Ronald Albers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Ronald Albers
RePEc: Research Papers in Economics, 1996
Social Science Research Network, 2012
Soaring food and energy prices sparked the revolts in Northern African countries at the end of 20... more Soaring food and energy prices sparked the revolts in Northern African countries at the end of 2010. Despite government subsidies, consumer price inflation rose, which reduced consumers' purchasing power. This article empirically investigates the impact of world food prices on inflation and government subsidies for Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, the occupied Palestinian territories and Tunisia during the ten-year period 2002-2011. Our findings show an asymmetry in the response of consumer price inflation to world food price shocks, in that soaring world food prices made inflation rise fast while nominal rigidities prevented inflation from falling. Moreover, this paper shows that government balances deteriorated up to 2% of GDP in 2008 and 2011 due to the incremental government food subsidies while they hardly improved in value terms when world food prices sharply fell in 2009.
Just before the global crisis soaring commodity prices pushed up inflation significantly, not lea... more Just before the global crisis soaring commodity prices pushed up inflation significantly, not least in EU neighbour countries at the Mediterranean. These price shocks affected public finances in the southern Mediterranean region, notably via government subsidies. Partly due to lags in the transmission of commodity prices into prices for final users the subsidies burden continued to be felt, despite the price falls registered in the wake of the credit crisis. We show that downward price rigidities play a role. Recently, commodity price pressures have reemerged. We focus on food prices and analyse recent developments in food inflation in Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, the occupied Palestinian territories, Syria and Tunisia in comparison with other middle income economies. Subsidies on food and fuel are quantified per country for the period 2002-2010. The incremental government subsidies entail an estimated deterioration of the government balances of up to more than ...
Economic and Social History in the Netherlands, 1996
RePEc: Research Papers in Economics, 1994
The role of capital in economic growth in The Netherlands, 1850-1 91 3.
RePEc: Research Papers in Economics, 1994
We are grateful to Jan Luurs for his assistance with statistics and graphs. This paper is based o... more We are grateful to Jan Luurs for his assistance with statistics and graphs. This paper is based on research sponsored by the Foundation for Economic. Social, and Spatial Sciences (ESR), which is part of the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). 1 C.A. van Bochove & T.A. Huitker, Main national accounting series, 1900-1986. CBS NA-017 (1987). 9. 2 A. Maddison, Dynamic forces in capitalist development: a long-run comparative view (Oxford9New York, 1991), 212-214. Maddison's figures for The Netherlands are based on Van Bochove & Huitker, 'National accounting'. 3 H.A.R. Smidt, 'De regulering van de Nederlandse export van landbouwprodukten naar Duitsland tijdel Eerste Wereldoorlog', Economisch-en Sociaal-Historisch Jaarboek 54 (1991) 102-133.
A Standardised Time Series of the Stock of Fixed Capital in The Netherlands, 1900-1995 Peter Groó... more A Standardised Time Series of the Stock of Fixed Capital in The Netherlands, 1900-1995 Peter Groóte, Ronald Albers, Herman De Jong" Table of Contents Introduction 2 Sources and Methods 3 The Capital Stock at the Beginning of 1900 3 Gross Fixed Capital Formation, ...
This paper provides an overview of the currently available evidence on the importance of informat... more This paper provides an overview of the currently available evidence on the importance of information and communication technologies (ICT) for developments in productivity growth in the euro area. On the basis of the available data, there is evidence of an increased contribution of ICT to economic growth both in terms of production and investment in the second half of the 1990s. However, there is little, if any, evidence of significant positive spillover effects from the use of ICT to overall productivity growth. This implies that there is no reason to believe that potential output growth in the euro area has increased significantly in recent years on account of new technologies. JEL classification: E22, L63, L86, O3, O47
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view i... more If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. Information about this may be contained in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. ...
Economic Papers, 2011
... Note: The endogenous variables are the twelfth difference of the logarithm of the consumer pr... more ... Note: The endogenous variables are the twelfth difference of the logarithm of the consumer price index for each of the ... agricultural staples since the middle of 2008 brought some relief. ... countries were nevertheless faced with a sharp food price crisis at the end of the 1970s. Food ...
Working Paper Series, Mar 1, 2002
This paper contrasts the impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) on productivi... more This paper contrasts the impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) on productivity in the euro area and the United States with historical evidence on earlier general purpose technologies, notably steam and electricity. Such comparisons have become popular in recent economics literature, but the empirical basis is often thin. At first sight, long-run data on the United States, Britain and the Netherlands suggest a productivity impact of ICT, which resembles that of steam and electricity. The impact of new technologies is limited initially to a few sectors, while aggregate effects appear only with a substantial delay. However, this paper argues that there are also some differences between the ICT-revolution and earlier technological episodes. These concern the speed of diffusion, productivity growth within 'leading sectors', the size of relative price declines, the sectoral pattern of diffusion, cyclical factors and, perhaps most importantly, the interaction b...
This paper presents new estimates of the stock of human capital in the Netherlands between 1800 a... more This paper presents new estimates of the stock of human capital in the Netherlands between 1800 and 1913. The estimates of human capital are derived from data on primary, secondary and tertiary schooling. It is argued that the measure of human capital presented here is conceptually better than alternative measures, such as enrollment rates or literacy rates. The estimates were used in a growth accounting exercise employing an approximation of a translog production function with human capital as an additional factor of production. The results suggest that economic growth in the Netherlands during the 19th century was to a large extent based on the accumulation of fixed tangible capital, with human capital playing a less important role.
ABSTRACT Groningen Rijksuniv., Diss., 1998.
Empirical Economics, 2004
RePEc: Research Papers in Economics, 1996
Social Science Research Network, 2012
Soaring food and energy prices sparked the revolts in Northern African countries at the end of 20... more Soaring food and energy prices sparked the revolts in Northern African countries at the end of 2010. Despite government subsidies, consumer price inflation rose, which reduced consumers' purchasing power. This article empirically investigates the impact of world food prices on inflation and government subsidies for Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, the occupied Palestinian territories and Tunisia during the ten-year period 2002-2011. Our findings show an asymmetry in the response of consumer price inflation to world food price shocks, in that soaring world food prices made inflation rise fast while nominal rigidities prevented inflation from falling. Moreover, this paper shows that government balances deteriorated up to 2% of GDP in 2008 and 2011 due to the incremental government food subsidies while they hardly improved in value terms when world food prices sharply fell in 2009.
Just before the global crisis soaring commodity prices pushed up inflation significantly, not lea... more Just before the global crisis soaring commodity prices pushed up inflation significantly, not least in EU neighbour countries at the Mediterranean. These price shocks affected public finances in the southern Mediterranean region, notably via government subsidies. Partly due to lags in the transmission of commodity prices into prices for final users the subsidies burden continued to be felt, despite the price falls registered in the wake of the credit crisis. We show that downward price rigidities play a role. Recently, commodity price pressures have reemerged. We focus on food prices and analyse recent developments in food inflation in Algeria, Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, the occupied Palestinian territories, Syria and Tunisia in comparison with other middle income economies. Subsidies on food and fuel are quantified per country for the period 2002-2010. The incremental government subsidies entail an estimated deterioration of the government balances of up to more than ...
Economic and Social History in the Netherlands, 1996
RePEc: Research Papers in Economics, 1994
The role of capital in economic growth in The Netherlands, 1850-1 91 3.
RePEc: Research Papers in Economics, 1994
We are grateful to Jan Luurs for his assistance with statistics and graphs. This paper is based o... more We are grateful to Jan Luurs for his assistance with statistics and graphs. This paper is based on research sponsored by the Foundation for Economic. Social, and Spatial Sciences (ESR), which is part of the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO). 1 C.A. van Bochove & T.A. Huitker, Main national accounting series, 1900-1986. CBS NA-017 (1987). 9. 2 A. Maddison, Dynamic forces in capitalist development: a long-run comparative view (Oxford9New York, 1991), 212-214. Maddison's figures for The Netherlands are based on Van Bochove & Huitker, 'National accounting'. 3 H.A.R. Smidt, 'De regulering van de Nederlandse export van landbouwprodukten naar Duitsland tijdel Eerste Wereldoorlog', Economisch-en Sociaal-Historisch Jaarboek 54 (1991) 102-133.
A Standardised Time Series of the Stock of Fixed Capital in The Netherlands, 1900-1995 Peter Groó... more A Standardised Time Series of the Stock of Fixed Capital in The Netherlands, 1900-1995 Peter Groóte, Ronald Albers, Herman De Jong" Table of Contents Introduction 2 Sources and Methods 3 The Capital Stock at the Beginning of 1900 3 Gross Fixed Capital Formation, ...
This paper provides an overview of the currently available evidence on the importance of informat... more This paper provides an overview of the currently available evidence on the importance of information and communication technologies (ICT) for developments in productivity growth in the euro area. On the basis of the available data, there is evidence of an increased contribution of ICT to economic growth both in terms of production and investment in the second half of the 1990s. However, there is little, if any, evidence of significant positive spillover effects from the use of ICT to overall productivity growth. This implies that there is no reason to believe that potential output growth in the euro area has increased significantly in recent years on account of new technologies. JEL classification: E22, L63, L86, O3, O47
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view i... more If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the proper application to view it first. Information about this may be contained in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read the IDEAS help page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS site. ...
Economic Papers, 2011
... Note: The endogenous variables are the twelfth difference of the logarithm of the consumer pr... more ... Note: The endogenous variables are the twelfth difference of the logarithm of the consumer price index for each of the ... agricultural staples since the middle of 2008 brought some relief. ... countries were nevertheless faced with a sharp food price crisis at the end of the 1970s. Food ...
Working Paper Series, Mar 1, 2002
This paper contrasts the impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) on productivi... more This paper contrasts the impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) on productivity in the euro area and the United States with historical evidence on earlier general purpose technologies, notably steam and electricity. Such comparisons have become popular in recent economics literature, but the empirical basis is often thin. At first sight, long-run data on the United States, Britain and the Netherlands suggest a productivity impact of ICT, which resembles that of steam and electricity. The impact of new technologies is limited initially to a few sectors, while aggregate effects appear only with a substantial delay. However, this paper argues that there are also some differences between the ICT-revolution and earlier technological episodes. These concern the speed of diffusion, productivity growth within 'leading sectors', the size of relative price declines, the sectoral pattern of diffusion, cyclical factors and, perhaps most importantly, the interaction b...
This paper presents new estimates of the stock of human capital in the Netherlands between 1800 a... more This paper presents new estimates of the stock of human capital in the Netherlands between 1800 and 1913. The estimates of human capital are derived from data on primary, secondary and tertiary schooling. It is argued that the measure of human capital presented here is conceptually better than alternative measures, such as enrollment rates or literacy rates. The estimates were used in a growth accounting exercise employing an approximation of a translog production function with human capital as an additional factor of production. The results suggest that economic growth in the Netherlands during the 19th century was to a large extent based on the accumulation of fixed tangible capital, with human capital playing a less important role.
ABSTRACT Groningen Rijksuniv., Diss., 1998.
Empirical Economics, 2004