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on Heterodox Microeconomics |
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Issue of 2016‒01‒18
seventeen papers chosen by Carlo D’Ippoliti Università degli Studi di Roma “La Sapienza” |
| By: | Irena Petrovic; Slobodan Cvejic |
| Abstract: | The phenomenon of ERTs (empresas recuperadas por sus trabajadores) in Argentina has gained popularity since the financial crisis of 2001-2002. The resulting drastic drop in gross national product, the high inflation rates, and the increased rates of unemployment and poverty reflected serious weaknesses and limitations of neoliberal institutions in Argentina. This phenomenon was also determined by specific historical patterns, such as state interventionism, a long tradition of trade unionism and workers’ struggles, as well as a long and deep-rooted tradition of cooperativism. According to the latest survey (Ruggeri, 2014b), there are more than 300 ERTs in Argentina, employing over 13,000 workers. Data show that 95 per cent of ERTs are self-organized under the organizational and legal framework of worker cooperatives. This paper aims at providing a political, economic and social overview of the emergence and establishment of ERTs in Argentina over the past two decades. Moreover, the legal and institutional preconditions that significantly encourage, limit, and determine the scope of worker cooperatives, will be analyzed. In this analysis we will rely on the results of research on ERTs that has been done over the last 10 years, as well as on a historical analysis of the legal and institutional framework. |
| Keywords: | Argentina’s worker-recovered factories, Self-management, Employee participation, Labour managed firms, Labour movement, Trade union organization |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:trn:utwpeu:1580&r=hme |
| By: | Ana Bela Nunes; Carlos Bastien |
| Abstract: | The aim of this paper is to acknowledge the reflections of the Portuguese Marxist economists on the theory of economic crises. Although the references to Marx date back to the 1850s, both theoretical approaches and applied studies under this perspective were relatively late and superficial in Portugal. Relative backwardness of the Portuguese economy and other specificities to the Portuguese society were detrimental to the intellectual interest in the theory of economic crises. Anyway the approach to this subject by Marxist economists reveals the existence of three type of theories: the theory of the crisis in the business cycle, addressed from three different perspectives (the underconsumption theories, the disproportionality theories and the fall in the rate of profit theories); the theory of the crisis in the long cycle and the theory of the systemic crisis. Only after the Second World War II did the first relevant studies emerged and only after the 1970s did the academy appear sensitive to the subject. Meanwhile, the context of the late economic and financial crisis, that set in after 2007- 2008, resumed the topicality of the theory of economic crises, also from this heterodox perspective. |
| Keywords: | History of Economic Thought; Marxism; Crisis. JEL classification: B2, B5 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ise:gheswp:wp572015&r=hme |
| By: | Marcelo Vieta |
| Abstract: | This paper highlights the first phase of a research program, completed in late 2014 and early 2015 that homes in on worker-recuperated enterprises (imprese recuperate dai lavoratori) in Italy. The paper specifically focuses on Italy’s worker buyouts (WBOs) facilitated by its Legge Marcora (Marcora Law) framework—the form of worker-recuperated enterprises predominating in Italy. The paper first offers a definition of WBOs as a subset of workerrecuperate enterprises. It also reviews the most common scenarios from which WBOs emerge globally. It then overviews Italy’s Legge Marcora’s legal and financial framework, and situates the emergence of WBOs since the early 1980s as direct responses to market failure, business closures, rising unemployment, and, with the most recent WBOs, coinciding with the Great Recession and subsequent austerity measures that continue to negatively impact the country. The paper then discusses key findings from our research on WBO creation in Italy, touching on their most salient demographic and geographic particularities. Throughout the paper distinguishes Italy’s WBOs as exemplar because of their resilience in times of crisis, and the inclusion of multiple stakeholders in its WBO framework, namely: workers, the cooperative sector, and the state. |
| Keywords: | Worker buyouts, worker-recuperated enterprises, worker-recovered companies, business conversions, worker cooperatives, Legge Marcora, legal framework, enterprise entry and exit rates (birth and death rates), SMEs, Italy |
| JEL: | J01 J52 J53 J54 K2 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:trn:utwpeu:1578&r=hme |
| By: | China Mills, Diego Zavaleta and Kim Samuel |
| Abstract: | While people living in poverty talk about isolation, shame, and humiliation as being key aspects of their lived experiences of suffering, until recently, there has been no international data on these aspects – making them “missing dimensions” within poverty analysis and within research into suffering. Drawing upon international fieldwork and datasets from Chile and Chad, this chapter examines the relevance of social isolation, shame and humiliation in contexts of poverty, to research on suffering. The chapter suggests that the use of particular indicators of shame, humiliation, and social isolation can better recognize distributions of suffering. It can also help identify individuals and sub-groups within those living in multidimensional poverty - or of the general population at large - that are affected by concrete and particularly hurtful situations. Consequently, they can help to identify levels of suffering which are higher within a specific population. We argue that these types of indicators could form the basis of more refined measures that help generate more concise data on suffering. |
| Date: | 2014–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qeh:ophiwp:ophiwp071&r=hme |
| By: | Nuhu, Ahmed Salim |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we explore a unique exogenous instrument to examine how the intra-familial position of women influence health outcomes of their children using micro data from Ghana. Using the 2SLS-IV estimation technique,we build a model of household bargaining and child health development with perceptions of women regarding wife-beating and marital rape in the existence of domestic violence laws, in Ghana. Even though the initial OLS estimates suggest that women’s participation in decisions regarding purchases of household consumption goods help to improve child health outcomes, the IV estimates reveal that the presence of endogeneity underestimates the impact of women’s bargaining power on child health outcomes. Our test for endogeneity also confirms that child-health investment decisions is mediated through domestic violence laws, which protect women from physical and sexual abuse in the household. Our instrument is also robust to rural residency and father characteristics controls. |
| Keywords: | Keywords: Household Bargaining, Women Empowerment, Child Health Investment, Instrumental Variables, Domestic Violence |
| JEL: | J12 J13 J16 |
| Date: | 2015–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:68630&r=hme |
| By: | Antonio Fici |
| Abstract: | Social enterprise lawmaking is a growth industry. In the United States alone, over the last few years, there has been a proliferation of state laws establishing specific legal forms for social enterprises. The situation is not different in Europe, where the process began much earlier than in the United States and today at least fifteen European Union member states have specific laws for social enterprise. This article will describe the current state of the legislation on social enterprise in Europe, inquiring into its fundamental role in the development of the social economy and its particular logics as distinct from those of the for-profit capitalistic economy. It will explore the models of social enterprise regulation that seem more consistent with the economic growth inspired by the paradigms of the social economy. It will finally explain why, in regulating and shaping social enterprise, the model of the social enterprise in the cooperative form is to be preferred to that of the social enterprise in the company form. |
| Keywords: | Social enterprise; Social economy; Cooperatives; Comparative law; Non-profit corporate governance |
| JEL: | K22 L31 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:trn:utwpeu:1582&r=hme |
| By: | Hoseini, Mohammad (Tilburg University, Center For Economic Research) |
| Abstract: | Under the VAT, formal traders report their purchases to the administration for a<br/>deduction in their VAT bill. This paper models this third-party reporting feature of the VAT in an input-output economy and quantifies it among different activities using a forward linkages index. The administration can reduce the size of shadow economy by reallocating visiting audits to backwardly linked activities and cross-checking VAT payments with input credit claims in forwardly linked activities. Empirical evidence from Indian service sector justifies the assumptions and suggests a significant increase in the tax compliance of forwardly linked activities following VAT adoption in 2003. |
| Keywords: | Value-added tax; Informality; Tax enforcement; Linkage analysis |
| JEL: | H26 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tiu:tiucen:56358907-5e47-49f6-9a74-f59c0b69c49b&r=hme |
| By: | Claudia Olivetti (Boston College; NBER); Barbara Petrongolo (Queen Mary University; Centre for Economic Performance, LSE) |
| Abstract: | Women in developed economies have made major inroads in labor markets throughout the past century, but remaining gender differences in pay and employment seem remarkably persistent. This paper documents long-run trends in female employment, working hours and relative wages for a wide cross-section of developed economies. It reviews existing work on the factors driving gender convergence, and novel perspectives on remaining gender gaps. The paper finally emphasizes the interplay between gender trends and the evolution of the industry structure. Based on a shift-share decomposition, it shows that the growth in the service share can explain at least half of the overall variation in female hours, both over time and across countries. |
| Keywords: | gender gaps, demand and supply, industry structure |
| JEL: | E24 J16 J31 |
| Date: | 2016–01–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:boc:bocoec:889&r=hme |
| By: | Pier Angelo Mori |
| Abstract: | Le cooperative di comunità che si stanno diffondendo in molte parti del mondo sono il punto di arrivo di un processo evolutivo che ha visto il progressivo spostamento del baricentro delle cooperative da particolari gruppi sociali e professionali alla società nel complesso. Questa evoluzione è contrassegnata da due principali eventi. Il primo si è verificato all’inizio del XIX secolo, allorché sono apparse le prime cooperative di comunità che servivano intere comunità. Un ulteriore cambiamento è avvenuto verso la fine del secolo scorso, con l’allargamento degli obiettivi delle cooperative fino ad abbracciare il benessere collettivo. Da questo processo evolutivo emergono quattro tipologie di cooperative che, considerate nel loro insieme, costituiscono una classificazione esaustiva dell’universo cooperativo, entro cui vanno collocate le cooperative di comunità. Il termine è relativamente nuovo e organizzazioni simili o identiche sono state denominate in modo diverso in tempi diversi. Inoltre, benché le nuove cooperative di comunità abbiano in comune alcune caratteristiche fondamentali, presentano marcate differenze al loro interno e rispetto alle forme anteriori. Per fare chiarezza, elaboriamo un nuovo concetto di cooperativa di comunità, coerente con l’evoluzione di questa forma organizzativa e con la classificazione generale delle cooperative. Gli elementi fondamentali del concetto sono i beni di comunità, il territorio e la cittadinanza, che vengono discussi dettagliatamente e con riferimenti a casi concreti. Quindi esaminiamo in cosa le nuove cooperative di comunità si differenziano da quelle storiche. Il lavoro si conclude con una breve discussione delle loro prospettive future. |
| Keywords: | Cooperative di comunità, partecipazione dei cittadini, servizi pubblici |
| JEL: | D21 H44 L33 P13 |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:trn:utwpeu:1577&r=hme |
| By: | Lavy, Victor (Department of Economics University of Warwick); Sand, Edith (Bank of Isreal) |
| Abstract: | In this paper, we estimate the effect of primary school teachers’ gender biases on boys’ and girls’ academic achievements during middle and high school and on the choice of advanced level courses in math and sciences during high school. For identification, we rely on the random assignments of teachers and students to classes in primary schools. Our results suggest that teachers’ biases favoring boys have an asymmetric effect by gender—positive effect on boys’ achievements and negative effect on girls’. Such gender biases also impact students’ enrollment in advanced level math courses in high school—boys positively and girls negatively. These results suggest that teachers’ biased behavior at early stage of schooling have long run implications for occupational choices and earnings at adulthood, because enrollment in advanced courses in math and science in high school is a prerequisite for post-secondary schooling in engineering, computer science and so on. This impact is heterogeneous, being larger for children from families where the father is more educated than the mother and larger on girls from low socioeconomic background. |
| Date: | 2015 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wrk:warwec:1085&r=hme |
| By: | Carlo Ciccarelli; Alessandro Nuvolari |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the dynamics of technical change in the Italian locomotive industry in the period 1850-1913. From an historical point of view, this industry presents a major point of interest: it was one of the few relatively sophisticated "high-tech" sectors in which Italy, a latecomer country, was able to set foot firmly before 1913. Using technical data on the performance of different vintages of locomotives, we construct a new industry-level index of technical change. Our reassessment reveals the critical role played by non-tariff barriers for the emergence and consolidation of national manufacturers in this field. |
| Date: | 2014–02–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ssa:lemwps:2014/23&r=hme |
| By: | Roberto Mota Navarro; Hern\'an Larralde Ridaura |
| Abstract: | We present an agent based model of a single asset financial market that is capable of replicating several non-trivial statistical properties observed in real financial markets, generically referred to as stylized facts. While previous models reported in the literature are also capable of replicating some of these statistical properties, in general, they tend to oversimplify either the trading mechanisms or the behavior of the agents. In our model, we strived to capture the most important characteristics of both aspects to create agents that employ strategies inspired on those used in real markets, and, at the same time, a more realistic trade mechanism based on a double auction order book. We study the role of the distinct types of trader on the return statistics: specifically, correlation properties (or lack thereof), volatilty clustering, heavy tails, and the degree to which the distribution can be described by a log-normal. Further, by introducing the practice of profit taking, our model is also capable of replicating the stylized fact related to an asymmetry in the distribution of losses and gains. |
| Date: | 2016–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:1601.00229&r=hme |
| By: | Attila Havas (Institute of Economics - Centre for Economic and Regional Studies - Hungarian Academy of Sciences) |
| Abstract: | This paper reviews various approaches to measuring business innovation from the angle of capturing social innovations and offers several methodological and policy conclusions. First, the Innovation Union Scoreboard (IUS) indicators in principle could be useful in settings where the dominant mode of innovation is based on R&D activities. In practice, however, both R&D and non-R&D-based modes of innovation are fairly important. IUS, therefore, only provides a partial picture. Social innovations can certainly rely on R&D-based technological innovations. Their essence, however, tends to be organisational, managerial and behavioural changes. The IUS indicators do not capture these types of changes. Second, an assessment of the 81 indicators used to compile the Global Innovation Index reveals that it would neither be a fruitful effort to rely on those indicators to capture social innovations. Third, given the diversity among innovation systems, a poor performance signalled by a composite indicator does'nt automatically identify the area(s) necessitating the most urgent policy actions. Only tailored, thorough comparative analyses can do so. Fourth, analysts and policy-makers need to be aware of the differences between measuring (i) social innovation activities (efforts) themselves, (ii) the framework conditions (pre-requisites, available inputs, skills, norms, values, behavioural patterns, etc.) of being socially innovative, and (iii) the economic, societal or environmental impacts of social innovations. |
| Keywords: | Evolutionary economics of innovation; Business innovation; Social innovation; Measurement of innovation; Composite indicators; Scoreboards, league tables; Unit of analysis |
| JEL: | B52 C80 O31 O38 Y10 |
| Date: | 2015–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:has:discpr:1554&r=hme |
| By: | Giovanis, Eleftheris |
| Abstract: | This study examines the relationship between teleworking, gender roles and happiness of couples using data from the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) during the period 1991-2009. Various approaches are followed; Probit-adapted fixed effects, multinomial Logit and three stage least squares. The results support that both men and women who are teleworkers spend more time on housework, while teleworking increases the probability that the household chores examined in this study, such as cooking, cleaning ironing and childcare, will be shared relatively to those who are non-teleworkers. In addition, women are happier when they or their spouse is teleworker, as well as, both men and women are happier when they state that the specific household chores are shared. Thus, teleworkers may be happier for the reason that they are able to face the family demands and share the household chores with their spouse, increasing their fairness belief about the household division allocation and improving their well-being, expressed by happiness. |
| Keywords: | Gender Roles; Household Production; Teleworking; Well-Being |
| JEL: | D1 D10 D13 I31 J16 |
| Date: | 2015–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:68668&r=hme |
| By: | Esteve Dot Jutgla; Montserrat Pallares-Barbera |
| Abstract: | La evolución de la ciudad postindustrial se reestructuró a partir de nuevas actividades, generalmente de servicios, en espacios donde previamente se habían desarrollado procesos de desindustrialización. El objetivo de este artículo es analizar como el patrimonio industrial se convierte en un elemento competitivo de la ciudad del conocimiento, dónde el sector público presionado por los movimientos ciudadanos, introduce políticas de protección de este patrimonio en favor de la construcción de la ciudad cultural. La pregunta estructural es analizar cómo se produce el patrimonio industrial, cómo se consume, y cuáles son los agentes que participan en ambos procesos; y cómo el patrimonio deviene un elemento básico del proceso de revitalización económica y de compacidad urbana en el Poblenou-22@Barcelona; finalmente se postula como esta estrategia representa un Nuevo Modelo Barcelona. La política de clústeres en el área del Poblenou, donde se localiza el plan 22@Barcelona, representó una propuesta innovadora para la transformación urbanística, económica y social de la ciudad de Barcelona. |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qsh:wpaper:360626&r=hme |
| By: | Nicolai Suppa |
| Abstract: | This paper compiles a multidimensional poverty index for Germany. Drawing on the capability approach as conceptual framework, I apply the Alkire-Foster method using German data. I propose a comprehensive operationalization of a multidimensional poverty index for an advanced economy like Germany, including a justification for several dimensions. Income, however, is rejected as a dimension on both conceptual and empirical grounds. I document that insights obtained by the proposed multidimensional poverty index are consistent with earlier findings. Moreover, I exploit the decomposability of the Alkire-Foster measure for both a consistently detection of specific patterns in multidimensional poverty and the identification of driving factors behind its changes. Finally, the results suggest that using genuine multidimensional measures makes a difference. Neither a single indicator nor a dashboard seem capable of replacing a multidimensional poverty index. Moreover, I find multidimensional and income-poverty measures to disagree on who is poor. |
| Date: | 2015–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qeh:ophiwp:ophiwp098.pdf&r=hme |
| By: | Joel Perlmann; Patrick Nevada |
| Abstract: | This policy note examines the formulation and reformulation of questions deployed by the US Census Bureau to gather information on racial and ethnic origin in recent decades. The likely outcome for the 2020 Census is that two older questions on race and Hispanic origin will be combined into a single question on ethno-racial origin. The authors welcome these changes but suggest that this may also be an opportune time to drop the "race or origin" label from this new, unified question. They also argue for modest and readily implemented modifications to capture valuable information on parental birthplaces in the American Community Survey. This information would support our ability to measure the social and economic well-being of the population and thus better understand the trajectory of demographic groups over time. This policy note is accompanied by Working Paper No. 857, "Ethno-Racial Origin in US Federal Statistics: 1980-2020," in which the authors explore these issues in greater detail. |
| Date: | 2015–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:lev:levypn:15-8&r=hme |