The Knowledge Capital of Nations

The Knowledge Capital of Nations
Author: Eric A. Hanushek
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 275
Release: 2023-08-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 026254895X

A rigorous, pathbreaking analysis demonstrating that a country's prosperity is directly related in the long run to the skills of its population. In this book Eric Hanushek and Ludger Woessmann make a simple, central claim, developed with rigorous theoretical and empirical support: knowledge is the key to a country's development. Of course, every country acknowledges the importance of developing human capital, but Hanushek and Woessmann argue that message has become distorted, with politicians and researchers concentrating not on valued skills but on proxies for them. The common focus is on school attainment, although time in school provides a very misleading picture of how skills enter into development. Hanushek and Woessmann contend that the cognitive skills of the population—which they term the “knowledge capital” of a nation—are essential to long-run prosperity. Hanushek and Woessmann subject their hypotheses about the relationship between cognitive skills (as consistently measured by international student assessments) and economic growth to a series of tests, including alternate specifications, different subsets of countries, and econometric analysis of causal interpretations. They find that their main results are remarkably robust, and equally applicable to developing and developed countries. They demonstrate, for example, that the “Latin American growth puzzle” and the “East Asian miracle” can be explained by these regions' knowledge capital. Turning to the policy implications of their argument, they call for an education system that develops effective accountability, promotes choice and competition, and provides direct rewards for good performance.

Why Nations Fail

Why Nations Fail
Author: Daron Acemoglu
Publisher: Currency
Total Pages: 546
Release: 2013-09-17
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0307719227

Brilliant and engagingly written, Why Nations Fail answers the question that has stumped the experts for centuries: Why are some nations rich and others poor, divided by wealth and poverty, health and sickness, food and famine? Is it culture, the weather, geography? Perhaps ignorance of what the right policies are? Simply, no. None of these factors is either definitive or destiny. Otherwise, how to explain why Botswana has become one of the fastest growing countries in the world, while other African nations, such as Zimbabwe, the Congo, and Sierra Leone, are mired in poverty and violence? Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson conclusively show that it is man-made political and economic institutions that underlie economic success (or lack of it). Korea, to take just one of their fascinating examples, is a remarkably homogeneous nation, yet the people of North Korea are among the poorest on earth while their brothers and sisters in South Korea are among the richest. The south forged a society that created incentives, rewarded innovation, and allowed everyone to participate in economic opportunities. The economic success thus spurred was sustained because the government became accountable and responsive to citizens and the great mass of people. Sadly, the people of the north have endured decades of famine, political repression, and very different economic institutions—with no end in sight. The differences between the Koreas is due to the politics that created these completely different institutional trajectories. Based on fifteen years of original research Acemoglu and Robinson marshall extraordinary historical evidence from the Roman Empire, the Mayan city-states, medieval Venice, the Soviet Union, Latin America, England, Europe, the United States, and Africa to build a new theory of political economy with great relevance for the big questions of today, including: - China has built an authoritarian growth machine. Will it continue to grow at such high speed and overwhelm the West? - Are America’s best days behind it? Are we moving from a virtuous circle in which efforts by elites to aggrandize power are resisted to a vicious one that enriches and empowers a small minority? - What is the most effective way to help move billions of people from the rut of poverty to prosperity? More philanthropy from the wealthy nations of the West? Or learning the hard-won lessons of Acemoglu and Robinson’s breakthrough ideas on the interplay between inclusive political and economic institutions? Why Nations Fail will change the way you look at—and understand—the world.

A Mathematical Treatment of Economic Cooperation and Competition Among Nations, with Nigeria, USA, UK, China, and the Middle East Examples

A Mathematical Treatment of Economic Cooperation and Competition Among Nations, with Nigeria, USA, UK, China, and the Middle East Examples
Author: Ethelbert N. Chukwu
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 793
Release: 2005-09-30
Genre: Mathematics
ISBN: 0080459528

The book presents a careful mathematical study of Economic Cooperation and Competition among Nations. It appropriates the principles of Supply and Demand and of Rational Expectations to build the dynamic model of the Gross Domestic Products of two groups of nations which are linked up together. The first group consists of Nigeria, the US, the UK and China. The second group is made up of Egypt, the US, Jordan and Israel. The link connecting the four nations of each group is mirrored in the net export function which is broadened to include trade, debts and the inflow or the outflow of wealth from the competing and cooperating nations. This realistic models of the four interacting GDP's, a hereditary differential game of pursuit are validated with historical data from International Financial Statistic Year Book. The Mathematical model is then studied for controllability: from a current initial GDPs a better state can be attained using government and private strategies which are carefully identified. We use regression and differential equation methods to test whether the four countries are competing or cooperating. The consequences of competition or cooperation are explored. Cooperation can be realized and the growth of wealth assured because the system is controllable and we can increase the growth of GDP and then increase the coefficient of cooperation. The outcome may be unbounded growth of wealth for all concerned – the triumph of cooperation. With analogous simple examples the book shows that sufficiently cooperating systems grow unbounded and competing ones are either bounded at best, or become extinct in finite time. If competition is small, i.e., limited, or regulated the GDP's need not be extinct even after a long time. This results are in contrast with popular opinion which advocate competition over cooperation. The detailed policy implication of the cooperation analysis at one time or the other were advocated by Pope John Paul II, President Clinton and President Bush. The mathematical message is clear: the strategy of cooperation is the best way in an Interconnected World: Cooperation triumphs over competition. The same type of analysis allows the book to argue through modeling that prosperity, internal peace and harmony can flourish in Nigeria among the old three regions and the newer six geopolitical regions. The same is true for the four powerful states in the Middle East.Thus the author's refreshing approach is the "scientific" treatment of cooperation and competition models of the gross-domestic product of two groups of nations – Nigeria, the USA, the UK, and China, and the USA, Egypt, Jordan and Israel. Attempts are made to provide "scientific" answers to broad national policies. It allows predictions of growth to be made with some degree of accuracy for up to 4 years. MATLAB and Maple programs in accompanied CD are provided. The author's individual nations economic models are cited. The dynamics are ordinary and hereditary games of pursuit also cited from the original earlier writings of the author are models of the economic state of each nation – a vector of six things – the gross domestic product (GDP) (y), interest rate R; employment (or unemployment) (L), value of capital stock (k), prices p(t), and therefore inflation and cumulative balance of payment (E). Each economic state is isolated except the impact of export function on aggregate demand.The main difference between this earlier contributions and this book is the link and its apparent policy implications and consequences.Key features:

Conflict Among Nations

Conflict Among Nations
Author: Thomas R. Howell
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 519
Release: 2019-03-04
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0429710461

This book presents a study of the trade objectives and strategies of Japan, Germany, South Korea, Taiwan, Brazil and the European Community, and of the implications of the policies for both the US and the international trading system of the 1990s.

Global Economic Competition

Global Economic Competition
Author: George Kozmetsky
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 435
Release: 2012-12-06
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1461562716

Global competitiveness has always been a hotly debated issue, promoting differing opinions among economists, management strategists, business leaders, and policy analysts and consultants. Global Economic Competition provides a broad framework to compare the United States economy with 23 other global economies. This is done by presenting empirical evidence in a series of comparative analyses of economic competition using data pertaining to specific countries, industries and companies. In this volume, the electronics industries are used to illustrate an ongoing economic warfare among competing regions, nations, and cluster companies across the electronic technology chain. Employing the latest empirical data to evaluate the competitiveness of the US economy and its electronic industries and companies in the 1980s and early 1990s, Global Economic Competition will be of interest not only to those who study economics, management science and international trade, but also to policy makers and business leaders.

Economic Competition in the 21st Century

Economic Competition in the 21st Century
Author: Howard J. Shatz
Publisher:
Total Pages: 80
Release: 2021-04-30
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9781977405470

Taking a wide-ranging look at economic competition and the use of economics as a geopolitical tool, the author explains how countries compete, why this economic competition is relevant to the U.S. armed forces, and what the policy implications are.

The Microelectronics Race

The Microelectronics Race
Author: Thomas R Howell
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 278
Release: 2019-07-11
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1000231461

This book is dedicated to those individuals in the U.S. Government who have begun to recognize the full implications of the challenge which this country confronts in microelectronics race, and who are beginning to take steps to deal with that challenge.

The Influence of National Competition Policy on the International Competitiveness of Nations

The Influence of National Competition Policy on the International Competitiveness of Nations
Author: Andreas Mitschke
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 285
Release: 2008-05-05
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 3790820369

This fascinating book offers up a window on one of today’s key areas relating to globalization. The matter in question is to what extent national competition policy has to be regarded as a factor of international competitiveness. Should national antitrust policy be given priority over international antitrust rules?

Limits to Competition

Limits to Competition
Author: Group of Lisbon
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 204
Release: 1995
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780262071642

How can Europe, the United States, and Japan stop the technological, trade, and financial war on which they have increasingly and wastefully embarked? How can they direct the development and uses of science and technology and the economy in the interests of the well-being of the 8 billion people who will inhabit the planet in 2010-2020? Limits to Competitionboldly frames international political economy and globalization debates within the new overarching ideology of competition and offers a balancing voice. The word compete originally meant "to seek together," but in our time it has taken on more adversarial connotations and has become a rallying cry of both firms and governments, often with devastating consequences. Limits to Competitionexplores the question of whether free-market competition can indeed deliver the full range of needs for sustainable development. Is competition the best instrument for coping with increasingly severe environmental, demographic, economic, and social problems at a global level?

After the Cold War

After the Cold War
Author: Keith Philip Lepor
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Total Pages: 456
Release: 2010-07-05
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0292788355

The end of the Cold War between the United States and the former Soviet Union reassured people around the world who had lived in fear of a nuclear confrontation between the superpowers. Yet the early euphoria over "peace dividends" and a "new world order" was premature. Conflicts within and between nation-states are springing up around the globe, challenging world leaders and ordinary citizens to find peaceful means for national, group, and individual self-determination. In this book of specially commissioned essays, twenty world leaders assess the possibilities and perils of the new strategic, political, and economic interrelationships that are emerging around the world. They tackle such fundamental questions as: What is the future of the international system as we approach the twenty-first century? What will be the fate of disintegrating nation-states, and how will the international community respond? Has the nation-state outlived its usefulness? Are we beginning to witness the complete breakdown of the international system? The contributors are: Ali Alatas (Indonesia) Tariq Aziz (Iraq) James A. Baker III (United States) Benazir Bhutto (Pakistan) Boutros Boutros-Ghali (United Nations) Fernando Henrique Cardoso (Brazil) Osama El-Baz (Egypt) Eduardo Frei (Chile) Alberto Fujimori (Peru) Rachid Ghannouchi (eminent Islamic thinker) Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (Russian Federation) Kamal Kharrazi (Iran) Andrei Kozyrev (Russian Federation) Leonid Kuchma (Ukraine) Nelson Mandela (South Africa) Nursultan Nazarbayev (Kazakhstan) Olusegun Obasanjo (Nigeria) Muammar El-Qadhafi (Libya) Fidel Ramos (Philippines) Shri P. V. Narasimha Rao (India)