A 1996 survey of Hong Kong establishments designed to identify hiring and employment patterns by workers' age shows that, as in the United States, many firms employed older workers but did not hire older workers. This pattern appears to reflect mainly economic forces, rather than public policy,...

Principles of Public Policy Practice was written with policy makers, concerned citizens, and students of public policy in mind. Striving to avoid technical language, the author introduces a new paradigm that starts from the commonality of human nature and the assumption that public policy should...

This paper discusses alternative privatization schemes for public housing in light of economic efficiency, "policy efficiency," and equity. The analysis shows that removing restrictions to resale by the purchasers is the key to improving economic efficiency and that restricting resales to target...

This paper puts forward a public pension scheme that is fully funded for each cohort and covers everybody. The scheme is an application of the generational accounting concept. As compared to pay-as-you-go schemes, it is free of the vagaries of uncertain demographic changes. Because payouts for...

The authors find evidence that a public housing privatization program produced adverse effects on housing transactions and the economy in Hong Kong. A scheme announced in December 1997, offering tenants an opportunity to buy their units at deeply discounted prices, reduced public housing...

This paper offers a new way of compiling effective exchange rate indices, which is then shown to perform generally better in prototype equations explaining total real exports than other published indices. Researchers can use this method to compile effective exchange rates, real or nominal,...

A series of surveys conducted in Hong Kong since 2005 shows a decline and then a recovery in the happiness index. A series of regression analysis suggests that the recent rise in the happiness index that began ahead of the financial tsunami and continued uninterrupted by the crisis possibly...

Intra-regional trade has been rising rapidly, especially after China's accession to the WTO in 2001. China's economy is expanding rapidly, and has already passed Japan in 2010 to become the world's second largest economy. It is clearly producing a huge impact on the world economy, and...