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The Romanian Economic Reform Program
This paper outlines the main characteristics and the development of the centrally planned economic sysetm in Romania before the beginnings of the transition to a market eonomy it then presents the design, objectives, and implementation of the reform program.
Unemployment in Greece
The Greek unemployment rate rose from 2 percent in the 1960s to 9-10 percent in the 1990s. This reflected the increase in female participation rates, the slowdown in growth, the restructuring of production, and the increased mismatch between jobs and job seekers. But the most crucial factor was the persistence of real wage aspirations. The paper develops and tests a model that attributes this to the rapid expansion in the number of easy, life-time government jobs and the increase in the public/private wage differential during the 1980s.
Government Employment and Wages and Labor Market Performance
Government wage, benefit, and employment decisions are not taken on a profit-maximizing basis and have a substantial impact on aggregate labor market performance and unemployment. In a two-sector labor market model with free mobility of labor, an increase in government wages or benefits reduces private sector employment, and government employment is not an effective counter-cyclical instrument. Empirical tests for Greece confirm that the expansion of the public sector in the 1980s contributed to the deterioration of labor market performance.
Designing Effective Macroprudential Stress Tests
Giving stress tests a macroprudential perspective requires (i) incorporating general equilibrium dimensions, so that the outcome of the test depends not only on the size of the shock and the buffers of individual institutions but also on their behavioral responses and their interactions with each other and with other economic agents; and (ii) focusing on the resilience of the system as a whole. Progress has been made toward the first goal: several models are now available that attempt to integrate solvency, liquidity, and other sources of risk and to capture some behavioral responses and feedback effects. But building models that measure correctly systemic risk and the contribution of indivi...
Equilibria with Unemployment in Segmented Labor Markets
The paper proves four theorems in an n-sector model of a segmented labor market, with search costs, and a continuum of workers with different reservation wages, who can apply to any number of sectors. The main conclusions are that: (i) an equilibrium with unemployment always exists; and (ii) some of the unemployment is involuntary, in the sense that it consists of workers with reservation wages below the equilibrium wage in the secondary market. These conclusions hold in the case of both separate and non-separate markets.
Labor Market Segmentation in a Two-Sector Model of An Open Economy
The paper examines formally the effects of labor market segmentation in a two-sector open economy model. The model demonstrates how the structure of the labor market affects the real exchange rate, defined as the relative price of traded and home goods, and is then used to examine the effects of two common labor market policies: increasing the degree of primary market coverage, and implementing wage restraint in the primary market. It is shown that increasing the degree of primary market coverage increases unemployment and leads to a real appreciation. Real wage restraint in the primary market, on the other hand, reduces unemployment, and has ambiguous but probably small effects on the real exchange rate.
Evaluation of Technical Assistance on Bank Supervision by Long-Term Experts in Asia
Technical Assistance Delivery by Long-Term Experts are an increasingly important vehicle for delivering TA in all financial sector areas. In recent years, the amount of MCM TA provided through LTEs has been about 28 staff years annually, or 36 percent of MCM’s total TA field delivery (including RTACs). This share has recently risen as a result of the steady increase in external financing and the cutback in MCM’s own resources for capacity building in the context of the recent downsizing. Indeed, the share of LTEs (who are mostly externally financed) in total planned MCM TA jumped to 41 percent in fiscal year 2009 (May-April). As these factors are expected to persist, the importance of LTEs as a means of delivering TA will likely increase further.
Poland
Poland's economy rebounded dramatically in 1992-93, several years after the nation embarded on a comprehensive program of economic transformation. This paper describes Polan's steps in the areas of public finance, monetary policy and financial sector reform, trade and exchange rate policy, and microeconomic liberalization, as well as the social impact of transition.
The Output Decline in the Aftermath of Reform
This paper analyzes the declines in economic activity experienced by Bulgaria, the Czech and Slovak Federal Republic (CSFR), and Romania in the period since the initiation of market-oriented reforms in these countries. The paper reviews developments in the three countries and empirically investigates two questions that are key to the interpretation of the output decline: First, to what extent does the output fall reflect “structural change” (or a reallocation of resources across sectors) rather than a conventional recession? Second, to what extent have demand-side or supply-side forces been dominant in generating the output decline?
Output Decline and Government Expenditures in European Transition Economies
This paper discusses the role of government expenditure policies in the decline in aggregate output in European transition economies. It is argued that there is little evidence for the hypothesis that more expansionary expenditure policies would have helped to mitigate the output decline. While measurement problems allow for very preliminary conclusions, it appears that government expenditures were, generally, not a binding constraint for output. In those cases where it could be argued that government expenditures were a binding constraint, they were usually not the only one. Government expenditure levels still remain on the high side, at least when compared with European market-based economies, and there exists few reasons for pursuing expansionary expenditure policies to lift European transition economies out of the “transitional recession.” While raising expenditure levels per se is an unappealing policy choice, a further reordering of expenditure priorities is desirable. In particular, increases in the share of government expenditures on capital--human and physical--are needed to improve long-run output potential.
