2001. vol. 5. No. 4

This paper examines the relationship between the abundance of natural resources and economic growth in different regions of the world. Here are some new results.  The paper shows that the main reasons that production based on natural resources can constrain economic growth are associated with the "Dutch syndrome", insufficient care about education, the desire to extract economic rent and unsuccessful economic policies. It is noted that in a large number of countries between 1965 and 1998, the share of the primary sector in employment is inversely proportional to the levels of exports, domestic and foreign investment and education, and is directly related to external debt, import protection, corruption and income inequality. In addition, cross-sectional data show that the primary sector's share of employment is inversely proportional to per capita economic growth in different countries. However, this is not objectively predetermined. For economic growth, it does not seem to be the abundance of natural resources per se that is important, but the quality of their management and economic governance and institutions as a whole.

This work is devoted to the study of stationary States and transitional dynamics of inflation and public debt. Analysis of unilateral or coordinated actions of fiscal and monetary policies is carried out under implicit restrictions that prevent the possibility of a crisis in the financial market. In terms of unstable dynamics of the money and debt market, the principle of "unpleasant monetary arithmetic" by Sargent-Wallace can be supplemented by the principle of "unpleasant fiscal arithmetic".

This paper describes the principles, mechanisms and tools of regional alignment in Germany. Given the latest evidence, this is perhaps the most complete description in Russian.

The article discusses the possible consequences of Russia's accession to the world trade organization for the financial services sector. Based on the study of the characteristics of this sector and the economic nature of non-tariff barriers existing in it, the degree of change in the price of financial services for end users after the elimination of non-tariff restrictions and the transition of the Russian financial sector to a new equilibrium state is determined. It follows from the results of calculations that in case of complete elimination of non-tariff barriers for financial institutions with foreign capital in Russia, the price of banking services for consumers may decrease by 15-18%, and taking into account the elimination of X-inefficiency of Russian banks - by 21-28%.

The paper analyzes the problems of measuring the dynamics of industrial production in the Russian transition economy. The specificity of the Russian transitional economy as an object of measurement is analyzed. The specificity of the Russian transitional economy as an object of measurement is analyzed. It is shown that this specificity leads to the complexity of the measurement of the dynamics of production and reduce its accuracy. The problems of analysis of the dynamics of production and their requirements for measurement methods are considered. The critical analysis of problems of the Russian official practice of construction of indexes of industrial production is carried out It is shown that the main problems of measurement are manifested in the conduct of short-term comparisons, which systematically complicates the identification of short-term trends in the dynamics of production.The directions of improvement of the official practice of index construction are discussed.