ESS working paper series August-2005 : Paper-04

Cataloged from PDF version of report.Includes bibliographical references (page 14-15).This paper examines the academic soundness of the Pareto welfare criterion as a normative rule for evaluating alternative economic inequality scenarios and suggests that the criterion has several weaknesses, which wear off its usefulness: First, the Pareto principle is of limited use in the inequality debate, because labour markets hardly satisfy the conditions of perfect competition, the pivotal assumption of the theory. Second, the proposition, competitive equilibrium leads to' common good' of society, is difficult to defend. Third, the Paretian welfare economics barely answers the questions society demands, because perfect competition does not guarantee fairness in the determination of relative prices in the initial situation of income distribution. Fourth, the marginal productivity principle does not determine how, profits, the huge surpluses generated by the businesses, are distributed. Fifth, income distribution is a political issue, but Pareto's primary motivation was to alienate the distribution debate from policy and political discourses. Finally, the public earning structure is much more equitable than that of the private sector. This brings out a very serious question: which earning structure reflects improvement in social welfare: public or private?Khandakar Qudrat-I Elah

Controversy over customary land ownership: An overview from political philosophy perspective

In many countries of Africa, Asia and South America, an overwhelming proportion of earth surface has remained undemarcated, unrecorded and unregistered.This territory is popularly known as customary land, whose ownership is claimed by the tribe/clan living in the area for generations. This vast track of land contains many valuable economic resources, including precious minerals, natural gases and oils etc., which are vital for accelerating the process of economic growth and poverty alleviation.Accordingly, since 1960’s, supranational organisations, including the World Bank, FAO and UNDP, began investing substantial sums of monetary and technical resources on developing these lands.The general policy principle they pursued is called individualisation.Under this scheme, the communally owned lands are first demarcated and recorded, and then registered under the names of individuals using them.Unfortunately, these policies, the customary land literature suggests, have failed to produce satisfactory outcome.This paper puts up two points, which might be helpful to identify problems associated with the current policy regimes.First, the prevailing perception of customary land needs refinement, because it is conceptually confusing. Second, ownership of any property, including land, is basically a legal and political issue, meaning the customary land controversy belongs to the jurisdiction of legal and political philosophy. The paper suggests that John Locke’s theory of property right has necessary policy insights that might offer a kind of sustainable solution to this complex customary land controversy issue

A MODEL FOR ESTIMATING LINEA R TREND IN PRODUC- TION, AREA AND YIELD OF AGRICULTURAL CROPS

Growth rates in production, area and yield of agricultural crops are widely estimated for examining growth performance of the crop sector and evaluating government policies. But estimation of linear trends which provide valuable information for policy analysis received little importance. This paper developed a model for estimating linear trends in production, area and yields of agricultural crops and used the same to derive estimates of linear trends in the cereal sector. The analysis shows that linear trends in cereal production Increased in the 80's only marginaliy which is unsatisfactory in view of population growth and public investment. The poor trend resulted mainly from decreased trends in production and yield of wheat and yield of boro paddy

ARE COMMERCIAL BANKS PREJUDICED AGAINST THE POOR?

Microcredit-microfinance revolution is founded on an overwhelming accusation: Conventional banks are prejudiced against the poor, the poor women in particular. This paper examines this popular accusation and argues that its conceptual foundation is weak. First, because commercial banks and microcredit NGOs have differing mandate and motivation, their social roles are not directly comparable. Second, providing loans to micro-entrepreneurs requires special skills as well as a special frame of mind. Commercial bankers may not have this kind of employees due to the nature of their business. Third, the microfinance theory suffers from academic soundness because it is founded on value-laden terms. Fourth, characterizing commercial bankers as anti-poor is professionally unfair. Fifth, holding orthodox economics responsible for poverty creation in the developing world contradicts the reality. Sixth, the criticisms that the para-statal agencies have failed to 'ignite the tires of subsidised agricultural development' are too hasty. Finally, the distinction that microfinance theory makes between commercial bankers and micro-lenders, concerning profit-maximization, has created a new puzzle in microeconomic theory

Entitlement failure and deprivation: a critique of Sen's famine philosophy

This paper insinuates the conceptual foundation of Sen's entitlement approach by pinpointing its major weaknesses. First, Sen's critique of FAD is inadequate because speculative, not actual, supply and demand forces determine short-run commodity prices. Second, Sen's idea of 'exchange entitlement' is inconsistent with the principles of capitalism, since this economic system operates on the conceptual and legal framework of voluntary exchange. Third, if food is considered as an entitled commodity, other basic necessities of life, such as healthcare, education etc. could claim the same status. Finally, the approach is founded on a hidden hypothesis that income distributions in non-communist states are economically and politically optimal.