This paper identifies the leading country-industry combinations that define the world technology frontier in manufacturing. Using a unique industry dataset compiled from EU KLEMS and PATSTAT, it explores which countries and industries reveal the most efficient innovation processes. We combine a...

This paper assesses the relative efficiency of knowledge production in the OECD using a nonparametric DEA approach. In general, resources allocated to R&D are limited and therefore must be used efficiently, given the institutional and legal constraints. The efficiency scores presented are based...

The German potable water supply industry is regarded as being highly fragmented, thus inhibiting high potentials for efficiency improvements through consolidation. Focusing on a hypothetical restructuring of the industry, we apply Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) to analyze the potential...

In this paper we utilize White's Reality Check bootstrap methodology (White (1997)) to evaluate simple technical trading rules while quantifying the data-snooping bias and fully adjusting for its effect in the context of the full universe from which the trading rules were drawn. Hence, for the...

This paper develops a simple model of employment, non-statutory redundancy pay and wage determination. An interesting feature of this model is that the contract curve is vertical. Some of the predictions of the model are confronted with the available British data on non-statutory firing costs,...

We model a South African city during Apartheid (in which both schooling and mobility are restricted on the basis of race) and after Apartheid (in which no restrictions are imposed). We first show that the inequality between blacks and whites decreases when Apartheid laws are removed. Indeed,...

Inflation targeting central banks will be hampered without good models to assist them to be forward-looking. Many current inflation models fail to forecast turning points adequately, because they miss key underlying long-run influences. The world is on the cusp of a dramatic turning point in...

South Africa has undergone a remarkable transformation since its democratic transition in 1994, but economic growth and employment generation have been disappointing. Most worryingly, unemployment is currently among the highest in the world. While the proximate cause of high unemployment is that...

There have been important studies of overall income inequality and of poverty in South Africa. In this paper, we approach the subject from a different direction: the extent and evolution of top incomes. We present estimates of the shares in total income of groups such as the top 1 per cent and...

Understanding how import prices adjust to exchange rates helps anticipate inflation effects and monetary policy responses. This paper examines exchange rate passthrough to the monthly import price index in South Africa during 1980-2009. A methodological innovation allows various short-run...