En este artículo se analizan los cambios en la estructura ycompetitividad de la industria de bienes de capital brasileña desdecomienzos de los años 1990 y se propone una clasificación dentrode esta industria basada en los diversos segmentos industriales quedemandan máquinas y equipos. Aunque esta industria sigue pesandobastante en el valor agregado del sector manufacturero, la eficienciaproductiva y la competitividad internacional de los segmentos quela componen son bastante heterogéneas. El artículo destaca lossegmentos con mayor potencial de desarrollo y sugiere para cadauno de ellos medidas…
This article argues that in a stable and competitive real exchangerate(SCRER); macroeconomic regime, the exchange-rate component candrive up inflation through the very mechanisms that stimulate high rates ofgross domestic product and employment growth; to offset this pressure,fiscal and monetary policies will have to be used to control aggregatedemand. It finds that in an exchange-rate regime of this type, monetarypolicy has a degree of autonomy that can be exploited to apply activemonetary policies. It analyses the degree to which monetary policy canbe used to control aggregate demand and con…
This article analyses changes in the structure and competitiveness ofthe Brazilian capital goods industry since the early 1990s and proposes aclassification within that industry based on the different industrial segmentsfrom which the demand for machinery and equipment derives. Althoughthis industry still accounts for a large share of manufacturing sector valueadded, the production efficiency and international competitiveness of thesegments it comprises are quite heterogeneous. The article singles out thesegments with the greatest development potential and suggests measuresthat could be taken …
This essay argues that while the complete lack of liquiditycharacterizing the most severe phase of the financial crisis unleashedin September 2008 is now a thing of the past, lending and productionactivity in the industrialized countries are both contracting rapidly andthe financial system is still undercapitalized. Of all the external channelsthrough which the crisis has been transmitted to Latin America, the dropin remittances is the least important. The most widespread negative effectswill come from the decline in the volume of international trade and thesharp deterioration in the terms of …
The combination of profound technological change and theemergence of powerful competitors such as China and the other briccountries has led to dramatic shifts in competitiveness and a tendencyfor production to be structured around global value chains. Against thisbackground, traditional protectionist threats have reappeared and othershave arisen in connection with new security requirements, private-sectorquality standards, good practices and climate change. These issues areintegral to the new competitive environment but could turn into protectionistbarriers in the absence of the right multilat…
This paper develops and tests a model of growth that emphasizesthe introduction of new exports as the main source of growth in countriesthat are well within the global technology frontier and depend for growthon adapting existing products to their economic environment. It seeks tocapture the stylized facts behind growth in countries as different as theRepublic of Korea, Taiwan Province of China, Mauritius, Finland, Chinaand Chile, all of which have relied on export diversification. The wideningof comparative advantage is thus seen as the main driver of economicgrowth. The export diversificatio…
This article examines the effect of training on competitiveness inthe manufacturing sector, drawing a distinction between industries withdiffering technological and productive characteristics. Using a systemicapproach, it studies activities within firms and the impact that traininghas on them, as well as the organizational and institutional environmentthat supports training and the effect of the latter on the locality as awhole. An analysis is performed at two levels. At the firm level (microanalysis);, econometric tools are used to study the manufacturing sectorin Mexico. At the regional leve…
This paper examines the role of structural change as a source of
economic growth and institutional and technological change. With the
creation of new activities in the economy, significant changes occur in
institutions and in the way domestic production capabilities are organized,
which alters the ultimate sources of growth in society. This is a complex
process that involves ubiquitous externalities and new forms of clustering
and direct interdependence between economic agents that the language
of modern growth theory cannot fully capture. Neoclassical growth models
construe economic growth in…
Este trabajo examina el papel del cambio estructural como fuente
del crecimiento económico y del desarrollo institucional y tecnológico.
Con la creación de nuevas actividades, la capacidad de organización
productiva local y las instituciones experimentan cambios significativos,
que alteran las fuentes esenciales de crecimiento de la sociedad. Se
trata de un proceso complejo que entraña externalidades de todo tipo y
nuevas formas de aglomeración e interdependencia directa entre
actores económicos, que no puede comprenderse a cabalidad en el
lenguaje de la teoría moderna del crecimiento. En los …
This article examines some theoretical approaches in support of
industrial policy in Brazil, with special emphasis on the neo-Schumpeterian/evolutionary approach. This approach is applied to the analysis of some satisfactory experiences in the field of industrial policy and economic development in Brazil up to the end of the 1970s, and some unsuccessful attempts in this field from the 1980s on. Lastly, it
evaluates the industrial policy applied by the government in the 2003-
2006 period, noting that, in spite of some positive aspects -the emphasis
on innovation, clear goals and a new instituti…
Este artículo examina algunos enfoques teóricos de apoyo a la
política industrial de Brasil, haciendo hincapié en la perspectiva
neoschumpeteriana/evolucionista. Aplica esa perspectiva al análisis de
algunas experiencias satisfactorias de política industrial y desarrollo
económico en Brasil hasta fines de la década de 1970, y de intentos
fallidos en ese campo a partir del decenio de 1980. Por último, evalúa la
política industrial del gobierno 2003-2006 y señala que, pese a algunos
aspectos positivos —acento en la innovación, metas claras y una nueva
organización institucional—, dicha política …
The core of a policy for accelerating economic growth is a
combination of knowledge accumulation and diversification of the
productive structure. These two dimensions are the focus of the present
article, which examines industrial policy experiences during the import
substitution industrialization period; highlights the policies currently being
applied in Latin America and the Caribbean and offers a typology of the
strategies underlying them; presents the main lines of action and policy
instruments; and analyses issues of policy implementation and impact.
The thesis is that, while policymaking…
Lo esencial de una política para acelerar el crecimiento
económico es combinar la acumulación de conocimiento y la
diversificación de la estructura productiva. Estas dos dimensiones son el
eje de este artículo, que examina experiencias de política industrial
durante el período de industrialización mediante la sustitución de
importaciones; pone de relieve las políticas que se aplican actualmente
en la región y elabora una tipología de sus estrategias; presenta las
principales líneas de acción e instrumentos de política, y analiza
cuestiones relativas a la evaluación de la puesta en práctica y e…
This article begins by showing that not all developing countries
concentrate their exports in products which make intensive use of natural
resources or cheap labour, and that those which also export some products
typical of more developed countries tend to grow faster, apparently
independently of their human capital endowment or the quality of their
institutions. For this purpose, an index is used which measures the degree
to which each country displays this type of export mix. This is an
idiosyncratic phenomenon which seems to be linked with the capacity to
undertake the production and export…
Este trabajo comienza por documentar que no todos los países en
desarrollo concentran sus exportaciones en productos intensivos en recursos naturales o en mano de obra barata, y que aquellos que también exportan algunos productos propios de países desarrollados tienden a crecer más rápidamente, con aparente independencia de su capital humano y su calidad institucional. Para esto se utiliza un índice que mide para cada país el grado en que presenta ese tipo de mezcla en sus exportaciones. Este es un fenómeno idiosincrásico, que parece estar ligado
a las facilidades para emprender la producción …
Este estudio analiza la dinámica laboral de la industria en Chile a
través de información descriptiva y paramétrica, a nivel de plantas industriales entre 1979 y 2000. Examina la creación, destrucción y rotación de empleo, e investiga su vínculo con el ciclo económico, las características según sectores y tamaño de las plantas. Encuentra evidencia de creación de empleo procíclica y destrucción de empleo contracíclica; de rotación laboral contracíclica y asociada inversamente al tamaño; de fuerte heterogeneidad entre sectores; de la gran importancia de la demografía empresarial en la evolución …