15 yr additionally energy efficiency improvements reoriented economic structure from capital intense energy supply sectors to relatively labour intense manufacturing and services we find evidence of widespread rebound on an energy expenditure basis across most sectors and backfire where energy efficiency leads to absolute energy use increases in oil sands in situ extraction bitumen upgrading shale gas extraction lime production pulp paper and metal smelting but overall energy use is reduced by energy efficiency improvements over this period

a nested ces approach to capital energy substitution abstract this paper uses the nested constant elasticity of substitution ces production function to estimate elasticities of substitution between capital labour energy and materials over the 1971 1976 period around the initial energy crisis elasticities are estimated for each of the two digit sic industries within us manufacturing using more disaggregate four digit sic data the nested ces function makes it possible to distinguish between engineering and economic elasticities of substitution capital and energy are estimated to be slight engineering substitutes and economic complements labour energy and materials are estimated economic substitutes

interfuel and interfactor substitution in ontario manufacturing 1962 82 the extent of substitutability between energy and the other factors i e labour and capital is an extremely important question and quite central to energy policy planning and analysis this paper addresses this question for the ontario manufacturing sector the theoretical model utilized in this analysis is the two stage translog production frontier the model was estimated for seven manufacturing sectors using four disaggregated energy inputs and labour and capital the model was estimated by the fiml technique for the period 1962 82

political sustainability and the design of social insurance this paper examines how the issue of political support affects the design of social insurance it distinguishes between redistributive character and size of social protection three main results emerge first it may be appropriate to adopt a system which is less redistributive than otherwise optimal in order to ensure political support for an adequate level of coverage in the second voting stage second supplementary private insurance may increase the welfare of the poor even if it is effectively bought only by the rich third the case for prohibiting supplementary private insurance may become stronger when the efficiency of private insurance markets increases

the redistributive design of social security systems countries with low intragenerational redistribution in social security systems bismarckian are associated with larger public pension expenditures a smaller fraction of private pension and lower income inequality than countries with more redistributive social security beveridgean this article introduces a bidimensional voting model to account for these features agents different in age income and in their ability to invest in the capital market vote on the degree of redistribution of the social security system and on the size of the transfer in an economy with three income groups a small beveridgean system is supported by low income agents who gain from its redistributive feature and high income individuals who seek to minimise their tax contribution and to invest in a private scheme middle income individuals instead favour a large bismarckian system

estimating the rebound effect in us manufacturing energy consumption abstract the energy price shocks of the 1970s are usually assumed to have increased the search for new energy saving technologies where eventual gains in energy efficiencies will reduce the real per unit price of energy services and hence the consumption of energy will rise and partially offset the initial reduction in the usage of energy sources this is the rebound effect which is estimated for the us manufacturing sector using time series data applying the dynamic ols method dols when allowing for asymmetric price effects the rebound effect is found to be approximately 24 for the us manufacturing sector

social security universal versus earnings dependent benefits i compare the welfare implications of bismarckian earnings dependent benefits and beveridgean universal benefits social security systems agents are better off with a beveridgean system than with a comparable bismarckian system in an environment with intragenerational homogeneity the latter results in a larger decrease in net wages with intragenerational skill heterogeneity most agents benefit from the more redistributive beveridgean system when agents vote for the replacement rates with intragenerational homogeneity the resulting bismarckian system is larger than the beveridgean system with intragenerational skill heterogeneity the beveridgean system is larger overall agents are worse off with the larger system

the demand for energy in greek manufacturing abstract this paper considers an econometric approach to measuring substitutability of three types of energy i e crude oil electricity and diesel with capital and labour in the manufacturing sector of greek industry during the period 1970 1990 a general dynamic framework is developed under the assumption that the structure of the production process is weakly separable in capital labour and energy aggregates the translog total cost function is used to represent the production technology the main advantages of the proposed dynamic structure are that it is both disaggregated in energy components and consistent with the neo classical theory of production

rational deterrence theory and comparative case studies several recent books have argued that comparative case studies of crises demonstrate the failure of rational deterrence theory they have offered certain empirical generalizations as substitutes this paper shows that such contentions are unwarranted first the empirical generalizations are impressive as historical insights but they do not meet the standards for theory set out by the most sophisticated case study analysts themselves second the tests of rational deterrence used in the case studies violate standard principles of inference and the ensuing procedures are so biased as to be useless rational deterrence then is a more successful theory than portrayed in this literature and it remains the only intellectually powerful alternative available case studies are essential to theory building more efficiently than any other methods they find suitable variables suggest middle range generalizations for theory to explain and provide the prior knowledge that statistical tests require their loose constraints on admissible propositions and suitable evidence are appropriate and even necessary for these tasks these same characteristics however inevitably undermine all attempts to construe case study generalizations as bodies of theory or tests of hypotheses

measuring the energy input substitution and output effects of energy price changes and the implications for the environment abstract previous studies of decomposition of factor inputs have limited their analysis on the estimation of substitution and output effects however this paper develops a two step approach to estimate the substitution and output effects of changes in energy demand resulting from changes in prices and further examines the implications of these effects on co2 emissions using european industrial dataset over the period 1995 2007 in our empirical estimations instead of relying only on isur model like previous studies we introduced a multilevel model which is a more befitting model to our data our analysis covers industry as a whole and for different sector types the primary results emerged from our analysis suggest a strong evidence using the multilevel model generally our results show that production inputs are substitutable we find the substitution and output effects to be negatively related to co2 emissions however the substitution effects dominate from policy perspectives our results suggest that output adjustments may not play a significant role in reducing emissions we find the overall effects of changes in energy demand to be moderate then we argue that increment in energy taxes should be complemented by cleaner factor substitution and sustainable growth to achieve a desirable carbon reduction

the capital energy substitutability debate a new look over the last twenty years many studies have been made of the elasticity of substitution between capital and labor the reported estimates are highly variable and reveal an apparent dichotomy between cross sectional and time series studies the former suggest that capital and energy are substitutes while the latter suggest the converse all these studies reported allen partial elasticities of substitution we suggest that the morishima elasticity may be a more useful measure for the issues of concern to capital energy substitution we calculate the morishima elasticities from parameters estimated in a selection of earlier studies and find no excessive variability nor any evidence of the time series cross section dichotomy capital and energy are morishima substitutes copyright 1995 by mit press

rationalist explanations for war realist and other scholars commonly hold that rationally led states can and sometimes do fight when no peaceful bargains exist that both would prefer to war against this view i show that under very broad conditions there will exist negotiated settlements that genuinely rational states would mutually prefer to a risky and costly fight popular rationalist and realist explanations for war fail either to address or to explain adequately what would prevent leaders from locating a less costly bargain essentially just two mechanisms can resolve this puzzle on strictly rationalist terms the first turns on the fact that states have both private information about capabilities and resolve and the incentive to misrepresent it the second turns on the fact that in specific strategic contexts states may be unable credibly to commit to uphold a mutually preferable bargain historical examples suggest that both mechanisms are empirically plausible

inter fuel substitution technical change and the demand for energy in the uk economy a model for energy demand based on a translog cost function is formulated unlike previous studies technical progress is modelled by means of stochastic as opposed to deterministic trend components the model is estimated using quarterly uk data for four economic sectors and forecasts of the future level of demand are made

social insurance majority voting and labor mobility abstract this paper presents a political economy approach to payroll tax competition between two countries choosing their respective systems of social insurance in a context of labor mobility it considers a class of social insurance systems which includes two interesting polar cases one where benefits are linked to contributions bismarck and one where benefits are flat beveridge the type of social insurance is chosen behind the veil of ignorance at a first constitutional stage in the second stage the generosity of social insurance as measured by the payroll tax rate is chosen by the majority given that some have the possibility to move the main results are as follows first the type of mobility namely poor vs rich has a significant impact on the second stage tax competition migration equilibrium second more bismarckian systems are not necessarily more tax competition proof third the process will result in social insurance systems with a stronger than optimal link between earnings and benefits put differently at the constitutional stage the countries will tend to adopt systems which are too bismarckian

engineering and econometric interpretations of energy capital complementarity comment in a recent paper in this review ernst berndt and david wood provide a useful clarification of gross and net complementarity pointing out that energy and capital can be gross substitutes in a production subfunction and yet net complements in the aggregate production function using this theoretical proposition they attempt to reconcile the econometric findings of energy capital complementarity with other studies finding energy capital substitutability their reconciliation rests on the finding that those studies finding energy capital substitutability considered only capital k labor l and energy e by omitting materials m one obtains only a gross elasticity the net elasticity which allows for the additional substitution between the kle aggregate and m can indicate energy capital complementarity in fact klem studies generally find energy and capital complementarity the purpose of this comment is to question whether the net and the gross elasticity distinction provides such a reconciliation among the econometric results i agree that this explanation tends to reduce the disparity between the original berndt wood elasticity estimate and griffin gregory yet three independent sources of evidence suggest that the omission of m is not a sufficient explanation and probably not even a major explanation for the disparity of findings first the difference between the gross elasticity in a kle submodel and the net elasticity in a klem model depends critically on the elasticity of substitution between m and kle let us adopt the berndt wood notation and consider their mathematical example which demonstrates the possibility of gross capital energy substitutability as in the griffin gregory study with net capital energy complementarity

u s soviet chinese relations routine reciprocity or rational expectations international relations theorists disagree about whether great power behaviors reflect bureaucratic routine or reciprocity recently some have suggested that these behaviors result from great powers rational expectations rather than from simple routine or reciprocity the debate is flawed in several respects the quasi experimental studies of great power behavior suffer from specification and measurement errors furthermore most studies of great power behavior focus exclusively on the superpowers without adequately appreciating china s role in world politics we present an improved analysis that recognizes the potential effects of chinese behavior and ameliorates the methodological flaws in existing work the results indicate that the behaviors of the united states the soviet union and china are a relatively stable mix of bureaucratic routine and reciprocity the results also indicate complex asymmetrical connections among u s soviet u s chinese and soviet chinese relations consistent with the notion of a strategic triangle

the impact of green innovation on energy intensity an empirical analysis for 14 industrial sectors in oecd countries abstract this paper analyses the impact of green innovation on energy intensity in a set of 14 industrial sectors in 17 oecd countries over the 1975 2005 period we create a stock of green patents for each industrial sector and estimate a translog cost function to measure the impact of green innovation on energy intensity next to other factors such as input substitution and autonomous technical change we find that green innovation has contributed to the decline in energy intensity in the majority of sectors the median elasticity of energy intensity with respect to green patenting is estimated at 0 03 in our sample hence a 1 increase in green patenting activities in a given sector is associated with a 0 03 decline in energy intensity the magnitude of the effect is robust across various specifications and is larger in more recent years a decomposition exercise shows that overall half of the decrease in energy intensity over the sample period is related to changes in input prices and half to changes in production technologies

energy conservation in china s light industry sector evidence from inter factor and inter fuel substitution following the impressive economic achievements in the past decades china is faced with energy and environmental challenges to carry out more effective and targeted energy policies the heterogeneities of different industrial sectors are of great importance the energy consumption of china s light industry in 2012 was 316 million tons of coal equivalents which is about the energy consumption of south korea the paper explored the substitution relationships between various input factors and fuel sources and showed that electricity price reform is crucial for energy conservation in china s light industry then the dynamics of energy intensity change is examined by decomposing energy intensity into budget effect substitution effect output effect and technology advance effect the result revealed that the substitution effect between input factors is a key driving force however technology progress seems to contribute very little for future energy policy alternatives promoting the implementation of new conservation technology and electricity price reform may be effective measures

factor substitution and energy productivity fluctuation in china a parametric decomposition analysis abstract technical research on energy productivity can support government officials as they evaluate practical energy policies for the future this study proposed a parametric method to decompose china s energy productivity rate of change into six factors based on a theoretical stochastic frontier analysis the method was applied to conduct an empirical study using inter provincial panel data in china from 1995 to 2012 the results highlighted three key points first the general rate of change in energy productivity was mainly influenced by a steady positive rate of change in technical progress combined with a steady negative rate of change in technical efficiency the core factors causing fluctuations in energy productivity included a positive rate of change in the substitution of capital and energy and a negative rate of change in the substitution of labor and energy second from a geographic perspective provinces with a high rate of change in technical progress experienced a weaker deterioration in technical efficiency however the rate of change in technical efficiency tends to decline as the rate of change in technical progress increases third there is a similar changing trend between the substitution of capital and energy and the substitution of labor and energy

an economic analysis of technology in the meat products industry the meat products industry underwent significant structural change during the last two decades the relocation and expansion of commercial cattle feeding stimulated development of new single species slaughtering facilities to replace older multi species plants an essentially new processing industry arose specializing in breaking and packaging carcasses this forward integration has significantly changed distribution methods of slaughtering and fabricating firms increased emphasis on coordination of inputs led to interest in backward integration from packing into cattle feeding the steer and heifer slaughtering sector which was decentralized and competitive in the 1950s has turned toward centralization and concentration although the largest firm accounted for only 13 of total u s steer and heifer slaughter in 1977 it had more than doubled its share since 1970 in 1978 this firm slaughtered more than twice as many steers and heifers as its nearest competitor in addi

asymmetric substitutability between energy and capital evidence from the manufacturing sectors in 10 oecd countries abstract this paper investigates the substitutability between energy and capital in the manufacturing sectors of ten oecd countries since 1980 by applying a cost function approach that has been widely used to analyze industrial energy demand first we attempt to determine the source of the disagreement in the literature on the substitutability between energy and capital and reach a conclusion regarding the substitutability between energy and capital dividing energy and capital into sub inputs we analyze their substitutability the empirical results indicate that fuel tends to complement capital in most countries whereas electricity and capital are substitutes thus this study confirms that heterogeneity in energy sources is a primary component of the systematic variation in the substitutability between energy and capital second we examine asymmetric substitutability between energy and capital by estimating the morishima elasticity of substitution the estimates of the morishima elasticity of substitution demonstrate that the substitution of energy for capital has dominated the substitution of capital for energy this asymmetric substitutability is natural from the producer perspective because capital costs are much greater than energy costs in most countries these results imply that the adoption of energy saving technologies has not been induced in response to increased energy prices

energy elasticities under divisia and btu aggregation abstract this paper considers two methods of energy aggregation divisia and btu a dynamic demand model is used to study the response of energy use to price and income changes under these two aggregation schemes while the short run responses of energy use are found to be similar the long run response is greater under divisia than under btu aggregation especially in periods of marked changes in energy prices

a positive theory of social security in many countries social security accounts for a large fraction of the government budget why is this so given that at any point in time the number of recipients of social security benefits is smaller than the number of contributors in the overlapping generations model studied in this paper all individuals currently alive vote on social security in every period in equilibrium the size of social security is larger the greater is the proportion of elderly people in the population and the greater is the inequality of pre tax income within each generation both predictions of the theory are supported by the empirical evidence in cross country data

output elasticities and inter factor substitution empirical evidence from the transportation sector of shanghai abstract as a major consumer of fossil fuels the transportation sector in shanghai presents a wide range of problems including air pollution noise and traffic congestion this study aims to explore the energy substitution effect based on a trans log production function to evaluate the contribution of each input factor to sectoral output and reveal the substitution possibilities between capital labor and energy to deal with a multicollinearity problem we adopt ridge regression to obtain the coefficient of each variable under the appropriate penalty value the bootstrap method is used for making statistical inferences and the 95 confidence interval is obtained with 1000 bootstrap samples the empirical results demonstrate the following 1 the output elasticities of capital 0 13 0 15 labor 0 24 0 25 and energy 0 43 0 48 are positive and show an increasing trend over the study period 2 the substitution elasticity between labor and energy is the highest among the input factors around 1 0095 with a slight decreasing trend 3 the substitution elasticity between energy and capital ranges from 1 0018 to 1 0021 and the substitution elasticity between capital and labor is infinitely close to 1

simulating fundamental tax reform in the united states this paper uses a new large scale dynamic life cycle simulation model to compare the welfare and macroeconomic effects of transitions to five fundamental alternatives to the u s federal income tax including a proportional consumption tax and a flat tax the model incorporates intragenerational heterogeneity and a detailed specification of alternative tax systems simulation results project significant long run increases in output for some reforms for other reforms namely those that seek to insulate the poor and initial older generations from adverse welfare changes long run output gains are modest