The Rybczynski Theorem, Factor-Price Equalization, and Immigration: Evidence from U.S. States

Recent literature on the labor-market effects of U.S. immigration tends to find little correlation between regional immigrant inflows and changes in relative regional wages. In this paper we examine whether immigration, or endowment shocks more generally, altered U.S. regional output mixes as predicted by the Rybczynski Theorem of Heckscher-Ohlin (HO) trade theory. This theorem describes how regions can absorb endowment shocks via changes in output mix without any changes in relative regional factor prices. Treating U.S. states as HO regions, we search for evidence of regional output-mix effects using a new data set that combines state endowments, outputs, and employment in 1980 and 1990. We have two main findings. First, state output-mix changes broadly match state endowment changes. Second, variation in state unit factor requirements is consistent with relative factor-price equalization (FPE) across states, which is a sufficient condition for our output-mix hypothesis to hold. Overall, these findings suggest that states absorb regional endowment shocks through mechanisms other than changes in relative regional factor prices.

The General Equilibrium Incidence of Environmental Mandates

Regulations that restrict pollution by firms also affect decisions about use of labor and capital. They thus affect relative factor prices, total production, and output prices. For non-revenue-raising environmental mandates, what are the general equilibrium impacts on the wage, the return to capital, and relative output prices? Perhaps surprisingly, we cannot find any existing analytical literature addressing that question. This paper starts with the standard two-sector tax incidence model and modifies one sector to include pollution as a factor of production that can be a complement or substitute for labor or for capital. We then look not at taxes but at four types of mandates, and for each mandate determine conditions that place more of the burden on labor or on capital. Stricter regulation does not always place less burden on the factor that is a better substitute for pollution. Also, a relative restriction on the amount of pollution per unit of output creates an "output-subsidy effect" on factor prices that can offset and reverse the traditional output effect and substitution effect. An analogous effect is found for a relative restriction on pollution per unit of capital.

The Morishima Gross Elasticity of Substitution

We show that the Hotelling-Lau elasticity of substitution, an extension of the Allen-Uzawa elasticity to allow for optimal output-quantity (or utility) responses to changes in factor prices, inherits all of the failings of the Allen-Uzawa elasticity identified by Blackorby and Russell [1989 AER]. An analogous extension of the Morishima elasticity of substitution to allow for output quantity changes preserves the salient properties of the original Hicksian notion of elasticity of substitution.elasticity of substitution ; relative factor shares ; homotheticity

Second thoughts on development accounting

We estimate the relative roles of factor inputs and productivity in explaining the level of economic development, which is measured as output per worker. For a large sample of countries, we show that alternative identifying productivity assumptions and alternative measures of human capital have a large impact on the relative weights of factor inputs and productivity in a decomposition of output per worker. For a sample of OECD countries, we find that productivity has almost no role in explaining cross-country differences in output per worker. This result supports the reasoning of a traditional neoclassical growth model.

Optimal location of static var compensator device for damping oscillations

Problem statement: Static Var Compensators (SVC) devices are used to improve voltage and reactive power conditions in AC systems. An additional task of SVC is to increase transmission capacity as result of power oscillation damping. The effectiveness of this controller depends on its optimal location and proper signal selection in the power system network. A residue factor had been proposed to find the optimal location of the SVC controllers to damp out the inter-area mode of oscillations. Approach: The proposed residue factor was based on the relative participation of the parameters of SVC controller to the critical mode. A simple approach of computing the residue factor had been proposed, which combined the linearized differential algebraic equation model of the power system and the SVC output equations. Input-output controllability analyses were used to assess the most appropriate input signals (stabilizing signal) for SVC device. Results: The placements of SVC controller had been obtained for the base case as well as for the critical contingency cases. Conclusion: The effectiveness of the proposed method was demonstrated on 25 bus of south Malaysian power system

Globalisation and the euro area: simulation based analysis using the New Area Wide Model

In this paper, we utilise the multi-country version of the NAWM to analyse the impact of globalisation on euro area macroeconomic aggregates. We provide alternative model-based definitions of globalisation associated with an increase in potential output in emerging Asia and its impact on total factor productivity in the euro area, and a shift in international specialisation patterns leading to changes in relative demand and import substitutions. The results indicate that globalisation has a positive impact on output, consumption, investment and real labour income in the long-run. This impact is driven by the improvement in the terms of trade and associated positive wealth effects, as well as by spillovers of higher potential output in emerging Asia on euro area total factor productivity. Additionally, we provide evidence that structural reforms in goods and labour markets would amplify the benefits associated with globalisation. JEL Classification: E32, E62DSGE modelling, euro area, Globalisation

International Competition, Slim Firms and Wage Inequality

A country with Cournot competition and free entry experiences an increase of its market size either due to economic growth or international integration of goods markets. The implied increase in competition leads to shrinking mark-ups and forces firms to reduce overhead costs relative to output. This implies a reallocation at the aggregate level from administrative to productive activities. Relative factor rewards change and wage inequality increases. The factor losing in relative terms can even lose in real terms. From a quantitative perspective, international competition is shown to be the more plausible cause of rising wage inequality.international trade, wage inequality, foreign competition, free entry and exit

Barriers to Capital Accumulation and Aggregate Total Factor Productivity

I develop a growth model where output can be produced with a modern and a traditional technology. The traditional technology has a lower TFP and a lower share of reproducible capital than the modern technology. In this simple framework, barriers to capital accumu-lation affect the extent to which these technologies are used. Intuitively, barriers reduce the return to using the modern technology relative to the traditional technology because reproducible capital is a more important input in the modern technology. As a result, bar-riers to capital accumulation not only affect the capital to output ratio in the economy but also aggregate TFP. The theory thus connects two seemingly disparate research programs in the recent growth literature: models of factor accumulation and models of total factor productivity. The model economy is calibrated by interpreting the traditional technology as producing agricultural output and the non-reproducible factor as land. The theory implies that barriers to capital accumulation are associated with large agricultural shares. This novel implication of the theory is strongly supported by both cross-country data and time series evidence from a set of East Asian miracle countries. For a reasonable parameterization of the model, the required TFP differences needed to account for a reasonable disparity in the wealth of nations are reduced by a half relative to the standard growth model that abstracts from technology choice.income, technology choice, barriers, total factor productivity.

How good are dynamic factor models at forecasting output and inflation? A meta-analytic approach

This paper surveys existing factor forecast applications for real economic activity and inflation by means of a meta-analysis and contributes to the current debate on the determinants of the forecast performance of large-scale dynamic factor models relative to other models. We find that, on average, factor forecasts are slightly better than other models' forecasts. In particular, factor models tend to outperform small-scale models, whereas they perform slightly worse than alternative methods which are also able to exploit large datasets. Our results further suggest that factor forecasts are better for US than for UK macroeconomic variables, and that they are better for US than for euro-area output; however, there are no significant differences between the relative factor forecast performance for US and euro-area inflation. There is also some evidence that factor models are better suited to predict output at shorter forecast horizons than at longer horizons. These findings all relate to the forecasting environment (which cannot be influenced by the forecasters). Among the variables capturing the forecasting design (which can, by contrast, be influenced by the forecasters), the size of the dataset from which factors are extracted seems to positively affect the relative factor forecast performance. There is some evidence that quarterly data lend themselves better to factor forecasts than monthly data. Rolling forecasts are preferable to recursive forecasts. The factor estimation technique seems to matter as well. Other potential determinants - namely whether forecasters rely on a balanced or an unbalanced panel, whether restrictions implied by the factor structure are imposed in the forecasting equation or not and whether an iterated or a direct multi-step forecast is made - are found to be rather irrelevant. Moreover, we find no evidence that pre-selecting the variables to be included in the panel from which factors are extracted helped to improve factor forecasts in the past. --Factor models,forecasting,meta-analysis