Contemporary Economic Policy articles from October 1995

Contemporary Economic Policy archives from October 1995

Pacific Rim trade and development: historical environment and future prospects.
October 1, 1995... I. INTRODUCTION Hou: With the Industrial Revolution, the "Epoch of Modern Growth" (EMG), as Kuznets (1966) called it, replaced centuries of settled agrarianism. The past two centuries has been essentially a gradual spread of the EMG, resulting...

Tying, banking, and antitrust: it's time for a change.
October 1, 1995... I. INTRODUCTION Though the twenty-first century is only a few years away, the American polity continues to view and treat commercial banks in terms of nineteenth century populist stereotypes: Banks are large, "rich," powerful institutions that...

Bank asset risk: evidence from early-warning models.
October 1, 1995... I. INTRODUCTION The recent U.S. financial difficulties serve as a reminder that accurately analyzing a bank's vulnerability to financial distress remains difficult. Although most observers of the U.S. banking difficulties would agree that...

In search of an optimal debt ratio for economic growth.
October 1, 1995... I. INTRODUCTION In recent years, federal deficits and debt have increased to phenomenal levels. In 1993, total debt reached $4.35 trillion, and the debt burden per capita amounted to $16,848. Measured in 1987 dollars, total debt and per capita...

Comparing partial and general equilibrium estimates of the welfare cost of inflation.
October 1, 1995... I. INTRODUCTION Estimates of the welfare cost of inflation serve vital functions in research and policy. They help in comparing model economies and in evaluating the policy of sustained inflation. Partial equilibrium estimates confuse these...

Time, money, and optimal criminal penalties.
October 1, 1995... I. INTRODUCTION Economic theory and widely held ideas of justice suggest that individuals guilty of identical crimes should face the same expected level of punishment. However, defining "identical crimes" and "expected levels of punishment" is...

Analyzing postsecondary returns: does educational loan default play a role?
October 1, 1995... I. INTRODUCTION Leslie and Brinkman (1988) provide comprehensive surveys of the large and well established literature on the economic returns of college degrees relative to high school educations. Little is known, however, about how the...

Willingness to pay for desert protection.
October 1, 1995... I. INTRODUCTION Establishing new national parks and wilderness areas in the Mojave desert of eastern California has the potential to alter significantly current and future land use patterns. For example, the 1993 version of the California...

Costs and benefits of air quality improvement in Hong Kong.
October 1, 1995... I. INTRODUCTION In 1989, a respiratory health survey of children aged eight to 11 found significant differences between children living in the heavily industrialized Kwai Tsing District of Hong Kong and children in a control group living in...

External economies in Taiwan's manufacturing industries.
October 1, 1995... I. INTRODUCTION The Taiwan economy has sustained economic growth in the past few decades. The average growth rate in real GNP was 8.9 percent for the period from 1952 to 1990. Even after the first oil shock, the Taiwan economy still grew at a...