Der Artikel untersucht die sektoralen und gesamtwirtschaftlichen Effekte veränderter Erwerbsarbeitszeiten in Österreich. Ausgangspunkt der Analyse ist ein (hypothetisches) Szenario, in dem mittels kollektivvertraglicher und betrieblicher Regelungen die Arbeitszeit der unselbstständig Beschäftigten so verändert wird, dass sie den individuellen Wünschen entspricht. Die Veränderung der Arbeitszeit wird dabei aus Mikrodaten (Mikrozensus-Arbeitskräfteerhebung) unter der Annahme berechnet, dass alle Beschäftigten ihre Arbeitszeit auf das präferierte Maß reduzieren oder ausweiten. Daraus wird die durchschnittliche Veränderung der Arbeitszeit je Sektor berechnet und als Ausgangspunkt für die Abschätzung der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Effekte verwendet. Insgesamt beträgt die gewünschte Veränderung der wöchentlichen Normalarbeitszeit laut Mikrozensus-Arbeitskräfteerhebung 2019 –1,2 Stunden (–3,3 %). Gesamtwirtschaftlich ergeben sich durch die Arbeitszeitveränderung – je nach Szenario – Effekte auf die Beschäftigung von 1 % bis 2 %. Das BIP sinkt in allen Szenarien um weniger als 1 %.

This paper builds Distributional National Accounts (DINA) using household survey data. We develop a transparent and reproducible methodology that uses only publicly available sources, provides highly comparable results well suited for policy analyses, and can be applied when administrative tax data are not available for research. We apply this methodology to build synthetic micro-datafiles for European countries that cover the entire distribution, include all income components separately, are consistent with national accounts, and preserve the detailed socioeconomic information available in the surveys. We discuss the methodological steps and their impact on the income distribution. In particular, we highlight the effects of imputations and the adjustment of variables to national accounts' totals. Furthermore, we compare the different income concepts of the DINA and the EG-DNA approach in a consistent way. Overall, aligning household incomes with national accounts' totals and imputing incomes from other sectors increases inequality in most countries, which underlines the importance of reconciling income distributions with macroeconomic aggregates.

We study endogenous employment and distribution dynamics in a Post-Keynesian model of Kalecki-Steindl tradition. Productivity adjustments stabilize employment and the labour share in the long run: technological change allows firms to replenish the reserve army of workers in struggle over income shares and thereby keep wage demands in check. We discuss stability conditions and the equilibrium dynamics. This allows us to study how legal working time and its reduction affect the equilibrium. We find that a demand shock is likely to lower the profit share and increase the employment rate. A supply shock in contrast tends to have detrimental effects on employment and income distribution. Labour market institutions and a working time reduction have no long-term effect on growth, distribution and inflation in the model. The effects on the level of capital stock and output however are positive in a wage-led demand regime. Furthermore, an erosion of labour market institutions dampens inflation temporarily. The model provides possible explanations as to the causes of several current economic phenomena such as secular stagnation, digitalisation, and the break-down of the Philips curve.

This article investigates the role oflabor in post-Keynesian economics and proposes an integration with ecological macroeconomics. Although post-Keynesians have to date not engaged extensively with environ-mental limits, there is an increasing interest in modeling policy proposals by ecological economists. While ecological and post-Keynesian economists share many ways of conceptualizing labor that are distinct from the mainstream, it is unclear how these feed into modeling, since post-Keynesians model labor as a resi-dual and not as a policy variable per se. In fact, post-Keynesians have traditionally focused on targeting employment via targeting aggregate goods demand, rather than targeting it directly. This paper argues that by complementing this demand-side view with post-Keynesian perspectives on labor supply, one can arrive at a post-Keynesian labor theory that offers entry points for ecological theorizing.

Die heimische Wirtschaftsleistung schrumpfte im IV. Quartal 2020 und erholte sich auch in den ersten Wochen 2021 kaum. Privater Konsum und Exporte sind weiterhin deutlich schwacher als vor dem Ausbruch der COVID-19-Pandemie. Im Dienstleistungsbereich und in der Konsumgutererzeugung bleibt die Stimmung zu Jahresbeginn skeptisch, wogegen der Investitionsguterbereich vom Aufschwung der Weltwirtschaft profitiert. Die Inflation sank zuletzt und die Arbeitslosigkeit ist weiterhin hoch.

The paper investigates how including the distribution of wealth changes the demand effects of redistributing functional income. It develops a model with an endogenous wealth distribution and shows that the endogenous rise in wealth inequality resulting from a redistribution towards profits weakens the growth effects of this redistribution. Consequently, a wage-led regime becomes more strongly wage-led. A profit-led regime on the other hand becomes less profit-led and there may even be a regime switch - in this case the short-run profit-led economy becomes wage-led in the long run due to the endogenous effects of wealth inequality. The paper thereby provides a possible explanation for the instability of demand regimes over time.

If Piketty's main theoretical prediction (r > g leads to rising wealth inequality) is taken to its radical conclusion, then a small elite will own all wealth if capitalism is left to its own devices. We formulate and calibrate a Post-Keynesian model with an endogenous distribution of wealth between workers and capitalists which permits such a corner solution of all wealth held by capitalists. However, it also shows interior solutions with a stable, non-zero wealth share of workers, a stable wealth-to-income ratio, and a stable and positive gap between the profit and the growth rate determined by the Cambridge equation. More importantly, simulations show that the model conforms to Piketty's empirical findings during a transitional phase of increasing wealth inequality, which characterizes the current state of high-income countries: the wealth share of capitalists rises to over 60 per cent, the wealth-to-income ratio increases, and income inequality rises. Finally, we show that the introduction of a wealth tax as suggested by Piketty could neutralize this rise in wealth concentration predicted by our model.

This paper estimates rates of return across the gross wealth distribution in eight European countries. Like differential saving rates, differential rates of return matter for post Keynesian theory, because they impact the income and wealth distribution and add an explosive element to growth models. We show that differential rates of return matter empirically by merging data on household balance sheets with long-run returns for individual asset categories. We find that (a) the composition of wealth differentiates three socioeconomic groups: 30% are asset-poor, 65% are middle-class home owners, and the top 5% are business-owning capitalists; (b) rates of return rise across all groups; and (c) rates of return broadly follow a log-shaped function across the distribution, where inequality in the lower half of the distribution is higher than in the upper half. If socioeconomic groups are collapsed into the bottom 95% workers and top 5% capitalists, then rates of return are 5.6% for the former and 7.2% for the latter.

We develop and calibrate an analytical growth model in the neo-Kaleckian tradition with an endogenous wealth distribution and differential returns to wealth between workers and capitalists. We show that a long-run equilibrium allows for non-zero wealth owned by workers, even as the model contains the “triumph of the rentier” predicted by Piketty’s r > g as a special case. The model’s calibration to ten European countries shows that the distribution of wealth is likely to become more unequal in all cases, barring political countermeasures.

Macroeconomic imbalances in the EMU are at the heart of the current crisis. One explanation for the high current account deficits in the Southern European countries is that they lack a large, competitive and export-oriented industrial sector. The paper tests the hypothesis that parts of the structural change which happened in the EU before 2008 were supported by the divergent unit labour cost developments in the EMU. We look into patterns of structural change and sectoral competitiveness in all EU member countries and assess their linkages by means of a descriptive analysis as well as through econometric estimations. Our results broadly support the hypothesis. Industrial policy, which aims at fostering new competitive export-oriented industries in Southern Europe in order to reduce macroeconomic imbalances in the EMU, should thus be combined with adjustments in relative labour costs. (C) 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Um die Auswirkungen der flachendeckenden Einfuhrung eines Mindestlohnes in Osterreich von 1.500 € oder 1.700 € zu schatzen, werden zunachst mit dem WIFO-Mikrosimulationsmodell die Effekte auf die Personen- und Haushaltseinkommen und deren Verteilung untersucht. Im zweiten Schritt werden die Ergebnisse der Mikrosimulation ins WIFO-Macromod ubernommen und die gesamtwirtschaftlichen Effekte berechnet. Wie die Ergebnisse zeigen, wurde die Einfuhrung eines Mindestlohnes einen breiten Personenkreis insbesondere am unteren Rand der Einkommensverteilung betreffen und das Einkommen dieser Gruppe deutlich erhohen. Die Armutsgefahrdung wurde dadurch merklich sinken. Auf Produktion und Beschaftigung der Gesamtwirtschaft hat die Einfuhrung eines Mindestlohnes hingegen kaum Auswirkungen.

Der Artikel untersucht die Auswirkungen der flachendeckenden Einfuhrung eines Mindestlohnes in Osterreich von 1.500 € oder 1.700 €. Im ersten Schritt werden mit dem WIFO-Mikrosimulationsmodell die betroffenen Personen sowie die Effekte auf Personenund Haushaltseinkommen und deren Verteilung untersucht. Im zweiten Schritt werden die Ergebnisse der Mikrosimulation ins WIFO-Macromod ubernommen und die gesamtwirtschaftlichen Effekte berechnet. Wie die Ergebnisse zeigen, wurde die Einfuhrung eines Mindestlohnes einen breiten Personenkreis insbesondere am unteren Rand der Einkommensverteilung betreffen und die Einkommen dieser Gruppe deutlich erhohen. Frauen, Niedriglohnbeschaftigte, Teilzeitbeschaftigte und Beschaftigte mit befristeten Dienstverhaltnissen profitieren dabei besonders. Die Armutsgefahrdung der Erwerbstatigen wurde dadurch merklich sinken. Auf die gesamtwirtschaftliche Produktion und die Beschaftigung hat die Einfuhrung eines Mindestlohnes hingegen kaum Auswirkungen.

Die vorliegende Studie untersucht Verdoorn-Effekte in Osterreich und der EU empirisch mittels okonometrischer Methoden. Dabei ergeben sich sowohl fur die Sachgutererzeugung als auch fur die Gesamtwirtschaft signifikante Effekte. Demnach zieht ein Anstieg der Produktion um 1% eine Steigerung der Arbeitsproduktivitat um bis zu ½% nach sich. Mit Hilfe von Impuls-Antwort-Funktionen werden zusatzlich endogene Verstarkungsmechanismen uber eine starkere Kapitalakkumulation und den dadurch induzierten technischen Fortschritt abgebildet. Eine Phase schwachen Wirtschaftswachstums hat demnach einen direkten negativen Einfluss auf das Produktivitatswachstum und daher den langfristigen Wohlstand und die Wettbewerbsfahigkeit. Angebotsseitige Politikmasnahmen zur Steigerung der Produktivitat sollten daher durch Masnahmen zur Starkung der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Nachfrage erganzt werden.

Commodity prices have crucial implications for developing countries. The question whether the financialization of commodity derivative markets has contributed to high and volatile commodity prices has been controversially debated. Building on limitations in the empirical literature, we estimate a multivariate Vector Autoregressive (VAR) model to assess the effect of different groups of financial investors (index investors and money managers) as well as fundamental and macroeconomic variables on the prices of coffee, cotton, wheat and oil. We find that, in contrast to index investors, money managers' net long positions have a large statistically significant effect on commodity prices. This calls for policy interventions as commodity derivative markets may cease to perform their fundamental developmental roles.

The paper summarises the channels and mechanisms which lead to the emergence of macroeconomic imbalances in the EMU before, in and after the crisis of 2008-09. It focuses on the role of the specific institutional setting of the EMU in these developments and outlines the key reforms which are necessary to eliminate the imbalances and prevent them from re-emerging.

The paper summarises the channels and mechanisms which lead to the emergence of macroeconomic imbalances in the EMU before, in and after the crisis of 2008/09. It focuses on the role of the specific institutional setting of the EMU in these developments and outlines the key reforms which are necessary to eliminate the imbalances and prevent them from re-emerging.