Economics of Transition and Institutional Change最新文献

This paper presents an empirical analysis of the social contract (SC) in MENA based on a simple model synthesizing three main characteristics of a SC linking governments and citizens: Participation, Protection, and Provision. Using this 3-P framework, we focus on the role of provision and protection in determining citizen participation, a question that drew much attention following the recent economic and social developments in MENA. We compare our characterization of the SC in MENA and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries and find robust empirical evidence that, in MENA, the benefits provided to citizens through improved delivery of basic services have come at the cost of impaired participation. We also find that digital transformation, a potential channel through which the SC may improve, has an inversely U-shaped effect suggesting that institutional changes are called for in MENA countries before their SC is comparable to that of OECD countries.

A wealth of evidence has shown the positive effects of better management practices on firms. More recent evidence has highlighted that ownership matters for several developing and advanced economies. However, this relationship has not been studied extensively for economies in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), a region where the presence of the government in the productive sphere looms large. This study addresses a gap in the literature by exploring how partial government ownership can influence management practices of medium and large formal firms in the MENA. Using two waves of Enterprise Surveys undertaken in 2013 and 2019/2020, the evidence points at a negative relationship between partial government ownership and management practices in the developing MENA region. The findings pass several robustness checks.

In this paper, we analyse the effect of fiscal policy volatility on capital flight. Based on a sample of 27 African countries over the period 1970–2018 and using System generalised method (GMM) of moments, we show that fiscal policy volatility increases capital flight. Specif-ically, our baseline results indicate that an increase in fiscal policy volatility by 1% increases capital flight by 1.4%. In other words, an increase in fiscal policy volatility by 100% increases capital flight by 140% or by 40% above the increase in the cause, that is, fiscal policy volatility. These results are robust to additional control variables, alternative methods, samples, and specifications, and may vary with the initial level of capital flight.

This study involved a meta-analysis of 506 estimates extracted from 75 studies to estimate the effect size of rural household registration (hukou) on wage levels. Our meta-synthesis results indicated that the negative effect of rural hukou on wages is statistically significant; however, the effect size remains small in terms of the partial correlation coefficient. The results of the meta-regression analysis and test for publication selection bias indicated that the differences in the wage effect of hukou among genders, corporate ownership sectors, and periods are insignificant. We also found that publication selection bias is unlikely, and genuine evidence exists in the literature.

This study investigates the sources of economic growth for Latin American economies. With two centuries of data and extended growth accounting methods, the study shows that poor total factor productivity (TFP) growth is the key to understanding Latin America's low economic growth relative to other economies. Using a functional form of TFP growth, based on second-generation growth models, furthers analyses to show some empirical evidence for growth induced by R&D, knowledge spillovers, educational attainment and the distance to the frontier. However, the magnitude effect is very small and when compared to the OECD countries, the gap between the TFP growth generating factors is very substantial. An intricate policy structure should be implemented for Latin America to foster an environment that is conducive to aid permanent TFP and economic growth.