Development, Institutional Change and Gender
Paper Session
Saturday, Jan. 6, 2024 12:30 PM - 2:15 PM (CST)
- Chair: Rodrigo Jeronimo, Sao Paulo State University
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and Institutional Change
Abstract
It has become increasingly clear that the majority of the UN SDGs and SDG targets cannot be timely achieved by 2030 for all the countries in the world. The OECD has begun to evaluate the actual progress of Member States in promoting sustainable development since 2016 and has published reports on Measuring Distance to the SDG Targets. The process of achieving multiple-goals at the national level in the long run is a process of institutional change and requires comprehensive institutional planning. On the UN 2030 Agenda, sustainable economic growth is first shown as a vision in Preamble #9. This vision has then been officially treated as the UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) #8. Goal 8 is stated as “Promoted sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all.” In essence, sustainable economic growth is an integrated element of sustainable development. To achieve multiple national sustainable development goals in the long run, this paper emphasizes that it is necessary for policy makers to abandon laissez-faire ideas and economic theory of the free market. Moreover, civil society and government have to initiate a process of economic planning, i.e., an adjustment of socio-economic institutions for aligning government policy measures from the short-term to the long-term.Why Do Institutions Change? - Case Studies of Changes in the Local Government Finance System in Japan
Abstract
The question "Why do institutions change?" is a question that is currently attracting strong interest among researchers interested in institutions. In the theory of comparative capitalism (CC), a shift from the view of "institutions as equilibrium" to that of "institutions as resources" is being attempted, and if the "quantity" of taxes and grants, which is the analysis subject in the theory of public finance and local public finance, is incorporated into the institutional analysis, it is useful to consider the institutions as resources rather than rules.Although Japan is a centralized country, local governments have certain degree of autonomy, and are not mere delivery agencies. Hence, the central government (institutional designer) relies on local governments to implement projects to achieve its policy goals. Therefore, the central government is forced to change the institution when the restriction on the action of the local government increases (decrease in resources) and the policy goal of the central government cannot be achieved. In other words, for the institutional designer, the threshold beyond which the "agent" becomes financially unsustainable is exceeded, and the "unintended consequence" of deviant behavior that deviates from the inducement of the institutional designer forces the institution to change. The central government in a centralized state, is the institutional designer that officially has "power". This paper discusses this issue, using the cases of local fiscal distress in Japan in the 1930's and the establishment of fiscal adjustment system in 1940 and policy interventions after the bubble burst in 1990's and the response of local governments.Gendered Impacts of Real Exchange Rate Trends in Latin America; Job Market Segregation and Income Distribution
Abstract
For the past three decades, several Latin American countries adopted the neoclassical macroeconomic tripod: primary expenditure, inflation targeting, and fluctuating exchange rates. Such strategy tends to appreciate real effective exchange rates (REER) by decreasing domestic inflation. Together with the commodity price boom of the 2000s, the industrial sector suffered severe pressures in the region, with consequences for the sectoral composition of GDP and labor market demand. Related literature suggests that such movements tend to decrease employment generation and the women/men employment ratio. This paper expands that literature by mapping how REER trends impact not only job demand in different sectors, but also job quality for women, as measured by women’s weekly earnings in an occupation relative to the national median wage. Such relationships are increasingly important in the post-pandemic context, in which gender gaps in the labor market increased worldwide and high inflation, increasing interest rates, and tightening fiscal space further constrain employment prospects in developing economies. Our analysis uses a panel of labor force survey and macroeconomic data from 15 Latin American countries between 1991-2018, and finds that REER appreciation tends to decrease women’s share of good jobs in an economy.JEL Classifications
- B5 - Current Heterodox Approaches
- O1 - Economic Development