Econ - Science topic

There are both optimistic and pessimistic factors in macroeconomic forecasts for the world economy over the long term. Depending on how they operate and which prevail, either more optimistic or more pessimistic scenarios are developed for the development of the projected economic situation realised in the future. In terms of optimistic factors, these include the use of new information technologies, Industry 4.0 and others, which, when implemented in companies and enterprises, allow for improved profitability of business processes, increased production scale, improved quality control systems and/or improved quality of product and service offerings, etc. Besides, the green transformation consisting in the development of renewable and emission-free energy sources and based on rapidly cheap green energy technologies and on generating savings in energy consumption contributes to economic efficiency and energy security. In addition, the development of sustainable economic processes, scaling up the sharing economy, improving waste separation systems, reusing recovered secondary raw materials, improving and scaling up industrial recycling, etc. will also generate savings in the consumption of raw materials and energy in the context of an efficient economy. In this way, savings will be generated that will allow for an increase in the scale of financial subsidies directed to special purpose funds supporting the development of pro-climate and pro-environmental economic ventures and the development of green economic sectors. Pessimistic factors, on the other hand, include the retreat of economic globalisation from the onset of the pandemic, the rise of economic isolationism, the prospect of deepening trade wars between the world's major economies, the introduction of prohibitive tariffs to protect domestic labour markets, the successive reduction in the scale of cross-border transfers of strategic raw materials, components, prefabricated products and technology, etc. The reduction in the scale of the international transfer of products and services, international trade also involving factors of production, strategic raw materials was already noticeable a few years before the coronavirus pandemic (Covid-19), and during the pandemic through disrupted chains of international supply and procurement logistics the scale of intermodal logistics, international trade decreased. It also resulted in the shortening of international supply and procurement logistics chains and the development of domestic industries supplying the necessary sub-assemblies and pre-fabricated components used in the production of various goods, products, mainly technological products composed of many sub-assemblies.

Such problems determining the deepening of trade wars and the backsliding of economic globalisation processes at the end of February 2022 are increased by a full-scale military war in Ukraine. This kind of war generates economic uncertainty, and uncertainty is an increase in the scale of economic risks that are difficult to measure, not easy to quantify, and holding back investment. In addition to military sectors, apart from companies producing weapons and equipment for the military, it is in many other sectors and industries of the economy that the aforementioned increase in uncertainty becomes a limiting factor for the development of investment and economic activity. On the other hand, when the war ends and the processes of reconstruction of Ukraine's economy begin, there will be a significant recovery of economic processes in some sectors of the economy, such as construction and heavy industry. However, it is unclear when the war will end. In addition to this, determinants contributing to the deepening downturn of the economy include continued elevated inflation at double-digit levels. In the context of high consumer inflation, the high proportion of core inflation determined by domestic factors is a matter of concern. In addition to this, there remains a high level of risk of further investment bank failures in a situation of falling stock market valuations of previously issued government bonds with fixed and significantly lower interest rates on new series of government bonds being issued than at present. Consequently, there is still a high level of uncertainty about the development of the economic situation in the financial markets, including the capital markets, the stock markets on which securities are priced.

In view of the above, I would like to address the following question to the esteemed community of scientists and researchers:

What do you think about this topic?

What is your opinion on this subject?

Please respond,

I invite you all to discuss,

Thank you very much,

Best wishes,

Dariusz Prokopowicz

The sharing economy model, i.e. the sharing economy, the sharing economy, the collaborative economy, is an important element of what is more broadly referred to as a sustainable circular economy. On the other hand, the processes of green transformation of economies aimed, among other things, at reducing the consumption of natural resources, decreasing waste generation and decreasing greenhouse gas emissions are expected to lead to a reduction in the scale of carbon emissions, i.e. greenhouse gas emissions and thus slow down the progressive process of global warming and reduce the scale of environmental pollution, reduce the scale of loss of biodiversity of natural ecosystems and the consumption of strategic natural resources such as water and rare raw materials. The phenomenon is based on people's willingness to cooperate, help others and share their time and resources, which is reciprocated in various ways (material and non-material). In the past, this form of cooperation was limited to a narrow circle of family, friends and neighbours, and with mass production, the development of trade and services and stronger migration resulting in the separation of multi-generational families and the loss of networks of acquaintances, this phenomenon slowly lost its importance and its functions were taken over by companies and institutions (e.g. public institutions). The other side of human nature, which is the desire to compete and look after narrowly defined self-interest, is the basis of classical economics, but under market economy conditions it sometimes leads to distortions (exploitation, fraud, etc.). Thanks to the development and application of new technologies, collaborative economics is once again gaining popularity and economic rationality. A key determinant of the dynamic development of the sharing economy was the financial crisis in 2008, as well as the need to save money, make better use of resources and change social relations. The development of the concept of a sustainable circular economy should therefore also take the sharing economy into account. The circular economy takes into account, among other things, the minimisation of the environmental impact of the production cycle. An important element of the closed loop economy can be the production method called in Polish 'from cradle to cradle'. This idea specifies methods for designing and producing objects in accordance with the concept of sustainable development, so that, at the end of their useful life, they can be put back into the production cycle. The circular economy also has a territorial dimension. In the context of the functioning of regions and especially urban areas, it refers to yet other economic solutions, e.g. the concept of the sharing economy, according to which unlimited consumption or accumulation of property gives way to sharing, exchanging or borrowing. According to this concept, people give up many goods for their own exclusive use in favour of others, i.e. they reduce the need for products whose production cycle often requires large amounts of raw materials and energy. The sharing economy is defined as a social and economic phenomenon that involves a shift in organisational and distribution models towards distributed networks of interconnected individuals and communities, involving both the direct provision of services by people to each other, as well as sharing, co-creation, co-direction, etc., enabling a radical increase in resource efficiency. Accordingly, the sharing economy model is an essential component of a sustainable circular economy and thus a sustainable green zero-carbon economy or one that strives towards zero-carbon.

In view of the above, I address the following question to the esteemed community of scientists and researchers:

What is your opinion on this subject?

Please respond,

I invite you all to discuss,

Thank you very much,

Best wishes,

Dariusz Prokopowicz

Thanks to high inflation, tax revenues increase in the central state budget, the main element of the state's public finances. Research centres independent of the government estimate that, thanks to high inflation in recent quarters, around PLN 5 billion has additionally flowed into the state budget. As the indebtedness of the public finance system has increased dramatically over the past few years and, in addition, during the SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) coronavirus pandemic, the government has injected over PLN 200 billion of additional, printed money into the economy, so the risk of indebtedness of the public finance system is growing. In the situation of a deepening downturn in Br 2023, the scale of the debt of the state's public finance system could still increase significantly. In such a situation, rating agencies operating through investment banks could significantly lower the solvency and creditworthiness ratings of public finances, which would result in an increase in the investment risk of funds invested in Treasury bonds and it would be necessary to increase the interest rate of these securities sold to foreign investors. This would significantly increase the cost of rolling over successive series of issued treasury bonds and increase the cost of servicing the debt of the state's public finance system, the cost of servicing public debt. For the government, it is better to keep inflation high, because this way the scale of the increase in the cost of servicing the public debt is smaller. Unfortunately, this comes at the expense of the rapidly declining purchasing power of the money available to citizens and economic agents. From mid-2022 onwards, the wage increases that employers are implementing for employees in companies, enterprises and institutions no longer compensate in full for the rapidly declining purchasing power of money due to high inflation. This whole process, which began with the use of so-called Anti-Crisis Shields during the SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) coronavirus pandemic, is the result of Poland's short-sighted and chaotic economic policy. These Anti-Crisis Shields consisted of non-refundable financial subsidies for the majority of economic entities operating in the country in the form of government subsidies to salaries of employees working mainly in commercially operating companies and enterprises and other forms of financial support aimed at limiting the scale of growth of unemployment during large-scale lockdowns imposed in Poland on selected sectors of the economy and national quarantines introduced during as many as three consecutive waves of the SARS-CoV-2 (Covid-19) coronavirus pandemic from March 2020 to early 2021. The procedure of imposing the Shields on operators in certain economic sectors during the ongoing investigations in many countries was considered questionably legitimate as so-called 'anti-pandemic safety instruments', i.e. slowing down the development of coronavirus infections. The main effect of the aforementioned Anti-Crisis Shields was an increase in inflation already from the beginning of 2021, followed by an increase in interest rates by the central bank in Poland, i.e. the National Bank of Poland, between October 2021 and September 2022. This resulted in a significant increase in loan instalments paid by borrowers to commercial banks and a decrease in the creditworthiness of new borrowers. Then, from as early as the beginning of 2022, economic growth began to decline rapidly, inflation continued to rise, investment levels began to fall and by the end of 2022 the beginning of a decline in consumption was noticeable. From mid-2022 onwards, housing developers have been reducing investment levels in the construction and delivery of new houses and flats. Accordingly, the chaotically short-sighted economic policy pursued, in which the pandemic crisis of 2020 was exacerbated by lockdowns imposed on selected, mainly service sectors of the economy, and the so-called Crisis Shield programmes applied, triggered an increase in inflation and an even more serious and economically realistic deepening of the downturn in 2022 and 2023. In addition, the applied restriction (solar energy, biofuel-based energy) and inhibition (wind energy in 2016) of the development of renewable and emission-free energy sources caused a significant decrease in the energy security of the domestic energy sector resulting in an extremely acute energy crisis of 2022, highly costly for citizens. In view of the above, the chaotic short-sighted economic policy conducted by the increasing level of state interventionism carried out by the government over the past 8 years, including the increasing level of government control of certain sectors of the economy, the increasing scale of the application of the so-called "Anti-Crisis Shield", the increasing scale of the introduction of additional, printed money into the economy without coverage led to the formation of even greater crises. As the next parliamentary elections are due to be held in autumn this year 2023, which the PIS political option in power for the last eight years plans to win, so further programmes of non-refundable subsidies for selected types of enterprises continue to be applied, which becomes another pro-inflationary factor. However, high inflation for the government apparently is the least of all problems, because thanks to high inflation, as I wrote above, tax revenues to the state budget are higher and thus the cost of servicing the high public debt is lower.

In view of the above, I address the following question to the esteemed community of scientists and researchers:

And what is your opinion on this?

What is your opinion on this subject?

Please respond,

I invite you all to discuss,

Thank you very much,

Best regards,

Dariusz Prokopowicz

Unfortunately, not all such social policies have worked effectively. For example, in the country where I operate, such a social policy programme whose official strategic goal was to counteract the rapidly declining birth rate of children and the rapidly progressing process of demographic changes in society defined as ageing since the end of the 20th century in Poland is the Family 500 Plus Programme, introduced in 2016. Apart from this, the key ongoing objective of this programme was to improve the material status of children, financially support families raising children and reduce the scale of family poverty in Poland. In the first years of the programme's operation, i.e. from 2016 onwards, this programme became one of the important factors of economic growth. The Family 500 Plus programme consists of a monthly non-refundable transfer of PLN 500 for each child in the family. I have described the strategic goals of this programme as a key element of long-term, i.e. on a multi-year scale, socio-economic policy planning and implementation in my published articles and monograph chapters on my profile of this Research Gate portal. I invite you to join me for research collaboration on this issue. However, the Family 500 Plus programme has already been in place for several years. The design and introduction of this programme drew on models of similar programmes operating for years in other countries in Europe. this programme was introduced in Poland in 2016. It is now already 2023. In 2022, the level of child births in Poland was the lowest in more than half a century, so clearly this programme is completely failing to meet the strategic goals that were set out when this programme was introduced. These strategic objectives, in addition to reducing the scale of poverty among families with many children in Poland, were to significantly increase the fertility rate in society and thus counteract the progressive ageing of the population. This programme has been implemented by the PIS government in Poland for almost eight years. In connection with the fact that, according to political scientists, the introduction of this social policy programme helped the PIS political party to win the parliamentary elections in 2015 and 2019 and the formation of the government by this party, so for years there have been considerations as to whether the introduction of this social policy programme, i.e. the programme of financial support for families in Poland, was related not to the issue of long-term shaping of social and economic policy in Poland but to the issue of winning the parliamentary elections. In view of the above, the current goals of the Family 500 Plus Programme have been achieved, while the strategic goals, unfortunately, have not.

In view of the above, I would like to address the following question to the esteemed community of scientists and researchers:

What do you think about this topic?

What is your opinion on this subject?

Please respond,

I invite you all to discuss,

Thank you very much,

Best wishes,

Dariusz Prokopowicz

When a new risk factor emerges that threatens the efficient development of the economy, it can cause serious perturbations on financial markets, including capital markets. When the WHO declared a pandemic on 11 March 2020, uncertainty prevailed on the capital markets, with a strong stock market crash. The heavy discounting and panic selling of shares was only halted by significant, interventionist interest rate cuts by central banks, and this despite the low interest rates already in place at the time. Additional interest rate cuts were possible because inflation was low in many countries in 2020. Subsequently, lockdowns imposed on selected sectors of the economy and temporary national quarantines were introduced in some countries to slow down the transmission of the coronavirus. In order to limit the economic crisis and increase unemployment, governments introduced new anti-crisis programmes called, for example, Anti-Crisis Shields consisting of subsidies to workers' salaries, subsidies to companies, refinancing of fixed costs, temporary tax cuts, etc. In this way, additional funds were injected into the economy. In this way, large amounts of additional money were injected into the economy. The now familiar mechanism of interventionist, anti-crisis measures, which had previously been applied in the USA during the 2008 global financial crisis to commercial and investment banks and some companies in the non-financial sectors, was applied. In this way, a huge amount of additional money was injected into the economy. When, thanks to the coronavirus vaccines, the state of uncertainty in the financial markets and in the economy was significantly reduced in 2021, economies were rapidly recovering from the pandemic recession of the 2020 economy. From 2021 onwards, commodity prices and other categories of inputs began to rise. Consumption and inflation were also rising. In 2022, some central banks embarking on a plan to curb the scale of rising inflation began to raise interest rates, a process that continued until the first quarter of 2023, as inflation levels in many countries had already been in double digits for several months and continued to rise. The increase in interest rates by central banks resulted in an increase in the cost of borrowed money, bank loan instalments increased, and the availability of credit decreased. commercial banks, perceiving symptoms of the risk of another economic crisis looming on the horizon, tightened their credit policies, further restricting access to credit. The level of investment already started to decline from around mid-2022. Earlier, as economic growth started to decline as early as the beginning of 2022. In the second half of 2022, the beginning of a decline in citizens' real incomes was already noticeable in some countries, despite wage increases. This resulted in a decline in consumption levels, which deepened in the first half of 2023. From March 2023, inflation began to fall in some countries and the decline in economic growth reached its minimum. This seemed to be the beginning of the end of a weak economy exacerbated by the 2022 energy crisis. However, all of a sudden, in March 2023, financial institutions start to fail. In mid-March 2023, the sizable US banks Silicon Valey Bank and Signature Bank, which had been investing in securities as part of investment banking, go bankrupt. Paradoxically, they lost liquidity by investing in securities classified as those generating low investment risk, i.e. government bonds. But even these widely regarded as the safest financial instruments in a situation of misguided investment banking policy can lead to a serious crisis, insolvency and, consequently, bank failure. In such a situation, central banks find themselves at a kind of crossroads in terms of deciding whether to continue tightening monetary policy by continuing to raise interest rates or to change their strategy from hawkish to dovish, i.e. to a more benign one by ending interest rate hikes despite still elevated inflation. The decision on the aforementioned change of strategy could be interpreted by financial market participants as the start of a period of monetary easing. This would probably also have an impact on developments in financial markets. Therefore, the key issue is to decide what could deepen the economic downturn and cause more negative economic effects, i.e. the continuation of interest rate increases, which could increase the scale of bankruptcies of economic entities, or the end of interest rate hikes, which would slow down and prolong the rate of inflation decrease in subsequent quarters and possibly years.

In view of the above, I address the following question to the esteemed community of scientists and researchers:

And what is your opinion on this?

What is your opinion on this subject?

Please respond,

I invite you all to discuss,

Thank you very much,

Best wishes,

Dariusz Prokopowicz

We are currently conducting our undergraduate research proposal about the impact of monetary and fiscal policy on the economic growth of the Philippines. We used real GDP as a measure of econ growth. Our problem is that for our theoretical framework, we adopted the monetarism and keynesian theory as based on the empirical studies we reviewed. However quantity theory of money talked about how it influences nominal income. Though it has an effect on real income but only short-run. During our consultation our professor said it might be difficult to use QTM as a framework for our study. Is there any way we can still use it or what are other theory that can be used as framework in terms of the effect of montery policy on the econ growth of a country? (We've sorted things out on the side of fiscal policy though). We are very new in this field and don't have adequate knowledge with regards to this yet (don't know though why we conducted this study lol). Thankyou in advance.

What do you think, who is behind the "Unstoppable Sustainable Economic Growth of China"? Is it for President Xi Jinping or his new era of socialist economic thought?

Ref:

Let's know your valued opinions.

This is probably a naive question for economists, but I am a lawyer with limited understanging of econ and thus I am not confident about how to answer this question. Assume we have an agricultural production function with contstant return to scale. One factor contributing to production is water. Now climate change hits and hits the elasticity of water (but does not impact elasticity of other factors) then I would say, depending on which direction the elasticity of water heads, the return to scale will change to increasing or decresing. Does this make sense given the assumptions?

Has anyone done a study or analysis on the impact of climate change on tourism? If yes, what methodology have you used?

Seasonality at tourism destinations is a problematic issue as during the low months, resources aren't used and destinations cannot generate enough revenue. How can this be combatted in order to develop a more sustainable future for destinations who face this problem?