Business Economics articles from July 2000

Business Economics archives from July 2000

[1] IN MEMORIUM.(Obituary)
July 1, 2000... Geoffrey H. Moore, a man who was well-known to members of NABE, died last March at eighty-six. He was important both for his accomplishments as a researcher and for his qualities as a human being. In his research role, Moore made an...

FROM THE EDITOR.
July 1, 2000... This issue contains two innovations to Business Economics. One will be a regular feature: Forum on Emerging Issues. The Forum is intended to be an early warning for issues that are over the horizon but will become important for business and...

Forecasting Inflation--Surveys Versus Other Forecasts.
July 1, 2000... SURVEYS OF EXPECTATIONS PERFORM AS WELL AS ECONOMIC MODELS AND BETTER THAN OTHER METHODS. Few forecasts are as common in business as forecasts for inflation. Surveys, time-series methods and structural econometric models are the most...

Bayesian VAR Forecasts Fail to Live Up to Their Promise.
July 1, 2000... FOR THE PERIOD 1981-1996, JUDGEMENTALLY ADJUSTED LARGE STRUCTURAL MACROECONOMIC MODELS FORECAST MORE ACCURATELY THAN BAYESIAN VAR MODELS. Macroeconomic forecasts from vector autoregression (VAR) models, in which the data are combined with...

The Political Economy of Child Labor and Its mpacts on International Business.
July 1, 2000... RIGHT OR WRONG, PERCEPTIONS THAT GLOBALIZATION LEADS TO EXPLOITATION OF CHILDREN ARE BECOMING AN IMPORTANT PROBLEM FOR INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS. Child labor is linked to global business directly and, more commonly, indirectly. Critics blame...

Remaking the World Financial System.
July 1, 2000... WORLD FINANCIAL STABILITY PROVIDES THE PLATFORM FOR INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS. WHAT STEPS ARE BEING TAKEN TO REDUCE THE PROBABILITY OF FUTURE FINANCIAL CRISES? Globalization of production and investment in recent years has led to an enormous...

Equity Valuation Cannot Outgrow the Economy Over the Long Run.
July 1, 2000... MACROECONOMIC THEORY AND HISTORICAL EVIDENCE SUGGEST THAT BOND PRICES HELP CAUSE LONG-RUN CONVERGENCE BETWEEN STOCK MARKET AND GDP GROWTH. Over the very long term the total dividend and capitalization of an economy's equity market should...

Economic Implications of "The Senior Citizens' Freedom to Work Act of 2000".
July 1, 2000... THE IMPLICATIONS OF THIS ACT ARE MORE COMPLEX THAN THEY MIGHT APPEAR. PRIVATE EMPLOYERS, IN PARTICULAR, ARE LIKELY TO FIND THAT IT CREATES PROBLEMS AS WELL AS OPPORTUNITIES. On April 7, 2000 President Clinton signed "The Senior Citizens'...

Census Bureau Moves Ahead on Measuring E-business.
July 1, 2000... Both authors are with the Bureau of Economic Analysis, U.S. Department of Commerce. Based on material provided by Thomas Mesenbourg of the U.S. Bureau of the Census, this article describes strategies the Census Bureau is using to...

Heavy Construction Equipment: Vitality in an "Old Economy" Sector.
July 1, 2000... The world demand for heavy construction equipment is projected to increase by 5.9 percent per year through 2003, almost identical to the 1993-1998 rate and exceeding the rate projected four years earlier. Continued healthy growth is attributed...

Is the U.S. Current-Account Deficit Sustainable?(Brief Article)
July 1, 2000... The decade-long deterioration in the current account of the U.S. balance of payments has sharply accelerated in the last three years. After minor deficits in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the deficits in the current account climbed to over...

Implications of the Treasury Buy-Back Program.(Brief Article)
July 1, 2000... As the government surplus swelled in the U.S. in 2000, the Treasury began repurchasing long-dated bonds. The buy-back program had a dramatic impact on the financial sector, significantly reducing liquidity in the market for thirty-year Treasury...

Stock Markets, Speculative Bubbles and Economic Growth: New Dimensions in the Co -evolution of Real and Financial Markets.(Review)
July 1, 2000... By Mathias Binswanger, Cheltenham, UK and Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar Publishing, 1999, 368 pp., $110.00 hardcover. As the U.S. stock market moved into record highs and uncharted waters by any historical valuation measures, a cottage...

Economical Writing.
July 1, 2000... By Deirdre N. McCloskey, Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, 2000, 98 pp., $8.95 softcover. Economica1 Writing is well worth reading. Economists can learn much from this short book (I certainly did), and they can read it in less than two...

The Illustrated Guide to the American Economy.(Review)
July 1, 2000... Third Edition by Herbert Stein and Murray Foss, Washington, DC: The AEI Press, 1999, 283 pp-, $19.95 paper. This book was written "in the belief that talk about the American economy suffered from a lack of information and that an attempt...

The Lexus and the Olive Tree.(Review)
July 1, 2000... By Thomas L. Friedman, New York, NY: Farrar Straus Giroux, 1999, 394 pp $27.50 hardcover, $15.00 paperback (revised and expanded, New York: Anchor/Random House, 2000). Pulitzer Prize-winning author Tom Friedman, foreign affairs columnist...