An empirical investigation of the nexus among money balances, commodity prices and consumer goods'prices

This paper aims to identify the nexus between the excess of liquidity in the United States and commodity prices over the 1983-2006 period. In particular, it assesses whether commodity prices react more powerfully than consumer goods'prices to changes in real money balances. Within a cointegrated vector autoregressive framework, the author investigates whether consumer prices and commodity prices react to excess liquidity, and if the different price elasticities of supply for goods and commodities allow for differences in the dynamic paths of price adjustment to a liquidity shock. The results show a positive relationship between real money and real commodity prices and provide empirical evidence for a stronger response of commodity prices with respect to consumer goods'prices. This could imply that, if the magnitude of the reaction is due the fact that consumer goods'prices are slower to react, then their long-run value can be predicted with the help of commodity prices. The findings support the view that the latter should be considered as a valid monetary indicator.Markets and Market Access,Emerging Markets,Economic Theory&Research,Commodities,E-Business

Business cycle causation relations for Mercosur countries

This paper aims at investigating business cycle interdependences among Mercosur countries over the period 1991-2006. In particular, it analyses the causation relationships among the aforementioned countries’ business cycles, and the impact of the EU and US shocks on them. The estimated VAR model points out that some causation relations are present among the former, and that, conversely, the latter do not play a relevant role in determining the fluctuations of their economies.

The impact of trade integration on business cycle synchronisation for Mercosur countries

Frankel and Rose (1998) reassessed the Mundellian criteria on OCAs and considered their application to be untenable, since trade integration and cycle synchronisation may be endogenous. This research aims at testing this hypothesis for Mercosur countries. In particular it intends to evaluate empirically the impact of reduced trade barriers, and then, increased trade on the synchronisation of business cycles. Using a panel data spanning the members over sixty-four quarters since the establishment of the FTA, my findings indicate a positive effect, implying intra-industry trade. JEL Classification Code: F15, E32Trade Integration, Business Cycle Synchronisation, Mercosur

Do high and volatile levels of public investment suggest misconduct ? the role of institutional quality

This paper investigates the impact of institutional quality on public investment levels over the period 1984-2008. Moreover, it studies how the volatility of public investment and the quality of infrastructure are affected by institutional quality, and explores the contribution of other critical factors. The findings suggest an inverse relationship between public investment levels and institutional quality, supporting the idea that governments use public investment as a vehicle for rent-seeking or to compensate for the fall in private investment due to the poor business environment. In addition, aid flows, revenues and abundance of natural resources contribute positively to the level of capital spending. The author also finds that high volatility of public investment is associated with a lower quality of governance. An increase in revenues is associated with a reduction in the volatility of capital spending, suggesting that proper macroeconomic management smoothes the investment cycle. Finally, the paper provides some tentative evidence of a positive relationship between institutional quality and the quality of infrastructure.Investment and Investment Climate,Debt Markets,Non Bank Financial Institutions,Public Sector Economics,Emerging Markets

Enhancing the Capability of Central Finance Agencies

A well-organized and effective finance ministry and its associated central finance agencies (CFAs) are essential to good fiscal outcomes. Recent studies of CFAs in selected low-income countries demonstrate that their organizational structure varies widely and that decision making on public finance is strongly influenced by political economy factors. This note presents some common themes arising from the case studies and provides some descriptive evidence about the organizational structure of the CFAs. This note also includes evidence of a “U-curve” pattern in the development of the organizational structure of CFAs over the long term. It confirms that political economy analysis, though difficult to apply in practice, is highly relevant in the development of reform strategies for strengthening CFAs and public financial management systems.finance ministry, central finance agencies, fiscal, public finance, political economy, low-income countries, development, reform, public financial management, World Bank

Determinants and dynamics of schooling and child labor in Bolivia

This paper investigates the determinants of primary school enrollment, attendance and child labor in Bolivia from 1999 to 2007. The analysis also aims at identifying the substitution and complementary relationships between schooling and working. Although enrollment rates show a significant improvement, lack of attendance remains an issue. The empirical results reveal that the increase in enrollment is led by indigenous children and those living in urban areas. Moreover, contrary to common belief, being extremely poor and indigenous are the main determinants of school attendance. Although extremely poor children increased their school attendance, they were not able to reduce child labor. However, for indigenous children school attendance and child labor were substitutes, increasing schooling and reducing child labor.Street Children,Primary Education,Education For All,Youth and Governance,Children and Youth

Essays on development economics.

This thesis consists of four essays in empirical development economics. The first three essays focus on macroeconomic topics, examining issues related to the business cycle, fiscal and monetary policy, whereas the last one is focusing on a microeconomic topic, namely the relationship between schooling and child labor. The first contribution investigates the effectiveness of macroeconomic policies in the recoveries periods in the Middle East, North Africa and Pakistan (MENAP). It is found that fiscal policy played a key role during the recoveries to potential output, although with weaker effects for the countries in the region that are more open to trade; monetary policy is found to have been less effective. The second essay explores the effects of the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) adoption on the main fiscal performance indicators, finding a positive and encouraging impact on fiscal discipline, allocative efficiency and technical efficiency, although the last one is not always robust. The third essay aims at identify the nexus between the excess of liquidity and commodity prices; in particular, it assesses whether the commodity prices react more powerfully than the consumer goods\u2019 prices to changes in real money balances. The results show a positive relationship between real money and real commodity prices and provide empirical evidence for a stronger response of commodity prices with respect to consumer goods\u2019 prices. The last essay investigates the determinants of primary school enrollment, attendance and child labor in Bolivia, with a special attention at identifying the substitution and complementary relationships between schooling and working. The empirical findings reveal that the increase in enrollment is led by indigenous children and those living in urban areas. Moreover, contrary to common belief, being extremely poor and indigenous are the main determinants of school attendance; while extremely poor children increased their school attendance, they were not able to reduce child labor. On the other hand, indigenous children made them substitutes increasing schooling and reducing child labor. Different econometric techniques have been used, among which Ordinary Least Squares, Fixed Effects, Instrumental Variables, Generalized Methods of Moments estimations, Stochastic Frontier Analysis, Cointegrated Vector Autoregression and Multivariate Probit models

A Hybrid Approach to Estimating the Efficiency of Public Spending on Education in Emerging and Developing Economies

The measurement of the efficiency of public education expenditure using parametric and non-parametric methods has proven challenging. This paper seeks to overcome the difficulties of earlier studies by using a hybrid approach to measure the efficiency of secondary education spending in emerging and developing economies. The approach accounts for the impact of the level of development on education outcomes by constructing different efficiency frontiers for lower- and higher-income economies. We find evidence of large potential gains in enrollment rates by improving efficiency. These are largest in lower-income economies, especially in Africa. Reallocating expenditure to reduce student-to-teacher ratios and improving the quality of institutions could help improve the efficiency of education spending.  Easing the access to education facilities and reducing income inequality could also help improve efficiency

Studio dei codici, trasmissione e correzione efficiente di un messaggio

L'elaborato si prefigge di descrivere come avviene la codifica, la decodifica e la correzione di errori in una trasmissione dati, sfruttando l'entropia di Shannon, la codifica di Huffmann e i codici di Hamming

Locating clustered seismicity using Distance Geometry Solvers: applications for sparse and single-borehole DAS networks

The determination of seismic event locations with sparse networks or single-borehole systems remains a significant challenge in observational seismology. Leveraging the advantages of the location approach HADES, which was initially developed for locating clustered seismicity recorded at two stations, we present here an improved version of the methodology: HADES-R. Where HADES previously needed a minimum of 4 absolutely located master events, HADES-R solves a least-squares problem to find the relative inter-event distances in the cluster, and uses only a single master event to find the locations of all events, and subsequently applies rotational optimiser to find the cluster orientation. It can leverage iterative station combinations if multiple receivers are available, to describe the cluster shape and orientation uncertainty with a bootstrap approach. The improved method requires P- and S-phase arrival picks, a homogeneous velocity model, a single master event with a known location, and an estimate of the cluster width. The approach is benchmarked on the 2019 Ridgecrest sequence recorded at two stations, and applied to two seismic clusters at the FORGE geothermal test site, including a microseismic monitoring scenario with a DAS in a vertical borehole. Traditional procedures struggle in these settings due to the ill-posed network configuration. The azimuthal ambiguity in this scenario is partially overcome by assuming that all events belong to the same cluster around the master event and a cluster width estimate. We find the cluster shape in both cases, although the orientation remains uncertain. The method's ability to constrain the cluster shape and location with only one well-located event offers promising implications, especially for environments where limited or specialised instrumentation is in use.Comment: 33 pages, 15 figures. Manuscript submitted to Geophysical Journal Internationa