Characteristics of Business Cycles: Have they Changed?
Oliver Holtemöller, J. Rahn, M. H. Stierle
IWH-Sonderhefte,
No. 5,
2009
Abstract
The most recent economic downturn has shown that economic activity nowadays is still prone to large fluctuations. Despite a long tradition of research, the understanding of such fluctuations, namely business cycles, is still far from comprehensive. Moreover, in a developing world with new technologies, faster communication systems, a higher integration of world markets and increasingly better-skilled people the nature of business cycles changes continuously and new insights can be drawn from recent experience.
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Smuggling Illegal versus Legal Goods across the U.S.-Mexico Border: A Structural Equations Model Approach
A. Buehn, Stefan Eichler
Southern Economic Journal,
No. 2,
2009
Abstract
We study the smuggling of illegal and legal goods across the U.S.-Mexico border from 1975 to 2004. Using a Multiple Indicators Multiple Causes (MIMIC) model we test the microeconomic determinants of both smuggling types and reveal their trends. We find that illegal goods smuggling decreased from $116 billion in 1984 to $27 billion in 2004 as a result of improved labor market conditions in Mexico and intensified U.S. border enforcement. Smuggling legal goods is motivated by tax and tariff evasion. While export misinvoicing fluctuated at low levels, import misinvoicing switched from underinvoicing to overinvoicing after Mexico's accession to the GATT and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) induced lower tariffs.
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Identifying Sources of Business Cycle Fluctuations in Germany 1975-1998
Oliver Holtemöller, Torsten Schmidt
Ruhr Economic Paper 68,
2008
Abstract
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Flexible utilization of labor strengthens industrial enterprises´ ability to adapt to fluctuations in business - an empirical east-west comparison based on the IAB company panel
Brigitte Loose, Udo Ludwig
Wirtschaft im Wandel,
No. 12,
2004
Abstract
Auf der Basis von Einzeldaten wird der Frage nachgegangen werden, mit welchen herkömmlichen Mitteln und neuen Instrumenten Industriebetriebe ihre Geschäftstätigkeit an Schwankungen anpassen und was diese Betriebe von anderen unterscheidet, die diese Instrumente nicht implementiert haben. Dazu werden die Rolle der technischen Ausstattung, der Personalpolitik und der Tarifpolitik behandelt. Ein Vergleich der Daten mit Westdeutschland zeigt , inwieweit die ostdeutschen Betriebe in diesem Bereich einen Wettbewerbsvorteil besitzen. Während die produktionstechnischen Voraussetzungen für die betriebliche Flexibilität im ostdeutschen Verarbeitenden Gewerbe etwas schwächer ausgeprägt sind, unterscheidet sich der Anteil “standardisierter“ und flexibler Beschäftigungsverhältnissen zwischen den Industriebetrieben in Ost und West kaum. Größere Unterschiede können hier eher zwischen verschiedenen Betriebsgrößen und Ertragstypen ausgemacht werden. Die geringere tarifliche Orientierung bei Arbeitszeit und Löhnen sowie der über das ganze Jahr ausdehnbare, überwiegend unentgeltliche Abbau von Überstunden erweisen sich als Wettbewerbsvorteile für die ostdeutsche Industrie. Der Untersuchung zugrunde liegen Angaben des IAB-Betriebspanels aus der Erhebungswelle 2003 für das Verarbeitende Gewerbe.
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Financing FDI into developing economies and the international transmission of business cycle fluctuations
Diemo Dietrich
Swiss Journal of Economics and Statistics,
2004
Abstract
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Why do we have an interbank money market?
Jürgen Wiemers, Ulrike Neyer
IWH Discussion Papers,
No. 182,
2003
Abstract
The interbank money market plays a key role in the execution of monetary policy. Hence, it is important to know the functioning of this market and the determinants of the interbank money market rate. In this paper, we develop an interbank money market model with a heterogeneous banking sector. We show that besides for balancing daily liquidity fluctuations banks participate in the interbank market because they have different marginal costs of obtaining funds from the central bank. In the euro area, which we refer to, these cost differences occur because banks have different marginal cost of collateral which they need to hold to obtain funds from the central bank. Banks with relatively low marginal costs act as intermediaries between the central bank and banks with relatively high marginal costs. The necessary positive spread between the interbank market rate and the central bank rate is determined by transaction costs and credit risk in the interbank market, total liquidity needs of the banking sector, costs of obtaining funds from the central bank, and the distribution of the latter across banks.
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Investment Behaviour of Financially Constrained Multinational Corporations: Consequences for the International Transmission of Business Cycle Fluctuations
Diemo Dietrich
IWH Discussion Papers,
No. 165,
2002
Abstract
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Business fluctuations in the service sector
Thorsten Wichmann
IWH Discussion Papers,
No. 54,
1997
Abstract
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