Improvement On Traditional Input-output Analysis

The title of this dissertation is Improvement on Traditional Input-output (IO) Analysis. The gist can be concluded as follows: Improve traditional IO analysis by using information technology.The IO analysis is a comprehensive research method. It draws on the theory of general equilibrium, the core of which is that economic activities are interlinked, and which analyzes technical economic relevancy among economic sectors. It describes the process that products and services flow among economic sectors in an area. It also sets up a virtual reality economic mathematical model to reflect the process of social reproduction of the national economic system, by drawing up an IO table and establishing a corresponding system of linear algebraic equations. The most prominent feature of the IO analysis is that it put the experience reality into"the empty economic theoretical box". This kind of research method that combines theoretical study and empirical study are highly respected by Western economists so that it is widely used in solving many important economic problems. At the same time, the UN recommends its member states to take the IO analysis as an integral part of System of National Accounts.The IO model, by its very nature, is an information system that reflects the operation of national economy. Besides the factor of design, the quality of the information system is determined by the quality of its reference data. There are three pieces of standards that measure the quality of reference data, namely accuracy, range and efficiency. However, with the frequency of economic activities and the expansion of economy scale, the problem of low efficiency that traditional IO analysis reveals has seriously affected the quality of reference data, as well as the ability of solving real economic problems. Therefore, it has become an urgent and important issue to improve the IO analysis, to improve the data quality and to enhance the ability of solving practical problems. And it is a serious issue which is related to the survival and development of the IO analysis.The problem of low efficiency of the IO analysis is essentially a problem of man. The traditional manual way has been unable to keep up with the pace of the information economy time. It must be changed. Otherwise, the IO analysis will be possibly eliminated in the future. It is mainly by introducing advanced information technology to change the backward manual way to advanced automated way, so as to achieve the goal of improving the traditional IO analysis. The improvement is mainly in two fields. One is technical means, the other is institutional arrangements. Around this issue, the dissertation is divided into seven chapters.Chapter one, introduction. The IO analysis is an important method to study industrial structure and industry relevancy. The background and reason why I focus on industrial structure and industry relevancy are that industrial structure has the necessity to adjust. The necessity is reflected in the intrinsic relation between industrial structure and economic aggregate. That is, industrial structure adjustment and economic aggregate growth are mutual related tightly, which are two important indispensable factors to the scientific economic development. And that is to say, scientific economic development is neither separable from economic aggregate growth, nor from industrial structure adjustment. What's more, the IO analysis is the most appropriate method to study industrial structure and industry relevancy. The prime merit of it is to reveal the economic relevancy among economic sectors, which is also the core economic thought of the IO analysis. Meanwhile, comparing with other research methods that study industrial structure, the IO analysis has a special advantage. It combines micro-economic survey and macro-economic research, combines theoretical analysis and empirical measurement, and is able to reveal the intrinsic relation between industrial structure and economic aggregate effectively. In short, it is a comprehensive research method that combines theoretical study and empirical study. These are shown in the theory and application development of the IO analysis. Therefore, it is of great significance to study the IO analysis.Chapter two, summary. Summary is divided into three parts. The first part is the origins of the economic thought of the IO analysis. I mainly focus on what those splendid economic thoughts are that the IO analysis inherits, and how these ideas evolve and ultimately infuse into the IO analysis. These economic thoughts that form the unique core of the IO analysis are kept in my mind and never given up. They are also the core of the improved informationized IO analysis. The second part is the theory of the IO analysis. The whole theory can be divided into three important parts as follows: the IO survey, the IO compilation and the IO model. The third part is the development of the IO analysis, which includes theory development and application development. As for the former, I focus on the reason and the ideas of the improvement. As for the latter, I focus on the evolution of the economic thought, and the application.Chapter three, discussion on the problems of the traditional IO analysis. Because there are problems and shortcomings in the traditional IO analysis, they greatly reduce the application value of the IO analysis. Thus, I will focus on these problems and shortcomings. Specifically, they are existed in the IO survey, the IO compilation and the IO model, and are expressed as low data quality, ambiguous structural nature, and contradictive basic assumptions. These are disadvantages to the application of the IO analysis. Therefore, we must analyze these problems and shortcomings. First, in my opinion, measured by the standards of accuracy, range and efficiency, the data quality is not high because of the restriction of cost. Meanwhile, the cost is influenced by two major factors, man and institution. Hence, if we want to reduce the cost of the IO survey and assure the quality of reference data effectively at the same time, we have to change the present institutional arrangements, so as to minimize the interference of man. Second, in my opinion, the reason why the nature of IO structure is ambiguous is that there contain two kinds of mutual exclusive data in the IO table. One kind has the nature of transaction but without technique. The other has the nature of technique but without transaction. So, if we want to draw up an IO table that reflects the activities of national economy, we must only use those data with the nature of transaction. Third, in my opinion, the reason why the basic assumptions of the IO model are contradictive is that the basic assumptions are not reasonable. The assumption of"pure sector"is not necessary. The differences of production technology should be permitted inner and outer sectors. Thus, if we want to assure the existence of the differences of production technology as well as the linear algebraic relation at the same time, we shall adopt two different units of measurement to draw up IO tables in order to realize the above two assurances. Basing on analyzing the problems and shortcomings, I try to use information technology to improve the traditional IO analysis, and found the informationized IO analysis.Chapter four, study on the improvement of the IO survey. The improvement on the IO survey is based on the trend that China gradually speeds up the pace of informationization process. In my opinion, first, we shall promote electronic transaction further. There is a typical characteristic of electronic transaction. That is, there is a particular and complete transaction record saved in the transaction database. We can use this record which contains transaction data as the source of the IO survey. Second, we shall build an automated data collection mechanism, so as to replace the traditional manual survey method. It requires two steps to build such a mechanism. One is to establish and promote a series of data standards. The other is to found a data collection and process center, where we will generate a system to collect, aggregate and analyze data. The direct benefit of the improvement is to improve efficiency and cut costs. Meanwhile, the automated collection way is able to minimize the factor of disturbance of man, so as to ensure the objectivity of data. It is certain that pure technical improvement is not enough. While introducing information technology, we need to improve the institutional arrangement of the IO survey properly in order to make sure that the new institutional arrangement gets along with the new information technology. After the qualitative improvement of the IO survey is achieved, we can successfully solve the problem that the data quality is greatly constrained by man and institution.Chapter five, innovation on the compilation of the IO table. The innovation on the compilation of the IO table is based on the informationized improvement on the IO survey. I will focus on explaining the principles and functions of data aggregation and table compilation of the data collection, aggregation and analysis system. It is worth emphasizing that, in drawing up input-output tables, I use a different kind of idea and process of compilation. The reason is that the IO survey is not enterprise-oriented, but market-oriented. Precisely, it is based on the market carrier, electronic trading platform. The most notable feature of this compilation method is that the classification of sectors is based on the category of trading subjects. Every trading subject can play two roles in the market, the supply subject and the demand subject respectively. And we can analyze the input direction and output direction according to the roles. In this way, we can draw up an IO table with equal rows and columns. On the other hand, as the objects of the IO survey are still enterprises, the market units, the consequence of the compilation is theoretically the same as the one using old compilation method. And then, I focus on discussing the characteristics of the new method and the old one in compilation. By comparing, I can prove that the innovation on the compilation of the IO table is reasonable.Chapter six, innovation on the analysis of the IO model. As I evolve the form of the IO table to some extent, abstracted from the IO table, there are some typical characteristics in the form of the IO model. The most typical is that the IO matrix is a non-negative square matrix. This means that the new IO model is completely different from the old one, and thus the solution is different, too. Then, with analyzing the IO model, I discuss about the three major effects which affect the national economic system. The three major effects are relevancy effect, equilibrium effect and diffusion effect, respectively. It is worth emphasizing that, the cores of three major effects are the same as those of Marx's principle of simple social reproduction, principle of resource allocation and principle of expanded social reproduction separately. Chapter seven, conclusion. After discussing about the informationized IO model and drawing some important conclusions, I get down to the empirical research on China's economic data and policies of recent years. Above this, I propose a series of academic ideas and policy recommendations. As for the latter, I mainly focus on the interrelation among policy measures and the general idea of policy implementation. Finally, I have to point out that the informationized IO analysis is still in the stage of theoretical innovation and improvement. This dissertation only discusses about the importance, the reason, the general idea and the preliminary theoretical exploration of the informationized IO analysis. There is still a broad study space in both fields of theoretical improvement and empirical application.The dissertation proposes a new method, informationized IO analysis, which uses information technology to study industrial structure and industry relevancy, basing on studying the improvement of the traditional IO analysis. This is the main point of innovation of this dissertation. And this dissertation only preliminarily studies the feasibility and rationality of this new method. I wish that, in the future, we can found an IO system to reflect the operation of the national economy precisely, roundly and synchronously by using information technology and innovating institutional arrangement, so as to provide scientific and logical reference for policy making and academic research.