Suchergebnisse

Multinational companies are now obliged to deliver an annual report to the tax authorities with information disaggregated by country (country-by-country reporting) in order to show where the assets and workers are allocated, how profits are distributed and to whom taxes are paid. Unfortunately, these reports are not made public in the European Union, thus preventing public scrutiny about the strategies used by multinational companies to displace profits to tax havens. This article applies the Unitary Taxation regime proposed by the European Commission to US multinational companies. The results confirm a strong bias among the profits distribution towards countries with lower corporate tax rates. Likewise, they confirm the capacity of the Unitary Taxation to promote a fairer distribution of tax revenues. These results can be a good contribution to the current Portuguese presidency of the European Union, which managed to gather important support to move forward with the European public country-by-country reporting directive.

As atividades económicas não se distribuem uniformemente em todo o território. Como tal, a concentração geográfica das atividades económicas tem despertado um grande interesse na comunidade científica, na sequência de exemplos famosos como Silicon Valley (Califórnia), Route 128 (Boston), Cambridge (Reino Unido), o estado federal de Baden Wurttemberg (Alemanha). Dada a importância desta matéria, geralmente aceite como uma prioridade no quadro das diversas políticas de desenvolvimento económico, o objetivo deste trabalho é medir e descrever o padrão de distribuição espacial dos principais setores da atividade económica em Portugal. Para isso, seguimos a metodologia de (Guillain & Le Gallo, 2010), combinando o Índice de Gini locacional com uma Análise Espacial de Dados Exploratória, aplicada aos dados do emprego por setor e por municípios em 2009 e 2010. Esta abordagem tem a vantagem de introduzir uma dimensão espacial nas medidas habituais de concentração, procurando assim determinar o padrão de localização de cada setor de atividade e medir a correlação espacial.

Após o processo de alargamento da União Europeia, que ocorreu a partir da década de 1980, as políticas regionais foram reforçadas, fazendo com que as disparidades do PIB per capita entre Estados-membros diminuíssem. No entanto, esta tendência de convergência à escalada nacional não é observada ao nível das regiões de cada país, onde as disparidades regionais tendem a aumentar. No presente trabalho, procedemos a um exercício empírico de convergência dos municípios portugueses continentais, entre 1998 e 2009. Diferentemente da literatura comum, usamos uma abordagem econométrica espacial como um meio para incorporar o papel do espaço e da geografia no desenvolvimento económico, considerando os efeitos de dependência e heterogeneidade espacial. A primeira conclusão aponta para a existência de um forte processo de beta-convergência durante este período. Os resultados também sustentam a existência de dois clubes de convergência, um primeiro composto pelos municípios do interior com velocidade de convergência superior e um segundo, formado pelos municípios do litoral com uma velocidade de convergência menor, mas ainda assim significativa. A presença de dependência espacial no processo de convergência dos municípios costeiros representa o nosso terceiro e último resultado.

Since their accession to the European Union in 1986, both Portugal and Spain have benefited from strong financial support. Both countries have experienced considerable growth in income per capita, converging towards average European levels. However, several studies suggest a high degree of persistence of regional asymmetries within the countries. This paper empirically analyses convergence among NUTS 3 regions of the Iberian Peninsula between 1995 and 2008. The results reveal divergent national trends and indicate no evidence of catching-up effects among the poorest regions, confirming the existence of economic clusters.

The Spanish debt consolidation between 1996 and 2007 represents, by its size and duration, an impressive case among the European Union countries. This paper aims at characterizing the Spanish debt consolidation process in order to assess its effects on economic inequality and welfare. For that purpose we built a general equilibrium heterogeneous-agent model capable of exploring the relationship between fiscal policy variables and the endogenous cross-section distribution of income and wealth. The results show a quite impressive positive welfare gain despite significant transition costs. The simulations point to an increase of inequality during the initial transition period, reversing to more compressed distributions as the economy evolves to its final steady state equilibrium. Overall, the welfare gains are slightly biased towards wealthier individuals. Furthermore empirical data on the dynamics of some crucial variables during the consolidation period lend support to the model simulation results.

The sovereign debt crisis, triggered by the 2007-08 global financial cri- sis, has affected several European Union (EU) countries, leading to unprecedented financial assistance programs. In May 2011, the Portuguese Government set an agreement with the Troika (a supranational institution composed by the European Commission (EC), the European Central Bank (ECB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF)), through which, in exchange for external help, the Portuguese author- ities committed to an Economic Adjustment Program (EAP). In order to assess the impacts of the EAP on welfare and, in particular, on inequality, this paper simulates the debt consolidation strategy proposed by the Troika using a general equilibrium model with heterogeneous agents. The model enables to explore the impacts of the fiscal adjustment on the endogenous cross-section distribution of income, wealth and welfare. Our results predict a positive net welfare gain, despite the existence of sig- nificant transition costs in terms of output losses and inequality, especially during the first years of implementation. Overall, the net positive welfare gains are biased towards the poorer, which means that the consolidation plan will be, in the end, equality-enhancing. These results reflect the instruments involved in the consolida- tion strategy: productive and unproductive expenditure cuts combined with a slight increase in social transfers. Furthermore, the simulation predicts a positive impact on the Portuguese net foreign asset (NFA) position. Assuming this prediction is correct, this strongly supports the motivation for the adoption of the Economic Adjustment Program which considers the large external indebtedness of Portugal as a central issue in the economic diagnosis. ; info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

The housing market occupies a central place within any society. Residential property represents the essential parts of most families' wealth, as well as a substantial part of their monthly expenditure. It also represents a large fraction of private investment, generating significant earnings. However, and despite this importance, the compilation of reliable residential property price indexes (RPPI) is far from satisfactory in Portugal, revealing an important gap in the field of statistical information.
The construction of a residential property price index (RPPI) poses particular problems arising from the inherent nature of the object concerned. Considering the gap in Portugal regarding the lack of a sufficiently enlarged database allowing the compilation of reliable RPPIs, this article seeks to contribute to this area, proposing a methodology applied to the urban area of Aveiro and Ílhavo by means of a spatial data analysis.

The European Union is one of the most prosperous areas of the world. However, huge disparities remain among its member states and regions. Given the persistence of those large regional inequalities, it is pertinent to analyse the efficiency of structural funds. In light of the neoclassical theory, these funds should contribute to improving the economic efficiency among the poorest regions, promoting regional convergence. However, the new economic geography states that structural funds may also facilitate the geographic concentration of economic activities, thus perpetuating regional imbalances. This article measures the impact of structural funds on regional convergence using a spatial econometric approach applied to an extended sample of European regions across a long time interval. Based on data for 96 EU regions during the period 1995–2009, a Durbin model with panel data is estimated in order to capture the effects of spatial dependence in both the lagged dependent variable and the independent variables. The results confirm the existence of conditional convergence and the importance of neighbourhood and spillover effects but do not detect the existence of positive impacts from structural funds.

During periods in which there are large fiscal adjustments in a country's economy, spending and public investment decreases as a result of the adjustment process. Often we are witnessing a general tax increase to generate more public revenue, and at the expenditure side, a 'blind' cut in government expenditure in order to reduce public spending. A greater tax burden has consequences, direct or indirect, on labour income that, in turn, lead to a decrease in the purchasing power of the population and hence the decline in domestic demand. This type of fiscal policies, in the short term, leads to contraction of a country's economy and the economic recovery strongly depends on the goods and services export sector in which is included the tourism sector. Between 1970 and 2012 Portugal was required to make three large fiscal adjustments due to external imbalances. This paper aims to understand if the international tourism demand is in countercyclical with business cycle, thus functioning as a stabilizer for the economy, or whether it is in accordance with it. Using a Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ADL) Model for the period 1970-2012, the result of the estimations suggest that the tourism sector during the three periods of large fiscal adjustment has never worked as a stabilizer of the economy. ; Em períodos onde ocorrem grandes ajustamentos orçamentais na economia de um pais, a despesa e o investimento publico diminuem em consequência desse processo de ajustamento. Frequentemente assiste-se a um aumento generalizado de impostos de forma a gerar mais receita publica, e, pelo lado da despesa, a um corte 'cego' nas despesas do Estado de forma a reduzir os gastos públicos. Ora uma maior carga fiscal tem reflexos, diretos ou indiretos, nos rendimentos do trabalho que, por sua vez, levam a uma diminuição do poder de compra da população e consequentemente a diminuição da procura interna. Este tipo de politicas orçamentais, no curto prazo, conduz a contração da economia de um pais e a retoma económica depende fortemente do setor da exportação de bens e serviços onde se encontra o turismo. Entre 1970 e 2012 Portugal viu-se forcado a fazer três fortes ajustamentos orçamentais devido a desequilíbrios externos. O presente trabalho pretende inferir se a procura turística externa em Portugal evoluiu a contraciclo funcionando desta forma como um estabilizador da economia, ou se pelo contrario, apresenta uma evolução cíclica a par da conjuntura económica. Utilizando-se um modelo autorregressivo de desfasagens distribuídas para o período 1970-2012, o resultado das estimações sugere que o setor turístico durante as fases de ajustamento orçamental nunca serviu de estabilizador da economia.

O declínio populacional é um dos fenómenos mais desafiantes nas últimas décadas em várias regiões da Europa. Mesmo em regiões com saldos migratórios positivos, persiste uma dinâmica demográfica negativa dominada pelo envelhecimento da população. Como tal, o tema do envelhecimento da população, e o papel determinantes das migrações, tornou-se uma áreade investigação e de política regional amplamente debatida.As alterações demográficas são ao mesmo tempo uma causa e uma consequência da dinâmica social, económica e ambiental. A economia e a demografia interagem, reforçando-se em círculos de causalidade cumulativa e, portanto, políticas regionais para lidar com essa dinâmica devem ser implementadas e modelos capazes de simular esse processo interativo são necessários.Com o objetivo de responder a esse desafio, desenvolveu-se um modelo integrado que liga as mudanças do equilíbrio entre a procura e oferta de emprego, a nível regional, à migração líquida por faixa etária e sexo. O modelo foi aplicado às regiões NUTS III de Portugal, um país que apresenta características regionais contrastantes, tanto nas dimensões demográficas quanto económicas.Os resultados demonstram a urgência demográfica e apontam para a importância dos saldos migratórios no combate ao declínio da população na maioria das regiões portuguesas.Além disso, o artigo enfatiza a forte relação entre mercado de trabalho e migração, defendendo políticas integradas que abordem conjuntamente a dinâmica económica e demográfica.

Characterized by some of the highest naturally occurring sea surface temperatures, the Red Sea remains unexplored regarding the dynamics of heterotrophic prokaryotes. Over 16 months, we used flow cytometry to characterize the abundance and growth of four physiological groups of heterotrophic bacteria: membrane-intact (Live), high and low nucleic acid content (HNA and LNA) and actively respiring (CTC+) cells in shallow coastal waters. Chlorophyll a, dissolved organic matter (DOC and DON) concentrations, and their fluorescent properties were also measured as proxies of bottom-up control. We performed short-term incubations (6 days) with the whole microbial community (Community treatment), and with the bacterial community only after removing predators by filtration (Filtered treatment). Initial bacterial abundances ranged from 1.46 to 4.80 × 105 cells mL-1. Total specific growth rates in the Filtered treatment ranged from 0.76 to 2.02 d-1. Live and HNA cells displayed similar seasonal patterns, with higher values during late summer and fall (2.13 and 2.33 d-1, respectively) and lower in late spring (1.02 and 1.01 d-1, respectively). LNA cells were outgrown by the other physiological groups (0.33–1.08 d-1) while CTC+ cells (0.28–1.85 d-1) showed weaker seasonality. The Filtered treatment yielded higher bacterial abundances than the Community treatment in all but 2 of the incubations, and carrying capacities peaked in November 2016 (1.04 × 106 cells mL-1), with minimum values (3.61 × 105 cells mL-1) observed in May 2017. The high temperatures experienced from May through October 2016 (33.4 ± 0.4∘C) did not constrain the growth of heterotrophic bacteria. Indeed, bacterial growth efficiencies were positively correlated with environmental temperature, reflecting the presence of more labile compounds (high DON concentrations resulting in lower C:N ratios) in summer. The overall high specific growth rates and the consistently higher carrying capacities in the Filtered treatment suggest that strong top-down control by protistan grazers was the likely cause for the low heterotrophic bacteria abundances. ; Funding: This project was supported by King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) through the baseline research funding provided to XM. This research was undertaken in accordance with the policies and procedures of KAUST. Permissions relevant for KAUST to undertake the research have been obtained from the applicable governmental agencies in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Acknowledgments: We gratefully acknowledge Najwa Al-Otaibi, Eman Sabbagh, and Abbrar Labban, who aid us with laboratory and fieldwork.