Browse by: "2004"
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In dealing with extreme economic exposures we normally distinguish between natural catastrophes and man-made disasters. Natural catastrophes refer to abrupt events caused by natural hazards, such as windstorm, flood, drought, earthquake, landslides, avalanches, wildfires, etc., that inflict significant economic and human devastation throughout a geographical region. Man-made disasters, in turn, can be categorised as unintended events, caused by accidents, failures, crashes, explosions, fire, etc., and willful events, often referred to as civil unrest and terrorist acts. Until recently, willful events and specifically terrorist acts constituted a relatively modest share of the total catastrophe losses but suddenly turned into a sizeable loss potential with the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in 2001, ...
Governments often look to private health insurance (PHI) as a possible means of addressing some health system challenges. For example, they may consider enhancing its role as an alternative source of health financing and a way to increase system capacity, or promoting it as a tool to further additional health policy goals, such as enhanced individual responsibility. Yet private health insurance is a complex financing mechanism that affects and interacts with public systems in multiple ways. This is why, when assessing the current and potential role for private health insurance, policy makers need to consider the intricate interactions arising between public and private coverage, and the effects that PHI has upon ...
There is an increasing overlap with, and stronger inter-linkages among, banks, capital markets, insurance companies, and other financial institutions such as hedge funds, resulting in a steady blurring of sectoral and product boundaries. Looking ahead, the pace of overall financial sector convergence is unlikely to slowdown so that the future financial landscape will be characterised by ever stronger interdependences and inter-linkages among financial institutions. Increased interdependence and inter-linkages have led to growing convergence among institutions and products in the OECD area. These developments have led to important new challenges for market participants, ...
Financial markets have shown resilience in an environment of marked increases in oil and commodity prices and somewhat diminished expectations about the strength of the economic recovery. Major stock markets, which had risen over most of the first quarter, showed some weakening at the end of March, and again in late May and in mid-August, losing part of the gains they had made since the end of the downturn in the first half of 2003. Since then, however, equity markets have risen moderately or at least held steady and bond markets have absorbed, better than had been feared ...
This paper examines the state of the Russian banking sector in 2004 and assesses the most important reform initiatives of the last two years, including deposit insurance legislation, a major reform of the framework for prudential supervision, steps to increase transparency in the sector, and measures to facilitate the development of specific banking activities. The overall conclusion that emerges from this analysis is that the Russian authorities’ approach to banking reform is to be commended. The design of the reform strategy reflects an awareness of the need for a ‘good fit’ between its major elements, and the main lines of the reform address some of the principal problems of the sector. The major lacuna in the Russian bank reform strategy concerns the future of state-owned banks. Despite a long-standing official commitment to reducing the role of the state – and of the Bank of Russia in particular – in the ownership of credit institutions, there is still a need for a much more ...
This paper investigates the determinants of money demand (M3) in the euro area. It specifically examines the potential impact of financial and housing wealth on money demand. It tests the hypothesis, whether wealth associated with increases in asset prices is used to finance liquidity holdings in a standard portfolio context. Regressing velocity on interest rates and a wealth variable (a composite of residential property and stocks) within an error-correction framework provides evidence of positive wealth effects from financial and housing assets on money demand in the long run, but no significant impact in the short run. Tests suggests that the long-run and dynamic money demand equations are stable and have not been disrupted by the adoption of the euro on 1 January 1999, while the impact of wealth on money demand may have increased ...
The present paper was prepared in the context of a joint project between the OECD Investment Committee (IC) and Development Assistance Committee (DAC) on Official Development Assistance and Investment for Development. It responds to discussions at the IC-DAC Workshop on Synergies between ODA and Foreign Direct Investment on 11 March 2004, during which participants opined that development agencies lack information about the quality of the investment climate in developing countries and the likely repercussions for direct investment.
The purpose of the present paper is threefold. First, it provides an overview of a variety of scoreboards for the investment climate that have been established by a number of actors, including the World Bank, UNCTAD and several private “think tanks”. Second, it documents their similarities and discrepancies in assessing the investment climates of developing, emerging and transition economies (henceforth jointly referred to as “developing countries”) ...
Since the early 1990s, when France's general government deficit reached a disturbing 6 per cent of GDP, the country's public finances have progressed substantially, even though significantly further improvement is required. This paper examines the tools available to policy-makers to meet this challenge. The clearest message is that, given the relatively small size of the State Budget in total spending, the challenge cannot be met by the State sector alone. Social security, as the principal source of spending pressure, must play a role, but so too must sub-national government -- especially if current plans to transfer additional responsibilities to the local level go through. If policy-makers are to succeed in directing public expenditure so as to create this room, they will have to clarify governance structures so that those who administer programmes face appropriate incentives to control costs and maximise programme efficiency ...
Depuis le début des années 90, lorsque le déficit des administrations publiques de la France avait atteint le niveau inquiétant de 6 pour cent du PIB, les finances publiques du pays se sont nettement redressées, même si de nouvelles améliorations substantielles sont nécessaires. Ce document examine les outils dont disposent les décideurs publics pour relever ce défi. Il en ressort clairement que, étant donné la part relativement réduite du budget de l’État dans les dépenses totales, le secteur de l’État ne peut à lui seul résoudre le problème. Le système de sécurité sociale, principale source de la poussée des dépenses, a un rôle à jouer, mais il en va de même des administrations infranationales – surtout si le transfert prévu de nouvelles compétences à l’échelon local se réalise. Pour pouvoir orienter la dépense publique de manière à créer des marges de manœuvre, les décideurs publics devront clarifier les structures de gouvernance de façon que les responsables de l’administration ...
- This report presents the consensus recommendations of an international expert panel on indicators for mental health care. Using a structured review process, the panel selected a set of 12 indicators to cover the four key areas treatment, continuity of care, coordination of care, and patient outcomes. The report describes the review process and provides a detailed discussion of the scientific soundness and policy importance of the 12 indicators as follows ...
- This report presents the consensus recommendations of an international expert panel on indicators for cardiac care. Using a structured review process, the panel set out to select indicators to cover five key areas: primary prevention, secondary prevention of heart disease, acute coronary syndromes, cardiac interventions and congestive heart failure. In the event, no suitable indicators for primary prevention were retained, and this report proposes 17 indicators as follows:
- The report describes the review process and provides a detailed discussion of the scientific soundness and policy importance of the 17 indicators ...
This report presents the recommendations of an international expert group on indicators for diabetes care. Based on a review of existing indicators and an assessment of gaps left open by existing indicators, the experts set out to select indicators to cover clinical processes of diabetes care as well as proximal and distal outcomes of care. The review led to a recommendation of nine indicators: annual HbA1c testing, annual LDL cholesterol testing, annual screening for nephropathy, annual eye exam, HbA1c control, LDL cholesterol control, lower extremity amputation rates, kidney disease in persons with diabetes, and cardiovascular mortality in patients with diabetes.
- This report presents the consensus recommendations of an international expert panel on indicators for health promotion and primary care. Using a structured review process, the panel selected a set of 27 indicators to cover the three key areas health promotion, preventive care and diagnosis and treatment in primary care. The report describes the review process and provides a detailed discussion of the scientific soundness and policy importance of the 27 indicators as follows ...
Key indicators show Germany belonging to the countries in the OECD with strong innovation activity even though some weakening in Germany’s position relative to other OECD countries has occurred recently. While the redirection of resources towards unification-related spending as well as low economic growth have contributed to this development, more fundamental structural issues have also played a role. Germany has benefited less than other high-performing countries from the surge in new technologies, such as ICT and biotechnology, as innovation activities continue to focus on sectors, such as machinery and automobiles, in which Germany has a long record of strong export performance. Some features of the regulation of capital, product and labour markets are hampering the supply of risk capital, the creation of new firms and the reallocation of labour. In addition, firms are finding it increasingly difficult to recruit highly qualified labour. Measures to improve the framework ...
This article investigates issues related to industrial restructuring in Russia. Based on extensive sectoral data it examines, more particularly, levels and changes in labour productivity, unit labour costs and revealed comparative advantages for a large number of Russian industrial sectors. The main findings are the following. First, impressive increases in labour productivity have been achieved since 1997, especially during the post-crisis period. Secondly, this has been true for all major sectors, with the exception of those which are still predominantly state controlled or which suffer from strong state interference. Thirdly, there have been significant relative adjustments within the industrial sector, as labour productivity increased more in less productive sectors. Since the crisis, relative unit labour costs have also adjusted considerably, as less competitive sectors experienced relatively slower wage growth and larger labour force reductions. Fourthly, international ...
Effective competition law and policy are critical to achieving greater levels of economic efficiency, growth, employment and living standards. Pro-competitive reform and sound competition law enforcement have delivered dramatic price reductions, a proliferation of new products, superior quality and service and enhanced innovation wherever they have been embraced. Perhaps more importantly, they have strong links with key pillars of economic growth and development such as investment, governance, the cultivation of an entrepreneurial class, privatisation and trade. Achieving a better appreciation and understanding of these benefits and links is essential to making continued progress in removing ...