Suchergebnisse

The processes of socio-economic development are continuously accompanied by the process of population aging. It is seen as a growing of the percentage share of people aged 65 and over in the general population. It covers the majority of European Union countries and also refers to Poland. The objective of the paper is to analyze the population aging phenomenon in spatial perspective. The study was carried out for 66 subregions (NUTS 3) and covered the period 1995-2012. Poland is characterized by a strong spatial diversification regarding the senior citizens share and its growth rate, and also determinants exerting impact on the demographic aging processes. The demographically youngest and slowest aging population lives in south-eastern and also central Poland. The most intensive population aging processes are seen in the selected subregions of south-western Poland. Here, we observe extremely low fertility, demographically old working-age population and also significant migration outflow of younger people.

Implementing policy and forming socioeconomic conditions that support sustainable and equable growth of regions is currently an important objective both at European and national level. Regional development policy is supported by significant resources from European Union funds. As a result, a constant monitoring of the development process at regional level with application of quantitative methods is an important scientific and practical task. Thus, the aim of the article is to assess the level of economic development in Poland at the voivodeships level (NUTS 2). Economic development is considered here as a multiple-criteria phenomenon. In the case of multiple-criteria analysis a common dilemma is attributed to the problem of applying appropriate weights for variables used in the research. Therefore, in order to provide a rating of voivodeships a taxonomic measure of development with entropy weights was applied here. The research was conducted for the years 2010-2014. It was based on the data provided by Central Statistical Office of Poland. The results of the analysis confirm that in spite of a progress obtained by all voivodeships significant disparities between them are still present.

The main purpose of the research is to examine the progress achieved by European countries in the field of implementing the concept of sustainable development and to point the group of countries that can be considered as leaders in that sphere. The research is based on the Eurostat data and it is conducted at macroeconomic level in the years 2004-2013. The sustainable development concept should be considered as a multidimensional phenomenon. Thus, Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) was used in the research. TOPSIS method allows to evaluate the objects in terms of multidimensional economic phenomena based on the set of detailed economic attributes (variables). The dynamic synthetic index describing the relative level of sustainable development of the countries was created, which enabled to propose a rating of the countries and group them into homogenous subsets. The grouping was conducted with application of natural breaks method. The comparison of the ratings in the period 2004-2013 shows that most of the new member states of European Union have made a significant progress in implementing the concept of sustainable development. The research enabled to point the countries that are the leaders in the field.

Closing development gap and avoiding middle income trap are currently considered as the main challenges for the new EU member states. To obtain both those aims the countries must implement policies that support total factor productivity (TFP) growth. The main scientific purpose of the article is to examine the influence of quality of human capital (QHC) on TFP in Central European countries in the years 2000-2010. All the EU countries must be able compete internationally in reality of global knowledge economy. Thus, the QHC was analysed from the perspective of the knowledge-based economy. As the QHC is a multidimensional phenomenon in order to measure it and obtain time series for further econometric research, TOPSIS method was applied. To evaluate TFP the parameters of the Cobb-Douglas production function for the new EU members were estimated. Finally, it was possible to identify the relationship between the QHC and the level of TFP with application of dynamic panel model. The analysis was conducted for the years 2000-2010 based on Eurostat data. It confirmed a significant influence of the QHC on the level of TFP in the new EU members states.

The article concentrates on the problem of quality of institutions in European Union countries in the context of their compatibility with the global knowledge-based economy. The main objective of the article is to evaluate the progress obtained in that field by New Member States of the European Union in the years 2000-2013. The empirical research is based on the following hypothesis: the integration process of Central European countries with the European Union has influenced the acceleration of changes leading to improvement in the quality of their institutional systems in the context of global knowledge-based economy. The first part of the paper presents the most important determinants of the ability of a country to utilize the potential of the knowledge-based economy. This analysis is conducted on the basis of institutional economics specifically transaction cost theory. In the empirical part multiple criteria decision analysis methodology (MCDA) (the modified TOPSIS method) is applied. Data from Fraser Institute data base for Economic Freedom of the World Report has been used. The empirical research is the source of significant arguments in favor of the hypothesis of the paper.

Improving conditions for sustainable development has been a major aim of every Polish government since the beginning of transformation process. Thus, the aim of the paper is to analyse the level of sustainable development in Poland at re-gional level. The research was conducted at NUTS 3 level for the years 2010-2013. The analysis was based on the data from Central Statistical Office of Poland. It was assumed that the phenomenon of socio-economic sustainability at regional level should be considered as a multivariate latent variable. As a result, it was measured with application of Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). The proposed model was based on eight observable variables that are often pointed in the literature as measures of socio-economic development and human welfare. Application of SEM model allowed to verify the usefulness of the observable variables for analysis of the phenomenon of sustainable development in Poland at regional level. The conducted research confirmed serious disparities at regional level in the sphere of socio-economic sustainability that must be the subject of special interest and counteractions of Polish government.

Improving productivity is the main determinant of long term develop-ment. In the EU in Europe 2020 strategy special attention was given to the role of quality of human capital (QHC) as an important determinant of productivity growth. In this context the aim of the article is to assess the impact of the QHC on total factor productivity (TFP) in 'old' EU countries. The research is conducted at macroeconomic level. EU economies must build their competitiveness in reality of knowledge-based economy. Thus, the QHC was analysed from the point of view of global knowledge economy. This factor was treated as a multidimensional phenom-enon. As a result, it was measured with application of TOPSIS method, which al-lowed to obtained time series for dynamic panel analysis of determinants of TFP. In order to evaluate TFP parameters of the Cobb-Douglas production function for de-veloped EU countries were estimated. Then, the relationship between the QHC and the level of TFP was assessed with application of dynamic panel model. The re-search was based on Eurostat data for the years 2000-2010. It confirmed a signifi-cant influence of the QHC on the level of TFP in the analysed economies.

The key challenge for medium- and long-term policy in European Union countries is to use the potential of knowledge-based economy (KBE), which is a condition for maintaining high total factor productivity in Europe. For this reason, the relationship between quality of institutional system and total factor productivity in the EU countries has been examined. The quality of institutional system is defined here from the perspective of incentives that influence the use of the potential of KBE. In order to determine the level of effectiveness of the institutional system in the analyzed countries the method for linear ordering of objects was applied based on data from Fraser Institute. The main hypothesis of the article was formed as follow: the quality of institutional system in the context of KBE has significant influence on the level of total factor productivity in the EU. In order to verify the hypothesis, the parameters of the Cobb-Douglas production function were estimated, which allowed to evaluate TFP for EU countries. The calculation made in the article was based on Eurostat data. Then, the identification of the relationship between the quality of institutional system and the level of TFP was made with the application of panel model. The research made for the years 2000-2010 allowed to verify the hypothesis.

The article concentrates on the problem of influence of quality of institutional system in the context of utilizing the potential of knowledge-based economy on the human development in highly developed countries. In order to measure the quality of institutional system a synthetic measure based on multivariate analysis techniques was proposed. To obtain the institutional measure TOPSIS method was applied. To quantify the institutional factors the data from Fraser Institute was used. As diagnostic variables of quality of institutions 29 variables qualified to four aspects of national institutional systems were used: a) formal regulations influencing entrepreneurship; b) effectiveness of juridical system in keeping low level of transaction costs and supporting effectiveness of market mechanism; c) competitive pressure and effectiveness of labour markets; d) financial markets institutions as a stimulator of development of enterprises with high growth potential. Human Development Index proposed within United Nations Development Programme was used for measuring the quality of life. The estimation of relation between institutions and human development was made with econometric dynamic panel model. The estimation was made for 24 European Union countries for the years 2004-2010. The econometric analysis shows the positive influence of quality of institutions on human development in the context of knowledge-based economy in developed countries.

The use of the potential of economic convergence is one of the key challenges of economic policy in case of European Union. Due to structural changes that have led to the growing role of knowledge-based economy (KBE), the analysis made in the paper is based on the assumption that the convergences process of the EU countries takes place in the reality of the KBE, thus in order to facilitate it, all the EU members should concentrate on building institutions that are adequate to the conditions of the KBE. In this context, the aim of the study is to verify the potential impact of the quality of institutional system of the EU countries on the process of convergence. In this regard, the analytical framework of conditional ß-convergence was used with econometric dynamic panel modeling. To measure the quality of institutional system the authors proposed original synthetic indicator, which was designed with TOPSIS method. For this purpose the data was obtained from the Fraser Institute database. Dynamic panel econometric analysis carried out for the European Union countries in the years 2004-2010 confirms that the high quality and adequacy of the institutional system to the conditions of the KBE supports convergence process in the EU.

The article is devoted to measuring the effectiveness of institutional systems of EU countries in terms of their relevance to the requirements of global knowledge-based economy. The main aim of the article is to evaluate the progress obtained by New Member States in the years 2000-2010. The empirical part is based on the modified TOPSIS method. Data from Fraser Institute has been used.

The article is devoted to measuring the effectiveness of institutional systems of European Union countries in terms of their relevance to the requirements of the global knowledge-based economy. The theoretical analysis is based on the framework of new institutional economics with special consideration to economics of transaction costs. There are two main aims of the article. The main aim of the paper is to evaluate the progress obtained by Poland and the rest of so called New Member States of the European Union in the years 2000-2010 in the context of institutional reforms that can lead to decreasing of transaction costs and are up to requirements of global knowledge-based economy. The second aim of the paper is the evaluation of influence of the last crisis of the year 2008 on the institutional reforms in 'old' Europe. The realisation of that aims was possible due to application of TOPSIS method for the analysis of institutional effectiveness of European Union members states in the years 2000-2010. The empirical research is based on the data from Fraser Institute database for Economic Freedom.

Last global financial crisis has led to massive fiscal stimulation actions in most of developed countries which resulted in significant increase of their public debt. For many economists current level of debt in case of many highly developed countries is coming up to unsustainable level or at least level that has negative consequences on the long term growth. This can be also said about Eurozone or wider EU economies. This factors in near future will force many EU countries to adopt much stricter middle and long term fiscal policy that will be necessary for deleveraging process. In this context the aim of the research is to check whether can one find non-Keynesian effects of fiscal consolidations in Eurozone countries in last decade. If the answer is positive, then could these non-Keynesian effects be significant developing factor in case of Eurozone countries. The third scientific question concentrates on the ways the fiscal consolidations were implemented and the potential influence of consolidations strategies on short term growth. The research is based on European Commission and Eurostat fiscal and macroeconomic data for Eurozone countries for the years 1995-2013. In the research the econometric dynamic panel model based on the concept of conditional convergence was applied. As a complementary method qualitative analysis of cases of significant contractions was made with the concentration on the differences between expansionary thus non-Keynesian cases and conventional Keynesian cases of fiscal contractions. The research results give some arguments for existence of fiscal transitions channels leading to non-Keynesian effects of fiscal policy, which in the same time can be a factor of conditional convergence. Thus in case of proper construction of fiscal consolidations polices these factors can be helpful in future deleverage process.

Visegrad countries, Poland, Slovakia, Czech Republic and Hungary have common history and have faced the same challenges created by globalisation process for the last three decades. They have successfully transformed form central planned to market economies. They have implemented fundamental reforms of their whole institutional systems and finally joined the European Union in the year 2004. During this process the most significant changes, which were directly influenced by opening of these economies in the reality of globalisation, have been seen on the labour markets. From the policy point of view the labour markets are always considered as crucial for social and macroeconomic stability of economies. This forces the economists to constant empirical research in this field. In this context the aim of the article is to conduct comparative analysis of the unemployment phenomena in the four countries. For this purpose wavelet analysis was applied. In the research a discrete wavelet transformation was used, which has been recently effectively used for analysis of macroeconomic indicators. The empirical research was conducted for the years 1998-2016 and it was based on the Eurostat data. In the research the following hypothesis was verified: the phenomenon of unemployment in the case of Poland, Slovakia and Hungary is formed in a quite similar way, whereas in Czech Republic the situation on the labour markets is mainly determined by factors of different nature.

The main aim of the article is to analyze differences of agriculture performance across the European Union countries in the years 2010-2013. The special attention was devoted to the results obtained by New Member States. The research was conducted with application of multiple criteria analysis tools: the method proposed by Hellwig and Ward's clustering method. The research was based on the collection of the World Bank development indicators. It confirms the existence of significant disparity in the performance of agricultural sector between the old and new member states that joined the UE after the year 2004.