CEC5: On The Estimated Size of the Balassa-Samuelson Effect in CEC5 Countries

In this paper we try to give a summary on the importance of the productivity based real appreciation e.g. the Balassa-Samuelson (BS) effect in five Central and Eastern European (CEC5) countries, namely the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, the Slovak Republic, and Slovenia. We develop our approach from two directions. Firstly, we try to apply a common simple analytical framework for producing some stylised facts, and obtaining a “guesstimate” of relative price movements due to different sectoral productivity growth rates. Secondly, we try to summarise the econometric evidence available for the countries, both from individual country and panel estimates. It seems clear from the analyses, that both approaches gives a size of the BS effect not exceeding 2% per annum on CPI inflation vis-à-vis Germany. The numbers obtained are somewhat different, that one would conclude from the change in relative prices in the countries considered. This result might be explained by the fact, that the BS hypotheses did not hold exactly in the past, other factors like change in the sectoral wage rates, pricing behaviour and indermediate product prices also contributed to the behaviour of the nontradable and tradable price ratio. As these estimates are based on past data, when productivity differentials were higher than current figures, it is very likely, that as the catch-up goes by, the possible magnitude of the effect will be even smaller. From this one might conclude that real convergence should not necessary danger the fulfilment of the Maastricht Treaty Criteria on inflation.

Determinants of Real Exchange Rate Fluctuations in Hungary

This paper investigates the different sources of real exchange rate fluctuations in Hungary. We consider the effect of tradable pricing behavior and nominal rigidities in tradable real-exchange rate movements, and investigate the importance of relative productivity changes between the tradable and nontradable sector in relative price (nontradable/tradable) adjustments. We formulate a policy reaction function to separate the effect of tradable pricing shocks from policy shocks. The framework we use is a two sector open economy real exchange rate model. Its contemporaneous structure is used for the identification of structural shocks. Since the effect of policy shocks on tradable real exchange rate was not significant, our results suggest that nominal rigidities did not play an important role during the period under consideration. The evolution of nontradable prices and relative (nontradable/tradable) prices were well explained by nontradable output shocks. Thus, the Balassa-Samuelson-effect seems to have been at work in Hungary during the first eight years of transition.

Hungary in the NIGEM model

This paper presents a nationwide economy model for Hungary used by the National Bank of Hungary for analyzing the effects of world shocks, for quarterly forecasting exercises and other policy simulations. The study has two main goals: Firstly, we present the model for the Hungarian economy, developed in collaboration between the National Bank of Hungary and the National Institute of Economic and Social Research. The model is a one-sector aggregate economy model with a theoretically consistent supply side. A particular role is given to foreign direct investments in explaining the sources of growth both in the production process and foreign trade. Secondly, there is a brief discussion of the National Institute’s Global Econometric Model (NIGEM), to which the Hungarian model is linked. In this setup, we are also able to analyze the effect of world shocks on the domestic economy. For testing model properties, we present policy simulations for various shocks. A case study on the effect of the Russian crisis on Hungary is also discussed for the purpose of testing parameter adequacy.

On a randomized backward Euler method for nonlinear evolution equations with time-irregular coefficients

In this paper we introduce a randomized version of the backward Euler method, that is applicable to stiff ordinary differential equations and nonlinear evolution equations with time-irregular coefficients. In the finite-dimensional case, we consider Carath\'eodory type functions satisfying a one-sided Lipschitz condition. After investigating the well-posedness and the stability properties of the randomized scheme, we prove the convergence to the exact solution with a rate of $0.5$ in the root-mean-square norm assuming only that the coefficient function is square integrable with respect to the temporal parameter. These results are then extended to the numerical solution of infinite-dimensional evolution equations under monotonicity and Lipschitz conditions. Here we consider a combination of the randomized backward Euler scheme with a Galerkin finite element method. We obtain error estimates that correspond to the regularity of the exact solution. The practicability of the randomized scheme is also illustrated through several numerical experiments.Comment: 37 pages, 3 figure