Zwanzig Jahre nach dem Mauerfall - Konvergenz in Deutschland?

Abstract

Zwanzig Jahre nach dem Fall der Mauer ist die wirtschaftliche Integration Ostdeutschlands nicht erreicht. Trotz zahlreicher wirtschafts-und strukturpolitischer Maßnahmen sind die Unterschiede in der wirtschaftlichen Leistungsfähigkeit zwischen Ost-und Westdeutschland nach wie vor beachtlich. Insbesondere die hohen Wachstumszahlen zu Beginn der neunziger Jahre ließen anfänglich viele Politiker darauf hoffen, dass der wirtschaftliche Anschluss Ostdeutschlands schnell erreicht wird. Umso überraschender ist es, dass sich seit einigen Jahren die Wachstumsraten zwischen ost-und westdeutschen Bundesländern kaum mehr unterscheiden, obwohl das ostdeutsche BIP pro Kopf noch deutlich unter dem westdeutschen Niveau liegt. Ziel dieses Beitrags ist es, zu zeigen, ob eine baldige Konvergenz zwischen Ost-und Westdeutschland zu erwarten ist.

Economic Cycles, Crises, and the Global Periphery

“…We establish empirical comparisons between the effects of the 1929 and 2008 depressions, and fi nally highlight the issue of economic convergence and disaster cycles in the work of neo-classical contemporary economics (Barro & Ursúa, 2008 ;Jaeger & Springler, 2012 ;Mankiw, Romer, & Weil, 1992 ; see also Barro, 2012 ;Berthold & Kullas, 2009 ;Gennaioli, La Porta, Lopez-de-Silanes, & Shleifer, 2014 ). We also highlight the relationship of the Barro "economic disaster cycle" and the Kondratieff cycle.…”

“…According to the "law of convergence," mentioned by Barro, inter alia, in Barro ( 2012 ), under certain conditions countries tend to eliminate gaps in levels of real per capita GDP at a rate around 2 % per year. Convergence at a 2 % rate implies that it takes 35 years for half of an initial gap to vanish and 115 years for 90 % of the gap to disappear (see also : Berthold & Kullas, 2009 ;Gennaioli, La Porta, Lopez-deSilanes, & Shleifer, 2014 ). But as we will show in this chapter, the countries of the world experience-more often than not-dramatic implosions of their once so successful development path, as shown in Electronic Appendix Graph 7a to Electronic Appendix Graph 7f.…”

“…We already said (in Chapter 4 ) that according to the " law of convergence ," mentioned by Barro, inter alia, in Barro ( 2012 ), under certain circumstances countries tend to eliminate gaps in levels of real per capita GDP at a rate around 2 % per year. A convergence at a 2 % rate implies that it takes 35 years for half of an initial gap to vanish and 115 years for 90 % of the gap to disappear (see also : Berthold & Kullas, 2009 ;Gennaioli, La Porta, Lopez-de-Silanes, & Shleifer 2014 ). Electronic Appendix Graph 26a now portrays on the basis of World Bank data 37 the convergence paths as they should have happened in the countries whose per capita income was below the "world average" since 1963.…”

Real and Financial Asymmetries in the Euro Area

“…Empirical applications of equation (5.1) include both crosssection and panel analyses. For Germany, Berthold and Kullas (2009), Boltho et al (2018) and Maseland (2014) use a cross-section approach, while extend the analysis to panel estimation, for example.…”

“…Applications of equation (5.1) to Germany vary in the choice of convergence indicators and levels of regional data aggregation. The two most popular convergence indicators (Eltges, 2013) are GDP per capita (Boltho et al, 2018; and GDP per effective unit of labour (Alecke et al, 2013;Berthold and Kullas, 2009;Kubis and Schneider, 2009). Maseland ( 2014 2009) and Maseland (2014) find unconditional convergence, but the results are not always robust to the inclusion of additional explanatory variables.…”