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Selected Chapters from the History of Economic Thought
Sedláček, Tomáš ; Žák, Milan (advisor) ; Fidrmuc, Jarko (referee) ; Luptáčik, Mikuláš (referee) ; Schefold, Bertram (referee)
This thesis deals with the development of some key economic topic from the very foundation of our Western culture. From the Epic of Gilgamesh, on which no economic literature exists, through Hebrew thought in the Tanakh, Greek philosophers and Christianity, the paper analyses the development of philosophy of economy in the writings of Rene Descartes, Bernard Mandeville and Adam Smith. The work follows seven key topics: (i) history of the idea of demand and supply (consumption and labour), tracing its very roots to the oldest creation myths we have, (ii) the ethical dimension of the economic debate on good and evil, (iii) the notion of linear progress and cyclicality of development, (iv) the idea of invisible hand of the markets, (v) the idea of animal spirits, (vi) the philosophical basis of mathematization of economics and (vii) the idea of truth in science and economics in particular. This paper tries to look at meta-economics, offer a more integrated counterbalance to the mathematically reductionist approach of recent mainstream economic way of thinking. The work tries to combine philosophy, theology, anthropology, sociology and psychology with economic thinking. The thesis is a selection of chapters from a book Economics of Good and Evil -The Quest for Economic Meaning from Gilgamesh to Wall...
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White collar revisited - Millsean theory on impact of bureaucratization on social and economic development of western societies
Hampl, Petr ; Vlček, Josef (advisor) ; Matějů, Petr (referee) ; Žák, Milan (referee)
The first part of this thesis sums up ideas, which the author had published in his essays. These ideas are mostly focused on the relationship between the class structure of current western societies and economic policy preferred by the governments. The next part is dedicated to Charles Wright Mills, his sociological method, his contribution to sociology of 50th as well as his heritage for current sociological thinking. Three idea streams, which can be used for supplementing Mills' point of view, are explained: public choice economy (mainly its version of Gordon Tullock), new class theory and theory of business innovation. New typology of business innovation is developed in this part. The core of this thesis consist in discussion of Mills' propositions about the growth of bureaucratic organizations, birth of white collars as a massive social class and its impact on social structure, economic development and political development of western societies. Mills conclusions are looked on in the light of socioeconomic development during 60 years since the first publishing of White collar. They are also compared with key finding of idea streams mentioned above. Theory of impact of growth of big bureaucracy on economic and political development is formulated that specifies and supplement Mills' theory. The...
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Essays on Monetary Policy and Estimation of DSGE Models
Rychalovska, Yuliya ; Slobodyan, Sergey (advisor) ; Žák, Milan (referee) ; Hlédik, Tibor (referee)
The thesis is motivated by current practice of policy conduct implemented by many monetary institutions. In particular, a new operational framework, inflation targeting, has been introduced by the most advanced central banks. In addition, DSGE models became widely used for systematic evaluation of macroeconomic effects of monetary policy and forecasting. In the first chapter of the thesis, I assess possible risks and challenges of implementing inflation targeting strategy in more complicated, but at the same time more realistic, DSGE model economies. I focus on analysis of optimal monetary policy and welfare in a DSGE model of a small open economy with multiple domestic sectors, which have different structural characteristics. The findings suggest that openness to trade as well as sector-specific features do matter for monetary policy design thus generating important implications for optimal stabilization objectives and social welfare. The ranking of simple rules indicates that flexible CPI targeting regime is able to closely replicate the optimal solution and outperform the policy of domestic inflation stabilization. Finally, the sensitivity analysis demonstrates that the presence of sectoral asymmetries may alter the relative performance of alternative policy rules. The second part of the thesis...
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The sovereign debt crisis in the Euro area
Pilař, Tomáš ; Dvořák, Pavel (advisor) ; Helísek, Mojmír (referee) ; Žák, Milan (referee) ; Kubátová, Květa (referee)
This dissertation thesis focuses on complex analysis of the problem, which is the sovereign debt crisis in the Euro area. The aim of this paper is to provide a complex overview and analysis of the current sovereign debt crisis, from the theoretical definition of the term, through an analysis of the causes and consequences of this crisis to outline the economic policy response to it. The text is divided into two parts. The first part deals with theoretical problem solving. In the second part is analyzed and described course of sovereign debt crisis. This section also analyzes in detail causes and consequences of the sovereign debt crisis in certain countries. This section is completed by an analysis of economic policy response to the sovereign debt crisis and an expert estimate of the future development of public debt countries analyzed.
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Interconnection between labor market and monetary policy: NAIRU, unemployment hysteresis and monetary policy responses
Slaný, Martin ; Tomšík, Vladimír (advisor) ; Mandel, Martin (referee) ; Žák, Milan (referee)
This dissertation thesis deals with relation between labour market and monetary policy referring to two fundamental theoretical concepts -- natural rate hypothesis (or NAIRU) and unemployment hysteresis hypothesis. The first chapter outlines the most frequent values of the Phillips curve, the fundamental model of macroeconomics theory in the relation between the labour market and the monetary policy. The following chapter deals with the exogenous NAIRU concept which works as natural unemployment rate approximation. The unemployment hysteresis deals with the NAIRU as endogenous variable which is dependent on preceding imbalanced situations on labour market. The thesis outlines the main causes of the hysteresis: capital scrapping effect, role of the long-term unemployment and the insider-outsider hypothesis. The third chapter also comprises simple econometric tests of both particular mechanisms and the hysteresis itself based on usual unit roots tests. The results show the hysteresis using data from both the Czech Republic and Central and Eastern Europe countries (CEEC). The fourth chapter deals with monetary-political implications of the unemployment hysteresis. The practical part of the thesis is based on two hypotheses of the relation between inflation (policy interest rate) and NAIRU. The last chapter based on the VAR model outlines short-term relations between the labour market and monetary policy variables. Long-term relations are tested by both the co-integration analysis and vector error correction model (VECM). These models are examined on the data from the Czech Republic and Poland (2000-2013). The thesis also applies pooled regression estimate for ten CEEC. The results show that the monetary policy does have impact on the labour market not only in the short-term but also in the long-term period and thus they confirm the hysteresis hypothesis
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The concept, practice and culture of lobbying in the English speaking countries
Vymětal, Petr ; Reschová, Jana (advisor) ; Žák, Milan (referee) ; Malíková, Ľubomíra (referee) ; Rychetník, Luděk (referee)
The regulation of lobbying is a current topic both at the level of international organizations as well as in many European and overseas countries. This work deals with the comparison of the rules on lobbying in selected English-speaking countries. Descriptive, doctrinal and comparative methods are used to analyze the main trends in the lobbying regulation of the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland as well as Australia. The text is structured into four chapters. The first chapter deals with the definition of lobbying and its differences from corrupt dealings; it also covers the types of lobbying activities and the various kinds of lobbyists. The second chapter attempts to contextualize lobbying into the theories of the decision-making process. A comparison of the similarities and differences of the lobbying rules is made and analyzed in the third and fourth chapters. Both the third and the fourth chapter have a similar structure -- first, the general rules and approaches to regulation are introduced, and then a comparison of selected English-speaking countries is made. The third chapter deals with the most common rules for lobbyists; the fourth chapter focuses on the relatively neglected side of lobbying contacts, i.e. the rules for the targets of lobbying (public office holders). In the end, some measures and recommendations for the Czech Republic are also outlined.
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The Economics of Wind Energy
Ryvolová, Ivana ; Zemplinerová, Alena (advisor) ; Žák, Milan (referee) ; Štěpán, Vladimír (referee)
The presented work examines the special characteristics of electricity produced by the wind as a renewable resource into which considerable hopes are being placed. Production of electricity from wind, as well as from other renewable sources, is a subject of many legislatively enshrined preferential rules. These subsidies and regulatory provisions help the energy producers but represent additional costs to every final customer and tax payer. The aim of this work is to analyse the key arguments of wind energy advocates, which are 1) economic advantage of this production due to zero costs for 'fuel' and 2) negligible burden on the environment due to zero carbon dioxide emissions. The work takes into account all aspects of wind energy production, including their financial and extra-financial implications, and shows their indefensibility in economic terms and in terms of environmental protection. Besides, I have attempted to identify institutional aspects and forms of government which is known to give interest groups a chance to succeed in their rent-seeking activities and as a result allow prosperity of the above-mentioned ineffective energy production. Attention is also paid to the observation that, given the specific technological features of electricity production from the wind, it is not possible to fully apply the conclusions of a traditional theory of economic regulation onto the current position of key players in the electricity market.
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Potential sources of currency and banking crises in emerging markets
Brožka, Michal ; Revenda, Zbyněk (advisor) ; Dvořák, Pavel (referee) ; Žák, Milan (referee)
The thesis examines potential sources of currency crisis, banking crisis and twin crisis in a region of Central Europe, Eastern Europe, South-Eastern Europe and Baltics. The text assumes some basic knowledge of the theories of financial crisis and, thus, ommits some relevant details in the theoretical parts. The thesis aids at fading variables, which could signal vurnerability of a country to a curency, banking and twin crisis. In the second chapter we introduce a financial crisis typology. The text also briefly shows the theoretical and empirical studies of the financial crisis and introduces definitions of currency, banking and twin crisis. In the third chapter we identify the periods of financial crisis in the given region. Then we introduce the explanatory variables. In the fourth chapter we estimate logit model to explain the conditional probability of all the three types of financial crisis. In the fifth chapter we estimate the out-of-sample conditional probability of occurring crisis. In the end we discuss the results and possible recommendation for economic policy or investors. We find that some macroeconomic variables are significant when explaining financial crisis. For all three types of financial crisis these variables were significant: Share of total foreign debt to foreign reserves, interest rate differential, excessive credit expansion (its share to GDP).
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Theory of the Firm from the view of New Institutional Economics and some Aspects of Institutional Framework Quality in the Czech Republic
Vitík, Robert ; Sirůček, Pavel (advisor) ; Soukup, Jindřich (referee) ; Žák, Milan (referee) ; Mlčoch, Lubomír (referee)
This doctoral thesis presents the basic and the main developments of the theories of the firm rooted in Transaction Cost Theory (TCT). Since the article of Coase on the nature of the firm, this question has been elaborated by number of economists. In my point of view, I would like to introduce the last theory developed by the representative of the school called New Institutional Economics. The theory concentrates on the role of institutions. We distinguish institutions formal and informal. The formal are laws, constitution, regulations, contracts and other written rules. The informal don't require a written form and they represent informal restrictions such as rules of behaviour, conventions, traditions and habits. The main purpose of the institutions in their various forms is mainly to protect property rights, enforce voluntary contracts and establish the physical and regulatory infrastructure to facilitate economic activity. Generally, we can call them the rules of the game. They inform us about possible economic behaviour and give us basic restrictions in this sense. First -- the theoretical part of this thesis, we can find a simple model with human asset specificity based on TCT. The main proposition is that transactions with a high level of asset specificity are more probably internalised because the firm handles better such transactions compared to the market, even if asset specificity increases the cost of coordination in the firm. If the hierarchy, for example through the formation of routines, may enhance the efficiency compared to the market, we can modify the previous model. The model developed according to a Knowledge-based view assumes that asset specificity reduces transaction costs inside the firm and increases transaction costs on the market. In the conclusion of the theoretical part is discussed the reply on first formulate hypothesis if the TCT is still compatible with a newer Capability and Knowledge based view. In my opinion based on the presented arguments and views, both theories are compatible, they can answer more questions and explain more issues. The last step links the aforementioned theories into one Theory of firm boundaries. In the practical part of the thesis, I bring basic arguments about the institutional framework quality in the Czech Republic. These arguments rely on the latest studies of the international institutions such The Transparency International, The Heritage Foundation, The Kurtzman Group and mainly The World Bank. Studies reveal certain weak arrangements concerning for example the number of procedures when starting a business, complicated construction permits, rigidity of working hours, time-consuming and administrative demanding tax system, duration of judicial process which results in ineffective contract enforcement and mainly poor protection of property rights. Taking these disclosures into account we have to say that emergent transaction costs are enormous. These transaction costs influence negatively the competitiveness of the firms and the whole Czech economy. Therefore a negative response to the second hypothesis relating to the quality of the institutional framework in the Czech Republic.
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Costs and products analysis
Houšková, Gabriela ; Synek, Miloslav (advisor) ; Žák, Milan (referee)
The aim of the diploma thesis is to make up costs and products analysis and to arrange costing. These issues were described by vertical and horizontal analysis and were performed costing for particular products with using absorbing costing and variable costing methods. In conclusion were both methods compared and the break even point was analyzed. Theoretical part describes costs classification, methods and sort of costing and break even point analysis as well.
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