فصلنامه تحقیقات اقتصادی
پیاپی 65 (تابستان 1383)

An applied analysis of demand for international reserves for twenty Resource- based Countries is investigated, which is based on an Error- correction model, and a panel data is used for estimation. Besides addressing conventional issues, the model explicity incorporates the impact of expected exporting revenues and the impact of the exchange rate system on reserve demand.The result reveals that, shortrun money market disequilibrium have not any significant effect on demand for international reserve in resource -based countries. In addition, expected exporting revenues have positive long- run effect, while exchange rate flexibility has negative effect on demand for reserve in these countries.

The multiple objective of this paper is: 1) to identify the effective determinants of labor factor productivity and 2) to measure the extent of the effect of labor productivity on production costs and export of manufacturing products in Iran. For this purpose, based on (ISIC-2 digit) time-series manufacturing data for (1994-99) period, a system of simultaneous equations system is utilized, using an I2SLS regression technique. The results indicate the education and dexterity level of industrial labor force in Iran has had an appreciable and meaningful effect on labor productivity during the studying period. Moreover, increased labor productivity that was experienced by the industry, has resulted in a reduction in the unit labor cost, which in turn, has led to reduction in average cost of production, making Iranian manufacturing exports more competitive. The results do not show any significant and meaningful effect of manufacturing exports on industrial labor productivity, and thus, gives no support to the "learning-by-exporting" hypothesis. The paper calls for an effective government policy to strengthen the integration and consistency of the industry's labor force education and specialization requirements with the educational programs within the higher education system in order to enhance the international competitiveness of the manufacturing sector in Iran.

In this paper, we investigate the concept of justice in Imam Khomeini’s opinion, who was the founder of the Islamic revolution in Iran. We have illustrated that in his ideas and policies equality and providing the basic needs for all of the people form the core of his thoughts in relation to justice.We identify a general framework of performing pattern of justice in Imam Khomeini’s opinion by extracting 14 principles among his statements about justice.A noticeable point in this study is a relative coordination and harmony between Imam Khomeini’s opinion and the idea of “Basic Needs” in development economy?

Inflation decreases the actual tax revenues, if tax collection lag prolongs and tax system is inflexible (Tanzi hypothesis). In order to test Tanzi effect in Iran in short and long run seasonal data in 1981-2001 has been used and OLS and MLE have been applied. Results indicate that the lag length is almost 23 months and elasticity is more than unit (OLS). In MLE method, lag is 16 months and elasticities less than unit and with war dummy variable, the lag is10 months. In short-run, lag is estimated to be 18 months and, instead of increasing, inflation decreases the nominal tax revenues. Thus Tanzi effect in short run is stronger than long run in Iran’s economy.

It is assumed the exchange rate would affect resources balance through a switching – expenditure mechanism. Accordingly, the behavior of real exhange rate can be examined empirically. Of all structural models, the most applicable procedure relies on the partial trade model, which is specified based upon the basic equilibrium of Williamson exchange rate. Considering a specific concept of desired current account, this sort of model identifies a frame of the real exchange rate (Borowski and Couharde 2000). In a new classical framework, saving can be equivalent to difference between production and consumption plus payments of external debt interests. Consumption is also invariant on the basic of the life cycle theory. An optimal (desired) current accunt can thus be as a result of difference between investment and saving plus interests of external debt. Hence, development in real exchange rate can provide the desired conditions of the current account blance, which is called as a basic equilibrium (Williamson 1994).Due to assumptios of a trade model, the relative gap between potential and actual production is one of the main determinants of real exchange rate, which is computed, in the present study, by the filtering Hodrick-Prescott method for Iran. Determining optimal current account, the paper concludes that the relevant values obtained are negative for pre-revolutionary period, whereas they are positive for post-revolotionary period. The results are quite well-matched with Iran’s present economic condition.Overall, empirical results of equilibrium trade model for Iran reveal the fact that deviation from long-run equilibrium path of the real exchange rate has gradually diminished, even though it has been accompanied by correspondent fluctuations in Iran’s economic situation.

Estimation methods of inflation effects on the income (expenditure) distribution can be divided into three groups: parametric, semi-parametric and non-parametric. In this paper the inflation effects on the expenditure distribution inequality in Iran during 1971-2001 is estimated non-parametrically. In order to do so, the Consumer Price Index is divided into 5 food groups of bread & rice, meats, dairy products, fruit & vegetables and other food products, and 7 non-food groups of clothing & shoes, housing & energy, furniture, transportations & communications, health and cares, educations & hobbies and other non-food products. Then, expenditure distribution in terms of current prices, corresponding to the combination of quantity consumption basket and according to CPI in the base year is transformed into the constant expenditure distribution. After that, comparing the shares of the twenties and the corresponding inequality indices (Gini coefficients) of the current (pre inflation removal) and fix (post inflation removal) expenditure distributions, the extent and direction of the inequality changes is estimated. The results indicat that the relative price changes in the urban areas have had an egalitarian effect until 1980, but since then the trend has changed. The relative price changes in the rural areas have had cyclical effects on the fixed inequality since 1982.

The government of Iran arranged the budget structure in a new method on the basis of International Monetary Fund prescription since 2002.In this method the two balances, that is, current operational balance and the net transferring of assets balance have changed the form of financing the budget. In this paper, time series annual data for the period 1997- 2001 are used to study the effect of changing the financing structure of budget on economic growth by the use of Auto Regressive Distributed Lag (ARDL), exogeneity test and super exogeneity test. The results show that the size of the current budget has negative effect on economic growth and surplus of net transferring asset balance rationed the capital expenditures and decreased the positive effect of the expenditure size on the growth.

The purpose of the present paper is a quantitative determination of optimal monetary and fiscal policies under floating exchange rate regime for the country’s third development plan (2000-2004). For this purpose, first, a welfare loss function is designed in which penalized on the quadratic deviation of objective variables such as: economic growth, inflation rate, unemployment, current account and the ratio of government budget deficit to GDP from their optimal control algorithm “OPTCON”, the optimal values of government’s investment and consumption expenditures, tax revenues and money stock (liquidity) are calculated by minimizing the welfare loss function subject to a dynamic nonlinear system. The comparison between optimal monetary and fiscal policies with the Third Plan’s proposed macroeconomic policies shows the optimal values of liquidity, government consumption and investment are lower and the optimal values of tax revenues are greater than the proposed values in the Third Plan. Also, under optimal monetary and fiscal policies, the rate of economic growth, the ratio of budget deficit to GDP and current account will be better compared with the Third Plan’s proposed macroeconomic policies. The results of the present paper could help policy makers design fiscal and monetary policies of the Fourth Development Plan and the optimal values of instrument variables.