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Innovation Benefits from European Union Ascendancy: An Econometric Analysis.
Nguyen, Lisa ; Paulus, Michal (advisor) ; Figueira, Filipa (referee)
This paper investigates the benefits of joining the European Union (EU) and its impact on innovation for two indicators: patents and R&D expenditure. Based on a sample size of 27 countries within the EU observed over the time period 1996 to 2013 and utilising the GMM, FE and OLS models, I showed that, overall, entry into the EU has provided substantial benefits. Nevertheless, not all of the indicators of EU benefits are significant and sometimes did not provide positive impact on innovative activities. My evidence also suggests that with a further breakdown into two different regions, Western and Eastern Europe, there is a further rift in gains. Financial integration, for starters, has had a negative impact on innovation for both Western and Eastern Europe. Nevertheless, for the entire EU, financial integration has a positive impact on the number of patents filed. I also showed that another benefit of joining the EU, free movement of labour, has a negative and significant effect on both innovative indicators. This is consistent with the idea not all benefits of the EU provide a positive impact on innovation. Further research is warranted due to the insufficient time period.
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Does Aid Lead to More Trade? Evidence of the Effect of US Aid on its Exports
Schütz, Anna ; Paulus, Michal (advisor) ; Semerák, Vilém (referee)
This thesis investigates the effect of US development aid on US exports to 134 recipient countries over the time period 1993 to 2015 with an application of the gravity model of international trade. Estimates of one-way panel dataset, specified by a dummy approach and estimated with OLS and PPML, suggest that for every aid dollar spent by the United States, US exports significantly increase by 1.59 US dollar. By lagging the aid variable for several years after disbursement, we find a declining effect of US aid on US exports, which indicates that tied aid is an important channel of the effect's magnitude. The effect does not vary systematically across income groups. Yet for geographical regions with a higher US export share, the impact of US aid on US exports is significantly larger suggesting that existing trading relations contribute to a larger effect of aid on donor's exports. The evidence shows that US aid increases US exports and reinforces economic relations with recipient countries and, thus, can be regarded as an important motive for the donor to provide development aid.
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China's One Belt and One Road Initiative and its potential for the tourism industries in Africa, Asia and Europe: a gravity model approach
Jannaschk-Schmitz, Patrick ; Paulus, Michal (advisor) ; Benáček, Vladimír (referee)
In 2013, China presented the idea of the infrastructure project One Belt One Road. The thesis aims to analyse the potential effects of the initiative, and how its attempt to improve transport infrastructure will impact EU-tourist flows to participating countries. A closer look to the effects on the tourism industry is justified because of the importance of the touristic sector for the global economy. For instance, the direct contribution of the touristic sector accounted for 2.3 trillion USD worldwide in 2016. A gravity model approach is used in the following paper to examine the significance of road, railway, air service as well as port infrastructure for tourists from the European Union. Afterwards, an OBOR simulation is carried out that forecasts a potential change for EU-tourist inflows. The results go in line with previous gravity model studies regarding the positive relationship of the GDP and the inverse influence of the distance on tourism flows. Furthermore, the findings suggest a significant impact of well-developed road, railway and air service networks. However, the quality of ports did not meet the expectations and is somewhat contra productive for the decision making of EU tourists. The simulation for the improvement of transport infrastructure implies that countries with an under-...
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The financial instability hypothesis of Hyman P. Minsky and its apllication to the current financial crisis
Paulus, Michal ; Mertlík, Pavel (advisor) ; Skuhrovec, Jiří (referee)
This bachelor thesis deals with the financial instability hypothesis of Hyman P. Minsky and its application to the current financial crisis. The first part of the thesis summarizes the hypothesis, and it mentions works elaborating the hypothesis. The second part of the bachelor thesis applies the hypothesis to the current financial crisis. The whole thesis refers to the general discussion about relations of the Minsky's hypothesis to the current financial crisis and to the fall of the insurance company AIG Corporation. The second part concludes that many relevant parts of Minsky's hypothesis can be applied to the recent financial crisis but important differences of the current financial system to the system in Minsky's times should be awared of. There are two most important differences: changes in risk management and new financial instruments. At the end, the thesis discusses the implications of these differences for applicability of the hypothesis on the current financial crisis. The thesis regards the fact that the recent financial crisis is caused by rational behaviour of economic agents and not by exogenous forces as the most important lesson to learn from the financial instability hypothesis of Hyman P. Minsky.
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The VAT lottery as a charitable lottery
Horváthová, Veronika ; Gregor, Martin (advisor) ; Paulus, Michal (referee)
This thesis consists of two main parts. At first, VAT lotteries are modelled as charitable lotteries for a public good. For that purpose, an economy consisting of risk-neutral, utility maximizing consumers with quasi-linear preferences is assumed. It is shown that the Taiwanese and the Slovakian versions of the VAT lottery provide more of the public good than an economy with no such lottery. The second part analyzes the willingness of firms and consumers to cheat and keep part of the VAT revenue for themselves. This is done because the key difference between the VAT and the charitable lotteries is the existence of firms which have an incentive to cheat and collude with the customers at the expense of the tax office. So when a set of profit maximizing firms is added to the model and the presence of the VAT lottery is still assumed, it is shown that under certain circumstances it might be more profitable for firms and customers to cheat because higher levels of profit or utility, respectively, might be achieved. JEL Classification H25, H41, D62, H26 Keywords VAT, charitable lottery, public good, VAT eva- sion Author's e-mail 58516185@fsv.cuni.cz Supervisor's e-mail martin.gregor@fsv.cuni.cz
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Observing the Effects of CAFTA on Trade Using the Gravity Model of Trade
Škreb, Jan ; Paulus, Michal (advisor) ; Semerák, Vilém (referee)
This thesis aims to analyse the effects of the Central America Free Trade Agreement on trade using the gravity model. The principal actors of interest are the United States of America and Central American countries combined with Dominican Republic as the other regional actor. Panel data was used with 153 countries for the period of 1995-2015. The model was specified using the dummy approach and estimated with OLS and PPML estimators to obtain results on effects of trade policy variables on exports. Estimates show mixed results but the general effect of CAFTA on exports is positive and significant. This trade creation effect makes CAFTA an important trade agreement for economic relations between member countries.
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Trade and Politics: Political Determinants of International Trade Flows
Sosnovec, Jan ; Semerák, Vilém (advisor) ; Paulus, Michal (referee)
Charles University in Prague Faculty of Social Sciences Institute of Economic Studies Master's thesis Trade and Politics: Political Determinants of International Trade Flows Author: Bc. Jan Sosnovec Supervisor: Ing. Vilém Semerák, M.A., Ph.D. January 3, 2018 Abstract This thesis takes a comprehensive look at the relationship between international trade and politics. The first part of this thesis is theoretical. Besides providing a useful overview of this highly complex subject, it makes a contribution to the contemporary theory by proposing two simple models. The first of these models explains how because of complementarity of institutions, countries end up stuck with inefficient institutions and consequently high trade costs; countries can break out of this inefficient equilibrium only by coordinating their actions. The second proposed model shows how governments set trade barriers in order to pursue their political aims, while at the same time staying popular in order to remain in power. This model is consistent with a wide variety of regime types and ideologies, and takes into account voter heterogeneity. The second part of this thesis is empirical. It uses the gravity model of trade, with multilateral resistance terms represented either by fixed effects or by the Baier-Bergstrand linear approximation of...
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What Drives the Sovereign Bond Spreads in Central and Eastern Europe?
Růžička, Josef ; Baxa, Jaromír (advisor) ; Paulus, Michal (referee)
This thesis is devoted to spreads of sovereign bonds in central and eastern Europe relative to German government bonds. In the first part, a widely used government bond spread model is presented. It turns out that its assumption may be relaxed. Next, we show how spreads, inflation and exchange rates interact. Subsequently, we investigate the relationship between spreads and other macroeconomic variables by econometric methods. The most important factors affecting bond spreads in the region are public debt, GDP growth, openness of the economy, current account balance, and inflation. Bond markets in CEE put more weight on total level of public debt than on budget deficits. The effects of these variables differed before and after the year 2008. Two subgroups of central and eastern European countries with similar spread determinants were identified: the first group is formed by Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia, while to the second one belong Bulgaria, Hungary, Latvia, and Romania. Uncertainty on global financial markets increases bond spreads in CEE as well as in western Europe. Bond spread determinants of the two groups differ from those of western European countries.
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Economic Well-Being Beyond GDP: Implementing the Recommendations of the Commission on the Measure of Economic Performance and Social Progress
Burton, Liam ; Paulus, Michal (advisor) ; Baxa, Jaromír (referee)
Gross Domestic Product has historically been the dominant, often sole, yardstick regarding a nation's economic development, growth, and well-being. This paper acknowledges GDP's shortcomings and aims development more rounded metrics to better measure well-being. The aim of this thesis is to advance the work done by 2009 Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress by reassessing the twelve recommendations made by Stiglitz, Sen, and Fitoussi and attempting to apply them to a new dashboard of metrics. JEL Classification I31 E01 E21 Keywords well-being, economic performance, GDP, Stiglitz Commission, quality-of-life, social progress Abstrakt Hrubý domácí produkt je historicky dominantní metrika v souvislosti s národním hospodářským rozvojem, růstem a blahobytem. Tato práce potvrzuje nedostatky HDP a jejím cílem je vývoj více vyvážené metriky k lepšímu měření blahobytu. Zaměřuje se na prohloubení práce Stiglitze, Sena a Fitoussiho z roku 2009 (Commission on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress), přehodnocuje jejich dvanáct doporučení a pokouší se je aplikovat na kolekci možných měření společenského rozvoje.
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Observing Globalization using the Gravity Model of Trade
Dobiáš, Adam ; Paulus, Michal (advisor) ; Benáček, Vladimír (referee)
This thesis investigates application of the gravity model of international trade on measuring a distance coefficient, which is known to be a proxy to globalization. This estimation is performed on a dataset containing information on EU 27 countries through the years 1996 to 2014. The presence of 10 post- communist countries enabled the author to perform the estimation on transformative economies, which had been isolated from their western trade partners for over 40 years. The division of the dataset into the Western and Eastern Blocs enabled measurement of convergence of the intra-blocs trade - the second goal of this thesis. This measurement was done through newly introduced intra-blocs trade variables that enabled measurements of both directions of trade. Through the application of this model on 10 sections, these measurements could be performed on single trade components. The analysis shows a substantial heterogeneity between single sections both in distance coefficient and inter-blocs trade. An increase in the level of globalization was observed in 9 out of 10 sections and convergence of some sections between the blocs was also found. Finally, globalization was found to progress with varying speed within single SITC sections during periods of economic crises. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)
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