Author: Oleksandr Shepotylo, Kyiv School of Economics. This policy brief summarizes the results of recent research which predicts gains in Ukrainian exports from signing a deep and comprehensive free trade agreement with EU, and compares these gains with predicted gains from joining the Customs Union of Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Russia. We argue that the gains would […]
June 4, 2013
The European Commission against Gazprom: Should Gas Contracting Arrangement Be Changed?
Author: Chloé Le Coq, SITE. This policy brief discusses EC’s claim that Gazprom abuses its dominant position. I argue that parts of the claim, like denying Third Party Access, are warranted but others related to the contracts offered by Gazprom to different Member States need not be. In fact, major market players in Europe offer […]
May 28, 2013
Alcohol Consumption and Mortality
Author: Evgeny Yakovlev, NES. Many studies have shown that alcohol consumption is the main cause of death among working age Russian males and, in particular, among those younger than 40 (see Bhattacharya et al., 2013, Brainerd and Cutler, 2005, Denisova, 2010, Leon et al., 2007, Triesman, 2010, Yakovlev, 2013a, 2013b). A noteworthy example that illustrates […]
May 20, 2013
Can Anti-Smoking Campaigns Increase Obesity? Evidence from Belarus
Authors: Aliaksandr Amialchuk, University of Toledo, and Kateryna Bornukova, BEROC. In this brief, we discuss the possible effects of an anti-tobacco campaign on obesity levels in Belarus based on results of Amialchuk et al (2012). Both smoking and obesity are among the main health concerns in Belarus. Negative correlation between smoking and body weight is […]
May 13, 2013
Preferences for Redistribution in Post-Communist Countries
Author: Irina Denisova, NES/CEFIR. Public attitudes toward inequality and the demand for redistribution can often play an import role in terms of shaping social policy. The literature on determinants of the demand for redistribution, both theoretical and empirical, is extensive (e.g., Meltzer and Richard 1981, Alesina and Angelotos 2005). Usually due to data limitations, transition countries […]
May 6, 2013
Political Islam and Women’s Rights – Evidence from Turkey
Author: Erik Meyersson, SITE. In this policy brief, I discuss how state-of-the-art econometric techniques can be used to shed light on the causal effects of Islamic rule on women’s rights. A central empirical challenge is that the identity of a politician is endogenous to voter characteristics, which in the case of Islamic political participation is […]
March 26, 2013
Capital Structure and Employment Flexibility
Author: Olga Kuzmina, NES. This policy brief focuses on the relationship between employment policies and their potential impact on firms’ decisions and outcomes. In particular, the question dealt with here is whether policies aiming to promote job stability could have an impact on a firm’s capital structure and the ability to respond to negative shocks and […]
March 11, 2013
Directed Lending: Is It An Efficient Tool to Modernize the Economy?
Authors: Kiryl Haiduk and Dmitry Kruk, BEROC. Over the last couple of years, the growth rate of potential Belarus’ GDP declined. The government intends to revive economic growth by the policy of ‘modernization’, in practice pinned down to a drastic increase in the volume of capital investment, including by the means of directed lending. As the […]
March 4, 2013
Fact or Fiction? The Reversal of the Gender Education Gap across the World and the Former Soviet Union
Author: Ina Ganguli, SITE. In this policy brief, I discuss the reversal of the gender education gap in many countries around the world – a fact that is still not widely known, although is increasingly gaining attention. I describe recent studies that have documented this fact for both developed and developing countries and have provided […]
February 25, 2013
Empirical Evidence on Natural Resources and Corruption
Author: Elena Paltseva, SITE. This policy brief addresses the relationship between resource wealth and a particular institutional outcome – corruption. We overview some recent empirical evidence on this relationship and outline results of an on-going research project addressing a particular aspect of resource-related political corruption: transformation of resource rents into personal wealth hidden at off-shore […]
June 12, 2013
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