nep-pke New Economics Papers
on Post Keynesian Economics
Issue of 2015‒12‒01
five papers chosen by
Karl Petrick
Western New England University

  1. Neoliberalism and the post-hegemonic war of position: the dialectic between invisibility and visibilities By Bart Cammaerts
  2. Pension Funding and the Economy: Would “Proper” Funding Cost Jobs? By Dean Baker and Nick Buffie
  3. Is Neo-Walrasian Macroeconomics a Dead End? By Marchionatti, Roberto; Sella, Lisa
  4. Seven Reasons to Use Carbon Pricing in Climate Policy By Andrea Baranzini; Jeroen van den Bergh; Stefano Carattini; Richard Howarth; Emilio Padilla; Jordi Roca
  5. Services in Developing Economies: A new chance for catching-up? By Gisela Di Meglio; Jorge Gallego; Andrés Maroto; Maria Savona

  1. By: Bart Cammaerts
    Abstract: This article aims to understand the dialectic between the visible and the invisible in relation to the post-hegemonic nature of neoliberalism and the role of mediation in that process. The neoliberal ideological project is geared towards making itself invisible, positioning itself as quintessentially anti-ideological and natural rather than ideological. However, the post-hegemonic status of neoliberalism and capitalism requires its constitutive outsides to struggle for visibility so as to be able to make itself invisible. Mainstream media plays a pivotal role in this regard not only in terms of invisibilizing capitalist interests, but also in terms of providing (negative or positive) visibility to the constitutive outsides of capitalism. Mediation also implicates audiences and publics, who could be approached as an increasingly angry and frustrated Spivakean subaltern, distrustful of democracy and of the media. It is argued that a new democratic imaginary is needed, deterritorialized from the market imaginary and mobilizing the discontented subaltern. The question remains, however, whether it is überhaupt possible to unsettle the post-hegemonic status of the neoliberal ideological project.
    Keywords: Democracy; ideology; mediation; neoliberalism; post-hegemony
    JEL: L91 L96
    Date: 2015
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:64480&r=pke
  2. By: Dean Baker and Nick Buffie
    Abstract: This paper calculates the impact on the economy of adopting NM&R funding rules during the last recession. Specifically, it calculates the impact on GDP and employment if state governments had decided to fill the funding gap calculated by NM&R over a 15-year time horizon, as they advocate.
    Keywords: pensions, novy-marx, rauh, employment, gross state product, budget
    JEL: H H6 H7
    Date: 2015–11
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:epo:papers:2015-22&r=pke
  3. By: Marchionatti, Roberto; Sella, Lisa (University of Turin)
    Abstract: After the ‘new Great Crisis’ exploded in 2008 it is widely recognized that mainstream macroeconomics - the last result of Lucas’s anti-Keynesian revolution of the 1980s which tried to give macroeconomics sound neo-Walrasian microeconomic bases - has failed to anticipate and then appraise the crisis. Has this crisis revealed a failure of this macroeconomics as a scientific theory? Mainstream macroeconomists defend their models on the basis of their alleged superiority in terms of clarity and coherence. The thesis of this paper is that this claim about superiority is false. The paper argues that the reasons for the failure of mainstream macroeconomics – in particular its poor predictive performance and interpretative weakness - reside in the implications of the neo-Walrasian legacy and the problems connected with the implementation of that programme.
    Date: 2015–06
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uto:dipeco:201521&r=pke
  4. By: Andrea Baranzini (Haute Ecole de Gestion Genève, University of Apllied Sciences Western Switzerland); Jeroen van den Bergh (Institute of Environmental Science annd Technology (UAB); ICREA; Institute of Environmental Studies & Faculty of Economics and Business Administration (LSE)); Stefano Carattini (Haute Ecole de Gestion Genève, University of Apllied Sciences Western Switzerland; Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment (LSE)); Richard Howarth (Environmental Studies Program, Dartmouth College); Emilio Padilla (Department of Applied Economics (UAB)); Jordi Roca (Faculty of Economics and Business (UB))
    Abstract: The idea of a global carbon price has been a recurrent theme in debates on international climate policy. Discarded at the Conference of Parties (COP) of Copenhagen in 2009, it remained part of deliberations for a climate agreement in subsequent years. Unfortunately, there is still much misunderstanding about the reasons for implementing a global carbon price. As a result, ideological and political resistance against it prospers. Here we present the main arguments in favor of a carbon price to stimulate a fair and well-informed discussion about climate policy instruments. This includes arguments that have received surprisingly little attention so far. It is stressed that a main reason to use carbon pricing is environmental effectiveness, so not only economic efficiency (including the special case of cost-effectiveness). In addition, we provide ideas on how to implement a uniform global carbon price, whether using a carbon tax or emissions trading.
    Date: 2015–11
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uab:wprdea:wpdea1507&r=pke
  5. By: Gisela Di Meglio (Department of Economic Analysis II Complutense University of Madrid, Spain); Jorge Gallego (Department of Economic Analysis Autonomous University of Madrid, Spain.); Andrés Maroto (Department of Economic Analysis Autonomous University of Madrid, Spain.); Maria Savona (Science Policy Research Unit University of Sussex, UK.)
    Abstract: The paper analyses the potential contribution of services as a driving force of economic growth in developing countries within a Kaldorian framework. In doing so, we revisit Kaldor Growth Laws and econometrically test them for a number of economic activities (including four service branches) across twenty-nine developing countries from Asia, Latin-America and Sub-Saharan Africa during a time span of three decades (1975-2005). Panel data estimations are complemented with a decomposition of labour productivity growth by means of a shift-share analysis. The results induce to question the traditional role posed to services as unlikely drivers of productivity growth in developing economies. As a matter of fact, business services seem to allow productivity growth by the same Kaldorian mechanisms that have traditionally made manufacturing the key driver of growth.
    Keywords: structural change, growth, development, productivity, Kaldor
    JEL: L16 O14 O47 C23
    Date: 2015–11
    URL: http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sru:ssewps:2015-32&r=pke

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