Economic theory and policy: essays in honour of Dipak Banerjee

This contemporary collection of 15 essays, dealing with alternative areas of economic theory and policy, is to honour Professor Dipak Banerjee of Presidency College, Calcutta. All contributors to this volume are former students of Professor Banerjee.
The papers fall into five sections. The first section deals with macroeconomic theory and policy. It studies the macroeconomics effects of wage cuts and alternative methods of financing government expenditure such as increases in administered prices or money supply. The essays in Part II deal with topics in general equilibrium theory and welfare economics: phenomena of increasing returns, consumption expenditure ('envy'), as well as convergence of disequilibrium states to equilibrium. Part III concerns economic growth and development. Topics include the decentralization of optimal multi-sectoral growth plans, the relationship between income distribution and growth, and the effects of government policies in a growing labour-surplus economy. Part IV examines aspects of industrial organization: innovation incentives in vertically related industries, the desirability of encouraging entry of new firms in an industry, and the use of competitive reward schemes within organizations. The final section studies three issues in international economics: the relationship between terms of trade and national welfare in the presence of capital mobility, the relevance traditional theories of devaluation for less developed countries, and the effects of trade liberalization on employment.