This book presents the latest findings on network theory and agent-based modeling of economic and financial phenomena. In this context, the economy is depicted as a complex system consisting of heterogeneous agents that interact through evolving networks; the aggregate behavior of the economy arises out of billions of small-scale interactions that take place via countless economic agents. The book focuses on analytical modeling, and on the econometric and statistical analysis of the properties emerging from microscopic interactions. In particular, it highlights the latest empirical and theoretical advances, helping readers understand economic and financial networks, as well as new work on modeling behavior using rich, agent-based frameworks. Innovatively, the book combines observational and theoretical insights in the form of networks and agent-based models, both of which have proved to be extremely valuable in understanding non-linear and evolving complex systems. Given its scope, the book will capture the interest of graduate students and researchers from various disciplines (e.g. economics, computer science, physics, and applied mathematics) whose work involves the domain of complexity theory.

Whether they should or not, few economists do in fact refrain from making pronouncements on public policy, although the state of the economy (both here and elsewhere) suggests that either the advice given is bad or, if good, that it is ignored . . . I happen to think that we are appallingly ignorant about many aspects of the working of the economic system -- the economics of the firm and industry. Ronald H Coase, Economists and Public Policy In this volume we attempt to address an element of Coase's concern by linking the empirical economics of the fInn and industry more closely to macroeconomic policies, and to demonstrate how to assess some of the effects of those policies. The scope of our study ranges from a structural macroeconomic model of the United States, from which macroeconomic effects are propagated to detailed structural models of SIC four digit industries. The rationale for our approach is very much in the spirit of various integrated macroeconomic/industry models constructed by Dale Jorgenson, working with various collaborators. Our approach is also consistent with, and motivated by, Lawrence Klein's agenda of modeling explicitly and structurally the macro and sectoral elements in the national economy. We also examine the effects of the macroeconomic policies of different countries on the enterprise. In only one case, our examination of crowding out of private investment by government defIcit fmancing, is the linkage among sectors implicit.

Economic growth and its relevant subjects have been given the first priority in the research agenda since China initiated economic reforms in 1978, while the topics of social protection and gender equality have been largely left at the periphery for a long period. This book is a collection of evidence-based studies conducted mainly in poor areas of rural China during the recent two decades. Based on individual interviews and sample data analyses, this book emphasizes the importance of cooperative organizations to poverty reduction, and puts forward that gender equality is closely related with sustainable development. In addition, it addresses the issues of food security and elimination of social exclusion - the key to bridging economic divide. It also studies social protection, including basic health protection system, nutrition and healthcare for children, old age security for landless farmers and rural migrant workers. By providing first-hand accounts of different vulnerable groups, such as the poor, women, migrant workers, ethnic minorities and small farmers, this book offers valuable insights into studies of contemporary Chinese society and economy.

Unlike earlier studies of the Marshall Plan, this volume concentrates not on events in Washington, but on those in France and Italy--the second and third largest beneficiaries of the Plan. Using U.S., French, and Italian sources, the author analyzes the impact of the Plan on French and Italian economic policy between 1948 and 1950. Taking neither a "realist" nor "revisionist" stance, the author argues that massive American aid to Western Europe was a perceived political necessity--that American, French, and Italian governments shared with Truman the strategic-ideological goal of Communist containment. Yet, not all of the philosophy embedded in the Plan could be implemented, and American ideology did not, therefore, have a decisive influence in reshaping postwar French or Italian economic policies. The book's introduction discusses the goals of the Marshall Plan and how postwar political circumstances led France and Italy to dissimilar economic recovery paths that would often clash with American goals. The following seven chapters analyze how American officials sought to influence French and Italian economic policies. Chapters 2, 3, and 4 cover the French case; chapters 5, 6, and 7, the Italian. The concluding chapter provides a direct comparison of the French and Italian experiences and suggests implications for current historiographical debates.

Nations worry about their shrinking sovereignty as large numbers of immigrants cross borders at will. This collection of essays asks if globalization is killing off the nation state.

The current growth path in sub-Saharan Africa is not following the Lewis model where labour moves from low-productivity agriculture to higher productivity manufacturing. Instead, it is moving directly to inappropriate (import and labour-saving) methods. This book seeks to show how this distorted growth process leaves out the major resource of these countries - labour - and ends up creating unstable employment and underemployment, leading to inequality and poverty. In this way it demonstrates how the entire growth process may be rendered unstable and unsustainable. Sustainable Growth in the African Economy considers whether the relatively rapid growth of recent years can be maintained or improved upon, with a focus on the process of industrialisation. Basing itself on a well-known dual-economy model, the proposed book focuses on several major problems of industrialisation, which has long been seen as the means of structural change in an economy which begins from a low income level. The book considers how the future trajectory of sub-Saharan Africa compares to recent success stories on other continents, and explains how factors such as rapid population growth and capital and import-intensive technology in manufacturing could foreshadow future social and political problems. This book will be essential reading to students and policymakers who are concerned with the existing pattern of African growth.

This book examines sustainable wealth formation and dynamic decision-making. The global economy experienced a veritable meltdown of asset markets in the years 2007-9, where many funds were overexposed to risky returns and suffered considerable losses. On the other hand, the long-term upswing in the stock market since 2010 has led to asset price booms and some new, but also uneven, wealth formation. In this book a broader set of constraints and guidelines for asset management and wealth accumulation is developed. The authors investigate how wealth formation and the proper management of financial funds can help to adequately buffer income risk and obtain sufficient risk-free income at a later stage of life, while also being socially and environmentally sustainable. The book explores behavioral and institutional rules for decision-making that reflect such constraints and guidelines, without necessarily being optimal in the narrow sense. The authors explain the need for such a dynamic decision-making and dynamic re-balancing of portfolios, by putting forward dynamic programming as an approach to dynamic decision-making that can allow sustainable wealth accumulation and dynamic asset allocation to be successfully integrated. This book provides a clear and comprehensive treatment of asset accumulation and dynamic portfolio models with an emphasis on long term and sustainable wealth formation. An important concern in public debate is the sustainability of our economy and this book employs cutting edge quantitative techniques and models to highlight important facts that cannot be disputed under any reasonable assumptions. It has the potential to become a standard reference for both academic researchers and quantitatively trained practitioners. Eckhard Platen, Professor of Quantitative Finance, University of Technology Sydney, Australia This book should be read by both academics and practitioners alike. The former will find intellectually rigorous discussions and innovative solutions. The latter may find a few of the concepts a bit challenging. Yet, theory and technology are there to help simplify the work of those who worry about what time it is rather than how to make a watch--- but they do need a watch. Jean Brunel, Founder of Brunel Associates and Editor of The Journal of Wealth Management

This book develops current thinking on fiscal policy, emphasizing the role which fiscal policy can play in macroeconomic policy and challenging the view that macroeconomic policy should rely on monetary policy alone. This book offers theoretical insights in defence of fiscal policy as a valid macroeconomic instrument.

This work examines the role of comptetence, organization and strategies of firms in industrial dynamics linking eceonomic, management and historical persectives. In the first part of the book, a series of economic and managerial contributions discuss the concepts, dimensions and effects of routines, competence, adaptation, learning, organizational structure and strategies in the evolution of industrial enterprises at the theoretical and empirical levels. In the second part of the book, a series of historical papers examine these issues in a long-term perspective for the United States, Japan and several European countries.

The intention of this book is threefold: presenting and advancing German reporting on income distribution and poverty, looking at experiences with advanced reporting schemes in two other EU countries, and discussing concepts for comparable social monitoring in the European Union. The first group of papers elaborates on recent findings for Germany (trends in the personal distribution of income and income poverty, multidimensional approaches to measure poverty and extreme poverty, redistribution). Of special interest is a critical methodological review of the two main German databases for distribution analyses, taking the suggestions of the Canberra Group as a reference. The second group of contributions reviews research on income distribution and poverty in Great Britain and Ireland. The last paper discusses concepts of comparable indicators for poverty and social exclusion in the EU.

The papers in this volume review and evaluate the wave of income tax reforms that have taken place in the industrial world over the last five years. The key issues which are singled out include the effect of the income tax on labor supply, the tax unit, the relationship with social security taxes, the taxation of capital income, international issues and the political economy of income taxation. Special attention is given to the choice between income and consumption as the appropriate tax base on efficiency and horizontal equity grounds.

We are now living in a period of disillusion in the ability of economic policy to stabilise the economy. This is proven by the onset of severe world recession in the early 1980s and the inability to invert the negative phase of the business cycle under way in the industrialized countries in the early 1990s. The failure of old policies motivates the research into the causes of economic fluctuations and their measurement whose results are published in this volume

IS-LM is perhaps the prime example of `cognitive dissonance' in economics, and is problematic to many economists. On the one hand, the IS-LM model is still taught by many academic economists or they use it to derive the AD-AS approach. On the other hand, the same economists realize the limitations of the basic IS-LM model and would not now use it for policy analysis, as they did in the past. The distinction between pedagogical and analytical efficacy is made by all the authors in this volume regarding the IS-LM model. Indeed, even those who would reject using the model for modern policy analysis still see the basic model as useful for teaching purposes. Moreover, in an augmented form, some of the authors in this volume would even see fit to use IS-LM for modern policy analysis. As will be seen, therefore, the IS-LM model is `not yet dead'. Rather, the model's `plasticity' has enabled it to undergo a metamorphosis into augmented form, enabling its continuing utilization in economics accordingly.

Forecasting-the art and science of predicting future outcomes-has become a crucial skill in business and economic analysis. This volume introduces the reader to the tools, methods, and techniques of forecasting, specifically as they apply to financial and investing decisions. With an emphasis on "earnings per share" (eps), the author presents a data-oriented text on financial forecasting, understanding financial data, assessing firm financial strategies (such as share buybacks and R&D spending), creating efficient portfolios, and hedging stock portfolios with financial futures. The opening chapters explain how to understand economic fluctuations and how the stock market leads the general economic trend; introduce the concept of portfolio construction and how movements in the economy influence stock price movements; and introduce the reader to the forecasting process, including exponential smoothing and time series model estimations. Subsequent chapters examine the composite index of leading economic indicators (LEI); review financial statement analysis and mean-variance efficient portfolios; and assess the effectiveness of analysts' earnings forecasts. Using data from such firms as Intel, General Electric, and Hitachi, Guerard demonstrates how forecasting tools can be applied to understand the business cycle, evaluate market risk, and demonstrate the impact of global stock selection modeling and portfolio construction.

The Japanese economy has been in the post-bubble recession for the last decade. This is in contrast to the resilient and secular growth Japan had enjoyed since World War II to the 1980s. How Japan copes with the massive restructuring of its business and economic system that appears to be needed for Japan to get back to its growth path is of interest to its global trading partners. In this book, leading Japan specialists from North America, Japan, and the UK provide detailed discussions of the representative issues the Japanese business and economic system currently faces and explore the directions Japan will be following in the 21st century.

This book provides a comprehensive knowledge of the Asian crisis from an economic, political and social point of view, and suggests possible scenarios which could take place in the future. The analysis is divided into two parts. The first includes area studies of the main Asian countries during the crisis, beginning with China, Japan and Southeast Asia, followed by South Asia and Central Asia. The second focuses on international variables, including environmental, political, and regional issues.

The Open Economy Macromodel: Past, Present And Future has two main objectives. The first is to assess the state of play of the Open Economy Macromodel by bringing together those who developed it with those who apply it today. The second is to assess possible directions for its future development.

The volume is divided into three parts. Part one focuses on the models, men, and institutions involved in the development of the international macroeconomic model. In this section, the contributors examine the two monetary approaches to the balance of payments, as well as the relationship between long-term fluctuations in real exchange rates and inflation. Part two deals with the present state of the models by looking at Robert Mundell's theory of optimum currency areas (OCAs) and its relationship with key currencies. The chapters in this section also consider the impact of exchange rate variability on labor markets, as well as the interactions between theoretical developments and real-world behavior in the open economy macromodel. The third and last part of this volume provides a perspective on the future by looking at alternate models and institutional perspectives. Several contributors examine the relationship between asset prices, the real exchange rate, and unemployment in a small economy via what they call "a medium-run structuralist perspective." The future of institutional structures necessary to conduct international economic policy is the subject of the last chapters in part three of the volume.

The US current account deficit approaches one trillion dollars, absorbing 75 percent of world surpluses. A fire sale of US debt could cause a global recession through disorderly devaluation of the dollar, raising interest rates and crashing stock markets. The G7 doctrine of shared responsibility intends to coordinate regional efforts. There is meagre political capital in most regions for these reforms. The devaluation of the dollar could be faster than G7 policy coordination. This book analyzes the main issues and individual regions, including China, Japan, the EU and the USA.

This book analyzes the world economic crisis as the essential background for an investigation into recent problems of Japanese capitalism. Taken into consideration are various socio-political or intitutional factors which affect the concrete course of current capitalist development.;The study raises questions such as why the stable and prosperous long boom of the postwar capitalist world resulted in an unstable period of deep and widespread depression from 1973, what the roles of Keynesianism and Monetarism are in the ongoing process of world economic crises and how the socio-economic positions of working people have been affected by the attempts to restructure capitalist firms.;In so doing, the author hopes to contribute to Marxian social science studies and offer sound social alternatives for the mass of working people.

Until recently, central bank independence was confined to just two major capitalist countries, the USA and Germany. As a result of stagflation and the voguish espousal of neo-liberalism in the 1980s, the institution has been adopted in most OECD and in many other countries. This book questions the principle of autonomy, examining the Bundesbank in historical context and exposing the flaws in both the technical and the political case for the wholesale adoption of the Bundesbank model by other states.

This book takes readers on a unique journey across some of the most debated implications of the rise of the Chinese economy on the global scene. From the analysis, suggestions emerge on how to improve statistical tools to measure performance and to obtain more precise macroeconomic forecasts. Moreover, it confirms the suspicion that a governance model of firms that does not sufficiently encourage market competition may have significant costs in terms ofefficiency for the Chinese production system. The analysis of demographic factors and of household savings gives further support to calls for a serious reform effort, particularly of the pension and health care systems, to utilize households' savings more efficiently and equitably. Finally the analyses of Chinese and global trade underscore the need for a less superficial consideration of the implications of the Chinese presence in global markets.
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Starting point of this book is the observation that an increase in public debt must be accompanied by a rise in the primary surplus of the government to guarantee sustainability of public debt. The book first elaborates on that principle from a theoretical point of view and then tests whether empirical evidence for that rule can be found. Additional tests are implemented to gain further evidence on sustainability of public debt. In order to allow for time varying coefficients penalized spline estimations are performed. The theoretical chapters present endogenous growth models and assume that the primary surplus rises as public debt increases so that sustainability of public debt is given. Implications of public deficits and debt are studied assuming full employment and for unemployment. The conclusion summarizes the findings and compares the results of the different models. Finally, policy implications are given showing how governments should deal with high public debt to GDP ratios.

This book stresses how the rise of China and India has completely changed the world economy, moving it towards disequilibrium. Several alternative economic policies are tested to seek a way towards high growth in any continent associated with long-run real and financial equilibrium. The Authors argue that a new exchange rate system is required and that a new world governance is needed.

Developing countries' financial sector has been affected by a troubled macroeconomic environment and repressive policies. To improve their financial sector performance, some governments have responded with financial reform policies which have succeeded in only a few but failed in several countries. This book identifies the challenges and solutions for policymakers and financial managers in countries implementing financial reform policies. It analyzes the anatomy of success and failure of reform and argues for sound financial regulation and supervision in these countries.

Investment provides an examination of the key macroeconomic theories which underpin fixed asset investment. It would make ideal reading for an intermediate level macroeconomics course or a module on fixed asset investment taking an applied macroeconomic perspective.