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PEB co-hosted a symposium entitled “Invention, Maintenance, and Renewal of Urban Educational Facilities: Global Challenges and Community Solutions” with the American Institute of Architects’ Committee on Architecture for Education and the CEFPI Urban Education Facilities NE Chapter in October 1999. The meeting aimed to provide arguments and evidence for system managers seeking to secure resources for maintenance as well as to sharpen their abilities to use those resources well. Below are excerpts from the symposium papers, including keynote presentations and workshop reports.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a critical review of the current debate and recent literature on several aspects of international core labor standards. We attempt to address two basic issues. One strand of the literature examines the role that international trade plays in mediating international differences in wages, levels of development, labor law and cultural practices. In this context, we examine the theory and evidence concerning the impact of differing labor standards for international trade and whether such trade has implications for the income distribution in OECD countries. We also consider the impact of heterogeneous cross-country labor standards and practices for legal institutions relating to labor standards and industrial relations. In particular, we are interested in whether cross-country differences in labor standards must inevitably give rise to a race to the bottom in labor protections and what any consequent decline in standards might imply for broader ...

This paper investigates the impact of direct investment by foreign-owned companies on technical progress and hence labour productivity in the UK manufacturing sector. Using an industry-level panel data set we find that foreign-owned firms have a significant positive effect on the level of technical efficiency in domestic firms. There is evidence of significant intra-industry and inter-industry spillovers from inward investment. These findings remain robust even when other factors such as imports and domestic R&D expenditures are allowed for. Inward investment appears to be a much more important source of technical progress than foreign trade ...

The new global information infrastructure will prove effective only if it can guarantee high-speed transmission throughout the network of all kinds of data -- text, images, sound or video -- in a secure manner while preserving its integrity.

Central and eastern European countries have been and still are adapting their legal framework to the requirements of a Western market economy and the body of EU legislation, the acquis communautaire. As the harmonisation of the national legal framework to EU standards is one of the yardsticks for EU accession, most candidate countries have drafted and adopted new legislation under enormous time pressure. Sub-optimal solutions, unforeseen implementation costs and unintended side effects were unavoidable. In many cases new legislation has proved impossible to implement. This experience has led candidate countries and other transition countries to develop an interest in impact assessment. EU Member States introduced impact assessment for legal programmes about two decades ago, based on the experience that new legislation may have a considerable and sometimes unexpected, impact not only on the budget, but also on various parts of the economy and society as a whole. Today, there is an acceptance among EU Member States that some kind of impact assessment exercise should be conducted before legislative changes are introduced. Although the comprehensiveness of a particular impact assessment exercise depends on a variety of factors, e.g. the importance of the policy issue or the commitment of the respective government, the basic aim is to enhance the quality of government decision-making. Establishing or improving the administrative capacity to carry out impact assessments is crucial for both in order to provide the government with the necessary information to take informed decisions on policy options and to improve the quality of new legislation. Even applying only the basic principles of impact assessment can often avoid the necessity for immediate amendments or redrafting. This publication deals with impact assessment in a wide sense, including policy analysis (impact assessment for choosing the instrument), assessment of a policy instrument during the drafting stage and evaluation of existing laws or programmes. Special emphasis is given to impact assessment during drafting.

Significant changes in the structure of the telecommunication market have occurred since the introduction of competition in the sector. Now, companies are competing in all market segments and more importantly, competition is developing between companies, which use different network platforms such as fixed telecommunications networks, cable television networks and mobile networks. In terms of regulatory models, the development of inter-modal competition in the telecommunications sector requires the regulator to move forward to technology neutral regulation that is essential to maximise the welfare of consumers through innovative competition between different technology platforms.

Consumer laws, policies and practices exist to help build consumers’ trust and confidence by protecting them from unfair or deceptive acts or practices and helping to establish a more balanced relationship between sellers and consumers in commercial transactions. Domestic retail markets offer consumers assurances that their interactions and purchases are covered by national legal and private sector consumer protections. The increase in cross-border transactions and the limited or non-existent face-to-face contact between businesses and consumers brought on by the growth of electronic commerce reinforce the need for a predictable and trustworthy global marketplace.

Following the end of apartheid and the holding of multi-party elections in 1994, South Africa embarked on new economic and trade reforms and is now rapidly re-integrating its economy into the multilateral trading system. South Africa is by far the largest trading partner in both the Southern Africa Customs Union (SACU) and the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC). Under the SACU, members apply to imports customs, excise, sales, anti-dumping, countervailing and safeguard duties, and other related laws set by. The agreement provides for duty-free circulation of goods within the five-country customs union and grants transit rights across South African territory. SADC, on the other hand, sets out a timetable for the creation of a free-trade area encompassing the free movement of capital, goods, services and labour. SADC, an agreement which is to have its own dispute settlement mechanism, is also a forum for political co-operation. The structure of the SACU’s common external ...

This paper analyses the possibilities for reforming the Icelandic tax system. It puts the current tax structure in its historic context, showing that there has been a steady movement towards simplification. The personal income tax has a lower than average number of bands and, taxes capital income at an unusually low rate. Such a structure favours saving, especially since consumption taxes are particularly high. Nonetheless, there are a number of additional taxes on capital income that serve to raise the overall tax on assets, notably the tax on net wealth. The paper concludes that, if the current budget surplus persists over the medium-term, priority should be given to further reducing corporate taxes and the net wealth tax. At the same time, a number of discriminatory indirect taxes should be replaced by a uniform tax, and the diesel tax reformed. Consideration should also be given to the gradual introduction of a resource tax or to auctioning fishing quotas to help fund the other ...

Investment in information technologies has by no means been confined to the United States and yet, average European or Japanese growth experience has been quite different. The paper compares the impact of ICT capital accumulation on output growth in Australia, Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States. The analysis uses a newly compiled database of investment in ICT equipment and software based on the System of National Accounts 1993 (SNA93). Over the past two decades, ICT contributed between 0.2 and 0.5 percentage points per year to economic growth, depending on the country. During the second half of the 1990s, this contribution rose to 0.3 to 0.9 percentage points per year. The paper shows that, despite differences between countries, the United States has not been alone in benefiting from the positive effects of ICT capital investment on economic growth nor was the United States the sole country to experience an acceleration of these ...

There are only a few OECD Member countries with a lower tax take than the United States. Nonetheless there are a number of improvements that could help reduce the distortions that taxation creates in the economy and so boost long-run economic performance. The most noticeable gains could come from reforming the taxation of the income from capital. Savings are not always allocated to the area where they have the highest return, as there are large variations in the tax on capital income depending on the sector in which it is invested and the financing instruments that are used. In addition, taxation of capital income favours present over future consumption with a negative impact on savings and capital accumulation. In the past, a number of proposals have been made to reduce the tax burden on saving, by replacing the income tax with a consumption tax. While in many ways this would be the best approach, it is would represent a major change in a system that has evolved gradually ...

This paper investigates the evolution of the industrial structure in the Canadian manufacturing sector and its relationship to technological change by examining the take-up of advanced technologies and how it is related to the stochastic growth process in the plant population. Its framework is grounded in the view that growth is a stochastic process that involves learning. Experimentation with new technologies rewards some firms with superior growth and profitability. Examining how growth is associated with the choice of different technology strategies indicates which of these is being rewarded.

The evolution of this process is studied by examining the relationship between the uptake of advanced technologies and the performance of plants in the manufacturing sector. This is done by using crosssectional data on advanced technology use and by combining it with longitudinal panel data on plant performance. In particular, the paper examines the relationship between the use of information ...

There is growing interest in improving the performance of health systems in OECD countries. Many countries are developing initiatives to measure performance to guide and inform the improvement process. Indeed, measurement and improvement are increasingly linked, as is indicated by familiar phrases such as ‘evidence-based medicine’ and ‘evidence-based policy’.

This paper summarises the findings of an investigation of recent initiatives to better measure and improve health performance in four OECD countries: France, the Netherlands, New Zealand and Sweden. It highlights a number of case studies in these countries, which have been chosen to illustrate initiatives to improve performance, which paid greater or lesser attention to measurement issues. An attempt has also been made to describe the role of institutional arrangements as well as various policy and management “levers” which are used to bring about change. The case studies and discussion presented in this paper draw upon a more ...

The avoidance of monopoly rents and the need to ensure the continuity and quality of supply have, historically, been among the key drivers for the creation of new trade routes. In the field of telecommunications, for much of the past century, there has been little scope for achieving either of these goals. The avoidance of monopoly rents was unrealisable because most countries had legally mandated monopolies over the provision of telecommunication infrastructure. Even in those exceptional cases, where a country had opened its market to competition, monopolies continued to reign in corresponding countries. At the same time, monopolies made it difficult for one entity to guarantee service levels provided to its customers. This was because a single entity could not construct and manage their own end-to-end infrastructure across national borders.

In several OECD countries, investment rates in the business sector grew strongly in the second half of the 1990s. In some cases, the strength of private investment relative to output growth had raised concerns about the risk of capital overhang and the prospect of a prolonged period of slow capital formation in order to bring investment levels back to more sustainable levels. It is possible that the stock market boom has contributed to a rise of investment demand to an excessive level, not only in the United States, but also in the United Kingdom, Canada, Scandinavia and Greece. The purpose of this paper is to assess the contribution of fundamental determinants to the change in investment in the second half of the 1990s, based on the estimation of panel cointegration equations for gross business investment for 18 OECD countries from 1970 to 1999. In addition to the levels of real GDP and a measure of the cost of capital, the set of explanatory variables includes four alternative ...

This paper reviews the public expenditure system in the Czech Republic and the scope for its reform. In recent years much progress has been made in improving the transparency and management of government finances. Nevertheless, the budget and policy planning process retains a single-year and inputoriented focus. Moreover, with the recent introduction of a regional level of government and the expansion and proposed introduction of new extra-budgetary funds, the government’s capacity to manage the macroeconomy has been weakened. In this regard, establishing a multi-year budgetary process should be made a government-wide priority. Such a system would allow extra-budgetary funds to be re-integrated into the State Budget. Moreover, it would reduce the potential for expenditure creep and facilitate macroeconomic policy making, as would the establishment of mechanisms for co-ordinating sub-national spending programmes. Such a medium-term budgetary framework should evolve, over time, into a ...

This paper examines various efficiency and equity aspects related to the skill acquisition of young people and older adults. The analysis suggests that such human capital investment is associated with significant labour-market gains for individuals, including higher post-tax earnings and better employment prospects, which exceed the investment costs, mainly foregone earnings and tuition fees, by a significant margin. It also shows that the net benefits are strongly influenced by policy-related factors, such as study length, tuition subsidies and student support. Overall, the estimates reported in the paper indicate that there are strong incentives for the average student to continue studying beyond the compulsory schooling age, and also point to the benefits of such investment in education for society as a whole. However, the net gains fall with age, mainly reflecting a shorter period to take advantage of the benefits that come with education. Finally the paper notes that students ...

Given their role in the current transformation of advanced economies, information and communication technologies (ICTs) offer the promise of new business and employment opportunities along with higher productivity gains, but also make new demands on skills. OECD countries are thus confronted with the dual challenge of ensuring that the growth of new industries and activities is not stifled by labour bottlenecks and skill mismatches and that their population is equipped to master the basic IT skills which these transformations require. Despite recent claims of a widespread IT worker shortage, this study argues that although there is indeed some evidence of tightness in labour markets for particular categories of IT workers, the main issue of concern for policy makers and firms should be the gap between the skills of current and future IT workers and those sought by firms.

Both short- and long-term strategies can be implemented to address the rapidly changing skill requirements for ICT ...