This study examines the effect of exchange rate changes on consumer prices in Nigeria by examining the magnitude and speed of exchange rate pass-through (ERPT) to consumer prices in Nigeria using quarterly time series data from 1986 to 2013. The study also examines the potential nonlinearities and asymmetries in the ERPT in Nigeria during the same period. The study used vector error correction model (VECM) and smooth transition autoregresive (STAR) model. The methodology employed, are free from some weaknesses of the previous empirical studies and contributed to the analysis of ERPT from a macroeconomic perspective. This study focuses on the macroeconomic perspective of the effect of ERPT which is more relevant for monetary policy. To design and implement an efficient monetary policy, theoritical and empirical knowledge of the ERPT to domestic consumer price is necessary. Similarly, the understanding of the level of ERPT to domestic consumer prices would offer more understanding of the international transmission of shocks and the efficiency of exchange rate policy measures on external adjustment. The study results show full and statistically significant ERPT in the long-run in Nigeria during the sample period. However, using linear model (VECM) the short-run estimate shows no significant ERPT in Nigeria. Whereas, the nonlinear STAR model shows significant ERPT even in the short-run in Nigeria. The results of the nonlinear model (STAR) show evidence of nonlinearities and asymmetries in the ERPT in Nigeria. The nonlinearities and asymmetries tend to be prevalent during periods of higher inflation and greater exchange movements when the changes in prices and exchange rates exceed certain thresholds. This study, therefore, confirms Taylor’s (2000) hypothesis that pass-through declines in low and stable inflation environment which create nonlinear ERPT. The result shows asymmetric ERPT to the direction of exchange rate change (appreciation or depreciation). The result also shows clear evidence of nonlinearity with respect to the size of the exchange rate change. This result is in line with the menu cost hypothesis where the importing firms do not transfer the exchange rate changes due to the cost of changing their menu. Therefore, the effect of the exchange rate changes on consumer price is minimal when the exchange rate changes are below the threshold level. The study also examined the output growth as a source of nonlinearities. However, the result does not show evidence of nonlinear ERPT due to the output level. The comparison of statistical test results of linear autoregressive (AR) and the nonlinear (STAR) model indicates that the nonlinear STAR model fits the data better than the linear AR model in all cases. The results of this study, therefore, show a significant impact of exchange rate changes on the domestic consumer price in both short run and long run. The asymmetric and nonlinear ERPT induced by the pricing behaviors of the importing firms also significantly influences the speed and magnitude of the ERPT to consumer prices in Nigeria.

Since energy price changes have been studies by much literature, this thesis tries to discuss it through the elasticity of substitution. More importantly, this thesis finds that the substitution effect itself cannot completely interpret the phenomenon of energy price changes. This is based on the results of the estimation of the AES, the MES and the CES, as well as some previous studies' results of negative substitution elasticities. This thesis adopts VECM, ADL and panel data as methodologies. Different data is also colelcted and analyzed. Most of the AES estimates are negative and the CES estimation shows many negative elasticities as well. The estimated elasticities from the MES and the Panel dta CES are positive. Out positive elasticities from the MES may are consistent with the previous literature that finds the MES estimation method is better than AES. The negative elasticities of susbtitution as the substitution effects are usually followed by income effects. Based on literature view, if income effects are involved in the energy price changes between energy exporting and importing countries, it may lead to new policy making and application. In addition, there are some other findings: (1) an application approach is used to test the cointegration when variables include I(0), I(1) and share variables. This approach is different from Pesaran, Shin and Smith's (2001) ARDL method which is involved I(0) and I(1) variables. However, in the application, the data being used covers share variables. Share variables sum to unity so they have collinearity. New procedures (ADL) are adopted to solve the problem of collinearity in econometric application. This then allows to analyze I(0), I(1) and share variables together in the model. This is one of our contributions in econometric VECM application. (2) By the literature review in Chapter 4, it's found that the elasticities of substitution vary from economies. Since some economies do not share free flow of capital, labor or energy, their substitution elasticities cannot be estimated as a whole. The different sustitution elasticities in each country show that, when selecting the data, we may refer to a region or a country with a common free flow market for capital, labor and energy. (3) Different data is used in the application. Previous literature uses the data of the UK or other countries to analyze the Allen's elasticity of substitution (AES), or the US data in the period different from that in this study, or uses the familiar data but in technology forecasting. Importantly, the empirical analysis uses the US data to test the Allen's elasticity of substitution (AES) and the constant elasticity of substitution (CES), in order to explore negative estimates of the substitution elasticity.

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Demand for meat in Saudi Arabia increased dramatically during the last two decades which lead the government to promote economic development and increased self-sufficiency in meat commodities. This study represents a dynamic specification of the Almost Ideal Demand System (AIDS) based on recent developments on cointegration techniques and error correction models, based on meat and fish consumption data in Saudi Arabia over the period 1981 to 2000. The results show that there is evidence of long-run relationship between expenditure on meat with commodity prices and total meat expenditure. Also, the results for all budget shares elasticities indicate that the demand of poultry and fish, in both the short and long-rum are price inelastic. While the demand for beef and lamb in the short-run was price inelastic, in the long-run these were found to have unit elasticity. The magnitude of short and long-run cross-price elasticities indicates that lamb is a substitute for all meat items, Beef is a substitute for fish only. Poultry is a substitute for lamb and beef, while fish is a substitute for lamb only. In addition, poultry is a complement for fish, while fish is a complement for beef and poultry, beef is a complement for lamb and poultry. The short and long run expenditure elasticities indicate that beef, lamb and poultry were found to have a short run elasticity of less than one. In the long run beef, lamb and poultry, exhibited similar behaviour with regard to expenditure changes, indicating that these three meat items can be considered as necessities. On the other hand, fish is found in the short run and the long run to behave as a luxury good.

This thesis is a systematic attempt to investigate two conjectures about the distribution of company rates of profit: that it should be log-normal (Gibrat 1931), and that it should be gamma distributed (Farjoun and Machover 1983). A large set of company accounts data is analysed, and partial support found for Gibrat and for a generalised version of Farjoun and Machover. The analysis includes a demonstration of different empirical distributions for different profit rate measures, a demonstration of power law tails in all measures of the profit rate, and a demonstration of size effects (differences in tail weights) in financial ratios. Annual variation in the overall skewness and kurtosis of profit rate distributions is shown to be dominated by variation in the power law tails. <i>L</i>-moments, a recent innovation in robust methods to deal with extreme values, are used in conjunction with a size-weighted sampling scheme to identify possible models for distributions of the profit rate at the capital level. Farjoun and Machover derive their hypothesis from a particular conception of the process of capitalist competition. A rival conception, that of Glick (1985), is tested using company accounts data and shown to be vulnerable to criticism concerning the scope of its data set, the test statistic employed, and its choice of profit rate measure. More fundamentally, it is also dependent on doubtful premises about the within-industry distribution of profit rates, as L-moment analysis demonstrates.

This thesis attempts to investigate, theoretically and empirically, whether financial development (bank development and stock market development) has led to economic growth in Bangladesh, and it explores the important factors behind the evolution of the financial system itself. The literature survey in Chapter 2 argues that finance enhances growth while banks and stock markets are complementary in development; however the application to low-income countries is unclear. After reviewing financial sector policy and institutional background in Bangladesh in Chapter 3, a combination of various theoretical insights into one structural framework is proposed in Chapter 4. Our empirical findings for Bangladesh in Model l using the ARDL cointegration method are as follows. Both banks (quasi-money/GDP) and the stock market (number oflisted companies) have enhanced physical capital accumulation from 1980 to 2005. Using the same cointegration technique, growth in GDP per capita is found to lead to growth in banks (private-credit/GDP ratio). And there is a cointegrating relationship between banks and the stock market which indicates that debt and equity are complementary. The main message from Chapter 6 is that the finance-growth nexus can be shown to operate in the case of Bangladesh where banks are the main providers of finance. The key policy implication of Model l is that overall financial development (banks and stock markets) can lead to economic growth, while feedback effects promote further financial activity. We then identify and assess relationships that operate within the stock market itself. Model 2A begins the analysis of the stock market infrastructure by relating the number of listed shares to the value of traded shares or turnover (market liquidity). Empirical results in Chapter 7 for Bangladesh using the ARDL approach show support for cointegration from 1990Ql to 2005Q4. Model 2B then investigates the relationship between trading activity and price volatility on the stock exchange. Using a GARCH framework and Granger Causality tests, empirical results in Chapter 8 indicate that trading volume and particularly trading value carry predictive power for price volatility with daily data from 1995 to 2007. The overall conclusion in Chapter 9 is that to understand the finance-growth nexus in Bangladesh it is necessary to appreciate the essential role played by banks as well as the forces behind the stock market. The encompassing framework presented here along with its reinforcing and constrained features points to a growth-promoting and sustainable fmancial structure for central bank regulators to target.

This thesis explored two key aspects of growth, namely the role of financial development and external financial liberalization. In the case of financial development, it evaluated in chapter 4, how far the financial reforms implemented since 1977 was successful in increasing the level of savings and investment as postulated in the McKinnon -Shaw hypothesis. It employed an Autoregressive Distributed Lag approach (ARDL) to evaluate the impact of the interest rates on savings as well as on investment. In the case of savings, the modelling involved an unrestricted error correction model (ECM), a long-run level model and a short- run restricted ECM. To assess the impact of interest rates and savings on investment, a long-run differenced ARDL model was performed. Our empirical research confirmed that there was a positive effect from financial liberalization, both on savings and investment. In the case of external financial liberalization, it investigated in chapter 5, the contribution of outward looking policies on per capita economic growth. We employed a multiple linear regression model using OLS approach and regressed the per capita economic growth, as a dependent variable on some key explanatory variables including FDI inflows, bank credit to private sector and trade openness. We found evidence in support of our hypothesis that outward-oriented policies stood favourably in contributing for economic growth. We finally examined in chapter 6, further scope for greater external openness to contribute towards faster economic growth and development of Sri Lanka’s economy. Our conclusion in this respect is that unless Sri Lanka adapts several policy measures to streamline its macroeconomic environment and gradually build up adequate external reserves, it would not be desirable for the country to consider rapid opening up of its capital account in the current setting. The overall finding of this study is that there was a positive impact of financial liberalization on savings and investment, as well as of external openness on economic growth.

This thesis is concerned with the question of whether recently joining member countries are converging on European Union norms for per capita GDP. In par-ticular, we focus on the "convergence debate" that has developed within growth theory. In order to find an answer, we look for a testing framework that is coherent with mainstream theoretical models and we investgate why such convergence may have happened. Firstly, we employ a variety of approaches to test whether economies actually reach a steady state as a consequence of catching-up and we argue that, if this condition is not satisfied, convergence may not happen at all in the long run[sup]1. Secondly, we investigate the role of trade openness, motivated by the failure of early theoretical models to recognize its effects on growth. Again, we give particular attention to the the long-run and the supply-side of our economies. Empirical results suggest that there is evidence of catching up in the period under investigation, but no conclusive indication of long-run convergence. We also observe little signs the latter was caused by intra-EU trade openness which, in turn, helped growth. These findings are evidence that EU policies were effective in the short-run. Therefore, the EU should continue its long-run effort of guiding new members' convergence towards a common steady state. In particular, targeting foreign direct investments, as suggested by the existing literature, may be more effective than focusing on the integration of the EU goods market. Finally, the Solow-Swan growth theory proved a reasonable tool to understand convergence in the enlarged EU, with no compelling need to open the model to trade or endogenize technological progress. [sup]1This conclusion wouid invalidate the predictions of the neoclassical growth model.

This research used psychological well-being data on thousands of people across several countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) between the period of 2000 and 2013. It begins with data on the reported well-being levels of thousands of individuals in MENA and relates these data to the macroeconomic variables in each country. The macroeconomics variables to be analysed are the unemployment rate, GDP per capita and the inflation rate. With regards to the reported well-being levels, a random sample of people who live in some selected MENA countries were interviewed each year by the World Value Survey (WVS) and are asked many self-reported questions. Two kinds of questions are used in this thesis. The first is 'all things considered, how satisfied are you weuth your life as a whole?' where answers ranked from 1 being dissatisfied till 10 being satisfied. The second question is 'Taking all things together, would you say you are 1-not at all happy, 2-not very happy, 3-quite happy or 4-very happy'. Ordered probit equations are estimated in an attempt to relate the macroeconomics conditions with individual's happiness or satisfaction by measuring the real cost of unemployment on the population and measuring the effects of GDP changes in a country on the people living in that country. A further analysis to estimate the objective well-being situation in MENA countries and compare it or supplement it to the subjective happiness approach. Building on Sen's capability approach and taking into account factors such as life expectancy, inequality and corruption levels with the individual's happiness from self-reported surveys for the same set of countries in MENA. Two independent variables are the equality opinion question and the financial satisfaction question from the WVS. The first question is: 'Incomes should be made more equal?', where 1 means you agree completely and 10 means you don't. The other question is: 'How satisfied are you with the financial situation of your household?', where '1' means you are completely dissatisfied on this scale, and '10' means you are completely satisfied. The main goal of this thesis is to arrive with a quality of life assessment of the situation in the MENA region by combining a subjective approach presented by self-reported surveys with an objective approach that includes many social indicators.

The thesis is a case-study of wheat breeding in the UK. It is contextualised by a focus on the interacting influence of the three spheres of law, science and economics in determining the patterns of innovation and strategies of appropriation. Three concerns ground the thesis. The first concern is to develop a framework to analyse the dynamics of innovation-appropriation in plant breeding. Adopting an evolutionary approach, the thesis presents the technology paradigm of (wheat) breeding (chapter 5) and characteristic properties of the seed (chapter 6) as factors that substantially determine innovation-appropriation issues. Following this conceptualisation, the thesis posits that the main appropriation strategy is that of planned obsolescence which aims to subvert the durability of genetic information (software) embedded in seeds. Secondly, empirical measures of planned obsolescence are developed and examined (chapter 7). Empirical evidence of planned obsolescence is offered in terms of the diminishing age of varieties. The strategy of planned obsolescence is supported by a widening of varietal portfolios and breeding strategies aimed at maintaining narrow and specific disease resistance profiles and incremental productivity improvements. Innovation avenues of developing dwarf wheats, yield-quality tradeoff in bread wheats and F1-hybrids are assessed from the perspective of planned obsolescence. Finally, the thesis considers the institutional construction of the regulatory system in the UK with specific attention to the Plant Variety and Seeds Act (1964) of the UK (chapter 9). While popular claims of expediency and autonomy of action are dismissed, the discussion demonstrates the manner in which the rhetoric of national interest was deployed to generate consensus across divergent interest groups. Of key importance in the legislation in the delinking merit considerations from the grant of protection process, an achievement by the breeders that allowed the proliferation of near-identical varieties of marginally improved productivity. Consequently, the PBRs system is presented as a juridical legitimation of the strategy of planned obsolescence.