Fiscal policy is an effective instrument in helping governments in developed countries overcome a recession with a high unemployment rate or a hot economy with a high inflation rate to keep the economy on a stable path. Does governance contribute significantly to keeping this goal in these countries? The study looks for an answer by empirically investigating the role of governance in the output gap – fiscal policy relationship for a group of 27 developed countries between 2002 and 2019. It employs the difference GMM Arellano-Bond estimators and the PMG estimator for estimation and robustness check. The results provide some interesting findings. Firstly, both public spending and government revenue are counter-cyclical, confirming the counter-cyclical fiscal policy in developed countries. Secondly, governance hinders the counter-cyclical fiscal policy. The findings imply some crucial policies for governments in developed countries in running the fiscal policy.
{"title":"Counter-cyclical Fiscal Policy in Developed Countries: Does Governance Hinder?","authors":"Nguyen Van Bon","doi":"10.18267/j.pep.814","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18267/j.pep.814","url":null,"abstract":"Fiscal policy is an effective instrument in helping governments in developed countries overcome a recession with a high unemployment rate or a hot economy with a high inflation rate to keep the economy on a stable path. Does governance contribute significantly to keeping this goal in these countries? The study looks for an answer by empirically investigating the role of governance in the output gap – fiscal policy relationship for a group of 27 developed countries between 2002 and 2019. It employs the difference GMM Arellano-Bond estimators and the PMG estimator for estimation and robustness check. The results provide some interesting findings. Firstly, both public spending and government revenue are counter-cyclical, confirming the counter-cyclical fiscal policy in developed countries. Secondly, governance hinders the counter-cyclical fiscal policy. The findings imply some crucial policies for governments in developed countries in running the fiscal policy.","PeriodicalId":45324,"journal":{"name":"Prague Economic Papers","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41730680","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Financial Stability and Income Inequality in Developing Countries","authors":"Margaret Rutendo Magwedere, G. Marozva","doi":"10.18267/j.pep.815","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18267/j.pep.815","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45324,"journal":{"name":"Prague Economic Papers","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45017505","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
2 This paper deals with Czech household mortgage debt and its determinants in the period 1Q2005–2Q2021. Our analysis focuses on the variables determining the level of mortgage debt from both short- and long-term perspectives. Our contribution is two-fold. Firstly, we examine the relationship between the selected variables within a cross-correlation analysis. The results confirm the positive dependency of household mortgage debt and real GDP, real gross average income and the level of house prices. By contrast, a negative relationship was identified for real interest rates, the unemployment rate and the inflation rate. Secondly, we explore the ARDL and EC models and identify one cointegration relationship. Our results confirm that house prices and real wages are determinants of household mortgage debt in the long-term perspective. However, a wider range of variables plays a role in the short run, including house prices, real gross average income, inflation and long-term interest rates. Moreover, our model indicates the insignificance of unemployment in both the short and long run.
{"title":"Modelling Household Mortgage Debt: the case of the Czech Republic","authors":"L. Fiala","doi":"10.18267/j.pep.816","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18267/j.pep.816","url":null,"abstract":"2 This paper deals with Czech household mortgage debt and its determinants in the period 1Q2005–2Q2021. Our analysis focuses on the variables determining the level of mortgage debt from both short- and long-term perspectives. Our contribution is two-fold. Firstly, we examine the relationship between the selected variables within a cross-correlation analysis. The results confirm the positive dependency of household mortgage debt and real GDP, real gross average income and the level of house prices. By contrast, a negative relationship was identified for real interest rates, the unemployment rate and the inflation rate. Secondly, we explore the ARDL and EC models and identify one cointegration relationship. Our results confirm that house prices and real wages are determinants of household mortgage debt in the long-term perspective. However, a wider range of variables plays a role in the short run, including house prices, real gross average income, inflation and long-term interest rates. Moreover, our model indicates the insignificance of unemployment in both the short and long run.","PeriodicalId":45324,"journal":{"name":"Prague Economic Papers","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49059317","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Relationship Between Output Volatility and Output in OECD Countries Revisited","authors":"Aykut Ekinci","doi":"10.18267/j.pep.812","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18267/j.pep.812","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45324,"journal":{"name":"Prague Economic Papers","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42873569","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Qingjie Zhou, Mingyue Du, Zhenling Chen, Tianshun Miao, Guoge Yang
1 2 3 The sustainable development of the digital economy has attracted wide attention. To ex-plore how to improve the operational performance of China’s digital firms, this paper conducts an influence mechanism model to test the nonlinear effect, heterogeneity effects, and mediation effects using a panel data of China’s digital firms from 2008 to 2017. The empirical results indicate that R&D subsidies have an inverted U-shaped effect on operational performance, and these results are still valid after a series of robustness tests. In addition, we find that R&D subsidies have a heterogeneous effect on operational performance in terms of region, company size, governance structure, and executive education background. Moreover, regarding the influence mechanism, R&D subsidies improve operational performance by improving innovation efficiency. This paper proposes some policy implications to improve the operational performance of China’s digital firms.
{"title":"Do R&D Subsidies Improve Operational Performance? New evidence from China","authors":"Qingjie Zhou, Mingyue Du, Zhenling Chen, Tianshun Miao, Guoge Yang","doi":"10.18267/j.pep.809","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18267/j.pep.809","url":null,"abstract":"1 2 3 The sustainable development of the digital economy has attracted wide attention. To ex-plore how to improve the operational performance of China’s digital firms, this paper conducts an influence mechanism model to test the nonlinear effect, heterogeneity effects, and mediation effects using a panel data of China’s digital firms from 2008 to 2017. The empirical results indicate that R&D subsidies have an inverted U-shaped effect on operational performance, and these results are still valid after a series of robustness tests. In addition, we find that R&D subsidies have a heterogeneous effect on operational performance in terms of region, company size, governance structure, and executive education background. Moreover, regarding the influence mechanism, R&D subsidies improve operational performance by improving innovation efficiency. This paper proposes some policy implications to improve the operational performance of China’s digital firms.","PeriodicalId":45324,"journal":{"name":"Prague Economic Papers","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-12-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43324206","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
12 This paper presents the impact of fiscal councils in the European Union on public finance. Using a fiscal reaction function, the impact of fiscal councils on the discretionary component of fiscal policy is examined. The impact of fiscal councils is a topical issue due to the fact that most EU countries have established fiscal councils in response to the EU legislation adopted after the last financial crisis. The empirical results imply that fiscal councils are complementary to numerical fiscal rules and instrumental for limiting deficit bias in the EU countries, most importantly through monitoring of compliance with fiscal rules and endorsement of macroeconomic and budgetary forecasts. Despite certain research limits, the empirical results point to similar conclusions as from recent papers. Out of the empirical findings, several recommendations can be made for fiscal policy-making.
{"title":"FISCAL COUNCILS IN EU MEMBER STATES: IMPACT ON FISCAL DISCIPLINE","authors":"Martin Gorčák, Stanislav Šaroch","doi":"10.18267/j.pep.810","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18267/j.pep.810","url":null,"abstract":"12 This paper presents the impact of fiscal councils in the European Union on public finance. Using a fiscal reaction function, the impact of fiscal councils on the discretionary component of fiscal policy is examined. The impact of fiscal councils is a topical issue due to the fact that most EU countries have established fiscal councils in response to the EU legislation adopted after the last financial crisis. The empirical results imply that fiscal councils are complementary to numerical fiscal rules and instrumental for limiting deficit bias in the EU countries, most importantly through monitoring of compliance with fiscal rules and endorsement of macroeconomic and budgetary forecasts. Despite certain research limits, the empirical results point to similar conclusions as from recent papers. Out of the empirical findings, several recommendations can be made for fiscal policy-making.","PeriodicalId":45324,"journal":{"name":"Prague Economic Papers","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-12-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47908934","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Frederik Rech, Chen Yan, Amon Bagonza, Lubomir Pinter, H. Musa
12 The research and investment community seems to ignore the long-term sustainability of Bitcoin, which is reflected in four flaws: transaction fees, miners’ revenue, concentration and electricity consumption. While most of the authors have aimed to examine one topic at a time, with a particular interest in electricity consumption and carbon footprint, the aim of this paper is to examine all these issues simultaneously to provide a more comprehensive view on long-term sustainability of Bitcoin. This paper looks at these flaws and reveals why Bitcoin is not sustainable in the long run, how decentralization is being lost, how the design is putting artificial and unrealistic pressure on the ecosystem, while all being powered by an unjustifiable amount of dirty electricity sources. Our main findings are as follows. Firstly, transaction fees are already high and set to increase in time, further discriminating small transactions against big ones. Secondly, miners’ revenue comes mostly from the block reward. The block reward is the main income source for miners, but is set to be cut on a regular basis, making miners’ revenue not sustainable in the long run. Thirdly, miner concentration is already an issue, with a possibility of deepening even more and diminishing the idea of decentralization. Fourthly, the high electricity demand and the associated carbon footprint thus cannot be justified by any means. We deem our results useful for overall policy and regulatory implications.
{"title":"Bitcoin Transaction Fees, Miners' Revenue, Concentration and Electricity Consumption: A Failing Ecosystem","authors":"Frederik Rech, Chen Yan, Amon Bagonza, Lubomir Pinter, H. Musa","doi":"10.18267/j.pep.817","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18267/j.pep.817","url":null,"abstract":"12 The research and investment community seems to ignore the long-term sustainability of Bitcoin, which is reflected in four flaws: transaction fees, miners’ revenue, concentration and electricity consumption. While most of the authors have aimed to examine one topic at a time, with a particular interest in electricity consumption and carbon footprint, the aim of this paper is to examine all these issues simultaneously to provide a more comprehensive view on long-term sustainability of Bitcoin. This paper looks at these flaws and reveals why Bitcoin is not sustainable in the long run, how decentralization is being lost, how the design is putting artificial and unrealistic pressure on the ecosystem, while all being powered by an unjustifiable amount of dirty electricity sources. Our main findings are as follows. Firstly, transaction fees are already high and set to increase in time, further discriminating small transactions against big ones. Secondly, miners’ revenue comes mostly from the block reward. The block reward is the main income source for miners, but is set to be cut on a regular basis, making miners’ revenue not sustainable in the long run. Thirdly, miner concentration is already an issue, with a possibility of deepening even more and diminishing the idea of decentralization. Fourthly, the high electricity demand and the associated carbon footprint thus cannot be justified by any means. We deem our results useful for overall policy and regulatory implications.","PeriodicalId":45324,"journal":{"name":"Prague Economic Papers","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-12-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45729686","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
123 The active participation of the central bank in exchange rate management has accelerated the growth of foreign exchange reserve in India. The massive reserve stockpiling has substantially contributed to apprehensions about excess liquidity in the domestic economy. The extent to which these concerns are justified depends on the degree to which the central bank is able to mitigate its effects on monetary aggregates. This study is an attempt to assess the magnitude of the sterilization coefficient by using quarterly data from 1996 to 2019. In order to estimate sterilization and offset coefficients, the study employed the two-stage least squares (2SLS) method under the theoretical framework of simultaneous equation modelling. The findings show that the reserve accumulation through central bank interventions puts pressure on money supply. However, the RBI sterilization policy was effective as the central bank was able to sterilize 93 percent of its interventions, while the offset coefficient was 72 percent during the period of study. The low value of the offset coefficient compared to the sterilization coefficient indicates a high degree of monetary policy independence in neutralizing the central bank’s purchase interventions. Based on the findings, it can be recommended that policymakers should consider the sustainability of interventions and sterilization operations as the dual policy objectives of independent exchange rate management and monetary policy cannot be achieved in the presence of a high interest rate in an inflation-targeting regime.
{"title":"An Assessment of The Effectiveness of Sterilization of Central Bank Interventions: Empirical Evidence from India","authors":"A. Rishad, S. Gupta, A. Sharma","doi":"10.18267/j.pep.808","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18267/j.pep.808","url":null,"abstract":"123 The active participation of the central bank in exchange rate management has accelerated the growth of foreign exchange reserve in India. The massive reserve stockpiling has substantially contributed to apprehensions about excess liquidity in the domestic economy. The extent to which these concerns are justified depends on the degree to which the central bank is able to mitigate its effects on monetary aggregates. This study is an attempt to assess the magnitude of the sterilization coefficient by using quarterly data from 1996 to 2019. In order to estimate sterilization and offset coefficients, the study employed the two-stage least squares (2SLS) method under the theoretical framework of simultaneous equation modelling. The findings show that the reserve accumulation through central bank interventions puts pressure on money supply. However, the RBI sterilization policy was effective as the central bank was able to sterilize 93 percent of its interventions, while the offset coefficient was 72 percent during the period of study. The low value of the offset coefficient compared to the sterilization coefficient indicates a high degree of monetary policy independence in neutralizing the central bank’s purchase interventions. Based on the findings, it can be recommended that policymakers should consider the sustainability of interventions and sterilization operations as the dual policy objectives of independent exchange rate management and monetary policy cannot be achieved in the presence of a high interest rate in an inflation-targeting regime.","PeriodicalId":45324,"journal":{"name":"Prague Economic Papers","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-12-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47043364","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper analyses the asymmetric behaviour of exchange rate pass-through in Turkey using a threshold VAR model. The main purpose is to examine the asymmetries in the exchange rate pass-through based on size, direction and inflationary environment of an emerging market economy with a highly depreciated domestic currency and two-digit inflation rate. Monthly exchange rate movements and monthly inflation rates were used as threshold variables. Nonlinear impulse response functions were employed to compare upper and lower regimes. According to our findings, the transmission of exchange rate shocks to domestic inflation in the upper regime is stronger than that in the lower regime. The pass-through increases with the magnitude of shocks. Besides, positive shocks have more effect on domestic prices than negative shocks, especially in the upper regime. A positive relationship between inflation and exchange rate pass-through exists. During high inflation periods, pass-through to domestic prices increases.
{"title":"Asymmetries in Exchange Rate Pass-through in Turkey: A Threshold VAR Analysis","authors":"M. Türel, Ayhan Orhan","doi":"10.18267/j.pep.806","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.18267/j.pep.806","url":null,"abstract":"This paper analyses the asymmetric behaviour of exchange rate pass-through in Turkey using a threshold VAR model. The main purpose is to examine the asymmetries in the exchange rate pass-through based on size, direction and inflationary environment of an emerging market economy with a highly depreciated domestic currency and two-digit inflation rate. Monthly exchange rate movements and monthly inflation rates were used as threshold variables. Nonlinear impulse response functions were employed to compare upper and lower regimes. According to our findings, the transmission of exchange rate shocks to domestic inflation in the upper regime is stronger than that in the lower regime. The pass-through increases with the magnitude of shocks. Besides, positive shocks have more effect on domestic prices than negative shocks, especially in the upper regime. A positive relationship between inflation and exchange rate pass-through exists. During high inflation periods, pass-through to domestic prices increases.","PeriodicalId":45324,"journal":{"name":"Prague Economic Papers","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2022-09-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44289548","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}