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1681 publications found

  • Working Paper No. 219 December 01, 1997

    Linking the Minimum Wage to Productivity

    Oren Levin-Waldman
    Abstract

    One of the principal problems with the minimum wage is that adjustments to it must be voted on by Congress. Although recent congressional action solves the immediate problem of restoring value to a wage that has otherwise failed to keep pace with inflation, it has not removed the issue from the political agenda. Every time […]

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  • Working Paper No. 218 December 01, 1997

    Selective Use of Discretionary Public Employment and Economic Flexibility

    Mathew Forstater
    Abstract

    Flexibility is a desirable feature of an economic system. Structural rigidities can result in sluggish growth and inflationary pressures; many economic models, however, display considerable system flexibility because of the use of unacceptably unrealistic assumptions. The primary “real-life” features endowing the system with flexibility are unemployment and excess capacity. While realistic, unemployment is economically costly […]

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  • Working Paper No. 217 December 01, 1997

    The Economic Contributions of Hyman Minsky

    Dimitri B. Papadimitriou, and Nina Shapiro
    Abstract

    Financial economist Hyman P. Minsky believed that because there are many types of capitalism determined by circumstances and an evolving set of institutional structures, an abstract economic theory could not be applicable in all times and places but must be institution-specific. Therefore, he focused his attention on the changing institutional structure of developed capitalist economies […]

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  • Working Paper No. 214 November 01, 1997

    The School-to-Work Transition of Second-generation Immigrants in Metropolitan New York

    Philip Kasinitz, Dae Young Kim, Nancy Lopez, John Mollenkopf, and Mary C. Waters
    Abstract

    Social scientists have only begun to study the experiences of the 15 million immigrants who have settled in the United States since 1965 and have learned even less about their children. Several speculate that the children of immigrants, being restricted to poor inner city schools, bad jobs, and shrinking economic niches, will experience downward mobility, […]

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  • Working Paper No. 213 November 01, 1997

    Government As Employer of Last Resort

    L. Randall Wray
    Abstract

    Since the Employment Act of 1946 a stated policy of the United States government has been to pursue simultaneously high employment and stable prices. However, because many economists and policymakers do not believe that it is possible to have both high employment and stable prices, monetary policy has generally been geared, at least for the […]

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  • Working Paper No. 212 November 01, 1997

    An Efficiency Argument for the Guaranteed Income

    Michael A. Lewis, and Karl Widerquist
    Abstract

    Authors Karl Widerquist and Michael A. Lewis use a “multischool” approach to poverty policy, asking the following question: Given the many proposed causes for poverty, and the conflicting theories about how potential solutions would work, what conclusions can we draw about policy? They conclude that the guaranteed income is the most efficient and comprehensive policy […]

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  • Working Paper No. 211 November 01, 1997

    Income Distribution, Macroeconomic Analysis, and Barriers to Full Employment

    Malcolm Sawyer
    Abstract

    The distribution of income is conspicuous by its absence from most mainstream macroeconomic analysis. Visiting Scholar Malcolm Sawyer, of the University of Leeds, makes an effort to remedy this situation by discussing three aspects of the relationship between macroeconomics and the distribution of income: the effect of conflicts over the distribution of income on the […]

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  • Working Paper No. 210 November 01, 1997

    The Effects of Immigrants on African-American Earnings

    David R. Howell, and Elizabeth J. Mueller
    Abstract

    The improvement in the relative economic status of African American workers in the 1960s and 1970s was reversed in the 1980s. During that decade immigration to the United States reached its highest level since the early part of this century, and many immigrants entered lesser-skilled labor markets, where most African American labor is concentrated. Yet, […]

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  • Working Paper No. 216 November 01, 1997

    The Impact of Racial Segregation on the Education and Work Outcomes of Second-generation West Indians in New York City

    Mary C. Waters
    Abstract

    Mary C. Waters, a professor of sociology at Harvard University, examines one way in which race matters in the United States by studying black children of immigrants in New York City. She demonstrates that the segregation and concentrated poverty in black neighborhoods have long-lasting effects on the acquisition of skills. These youth face direct employment […]

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  • Working Paper No. 215 November 01, 1997

    Achievement and Ambition among Children of Immigrants in Southern California

    Rubin Rumbaut
    Abstract

    The influx of immigrants to the United States after 1965 has reached levels not seen since the early part of the century. The ability of these recent immigrant groups and their children to succeed in the American economy has been hotly debated but, until recently, little studied. Rubin G. Rumbaut, a professor of sociology at […]

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  • Public Policy Brief No. 36 October 09, 1997

    Dangerous Metaphor: The Fiction of the Labor Market

    James K. Galbraith
    Abstract

    The concept of a labor market, responding to familiar underpinnings of supply and demand, completely colors thought on the relationship between employment, wages, and inflation, according to James K. Galbraith. However, he asserts, wages are determined not by such market forces, but by what he calls the job structure—a complex set of status and pay […]

    Download Public Policy Brief No. 36, 1997 PDF (95.66 KB)
  • Public Policy Brief No. 35 October 08, 1997

    Reflecting the Changing Face of America

    Joel Perlmann
    Abstract

    On the United States’ census form, American citizens are told they may list any ethnic ancestries with which they identify, but are instructed to “mark one only” in the question on race. Joel Perlmann asserts that it is in the public interest to allow people to declare themselves as having origins in more than one […]

    Download Public Policy Brief No. 35, 1997 PDF (6.14 MB)
  • Working Paper No. 209 October 01, 1997

    Cumulative Regional Decline, Institutional Inadequacy, and the “Democratic Deficit”

    Andrew Paulson
  • Working Paper No. 208 October 01, 1997

    On Budget Deficits and Capital Expenditure

    Malcolm Sawyer
    Abstract

    No further information available.

    Download Working Paper No. 208 PDF (1.25 MB)
  • Public Policy Brief No. 34 September 07, 1997

    Safeguarding Social Security

    Walter M. Cadette
    Abstract

    The falling ratio of workers to retirees in the United States has raised concerns about Social Security’s ability to continue to provide a base level of support for all retired workers and to remain in balance with all of government’s other fiscal obligations. Of alternative plans that have been proposed to safeguard the system, Walter […]

    Download Public Policy Brief No. 34, 1997 PDF (263.80 KB)
  • Public Policy Brief No. 33 August 06, 1997

    Is There a Trade-Off between Unemployment and Inequality?

    Rebecca M. Blank
    Abstract

    Rebecca M. Blank considers how the flexibility of American labor markets and the regulation and redistribution policies of European labor markets may determine employers’ responses to worldwide economic transformations that result in increasing wage disparity in the United States and continuing high unemployment in Europe. She suggests that since the transformations will undoubtedly continue, governments […]

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  • Public Policy Brief No. 32 August 05, 1997

    What’s Missing from the Capital Gains Debate?

    Kris Feder, and Michael Hudson
    Abstract

    The recent enactment of a capital gains tax cut resulted, according to the authors, from the absence of a true appreciation or consideration of the real beneficiaries of such a cut, its probable actual effects, the distinction between productive and nonproductive sources of capital gains (two-thirds of capital gains accrue to real estate, which is […]

    Download Public Policy Brief No. 32, 1997 PDF (116.86 KB)
  • Working Paper No. 203 August 01, 1997

    The NAIRU

    Malcolm Sawyer
    Abstract

    The nonaccelerating inflation rate of unemployment, or NAIRU, has acquired a central role in macroeconomic theory. Fear of inflation has led to a reluctance to allow the unemployment rate to fall below the estimated NAIRU. If so much weight is going to be placed on an estimate of a theoretical variable, it is extremely important […]

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  • Working Paper No. 202 August 01, 1997

    Aggregate Demand, Investment, and the NAIRU

    Malcolm Sawyer
    Abstract

    The nonaccelerating inflation rate of unemployment, or NAIRU, is generally viewed as a supply-side-determined, short-run equilibrium rate of unemployment. In most NAIRU models, aggregate demand plays no essential role in determining equilibrium unemployment. However, Visiting Scholar Malcolm Sawyer demonstrates that the relationship between the real wage and employment (often mistakenly called labor demand) cannot be […]

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  • Working Paper No. 201 August 01, 1997

    Organizational Learning and International Competition

    William H. Lazonick
    Abstract

    Over the last three decades, despite economic growth, the United States has experienced both increasing relative inequality and an absolute decline of real wages. Explanations sometimes offered for this inability to achieve sustainable prosperity are a weakening of innovative ability (a result of reduced expenditures on training, education, and research) and international competition from low-wage […]

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  • Working Paper No. 200 August 01, 1997

    Second Generations

    Joel Perlmann, and Roger Waldinger
    Abstract

    This paper takes a doubting, though friendly, look at the hypotheses of “second generation deciine” and “segmented assimiiation” that have framed the emerging research agenda on the new second generation. Research Associate Roger Waldinger, of the University of California at Los Angeles, and Senior Scholar Joel Perlmann begin with a review of the basic approach, […]

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  • Working Paper No. 207 August 01, 1997

    Reasserting the Role of Keynesian Policies for the New Millennium

    Philip Arestis, and Malcolm Sawyer
    Abstract

    In this paper, Philip Arestis, of the University of East London, and Visiting Scholar Malcolm Sawyer, of the University of Leeds, assert the need for revived and revised Keynesian policies to secure full employment. They do not support “fine tuning,” but argue for a medium-term approach that includes both demand-side and supply-side strategies. Their approach […]

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  • Working Paper No. 206 August 01, 1997

    Are Good Jobs Flying Away?

    Beth Almeida
    Abstract

    Aerospace, once the "crown jewel" of American manufacturing, is experiencing a structural decline characterized by a narrowing of the industry trade surplus, an increase in the foreign content of commercial aircraft and engines, a greater role for foreign companies in research and development, and a loss of "good jobs." Employment in aircraft engine manufacturing peaked […]

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  • Working Paper No. 205 August 01, 1997

    Macroeconomics without Equilibrium or Disequilibrium

    Wynne Godley
    Abstract

    Distinguished Scholar Wynne Godley creates a numerical simulation model that attempts a synthesis between the monetary theory of Hicks and Kaldor, the asset allocation theory of James Tobin, and the Keynesian theory of income and output determination. Methodologically, it substitutes Walrasian rigor for the usual narrative exposition used by post-Keynesian writers—and indeed, by Keynes himself—before […]

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Blithewood
Bard College
Annandale-on-Hudson, NY 12504-5000
(845)758-7700
The Levy Economics Institute of Bard College, founded in 1986 through the generous support of Bard College trustee Leon Levy, is a nonprofit, nonpartisan, public policy research organization. The Levy Institute is independent of any political or other affiliation, and encourages diversity of opinion in the examination of economic policy issues while striving to transform ideological arguments into informed debate.