The theory of purchasing power parity implies that real exchange rate series should be stationary. However, conventional unit root tests on the Southern African Development community (SADC) real exchange rates confirm the existence of a unit root. Such deficiencies in the investigation of the...

South Africa waived user fees for primary health care, first in 1994, and again, in 1996. Since the 1994 plan focused on young children and older adults, as well as pregnant and nursing mothers, the 1996 change, which waived fees for the remainder of the population, subject to means tests, can...

This paper exploits the Lucas’ (1973) signal extraction model to study the effect of uncertainty in the output-inflation trade-off on inflation, using a monetary model with asymmetric central bank preferences over inflation and output. We show that the implication of the uncertainty is...

We develop a structural cointegrated vector autoregressive (VAR) model with weakly exogenous foreign variables, suitable for a small open economy like South Africa. This type of model is known as an augmented vector error correction model (VECM), referred to by VECX*. We compile the foreign...

This paper assesses the impact of uncertainty about the true state of the economy on monetary policy in South Africa since the adoption of inflation targeting. The paper also analyses the impact of uncertainty about the conditions in financial markets on the interest rate setting behavior that...

The impact of the abolition of user fees in South Africa, a policy implemented in 1994 for children under the age of six and the elderly, as well as pregnant and nursing mothers, is examined via regression discontinuity. The analysis focuses on the use of public health care facilities for the...

Money demand specifications exhibits instability, especially for long spans of data. This paper reconsiders the welfare cost of inflation for the US economy using a flexible time-varying cointegration methodology to estimate the money demand function. We find evidence that the time-varying...

In recent years, local governments in South Africa have faced daunting challenges, notably significant service delivery backlogs, poor financial management, corruption, and poor capacity due to lack of skills. As a result, numerous municipalities are deemed to be in financial distress, and...

Existing no trade results are based on the common prior assumption (CPA). This paper identifies a strictly weaker condition than the CPA under which speculative trade is impossible in a rational expectations equilibrium (REE). As our main finding, we demonstrate the impossibility of speculative...

This paper investigates the causality between oil price and economic uncertainty in India. In order to test for this relationship, we collect data on the Brent crude oil price as well as the crude oil ETF volatility index. We also use the policy-related economic uncertainty index as well as the...