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The purpose of this paper is to develop a macroeconomic framework to predict the impact of transient donor funding on a developing economy and to facilitate evaluation of the effectiveness of alternative uses of this funding in attaining the desired outcomes.

A simulation analysis of the macroeconomic impact of donor funding on the Lebanese economy is conducted.

The paper evaluates the potential outcomes for the country from alternative uses of this donor funding and concludes that targeting infrastructure expenditure, mediated through the government, will produce the most beneficial longer term outcomes.

This paper is the first substantive macro model to be developed for the Lebanese economy. It is the first major study of the contribution of donor funding to the Lebanese macro-economy. The framework, however, can be generalised to other developing donor recipient nations.

The objectives of this study are to investigate the role of wages, skills development and R&D on the productivity of Thai manufacturing firms, using data from the 2017 Industrial Census of Thailand.

The paper uses two-stage least squares (2SLS) to examine the role of wages, skills development and R&D, as well as other vital factors, impacting productivity as measured by labour productivity and total factor productivity.

Thai manufacturing firms' technology in aggregate exhibits decreasing returns to scale. Increasing wages and skills development promote the labour productivity and total factor productivity (TFP) of Thai manufacturers. R&D is also shown to be vital in promoting the labour productivity and TFP of large firms, but not small firms. Foreign direct investment (FDI) and government support can significantly increase large and medium-sized firms' labour productivity and TFP. Financially constrained firms tend to perform more productively. However, older firms, larger firms, labour supply shortages and political instability adversely affect labour productivity and TFP.

Upskilling and improving HRD policies could move Thailand towards a knowledge-based and high-income country in the future. Intellectual property protection should be strengthened to boost the country's R&D. The government should consider lifting restrictions on FDI to encourage international openness. The Thai Board of Investment’s promotion should target Thai manufacturing firms and FDI.

This study is the first to examine in detail the role of wages, skills development and R&D on the productivity of Thai firms based on the 2017 Thailand Industrial Census.

As a by-product of the production process, emissions can follow output fluctuations. Hence, disregarding the relationship between economic fluctuations and emissions could result in undesirable environmental outcomes. This study aims to investigate the environmental and economic effects of abatement subsidies on overall emissions during business cycles in Australia.

A real business cycle (RBC) model is devised and parameterised in this paper. RBC models have been recently introduced to environmental policy analysis, and this study contributes to the literature by investigating the effects of a potential subsidy policy in an RBC framework. The model is also calibrated and provides solutions for the Australian economy.

The authors find that under a steady-state situation, supporting abatement can result in reducing emissions by 6.45% while it imposes welfare costs to the economy (by 0.61%). Simulation results show that an optimal abatement policy should be pro-cyclical, with the abatement subsidy increasing during expansions and decreasing during recessions. As well, in a subsidy policy setting, emissions would react pro-cyclically, i.e. emissions increase (decrease) when the gross domestic product increases (decreases). The abatement reaction by firms, however, is different, because when a positive productivity shock occurs, firms reduce abatement and allocate resources to production. Nonetheless, as time passes, the increased subsidy provides a strong enough incentive to allocate resources to abatement and, subsequently, abatement increases.

This paper investigates how an emission reduction subsidy should be adapted to macroeconomic fluctuations so that it can limit variations in emissions.

This study investigates the impact of demographic structural changes on economic growth using data for Asian economies covering the period 1960–2020. Other factors affecting economic growth, such as human capital, are also considered.

A fixed-effects model and a fixed-effects model with endogenous covariates are used to examine a dynamic demographic model covering different age cohorts (i.e. youth-age, working-age and old-age populations) and other factors impacting economic growth.

The working-age population share, the labour force relative to the working-age population and growth of the actively employed population have significant and positive impacts on economic growth. Population growth and the youth-age population share exert a significant and negative impact on economic growth. A second and silver demographic dividend is found arising from a significant and positive association between the old-age population and economic growth. Human capital has an inverted U-shaped association with economic growth. Environmental degradation is significantly and negatively related to economic growth. No evidence is found for the importance of migration.

The positive association between the old-age population and economic growth indicates the policy significance of retirement-income systems with high coverage to enhance economic growth in Asia. Lifelong learning and preventative health measures can also be supportive policies to strengthen the third (silver) demographic dividend via the extension of retirement for productive and healthy elders.

This study is the first to examine the impacts of demographic structure, human capital, migration and environmental degradation on economic growth in Asia, using the most up-to-date longitudinal data from 1960 to 2020. Unlike previous empirical studies, this study discovers empirically based evidence to support Asia's second and silver demographic dividends.

The last decade of this century has witnessed the transition of the formerly centrally planned economies of Europe and Asia to market economies, a process affecting some 1.7 billion people in 28 countries. While much agreement exists on the sorts of reform measures required, disagreement exists over their sequencing. The economic and social performance of these transition economies has varied considerably and for a variety of reasons, however China’s performance, in particular, has been outstanding. The paper reviews the reform measures required for economic transition, and alternative sequencing approaches to these reforms. It conducts an overview of the performance of the transition economies, with focus placed upon the experience of the Chinese economy. An analysis of China’s approach to economic reform, its key components, major outcomes and outstanding issues are discussed. Key lessons to be derived for other transition economies from China’s experience are also presented.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationships between stock market returns of 13 countries based upon monthly data spanning December 1987 to April 2007.

Specifically, the principal component (PC) and maximum likelihood (ML) methods are used to examine any discernable patterns of stock market co‐movements.

Factor analysis provides evidence that stock returns in a number of Asian countries are highly correlated and, based on the resulting robust factor loadings, they form the first well‐defined common factor. The paper also finds consistent results (based on both the PC and ML methods) suggesting that the stock market returns of developed countries are also highly correlated, and constitute our second factor.

The paper concludes that, inter alia, geographical proximity and the level of economic development do matter when it comes to co‐movements of stock returns and that this has important implications for financial portfolio diversification if the aim is to reduce systematic risks across countries.

Very few previous studies have investigated the benefits from portfolio diversification by using the PC and ML methods.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the efficiency and productivity growth of the Iranian banking industry between 2003 and 2008, encompassing pre‐ and post‐2005‐reform years.

The study uses a new decomposition of the Hicks‐Moorsteen total factor productivity index developed by O'Donnell to analyse efficiency and productivity changes in a banking context. The advantage of this approach over the popular constant‐returns‐to‐scale Malmquist productivity index is that it is free from any assumptions concerning firms' optimising behaviour, the structure of markets, or returns to scale. The paper assumes that the production technology exhibits variable returns to scale.

The banking industry's technical efficiency level – which had improved between 2003 and 2006 – deteriorated after regulatory changes were introduced in Iran. The results obtained also show that during 2006‐2007, the industry's total factor productivity increased by 32 per cent. However, the industry experienced its highest negative scale efficiency rate of 38 per cent (ΔROSE=0.62) and its highest negative efficiency growth of 43 per cent (ΔEff=0.57) during this period. The industry also witnessed a strong drop in productivity in 2007‐2008. Overall, changes in the production possibility set and scale‐efficiency changes exerted dominant effects on productivity changes.

This study is the first to use a comprehensive decomposition of the Hicks‐Moorsteen TFP index to analyse efficiency and productivity changes in a banking context.

This essay demonstrates that US economist Charles Post’s attempted rebuttal of the ‘labour aristocracy’ thesis is both theoretically and empirically flawed. Defending the proposition that colonialism, capital export imperialism and the formation of oligopolies with global reach have, over the past century and more, worked to sustain the living standards of a privileged upper stratum of the international working class, it rejects Post’s assertion that the existence of such cannot be proven. The essay concludes with a working definition of this ‘labour aristocracy’, setting the concept within the field of global political economy and reclaiming its relevance to the Marxist tradition.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of the War on two prominent academic liberal historians.

The research is based on a narrative of their lives and careers before and during the War.

The findings include an analysis of how the War engaged these academic liberals in the pursuit of the War effort.

By the end of the War, both sought to reaffirm much of their earlier academic liberalism despite the political and social changes in the post-war world.