پژوهشنامه اقتصاد کلان
سال یازدهم شماره 21 (بهار و تابستان 1395)

This paper examines the effect of military expenses on economic growth in 11 Middle East countries. Sensitive and strategic position of Middle East region on the one hand and increase in the military spending of countries in this region on the other hand, the need to examine the effect of military spending on economic growth in the countries in this region is very important. In this regard, used an augmented Solow model (proposed by Knight, Loayza and Villanueva (1996)) during the period 1988-2012. The results of this research by using dynamic panel approach and generalized method of moments, show the negative impact of military expenses on economic growth in the Middle East countries. So, if the region of Middle East is stable politically, the expenses of economic development are replaced by military expenses and there will be more economic growth in the Middle East countries.
The results of this research by using dynamic panel approach and generalized method of moments, show the negative impact of military expenses on economic growth in the Middle East countries. So, if the region of Middle East is stable politically, the expenses of economic development are replaced by military expenses and there will be more economic growth in the Middle East countries.

This study provides an overview of relationship between input & demand of work-force in agriculture sector to predict the production inputs demand functions as well as substitution elasticities (MoriShima and Allen Ozava) and input prices using Symmetric Normalized Quadratic (SNQ) cost function. In so doing, we have estimated cost share equations for all three import, work-force and capital inputs along with cost function via Simultaneous Equation System and 3SLS methods. In addition, the sanction variable has been effectively entered into demand function .The results show the substitutive correlation between production factors. In other words, from Allen-Ozava substitution elasticity we show that work-force variable substitutes capital and imports as is capital stand in for imports which are substitution inputs. Substitution coefficient between work-force and import is 1.97. We also found that Sanction dummy variable has a negative and significant effect on demand for work-force and capital variables. In other words, from Allen-Ozava substitution elasticity we show that work-force variable substitutes capital and imports as is capital stand in for imports which are substitution inputs. Substitution coefficient between work-force and import is 1.97. We also found that Sanction dummy variable has a negative and significant effect on demand for work-force and capital variables.

Exports as the engine of the economy plays a role in global markets, because export take advantage of global markets to provide manufacturing firms and lift market restrictions on domestic manufacturing firms and the use of economies of scale. So the aim of this study is to evaluate the effect of innovation on exports of selected developing and developed countries over the period 2007-2012 using panel data approach and by estimating Seemingly Unrelated Regression (SUR) for a system of simultaneous equations. According to the general export equation estimations indicate that in developing countries, Global Innovation Index and GDP coefficients are positive and significant and the coefficients of governance and accumulation of FDI inflows is positive and meaningless and in developed countries, coefficients of accumulation of FDI inflows , Global Innovation Index, GDP and governance is significantly positive. However, the indirect effects of innovation on exports indicate that indirect effects such as direct effects of both developing countries and developed countries are positive. It is noteworthy that a significant portion of GII effects on export in developed countries is applied by indirect mechanism (the channels of GDP, FDI and governance index) but in developing countries, the reverse situation is observed .

This study investigates the impact of corruption on inflation rate in selected MENA countries over the 1996-2013. We apply base model presented by Al-Marhubi (2000), Vindelynand Hillman (2007) and Damir and Praksa (2011). The estimation results of non-linear Panel Smooth Transition Regression model strongly reject the linearity hypothesis, and estimates two regimes that gives a threshold at corruption of -1.26 for under review countries. The key results show that the effect of the corruption, GDP per capita and openness is negative and show the intensity of them are high in high levels of calculated threshold for corruption. Other results of research report the existence of positive effects of government consumption expenditure and liquidity on inflation rate. Moreover, the results of many done studies about positive effects of government consumption expenditure and liquidity and also negative effects of control of corruption index, GDP per capita and openness on inflation rate are confirmed in this study. As the intensity of negative effect of control of corruption on inflation rate increasing simultaneous with increasing control of corruption.

Firms tend to base production decision on relative price (real) of their products. One of the introduced and known costs of inflation in macroeconomic literature is that, inflation can create fluctuations in the relative prices of products and goods. In this way, this could lead to misallocation of scarce economic resources. Therefore, one of the ways and method in which inflation rate is looked at is to focus on minimizing relative prices variability of products. Empirical research in this area suggests that the relationship between inflation and relative prices variability (RPV) could be linear or u-shaped quadratic. Using the ordinary least squares (OLS) method, this study investigates the relationship between inflation and relative price variability based on monthly time series data form Iran during 2002 - 2014. The results of this study show that there is a nonlinear and quadratic (U- shaped) relation between inflation and relative price variability. The results also show that minimizing relative prices variability rate of inflation is al-most 21 percent. Finally results from generalized Auto-Regressive Conditional Heteroscedasticity model (GARCH) used in this study show and indicate both positive unexpected inflation and negative unexpected inflation have a symmetric and regular effect on the rela-tive price variability.

Export of Technical and Engineering Services is as one of the main element for attracting international resources. This variable is affected by macroeconomic environment of countries and the exchange rate fluctuations is the main effective variable in this regards. This study tries to evaluate the effects of the real exchange rate fluctuations on export of Technical and Engineering Services among Iran and its major partners using gravity model framework. Hence the panel data for 15 trade major partners of Iran during 2003-2013 and Poisson-pseudo maximum likelihood method has been used. The results show that the real exchange rate fluctuations, the distance variable and the dissimilar economic structures have negative effect and also the per capita income of Iran and its trade partner, the common border and the common religion have positive effect on export of Technical and Engineering Services among Iran and its major partners during the period. Finally, same economic policies (monetary and fiscal policies) have not had significant effect on export of Technical and Engineering Services. So pay attention to the real exchange rate instead nominal exchange rate by policy makers, can lead to sustainable growth in export of Technical and Engineering Services.

The ratio of tax to gross domestic product (GDP) is one of the factors measuring the role of public section in economic activities of the country which indicates the tax system’s efforts in collecting tax considering the surplus (added) value in the economy. Such a ratio suggests the rate of economic activities liable for tax basis, and shows the amount of money that public section draws back from economic resources and injects into different economic sections for fulfilling tax goals. The present paper studies the ratio of real tax to gross domestic products and its effects on country’s economic growth during recent decades (1977-2012). The paper’s method of analysis is based on an endogenous growth model adapted to a country like Iran in which economic structure relies on exchange income of oil sale and Cashin pattern is used too. Findings and results of the paper suggest that increasing taxes affects negatively on country’s economic growth by 0.14 to 0.16 percent. The results also indicate that the ratio of tax to surplus (added) value of economic sections which are liable for paying tax comparing with other selected countries not only is not slight, but also is more regarding the economic facts of our country. Selected countries include developed, developing and oil exporter countries.