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on Confederation of Independent States |
| By: | Bruno, Randolph; Bytchkova, Maria; Estrin, Saul |
| Abstract: | We analyse a micro-panel data set to investigate the effect of regional institutional environment and economic factors on Russian new firm entry rates across time, industries and regions. The paper builds on novel databases and exploits inter-regional variation in a large number of institutional variables. We find entry rates across industries in Russia are not especially low by international standards and are correlated with entry rates in developed market economies, as well as with institutional environment and firm size. Furthermore, industries that, for scale or technological reasons, are characterised by higher entry rates experience lower entry within regions affected subject to political change. A higher level of democracy enhances entry rates for small sized firms but reduces them for medium or large ones. |
| Keywords: | democracy; entry rate; institutions |
| JEL: | L26 P31 |
| Date: | 2011–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:8283&r=cis |
| By: | H. Lehmann; A. Muravyev; T. Razzolini; A. Zaiceva |
| Abstract: | This paper is the first to analyze the costs of job loss in Russia, using unique new data from the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey over the years 2003-2008, including a special supplement on displacement that was initiated by us. We employ fixed effects regression models and propensity score matching techniques in order to establish the causal effect of displacement for displaced individuals. The paper is innovative insofar as we investigate fringe and in-kind benefits and the propensity to have an informal employment relationship as well as a permanent contract as relevant labor market outcomes upon displacement. We also analyze monthly earnings, hourly wages, employment and hours worked, which are traditionally investigated in the literature. Compared to the control group of non-displaced workers (i.e. stayers and quitters), displaced individuals face a significant income loss following displacement, which is mainly due to the reduction in employment and hours worked. This effect is robust to the definition of displacement. The losses seem to be more pronounced and are especially large for older workers with labor market experience and human capital acquired in Soviet times and for workers with primary and secondary education. Workers displaced from state firms experience particularly large relative losses in the short run, while such losses for workers laid off from private firms are more persistent. Turning to the additional non-conventional labor market outcomes, there is a loss in terms of the number of fringe and in-kind benefits for reemployed individuals but not in terms of their value. There is also some evidence of an increased probability of working in informal jobs if displaced. These results point towards the importance of both firm-specific human capital and of obsolete skills obtained under the centrally planned economy as well as to a wider occurrence of job insecurity among displaced workers. |
| JEL: | J64 J65 P50 |
| Date: | 2011–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bol:bodewp:wp734&r=cis |
| By: | Richard Pomfret (Institute for International Economics) |
| Abstract: | The paper presents a comparative analysis of the resource-rich transition economies of Mongolia and the southern republics of the former Soviet Union. For Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, the ability to earn revenue from cotton exports allowed them to avoid reform. Oil in Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan was associated with large-scale corruption, but with soaring revenues in the 2000s their institutions evolved and to some extent improved. Kyrgyzstan and Mongolia illustrate the challenges facing small economies with large potential mineral resources, with the former suffering from competition for rents among the elite and the latter from lost opportunities. Overall the countries illustrate that a resource curse is not inevitable among transition economies, but a series of hurdles need to be surmounted to benefit from resource abundance. Neither the similar initial institutions nor those created in the 1990s are immutable. |
| Keywords: | Oil, Gas, Minerals, Central Asia, Resource Curse |
| JEL: | Q32 P35 O13 |
| Date: | 2011–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iie:wpaper:wp11-8&r=cis |
| By: | Edward Hunter Christie; Pavel K. Bev; Volodymyr Golovko |
| Abstract: | This report contains three separate papers, each addressing selected issues concerning natural gas policy and security of gas supply in Europe. The over-arching themes are vulnerability (to supply disruptions, to supplier pricing power) and fragmentation; and measures designed to overcome them, namely interconnection and consolidation of bargaining power. The first paper contains a review of some of the economic effects of, and subsequent policy reactions to, the January 2009 cut of Russian gas supplies through the Ukraine Corridor, with a particular focus on Bulgaria and on EU policy. The second paper provides an analysis of the current state of gas relations between Ukraine and the Russian Federation, with a focus on the Ukrainian perspective and on recent political developments in that country. The third paper provides an analysis of the case for consolidating buyer power in line with the concept of an EU Gas Purchasing Agency. |
| Keywords: | Natural gas, security of supply, supply disruption, interconnector, Russia, Ukraine, Bulgaria, European Union, energy policy, fragmentation, bargaining power, countervailing power, gas purchasing agency |
| JEL: | C78 L11 Q34 Q48 |
| Date: | 2011–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wsr:ecbook:2011:i:iii-003&r=cis |