Contenu du sommaire : Varia

Public ordering versus private ordering: a critical review of the williamsonian analysis of labor relationships in the United States. Law plays a crucial role in Williamson's transaction cost economics but this aspect has been often undermined in the academic debates. This research article proposes to remedy to this lack in literature by making a critical review of the Williamson's law and economics theory from the analysis of the collective labor relationships in the United States. From a positive point of view, Williamson explains that law determines the rules of play (public ordering), and then individuals freely negotiate the rules that constitute the institutions of governance (private ordering). From a normative perspective, Williamson argues that this partition is efficient with respect to the economic logic of individuals. However, we show that, actually, the American law of labour relationships is based on legal pluralism and that the model of private ordering, which has been less and less used since the 1980s, has strong limitations. In this context, the analysis of the public ordering/private ordering framework that Williamson proposes is of little interest. Classification JEL : J50, J80, L20, K00

Public spending on education and inequalities
In this article, we measure the redistributive impact of education expenses when financed publicly. We consider a life-cycle perspective and estimate, for each individual, the education expenses received and the taxes paid during his or her foreseen career. We conclude that the public financing of non-compulsory education slightly increases inequality, while the public financing of compulsory education strongly diminishes inequalities among individuals of a same generation. However, these transfers seem to matter far less than the differences in future income due to an unequal access to higher education based on social origin. Classification JEL : D31, D63, I22, H40

Changes in wage inequality in France: the impact of composition effects
This paper investigates the recent changes in the French wage structure from 1990 to 2008. To do so, we disentangle the impact of changes in employment probability, changes in the levels of education and experience and changes in the price of labor. Unlike other developped countries, we find that upper and lower tail inequality decline between the first and the last decile for male and female. The recent period thus could be described as a period of “great compression” of wages between the first and the last decile. As a result, the decline in education and experience returns has produced one of the most egalitarian wage structure ever observed in France since the 1960s. Classification JEL : J3, D3

Trade credit is a substitute to bank credit... when financial development is weak
Using a database of more than 1,100 firms in the MENA region, this article looks at the determinants of trade credit use. We show that the difficulty of accessing bank credit positively influences the use of trade credit, and thus demonstrate the (even imperfect) substitutability of bank credit and trade credit. Similarly, the quality of firms' financial structure negatively impacts the use of trade credit, emphasizing the latter is mainly useful for financially weak firms. Finally, we show that previous results tend to weaken or even disappear when financial development is high enough. Primarily driven by trade relationships with partner firms, trade credit becomes then more a complement to bank credit. Classification JEL : F4, G2, O16, O55

Trade in services a deceiving trade?
The paper focuses on the issue of cross-border trade in services. It argues that its current understanding may be quite misleading. First, bearing in mind Hill's [1999] services definition, the paper discusses the extent of services-producing activities. It stresses that “services” exporting activities, producing “knowledge capturing products”, should be recognised as genuine goods-producing activities. Second, the paper explains that the picture the Balance of Payments (bop) displays of trade in services, although improving, is still heterogeneous and blurring. On the one hand, several entries are still heterogeneous. On the second hand, contrary to a common view, the bop does not provide accurate information about trade of services industries. Moreover, a striking finding is that services industries are not the major actual traders of the services account. Classification JEL : F1, L8

Trade agreements in East Asia: an impact on trade flows?
The purpose of this article is to assess the impact of the three main East-Asian free trade agreements (Asean, Asean-China and Asean-South Korea) on intra-regional and extra-regional trade. To do this, we use a panel-data gravity model with three regional indicator variables. On the basis of the results, we conclude that the Asean agreement favours regional and multilateral trade, with the creation of imports to the rest of the world outweighing the diversion of extra-regional imports. The Asean-China agreement allows the creation of extra-regional exports but no effects was found on extra-regional imports. The Asean-South Korea agreement has not shown to have an impact on East-Asian trade flows.Classification JEL : C23, F13, F15, O53

The coexistence of a predominantly poor opinion on free markets and lack of education in economics are two documented features of France. In this paper, we use data collected in December 2009 through an Internet-based survey within the network of a major French Business School to test whether this situation is more than a mere coincidence. An instrumental variable model of opinion on pro-market reforms was estimated, taking into account the endogenous nature of knowledge in economics, while controlling for the characteristics of the respondents. Empirical results indicate that knowledge in economics contributes significantly to explain favorable opinion on pro-market reforms.