Does Military Spending Explode External Debt in Pakistan?

This paper explores the effect of military expenditures on external debt in case of Pakistan over the period of 1973-2009. For this purpose, ARDL bounds testing approach is used to examine cointegration between the variables. ADF, P-P and ADF-GLS, Clemente et al. (1998) unit root tests are applied to check the order of integration of variables. OLS and ECM regressions approaches are employed to investigate marginal impact of military spending on external debt in long and short run. Our findings indicate cointegration which confirms long run relationship between military expenditures, external debt, economic growth and investment. The results reveal that a rise in military expenditures increases the stock of external debt. The inverse effect of economic growth on external debt is found and an increase in investment is also increasing external debt in the country. This study invites policy makers to approach the problem of curtailing external debt in innovative ways in case of Pakistan.Military Spending, External Debt, Cointegration

Effect of financial development on agricultural growth in Pakistan: new extensions from bounds test to level relationships and granger causality tests

This study investigates the relationship between financial development and agriculture growth employing Cobb-Douglas function which incorporates financial development as an important factor of production for the period 1971-2011. The ARDL bounds testing approach to cointegration is applied to examine long run relationship between the variables. The direction of causality is detected by VACM Granger causality test and robustness of causality results is tested through innovative accounting approach (IAA). Our findings confirm that the variables are cointegrated for equilibrium long run relationship between agriculture growth, financial development, capital and labor. The results indicate that financial development has a positive effect on agricultural growth. This implies that financial development plays its significant role in stemming agricultural production and hence agricultural growth. The capital use in the agriculture sector also contributes to the agricultural growth. The Granger causality analysis reveals bidirectional causality between agricultural growth and financial development. The robustness of these results is confirmed by innovative accounting approach (IAA). This study has important policy implications for policy making authorities to stimulate agricultural growth by improving the efficiency of financial sector.Agriculture Growth, Financial Development, Cointegration

Financial Development, Energy Consumption and CO2 Emissions: Evidence from ARDL Approach for Pakistan

The paper explores the existence of a long run equilibrium relationship among CO2 emissions, financial development, economic growth, energy consumption, and population growth in Pakistan. ARDL bounds testing approach to cointegration is implemented to the data for 1974-2009. The results confirm a long run relation among these variables. Financial development appears to help reduce CO2 emissions. The main contributors to CO2 emissions however are: economic growth, population growth and energy consumption. Our results also lend support to the existence of Environmental Kuznets Curve for Pakistan. Based on the findings we argue that policy focus on financial development might be helpful in reducing environmental degradation.Financial Development, CO2 Emissions, Cointegration

Devaluation and income inequality: Evidence from Pakistan

The paper examines the impact of nominal devaluation on income distribution in Pakistan. In the empirical model we include economic growth, measured per capita; trade-openness; foreign direct investment (FDI); unemployment and inflation rates which appear well justified in the particular context of the economy of Pakistan. The Auto Regressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) bounds testing approach to cointegration has been employed for the long run relation; and the Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) for the short run dynamics. We also test the Kuznets inverted-U relation between income inequality and economic growth. We find long run relationship among the series; and that nominal devaluation worsens income inequality. Though economic growth appears to deteriorate income distribution, the non-linear link between the variables depicts Kuznets’ (1955) type inverted-U relationship. This is reassuring for Pakistan in the long run. We also find FDI and trade-openness worsens income distribution. Inflation lowers income inequality but unemployment aggravates it in Pakistan.Devaluation, Income Inequality, EKC, ARDL

Impact of Trade Liberalization on External Debt Burden: Econometric Evidence from Pakistan

Pakistan’s leading challenge today is to lessen its debt burden in order to pursue a path that leads towards sustainable and impartial growth for poverty diminution. The consequences of trade liberalization are of growing concern, mainly in the emerging economies with severe brim over effects on their debt situation. The major objective of this paper is to discuss the current external debt problem in Pakistan and analyze how its external debt is interrelated with trade liberalization policies and measures .Using data from the last three decades, this paper investigated whether there exist a momentous relationship between external debt and the trade liberalization variables or not. In this case study ARDL bounds testing approach is employed to investigate the long run relationships and Error Correction Method (ECM) for short run dynamics. After finding the order of integration through implementing the Augmented Dickey Fuller (ADF) and Phillips-Perron unit root tests, our finding suggested a significant long run positive association between external debt and trade liberalization is existed in case of PakistanExternal Debt, Trade Liberalization, ARDL Bounds Testing, Error Correction Method

Self-concatenated code design and its application in power-efficient cooperative communications

In this tutorial, we have focused on the design of binary self-concatenated coding schemes with the help of EXtrinsic Information Transfer (EXIT) charts and Union bound analysis. The design methodology of future iteratively decoded self-concatenated aided cooperative communication schemes is presented. In doing so, we will identify the most important milestones in the area of channel coding, concatenated coding schemes and cooperative communication systems till date and suggest future research directions

Energy and bursty packet loss tradeoff over fading channels: a system-level model

Energy efficiency and quality of service (QoS) guarantees are the key design goals for the 5G wireless communication systems. In this context, we discuss a multiuser scheduling scheme over fading channels for loss tolerant applications. The loss tolerance of the application is characterized in terms of different parameters that contribute to quality of experience (QoE) for the application. The mobile users are scheduled opportunistically such that a minimum QoS is guaranteed. We propose an opportunistic scheduling scheme and address the cross-layer design framework when channel state information (CSI) is not perfectly available at the transmitter and the receiver. We characterize the system energy as a function of different QoS and channel state estimation error parameters. The optimization problem is formulated using Markov chain framework and solved using stochastic optimization techniques. The results demonstrate that the parameters characterizing the packet loss are tightly coupled and relaxation of one parameter does not benefit the system much if the other constraints are tight. We evaluate the energy-performance tradeoff numerically and show the effect of channel uncertainty on the packet scheduler design

MONETARY EXCHANGE RATE MODEL REVISITED: COINTEGRATION AND FORECASTING IN HETEROGENEOUS PANEL DATA

ABSTRACT This study re-examines the exchange rate-monetary fundamentals link with in a panel data framework. Pure time series and pooled time series-based tests fail to find empirical support for monetary exchange rate models (Sarantis (1994) and Groen (2000)). Using recently developed Panel Data Techniques; we would test the exchange rates and monetary fundamentals in a quarterly panel of 19 countries mostly from developed region extending from 1973.1 to 1997.1. Present analysis would be centered on three issues. First, we test whether exchange rates cointegrated with long run determinants predicted by economic theory. For this purpose, we would be employed Pedroni (1997) and Larsson et al (2001) panel cointegration tests for empirical validation of the study. Second, we will also test the short run implications of exchange rate model. These short run implications will be tested; through adapting the panel VEC model the short run identification schemes of Johansen and Juselius (1994). The last issue is to examine the ability for monetary fundamentals to forecast future exchange rate returns. The present endeavor will follow Mark and Sul (2001) approach for forecasting in the case of Panel Data Testing.Panel cointegration; Prediction; Exchange rates.

Distributed Self-Concatenated Coding for Cooperative Communication

In this paper, we propose a power-efficient distributed binary self-concatenated coding scheme using iterative decoding (DSECCC-ID) for cooperative communications. The DSECCC-ID scheme is designed with the aid of binary extrinsic information transfer (EXIT) charts. The source node transmits self-concatenated convolutional coded (SECCC) symbols to both the relay and destination nodes during the first transmission period. The relay performs SECCC-ID decoding, where it mayor may not encounter decoding errors. It then reencodes the information bits using a recursive systematic convolutional (RSC) code during the second transmission period. The resultant symbols transmitted from the source and relay nodes can be viewed as the coded symbols of a three-component parallel concatenated encoder. At the destination node, three-component DSECCC-ID decoding is performed. The EXIT chart gives us an insight into operation of the distributed coding scheme, which enables us to significantly reduce the transmit power by about 3.3 dB in signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) terms, as compared with a noncooperative SECCC-ID scheme at a bit error rate (BER) of 10-5. Finally, the proposed system is capable of performing within about 1.5 dB from the two-hop relay-aided network’s capacity at a BER of 10-5 , even if there may be decoding errors at the relay