فصلنامه پژوهش ها و سیاست های اقتصادی
پیاپی 47 (پاییز 1387)

Empowering the labour force, as the main production factor, towards the realization of macroeconomic and social aims and policies at national and regional levels are of prime necessity. One of the effective ways in promoting the human development index is the consideration of factors influential at regional or local levels. The identification of determinant factors in lowering the regional gap can reduce the basic regional challenges in the process of development. An examination of the human development conditions in Zanjan province and the factors which may affect these conditions during the period 1379-1383 reveals an upward trend in human development index in this province. The figure for human development index in Zanjan province is less than the average of the country as a whole. Among the components of human development index is the income index in the province, which as compared with the aggregate income index for the country as a whole demonstrates a considerable gap. This implies the necessity of speeding up the physical and human investments towards improving the human development index in the province.

Most models developed during the past 30 years to explain OPEC’S behaviour have addressed this issue only from a mathematical point f view and within the framework of microeconomics. In this paper, the economic models of OPEC’s behaviour are introduced and the performance of this organization is examined by using these models. The results show that any of the said models can explain OPEC’s behaviour in the short-run but the explanation of OPEC’s behaviour in the long-run may not be possible due to factors such as the followings: structural change in the global oil market during the 48 years of OPEC’s life (e.g. diminishing the monopolistic power of oil companies, non-OPEC supplies and the resulting demand fall in OPEC’s oil, the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the reduced level of excess production capacity), economic and political instability in the five major oil producers of crude oil in the Persian Gulf countries (Iran, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, and UAE), which may adversely affect OPEC’s performance. Moreover, in the long-run, the heterogeneity of OPEC member countries has been responsible in the failure of purely economic models to explain OPEC’s behaviour. It may be possible to explain OPEC’s behaviour in the long-run by the utilization of combined economic models of OPEC’s behaviour taking into account the political and economic conditions of OPEC’s major producers as well as the conditions of oil reserves and the production capacity forecasts in countries holding the main oil reserves.

Performance evaluation and ranking domestic commercial banks are currently carried out using the volume of banks transactions and activities as well as the absorbed resources. However, inputs such as the space, facilities, human force and the environment are not taken into account. This is a shortcoming of the method currently in use. In this paper and in order to have a more realistic approach, the method of DEA is used within the framework and implementation of a software system to derive the efficiency of bank branches, which constitute a criterion based on input-output of branches. In addition, the method which is currently used for ranking the bank branches is the taxonomy or simple weighing which is imprecise and based upon personal value judgments. This paper presents a method by using the DEA technique which does not suffer from the shortcomings and problems of the common methods in ranking bank branches, hence the results are closer to the reality. This paper attempts to introduce a new and appropriate method for measuring the two different concepts of “ranking” and “ordering”, which is currently used synonymously in Iranian banking network.

This study is an attempt to apply a static Computable General Equilibrium model based on Iranian Social Accounting Matrix of 1380 in order to investigate the impact of 20 percent increase in Government expenditures under floating and fixed exchange rate regimes, on macro variables in the agricultural sector and Iranian economy as a whole. The parameters of the model are obtained using Calibration method. The model contained two sectors including the agriculture and non-agriculture. The results show that the increased Government expenditures would influence variables of agricultural sector and the macro Iranian economy undesirably, and this would be more serious under the fixed exchange rate regime as compared to the floating regime. It was also revealed that the increment in Government expenditures affects agricultural and rural sectors more in an unpleasant manner than the non-agricultural and urban sectors.

One of the most fundamental problems in Iranian tax system is the lack of reliable estimates for tax revenues. The present research work tries to estimate the tax revenues for Ghazvin province for the next period of 10 years. Time series models and intervention methods are used in the forecast. Since the mid-1386, and due to a number of unknown factors such as the ambiguities in tax law and the delayed tax payments as exogenous variables, the realized tax revenues has diverged from the planned level. The main policy recommendation resulting from this research work is that attempts should be directed towards clarification of taxing system and the related tax rules and regulations.