Lionello F. Punzo

Symbolic time series analysis and dynamic regimes

In this paper I describe and apply the methods of Symbolic Time Series Analysis (STSA) to an experimental framework. The idea behind Symbolic Time Series Analysis is simple: the values of a given time series data are transformed into a finite set of symbols obtaining a finite string. Then, we can process the symbolic sequence using tools from information theory and symbolic dynamics. I discuss data symbolization as a tool for identifying temporal patterns in experimental data and use symbol sequence statistics in a model strategy. In this application the data symbolization is based on economic criteria using the notion of economic regime.

The evolutionary game between tourist and resident populations and Tourist Carrying Capacity

Tourism implies the encounter and interaction of two non-homogeneous populations, possibly further internally structured into like-minded communities. Its sustainability, although still poorly defined, depends upon the type of such interaction and its evolution. This is why we believe that the theoretical representation of the problem has to occur within a game theory framework. This paper begins to investigate this uncharted, perhaps novel, idea. Moreover, building on existing literature, it discusses the impact of such an approach on one of the key concept that has been developed to assess the local impact of tourism, i.e. Tourism Carrying Capacity.

Research Note: Tourism as a Factor of Growth – the Case of Brazil:

International tourism is recognized to contribute to long-run growth through a whole list of diverse channels. This belief that tourism can cause long-run growth is known in the literature as the ‘tourism-led growth hypothesis’. This case study of Brazil can be taken as a specific test for such a hypothesis. In the paper, two different econometric methodologies are applied to two distinct data sets, showing that the results are independent of either data or methodology. On the one hand, annual data from 1965 to 2007 for Brazil as a whole are used for a cointegration analysis to look for the existence of a long-run relationship among variables of economic growth, international tourism earnings and the real exchange rate. On the other hand, high-quality data for the 27 Brazilian states, though for a shorter period (from 1990 to 2005), enable the use of the dynamic panel data model proposed by Arellano and Bond (1991). The authors show that the long-run elasticities between real per capita GDP with respect to tourism receipts and the real rate of exchange are 0.13 and 0.30, respectively. Finally, they compare their results with those of similar studies.

Coding economic dynamics to represent regime dynamics. A teach-yourself exercise

Abstract Much of the recent economic history of various countries, regions and/or sectors in the world economy can usefully be reconstructed as sequences of repeated, basically endogenously induced, changes of growth regimes. Coded dynamics (CD) is proposed hereafter as the appropriate tool for the analysis of such multi-regime dynamics, i.e. dynamics where switches between growth regimes represent structural changes, or in other words, abrupt alterations in an economys qualitative dynamics . On a theoretical tone, one of our arguments in favor of the adoption of a CD approach derives from the lesson that can be drawn from the complex dynamics literature. Often, some form of regularity, while it cannot be found in the punctual analysis of motion across states, can be recovered from the systems dynamics over a partition of its state space. This dynamics can be represented by strings of symbols (instead of real numbers), or symbolic trajectories . The 2-fold purpose of this paper is to introduce the formalism and terminology of multi-regime dynamics, and to try our hand with the technique of coding through a set of simple exercises. In fact, we consider only cases with two and three regimes, instead of the six of the Framework Space introduced in the Preface. Via such exercises, we also trace the origins of the multi-regime framework in the tradition of classical macrodynamics.

Tourism as a Factor of Growth: The Case of Brazil

International tourism, on which we focus in this paper, is recognized to contribute to long-run growth through a whole list of diverse channels. This belief that tourism can promote, if not, plainly, cause long-run growth is known in the literature as the Tourism-Led Growth Hypothesis (TLGH). Our case study of Brazil can also be taken as a particular test for such hypothesis. In our twofold empirical exercise, two different econometric methodologies are applied to two distinct data sets showing, among other things, that results are independent of either data or methodology. On the one hand, annual data from 1965 to 2007 for Brazil as a whole are used for a cointegration analysis to look for the existence of a long-run relationship among variables of economic growth, international tourism earnings and the real exchange rate. The relationship among the variables that we find, can be considered as weakly exogenous, but the test does not support Granger-causality. On the other hand, high quality data for the 27 Brazilian states though for a shorter period, from 1990-2005, allows for the use of the dynamic panel data model proposed by Arellano and Bond (1991). We show that the long-run elasticities between real per capita GDP with respect to tourism receipts and the real rate of exchange are 0.13 and 0.30, respectively. Finally, we compare our results with similar studies also investigating the TLGH showing a relationship between the value of the elasticity of per capita GDP with respect to tourism and the levels of development of tourism in each particular country.

Tourism, residents’ attitudes and perceived carrying capacity with an experimental study in five Tuscan destinations

This paper starts from the idea that tourism is an encounter of at least two non-homogeneous populations: residents and tourists. Their interaction may trigger conflicts and a population dynamics whose results are difficult to foresee. It follows that the sustainability of tourism depends simultaneously upon the sustainable use of local resources and the minimisation of the costs of conflict between the populations involved. The latter also depend on attitudes and perceptions that distinct groups of residents have toward tourism and other groups in their community. This issue is investigated within the tourism carrying capacity framework. The paper analyses both theoretically and empirically the likely outcomes of conflicts between distinct groups of residents. It presents and discusses the results of a research carried out in five famous tourist destinations in Tuscany, with a high number of tourists and seasonality of tourist flows. The main goals are to analyse how distinct groups of residents, characterised by different levels of involvement in tourism-related activities, perceive the tourism phenomenon, and to check whether there exists a latent or potential ground for conflicts between groups of residents. Contrary to expectations, the results portray communities with a high level of social acceptability toward tourism and an apparent lack of current conflict.

Dynamics of Industrial Sectors and Structural Change in the Austrian and Italian Economies, 1970–1989

There is a general agreement that changes of major momentum have being taking place in a variety of ways in the last twenty years in all European countries (and elsewhere) and more are anticipated. Such changes involve economic and institutional-political levels, and raise the question as to how to monitor them in the future in order to control processes towards desired policy targets (e.g. cohesion in the European unification is one of the major concerns of EC). To achieve this we need to devise and implement suitable industrial, sectoral and regional policies, and to design institutions as appropriate environments for a complex process of change which is taking place in an increasingly uncertain context.

Coding Economic Dynamics to Represent Regime Dynamics

In this paper a new approach to the analysis of the dynamics of economies is presented; applications to time series will also be suggested. In such applications, computational experiments may play a central role to provide a different heuristics and to explore data information. The approach is based upon ideas emerging in the literature on complex and chaotic dynamics, which imply that one can no longer rely on the fine description of classical dynamical systems: the state space structure breaks down, and instead of simple orbits, we should be satisfied with a description based upon symbolic trajectories, each symbol being associated with a partition of the original state space. Such partition can be induced by the introduction of the qualitative notion of regimes and of regime dynamics as a dynamics allowing for regime shifts. It can otherwise be suggested by preliminary data screening. Starting from a pre-set model, a regime is a set of dynamical paths generated by the same ?canonical model? with parameters. By identifying bifurcation values in the parameter space, one can classify a finite collection of realizations of such canonical model. A symbolic dynamical model reproduces dynamics across such sets of realisations, and can be tested against available empirical data. A preliminary exploration of some simple models yielding a finite (low-)number of regimes with a complex cross-regimes dynamics is presented, to motivate the move towards a discrete space dynamics and as a step towards the building of a general approach to multidimensional dynamical models.

Harrodian Macrodynamics in Generalized Coordinates

As a pupil of Harrod, R.M. Goodwin saw the blossoming of macroeconomic dynamics as a theory of disequilibrium. He paid very little attention to von Neumann and did not think much of the growth model that goes under this name. This attitude, he now explains, resulted from the fact that joint production, of one the major methodological innovations introduced by von Neumann, appeared (and still now appears) to him as an abstruse way of dealing with fixed capital.

An Alternative View of the Convergence Issue of Growth Empirics

In this paper we study the dynamics of economic growth for 140 countries during the period 1951-2003. The variables representing economic performance are levels and growth rates of per capita GDP. Using the concept of economic regime, we introduce a notion of distance between the dynamical paths of distinct countries. Then, a Minimal Spanning Tree and a Hierarchical Tree are constructed from time series to help detecting the existence of groups of countries sharing similar economic performance. The two main clusters that are identified over the whole time interval, can be interpreted as two groups of countries with high and low performance, respectively. The evolution of such clusters shows three main stylized facts: certain countries move across clusters; the high performance cluster tends to span its dimension, while the low performance one tends to be (more) compact; the distance between the two groups increases with time.