Publications

1681 publications found

• Working Paper No. 358 October 01, 2002

  Threshold Effects in the US Budget Deficit

  Philip Arestis, Andrea Cipollini, and Bassam Fattouh
  Abstract

  This paper contributes to the debate on whether the United States’ large federal budget deficits are sustainable in the long run. The authors model the government deficit per capita as a threshold autoregressive process, finding evidence that the deficit is sustainable in the long run and that economic policymakers will intervene to reduce the per […]

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• Working Paper No. 357 October 01, 2002

  The Euro, Public Expenditure, and Taxation

  Philip Arestis, and Malcolm Sawyer
  Abstract

  This paper explores the probable consequences for public expenditure in the United Kingdom if Britain were to join the euro. It focuses on the effects of sterling joining the euro (and the associated implications, such as monetary policy being governed by the European Central Bank). It does not consider any broader questions of the effects […]

  Download Working Paper No. 357 PDF (88.70 KB)
• Working Paper No. 356 October 01, 2002

  Asset Poverty in the United States, 1984–1999

  Asena Caner, and Edward N. Wolff
  Abstract

  Using PSID data for the years 1984 to 1999, we estimate the level and severity of asset poverty. Our results indicate that the share of asset-poor households remained almost the same and the severity of poverty increased during this period, despite the growth in the economy and the financial markets. The race, age, education, and […]

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• Working Paper No. 355 October 01, 2002

  Can Monetary Policy Affect the Real Economy?

  Philip Arestis, and Malcolm Sawyer
  Abstract

  Current monetary policy involves the manipulation of the central bank interest rate (the repo rate), with the specific objective of achieving the goal(s) of monetary policy. The latter is normally the inflation rate, although in a number of instances this may include the level of economic activity (the monetary policy of the United States’ Federal […]

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• Working Paper No. 354 October 01, 2002

  Should Banks Be Narrowed?

  Biagio Bossone
  Abstract

  Over the past 70 years, a proposal to narrow the scope of banks has emerged more and more frequently in financial debates and research. Narrow banking would prevent deposit-issuing banks from lending to the private sector and restrict nonbank intermediaries from funding investments with demand deposits. Proponents of narrow banking defend it as a step […]

  Download Working Paper No. 354 PDF (167.51 KB)
• Working Paper No. 353 September 01, 2002

  Managed Care, Physician Incentives, and Norms of Medical Practice

  David J. Cooper, and James B. Rebitzer
  Abstract

  The incentive contracts that managed care organizations write with physicians have generated considerable controversy. Critics fear that if informational asymmetries inhibit patients from directly assessing the quality of care provided by their physician, competition will lead to a “race to the bottom” in which managed care plans induce physicians to offer only minimal levels of […]

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• Working Paper No. 352 September 01, 2002

  Critical Realism and the Political Economy of the Euro

  Philip Arestis, Andrew Brown, and Malcolm Sawyer
  Abstract

  This paper is concerned with two issues. First, it discusses some of the main problems and inferences the methodological approach of critical realism raises for empirical work in economics, while considering an approach adopted to try to overcome these problems. Second, it provides a concrete illustration of these arguments, with reference to our recent research […]

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• Public Policy Brief No. 68 August 01, 2002

  Optimal CRA Reform

  Kenneth H. Thomas
  Abstract

  At issue in the debate over the renewal of the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) of 1977 are the various yardsticks regulators use to judge whether individual institutions are meeting the credit and service needs of low- and moderate-income (LMI) communities. Based on careful examination of new CRA data and assessments of comments by selected stakeholders, […]

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• Working Paper No. 351 August 01, 2002

  Race, Ethnicity, and the Gender-poverty Gap

  Yuval Elmelech, and Hsien-Hen Lu
  Abstract

  We use data from the Current Population Survey (CPS 1994-2001) to document the relationship between gender-specific demographic variations and the gender-poverty gap among eight racial/ethnic groups. We find that black and Puerto Rican women experience a double disadvantage owing to being both women and members of a minority group. As compared with whites, however, gender […]

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• Working Paper No. 349 July 01, 2002

  State Policies and the Warranted Growth Rate

  Jamee K. Moudud
  Abstract

  This paper raises questions about austerity policies by investigating the effects of the state’s tax and expenditure policies on the warranted growth rate. It proposes two mechanisms to raise the warranted growth rate in the event that there is long-run unemployment. First, it incorporates Pasinetti’s taxation function into Harrod’s growth framework to show how, with […]

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• Working Paper No. 350 July 01, 2002

  Polish and Italian Schooling Then, Mexican Schooling Now?

  Joel Perlmann
  Abstract

  This paper relies on data from the census and the Current Population Survey (CPS) to compare levels of education attained by second-generation young people from important immigrant groups during the last great wave of immigration and by second-generation Mexican Americans today. In addition, it provides evidence, based on the CPS, about the earnings relative to […]

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• Working Paper No. 348 June 01, 2002

  Asset Prices, Liquidity Preference, and the Business Cycle

  Korkut A. Ertürk
  Abstract

  In his Treatise on Money, John Maynard Keynes relied on two different premises to argue that the interest rate need not rise with rising levels of expenditure. One of these was the elasticity of the money supply, and the other was the interaction between financial and industrial circulation. A decrease (increase) in what Keynes called […]

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• Working Paper No. 347 June 01, 2002

  What Has Happened to Monetarism?

  Jörg Bibow
  Abstract

  It is widely perceived that today’s conventional monetary wisdom, and the common practice of monetary policy based thereupon, is essentially “monetarist” by nature, if not by name. One objective of this paper is to assess whether monetarism has had a lasting effect on the theory and practice of monetary policy; another is to scrutinize the […]

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• Working Paper No. 346 June 01, 2002

  CRA’s 25th Anniversary

  Kenneth H. Thomas
  Abstract

  This paper focuses on the past, present, and future rules and regulations implementing CRA as developed, applied, and enforced by the federal bank and thrift regulators. The past rules and regulations refer to those in effect during the law’s first 18 years, through 1995, when CRA underwent its first major reform. The present CRA rules […]

  Download Working Paper No. 346 PDF (609.95 KB)
• Working Paper No. 345 May 01, 2002

  The “Third Way” and the Challenges to Economic and Monetary Union Macropolicies

  Philip Arestis, and Malcolm Sawyer
  Abstract

  In the United Kingdom the emergence of a “New Labour” has been closely associated with the development of the notion of the “third way.” Tony Blair, for example, stated that “New Labour is neither old left nor new right. . . . Instead we offer a new way ahead, that leads from the centre but […]

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• Strategic Analysis April 01, 2002

  Strategic Prospects and Policies for the US Economy

  Wynne Godley
  Abstract

  Notwithstanding the great achievements of the American economy, the growth of aggregate demand during the past several years has been structured in a way that would eventually prove unsustainable. During the main period of economic expansion, the fiscal stance tightened at a much greater pace than in any period during the previous 40 years, and […]

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• Policy Notes No. 3 March 01, 2002

  European Integration and the “Euro Project”

  Philip Arestis, and Malcolm Sawyer
  Abstract

  The introduction of the euro has been a significant step in the integration of the economies of the countries that form the European Union (EU) and the 12 countries that comprise the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). Its adoption not only means that a single currency prevails across the Eurozone, with reduced transactions costs for […]

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• Working Paper No. 344 March 01, 2002

  Dollarization

  Alex Izurieta
  Abstract

  When economies “dollarize,” their exchange rate and monetary policy, both considered to be sources of instability, are simultaneously discarded. Often, dollarization becomes an attractive option for developing countries that have experienced successive failures of exchange rate and monetary management. This paper makes use of a theoretical model that shows, contrary to the commonly accepted view, […]

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• Policy Notes No. 2 February 01, 2002

  The Brazilian Swindle and the Larger International Monetary Problem

  James K. Galbraith
  Abstract

  The International Monetary Fund has offered Brazil a $30 billion loan, most of it reserved for next year, on condition that the country continue to run a large primary surplus in the government budget. In this way the Fund maintains a strong arm over Brazil’s next government. Any significant move toward fiscal expansion would trigger […]

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• Working Paper No. 343 February 01, 2002

  Poles and Italians Then, Mexicans Now?

  Joel Perlmann
  Abstract

  A good deal of recent discussion among social scientists concerned with immigration is about the disadvantages faced by immigrants who enter the American labor force with much-lower levels of skills than those possessed by the typical native white worker. Among contemporary immigrant groups, by far the most important example is the Mexicans. The challenges faced […]

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• Working Paper No. 342 February 01, 2002

  A Note on the Hicksian Concept of Income

  Ajit Zacharias
  Abstract

  Empirical studies of intertemporal dynamics of individual income, distribution of personal income, and growth and distribution of national income are all based on statistics that rely on some concept of income. The dominant one today appears to be the so-called Haig-Simons-Hicks (HSH) concept of income. I examine the foundations of this concept in Hicks? Value […]

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• Policy Notes No. 1 January 01, 2002

  Kick-Start Strategy Fails to Fire Sputtering US Economic Motor

  Wynne Godley
  Abstract

  There is a strategic need, if a “growth recession” is to be avoided, for a new motor to drive the economy, particularly if there is a further decline in private expenditure relative to income that could generate a further hole in aggregate demand.

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• Working Paper No. 341 November 01, 2001

  Israeli Attitudes about Inter Vivos Transfers

  Yuval Elmelech
  Abstract

  Using data from the 1994–95 Survey of Families in Israel—which includes 1,607 urban Jewish respondents interviewed on topics relating to work behavior, household income, wealth, assistance received from parents and given to children, and views about financial responsibilities between parents and children—the authors examined attitudes in Israel about intergenerational assistance and the effects of these […]

• Public Policy Brief No. 67 November 01, 2001

  The Economic Consequences of German Unification

  Jörg Bibow
  Abstract

  Although the costs associated with moving an antiquated socialist economy toward its capitalist counterpart was anticipated to be significant, German industrial efficiency was expected to quickly overcome any challenges. Things turned out rather differently. Conventional wisdom blamed poor economic performance on unification. The government and the Bundesbank therefore put in place fiscal and monetary policies […]

  Download Public Policy Brief No. 67, 2002 PDF (325.91 KB)