Based on the observation of an unabated trend towards higher social spending ratios in advanced countries, the study analyzes the risk of "social dominance", where social expenditures dominate fiscal policy, and undermine growth and fiscal sustainability. We scrutinize this risk by analyzing drivers of social expenditures and their interaction with other fiscal variables. Results show, that social expenditure expansion is largely ageing driven, it crowds out other primary expenditures and there is evidence of unsustainability. These findings and the accelerating trend of population ageing and particularly high political costs to reforming social expenditure suggest significant and rising risks of "social dominance".
Based on the observation of an unabated trend towards higher social spending ratios in advanced countries, the study analyzes the risk of "social dominance", where social expenditures dominate fiscal policy, and undermine growth and fiscal sustainability. We scrutinize this risk by analyzing drivers of social expenditures and their interaction with other fiscal variables. Results show, that social expenditure expansion is largely ageing driven, it crowds out other primary expenditures and there is evidence of unsustainability. These findings and the accelerating trend of population ageing and particularly high political costs to reforming social expenditure suggest significant and rising risks of "social dominance". ; info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion
Newer, fragile states often lack the police, administrative, and economic resources needed to govern effectively, and many cannot provide basic goods and services to significant sectors of their population. The vacuum inside these states is being filled by armed groups and political movements that are growing in both numbers and capability. The global competition for power, influence, and legitimacy leads to struggles for control of populations, territory, and resources. ; https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/ciwag-case-studies/1005/thumbnail.jpg
Recent court rulings, e.g., in the Gencor and Airtours cases, seem to indicate that the legal concept of joint dominance in oligopolistic markets is equivalent to the economic concept of collusion. This paper argues that the enlargement of the dominance concept to also include oligopolistic dominance is sensible and based on widely accepted economic theory. I discuss how competitive assessment in case law has taken seriously some economics lessons, but ignored some others. Economists on one hand and lawyers and antitrust authorities on the other hand seem to speak past each other on these issues. This paper attempts to bridge this gap, and to clarify the concept of collective dominance. I also discuss some recent advances in economic theory and empirical economic evidence related to the oligopolistic dominance that is relevant to the competition policy. – oligopoly ; dominant position ; market power ; competition policy ; merger ; Viimeaikaiset EU:n tuomioistuinten päätökset esimerkiksi Gencorja Airtours-asiassa indikoivat, että juridiikassa käytetty yhteisen määräävän markkinaaseman käsite oligopolistisilla markkinoilla vastaa taloustieteen kolluusion käsitettä. Tässä tutkimuksessa argumentoidaan, että määräävän markkina-aseman käsitteen laajentaminen koskemaan myös oligopolistista määräävää asemaa on järkevä ja perustuu laajalti hyväksyttyyn talousteoriaan. Vaikka kilpailuoikeudellinen arviointi on tapauskäytännössä ottanut huomioon eräitä taloustieteen oligopoleja koskevia tuloksia, se on näyttänyt olleen välittämättä eräistä muista tuloksista. Lisäksi ekonomistit ja juristit näyttävät toisinaan puhuvan toistensa ohi. Tämä tutkimus pyrkii rakentamaan siltaa ekonomistien ja juristien välille ja selventämään oligopolistisen määräävän markkina-aseman käsitettä. Tutkimuksessa tarkastellaan eräitä taloustieteen uusia teoreettisia ja empiirisiä tuloksia, joilla on merkitystä oligopoleja koskevaan kilpailupolitiikkaan. – oligopoli ; määräävä markkina-asema ; markkinavoima ; kilpailupolitiikka ; yrityskauppa
Bei den bisherigen Studien zu Montenegros politischem System lag der Schwerpunkt meist auf die extrem lange Regierungsdominanz der Demokratischen Partei der Sozialisten (DPS), wenig Aufmerksamkeit hingegen wurde den Oppositionsparteien in diesem kompetitiv-autoritären Regime zuteil. Diese Masterarbeit versucht diese Lücke mit einer Fallstudie zu schließen, die erforscht wie haben sich die Strategien politischer Oppositionsparteien auf die Dominanz der DPS im unabhängigen Montenegro ausgewirkt. Sie beginnt mit einer Analyse, wie DPS den Wettbewerb seit den ersten Mehrparteienwahlen manipulierte und damit bei Wahlen, im Parlament und in der Staatsführung Dominanz etablierte und festigte. Untersucht wird, wie nicht-regierende politische Parteien ihre Opposition ausdrückten, indem ihre strategischen Verhaltensweisen mit anderen kompetitiv-autoritären Regimen verglichen wird (z.B. Rekrutierung von Aktivist*innen, "Regierungsspaltung", Koalitionsbildung und Vertrauen auf Amtsinhaber auf lokaler Ebene). Die Analyse zeigt, dass die Oppositionsparteien in Montenegro kompetitiv zueinander sind, ihre Ressourcen und Bemühungen nicht gegen den Machtinhaber vereinen und als eine von externen Faktoren oder internen DPS-Spaltungen abhängige Alternative agieren. Weniger Fragmentierung, sondern endloser inner-oppositioneller Wettbewerb stellt das größte Problem oppositioneller Strategien im unabhängigen Montenegro dar: Das hat ihre Glaubwürdigkeit bei Wähler*innen und anderen Akteur*innen untergraben und die Fähigkeit aus vergangenen Fehlern zu lernen, scheint begrenzt zu sein. Somit liefert diese Masterarbeit auch Evidenz, dass die Strategien der Oppositionsparteien einen starken Beitrag für die Dominanz der DPS, in allen Bereichen des Parteiwettbewerbs, geliefert haben. ; Much research on Montenegros political system focuses on the outstanding longevity in office of the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS), often granting limited attention to opposition parties role within such competitive authoritarian regime. This thesis aims at filling the gap with a case study addressing how political party opposition strategies impacted on DPS dominance in post-independence Montenegro. It starts by reviewing how DPS skewed competition to establish and maintain dominance from the first multiparty elections within the electoral, parliamentary, and executive arenas of party competition. It then looks into how non-governing political parties expressed their opposition after independence, through the analysis of their strategic behaviour in comparison with successful opposition strategies from other competitive authoritarian regimes (i.e. activist recruitment, creation of a 'regime cleavage, coalition building, and reliance on local level office). It finds opposition parties in Montenegro are engaged in competing against each other rather than pooling resources and efforts against the dominant, behaving as alternation in office solely depended upon external actors or DPS internal divisions. Rather than fragmentation, ceaseless intra-opposition competition represents the crucial problem when it comes to political party opposition strategies in post-independence Montenegro: it undermined their credibility in the eyes of the electorate and other actors, as well as evidenced limited ability to learn from past mistakes. Thus, this thesis points to political party opposition strategies as crucial in accounting for continued DPS dominance, facilitating its reproduction in all the arenas of party competition. ; submitted by Alberto Sartori ; Zusammenfassungen in Deutsch und Englisch ; Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz, Masterarbeit, 2019 ; (VLID)4499141
A Montana Public Radio Commentary by Evan Barrett. Published newspaper columns written by Evan Barrett on this topic, which vary somewhat in content from this commentary, appeared in the following publications: Missoulian, October 3, 2014 Independent Record, October 13, 2014
This paper scrutinizes the debate of Keynes and Hayek concerning the adequate re- sponse to economic crises from a historical perspective. In a first step the develop- ment of the Keynesian economic theory, its ascent during the Great Depression and its use during financially sound times is analyzed. In a second step the Hayekian cri- tique to discretionary government intervention and its long run consequences is scru- tinized. In the last step it is analyzed why, in the wake of a crisis, short-run oriented Keynesian therapy dominates long-run Hayekian therapy as in the most recent crisis.
The internet giants - Facebook, Amazon, Netflix and Google, among others - have transformed society with both positive and negative effects. The negative effects have been stark. There have been huge disruptions caused by e-commerce. More recently, subtler, but even more serious negative effects are only now being recognized: threats to democracy, violations of privacy, and monopolistic behavior. By traditional measures Facebook and Google are highly concentrated. Each has obtained de facto monopolistic or oligopolistic power with little concern on the part of government. Facebook and Google and other internet giants are multisided markets (MSM); their economic rents are "hidden" from the public. On the user-side of the market, prices are zero - "free." On the other side of the market, Facebook's and Google's revenues are derived from advertising which appears when the users click on advertiser's web sites. Facebook and Google can extract exorbitant prices for ads, since they are virtually the only source that can target ads directly to potential customers. This is where the economic rents are not so obvious. This paper addresses the monopolistic/monopsony aspect of the internet giants. In the singlesided market, monopoly pricing is well defined - as well as tests for predatory behavior; not so with multisided markets. Since the definition of markets is central to the legal enforcement of antitrust statutes, the paper examines non-transactional multisided markets for their potential for determining consumers' harm and welfare effects, as well as defining monopoly and predatory pricing in this context. Initial estimates of Google's and Facebook's social cost in terms of consumers' welfare loss are $54 and $33 billion, respectively and increasing cost to consumers at least $87 billion dollars. It demonstrates and quantifies that dominate internet platforms can create three major harms to consumers: - Increasing prices to consumers via added costs to the products being advertised, - Elimination (or non-emergence) of competition in markets to the products being advertised, - Increasing prices to consumers beyond the cost of advertising via the market power of the remaining firms in the market of the products being advertised The paper outlines potential remedies to ameliorate the problems.
There are many risks to the U.S. Army's command and control (C2) operations and to its intelligence and information warfare (IW) capabilities. The challenges include: significant uncertainty; sudden unexpected events; high noise and clutter levels in intelligence pictures; basic and complex deceptions exercised through a variety of channels; the actions of hidden malign actors; and novel forms of attack on U.S. and allied command, control, communications, computers, information/intelligence, surveillance, targeting acquisition, and reconnaissance (C4ISTAR) systems. If the U.S. Army is to secure and maintain information dominance in all environments, it must exploit complexity and uncertainty in the battlespace and not simply seek to overcome it. Innovation requires that new ideas are considered, and that old ideas should be robustly challenged. To achieve and maintain information dominance, the U.S. Army will also require a significant injection of innovation, a robust and resilient C2 and intelligence capability, novel technologies and an accelerated information operations capability development program that is broad, deep, sustained and well-coordinated. Furthermore, once information dominance is achieved, maintaining it will demand continuous change and development. ; https://press.armywarcollege.edu/monographs/1390/thumbnail.jpg
How do we make sense of the policy implications of the numerous corporate elites appointed to positions in government? The board interlock network served as a reliable map of power for most of the 20th century. With the decline of the interlock network over the last few decades, we are left without a reliable map of corporate power, leading to a theory of a fractured corporate elite that is ineffectual in its collective policy influence. In this article, we argue that the fractured elite thesis overlooks two factors that counteract the decline of the domestic interlock network- a stable inner circle of highly connected individuals and a growing policy planning network (PPN). Using network data from 2010-11 on both board of director and corporate-policy planning org interlocks, along with a plethora of data on corporate political behavior, we demonstrate that the inner circle is still the primary organizing group of the capitalist class, and that the PPN is its current organizational vehicle. We demonstrate that the PPN is a primary source of political mobilization and cohesion, and is thus a source of continued corporate dominance. Ultimately we argue that the PPN can be used as a map to guide our understanding of the relationship between business and politics.
Throughout modern history, we can see that Western culture has influenced the life of people all of the world and the way we think. My research is focused on European colonialism and its impact on modern society. My reference materials in the research process include scholarly articles and current news articles. The findings of my research are that almost all of the issues and trends today are somewhat related to colonialism. Even though colonialism has long ended, its legacies remain in today's society and has shaped the way of our thinking today, as it has led to dominance of European culture in the world. This paper examines colonialism's impact in many different areas, including politics, economics, religion, language, clothing, and cuisine, using examples from different parts of the world, including Africa, Asia and South America. Based on the research, I have found the profound influence of European colonialism on today's society and people's way of thinking.
Using the spatial theory of voting, this paper describes an institutional structure where there are two branches of the government: the executive, elected by plurality rule, and the legislative elected by proportional rule. The resulting policy outcome is described through a compromise between these two branches. The parties announce their position on a policy issue and then voters vote. We prove the uniqueness of Nash equilibrium in the subgame, where the election of the president is known. Moreover, this equilibrium can be obtained by the process of iterated elimination of dominated strategies. We then solve the whole game by backward induction. Furthermore, the policy outcome at equilibrium of the two-stage game is the same of the simultaneous game, where voters simultaneously choose the two branches. The results suggest a moderate behavior of the voters, basically due to the will to balance the policy outcome.
Using the spatial theory of voting, this paper describes an institutional structure where there are two branches of the government: the executive, elected by plurality rule, and the legislative elected by proportional rule. The resulting policy outcome is described through a compromise between these two branches. The parties announce their position on a policy issue and then voters vote. We prove the uniqueness of Nash equilibrium in the subgame, where the election of the president is known. Moreover, this equilibrium can be obtained by the process of iterated elimination of dominated strategies. We then solve the whole game by backward induction. Furthermore, the policy outcome at equilibrium of the two-stage game is the same of the simultaneous game, where voters simultaneously choose the two branches. The results suggest a moderate behavior of the voters, basically due to the will to balance the policy outcome.
This paper studies the interdependence between fiscal and monetary policy in a DSGE model with sticky prices and non-zero trend inflation. We characterize the fiscal and monetary policies by a rule whereby a given fraction k of the government debt must be backed by the discounted value of current and future primary surpluses. The remaining fraction of debt is backed by seigniorage revenues. When k = 1, there is no fiscal dominance, since the fiscal authority backs all debt and accommodates (independent) monetary policy, by adjusting current or future primary surpluses to satisfy the government's intertemporal budget constraint. If k = 0, all debt is backed by the monetary authority and there is complete fiscal dominance. A continuum of possibilities lies between these two polar cases. We numerically show that: 1) the degree of fiscal dominance, as measured by (1 k), is positively related to trend inflation, and 2) when prices are sticky, k has significant effects on the business cycle dynamics. The model is estimated using Bayesian techniques. Estimates of k imply a high degree of fiscal dominance in both Mexico and South Korea, but almost no fiscal dominance in Canada and the U.S. The country-specific estimates of the structural parameters are used in a second-order approximation of the equilibrium around the deterministic steady-state to evaluate the welfare costs of fiscal dominance. Results suggest significant welfare losses for countries with high degrees of fiscal dominance.
This presentation discusses recent case law concerning excessive pricing as an abuse of dominance under EU competition law, particularly as it relates to drug pricing. It also discusses the treatment of discount and rebate schemes under the competition rules and how these schemes can be designed to be compliant with the rules. ; Peer reviewed
