Growth, fluctuations and technology in the U.S. post-war economy

This paper explores several issues concerning how technology affects growth and fluctuations during several U.S. postwar series. The nature of technology is divided into neutral progress and investment-specific progress. Accounting for several changes in the first and second order moments of these series (the slowdown of productivity in 1974, the moderation of 1984 and the resurgence in productivity after 1994), I find that the contribution of investment-specific progress to growth has increased over time. I also find that neutral progress is crucial in explaining the cyclical component of output (before and after 1984), contrary to results found in related literature. However, the shocks to investment-specific progress have played an increasing role in output and other macroeconomic variables. Finally, I conclude that moderation in the macroeconomic series can be associated with technology. In sum, the quality of technological processes affecting long run growth and fluctuations has changed over the past decades.Productivity growth; Investment-specific technological change; Neutral technological change

The optimal degree of exchange rate flexibility: A target zone approach

This paper presents a benchmark model that rationalizes the choice of the degree of exchange rate flexibility. We show that the monetary authority may gain efficiency by reducing volatility of both the exchange rate and the interest rate at the same time. Furthermore, the model is consistent with some known stylized facts in the empirical literature on target zones that previous models were not able to generate jointly, namely, the positive relation between the exchange rate and the interest rate differential, the degree of non-linearity of the function linking the exchage rate to fundamentals and the shape of the exchange rate stochastic distribution.Target zones, exchange rate agreements, monetary policy, time consistency.

How tight should one's hands be tied? Fear of floating and credibility of exchange regimes.

The literature on exchange regimes has recently observed that officially self-declared free floaters strongly intervene their nominal exchange rates to maintain them within some unannounced bands. In this paper, we provide an explanation for this behavior, labeled by Calvo and Reinhart (2002) as fear of floating. First, we analyze the linkages between the credibility of the exchange regime, the volatility of the exchange rate and the band width of fluctuation. Second, the model is used to understand the reduction in volatility experienced by most ERM countries after their target zones were widened on August 1993. Finally, solving the model for a subgame perfect equilibrium, fear of floating can be viewed as the credible choice of a finite non-zero bandFear of floating, target zones, exchange rate arrangements, credibility

On the Choice of an Exchange Regime: Target Zones Revisited

From the classical gold standard up to the current ERM2 arrangement of the European Union, target zones have been a widely used exchange regime in contemporary history. This paper presents a benchmark model that rationalizes the choice of target zones over the rest of regimes: the fixed rate, the free float and the managed float. It is shown that the monetary authority may gain efficiency by reducing volatility of both the exchange rate and the interest rate at the same time. Furthermore, the model is consistent with some known stylised facts in the empirical literature that previous models were not able to produce, namely, the positive relation between the exchange rate and the interest rate differential, the degree of non-linearity of the function linking the exchange rate to fundamentals and the shape of the exchange rate stochastic distribution.Infrastructures, taxes, efficiency, social welfare

Technological sources of productivity growth in Japan, the Us and Germany: What makes the difference?

This paper studies the contribution of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) on economic growth and labor productivity across the three leading economies in the world: Japan, Germany and the US. We use a dynamic general equilibrium growth model with investment-specific technological change to quantify the contribution to productivity growth in the three countries from different technological progress. We find that contribution to productivity growth due to ICT capital assets is about 0.40 percentage points for Japan and Germany, whereas it is about 0.65 percentage points in the case of the US. Neutral technological change is the main source of productivity growth in Japan and Germany. For the US, the main source of productivity growth derives from investment-specific technological change, mainly associated to ICT.Productivity growth; Investment-specific technological change; Neutral technological change; Information and communication technology.

Upgrading Relational Legacy Data to eh Semantic Web

In this poster, we describe a framework composed of the R2O mapping language and the ODEMapster processor to upgrade relational legacy data to the Semantic Web. The framework is based on the declarative description of mappings between relational and ontology elements and the exploitation of such mapping descriptions by a generic processor capable of performing both massive and query driven data upgrade

A power efficient neural spike recording channel with data bandwidth reduction

This paper presents a mixed-signal neural spike recording channel which features, as an added value, a simple and low-power data compression mechanism. The channel uses a band-limited differential low noise amplifier and a binary search data converter, together with other digital and analog blocks for control, programming and spike characterization. The channel offers a self-calibration operation mode and it can be configured both for signal tracking (to raw digitize the acquired neural waveform) and feature extraction (to build a first-order PWL approximation of the spikes). The prototype has been fabricated in a standard CMOS 0.13μm and occupies 400μm×400μm. The overall power consumption of the channel during signal tracking is 2.8μW and increases to 3.0μW average when the feature extraction operation mode is programmed.Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación TEC2009-08447Junta de Andalucía TIC-0281