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The paper deals with the monetary policy of the European Central Bank and its effects on economic development of the Czech economy and other new members of EU from the perspective of Post-Keynesian monetary economics. In the first part the basic principles of contemporary Post-Keynesian monetary theory of relative endogeneity of money are shortly presented. The second part concentrates on the Post-Keynesian criticism of the institutional arrangement of the ECB and its monetary policy. The closing part treats issues concerning potential effects of the policy of ECB in the given institutional framework on economic development of the Czech economy and economies of other less developed members of EU after joining the Eurozone. Possible adverse effects on the process of real convergence are discussed and alternative policies eliminating this danger are presented.

The article is concerned with the influence that the German historical school had on the Czech economic thought. There is analysed life and work of four most important representatives of the Czech economic thought in 19th century. It is shown that František Chleborad distanced from the German school because of patriotic feelings, on the other hand, Josef Kaizl was an enthusiastic adherent of the German school. Albín Bráf attempted to make a compromise between the German's tradition and the Austrian's one. Jan Koloušek rehabilitated the German approach when he criticized the Austrian school. In each case, without knowledge about the German historical school, understanding of the development of the Czech economic thought would stay limited and uncompleted.

What is the role of entrepreneurship in economic development from the perspective of neo-Austrian and new institutional economics and what is the difference between these approaches? Neo-Austrian economists claim that economic development is caused by entrepreneurial discovery. New institutional economists argue that structure of incentives determined by the institutional environment provides a guideline for entrepreneurial decision-making. Hence, an institutional environment that rewards rent-seeking does not provide opportunities for economic development. In this paper we offer a comparison of these approaches to show that both entrepreneurial discovery and institutional environment are closely related. Moreover, with the comparison we demonstrate that entrepreneurial decision-making plays more important role in economic development when an institutional change is taken into account.

Economic growth of the Czech Republic strongly accelerated in the years 2005-2007. Substantial decline of economic activity took place at the end of 2008 and in the year 2009. On the supply side the main contributing factors were labour and total factor productivity. On the demand side the growth was pulled by domestic demand and the contribution of foreign trade became positive in the years 2004-2008. Macroeconomic stability improved substantially in the field of foreign trade. The process of real convergence accelerated in the years 2001-2007 and was based on the growth of labour productivity. In 2008 the GDP per capita in purchasing power standards reached 80 % of the EU-27 average. The comparative price level grew quickly from the low starting level, but was far below the relative economic level compared with EU-15. In 2008 a great jump in CPL took place (from 59 % in 2007 to 67 % in 2008 in relation to EU-15).

In this paper I am trying to provide the reader with a brief overview of contemporary discussion about recently frequently mentioned topic of economics and happiness. In the last few years the number of publications related to happiness from the economic perspective growth exponentially. As the importance of this topic seems to grow significantly, I modestly intend to provide Czech public with a very starting reference point for further research in this field. In the first part I sum up the basic terms of subjective well-being and Easterlin paradox and give an overview of the most striking empirical observations. The second part shortly describes approach to the happiness problem of selected key historical personalities, namely Aristotle, Smith and Genovesi. In the third part I outline present key challenge for the economic theory - tackling with the reciprocity phenomenon.

Enviable strategic objective of Czech business sphere is to increase competitiveness. There is a long term task which major objective is to participate in this problematic. Its first part, empiric research and descriptive analysis of competitiveness of Czech organizations, are discussed in this article. First of all theoretical and methodical background is characterized, especially definition of terminology, systemic approach, conditions of relevant corporate environment and concepts of management of knowledge organization. Basic objective of assignment is to get relevant information from real environment of wide spectrum of our entrepreneur subjects and use them for analysis of system of management of Czech organization, especially from the point of view of systemic approach, level of interrelations and logic links - synergy. Competitiveness of Czech organizations is analyzed on the sample of 348 Czech organizations in time horizon 2002-2007. Final generalizations will be used as a background for work in next phases.

The authors present an analysis of the most recent trends in the Czech economy. They claim that the economy is going through a turning point in its development: after two years of a decline, the economy is likely to grow again in 2000. The growth will be driven mainly by exports, followed by private household consumption. The authors expect that Czech exports will be positively influenced by an accelerating growth in the EU, but not to such an extent to compensate fully for the increase of Czech domestic demand. The imbalance of the current account will be covered with the record inflow of foreign direct investment in 2000. The authors also analyse the recent monetary policy and predict the development of inflation in the Czech Republic. They expect inflation to accelerate slightly again in 2000, but the Central Bank is still likely to undershoot its target for 2000.

This article focuses on common and different attributes of education and health from economic and social perspective. Education and health are not usually analyzed together so this could be considered to be an innovative approach. Article contains knowledge which reflects empirically known dependencies in the area of education and health determinants and relationships of education and health to human capital. It also emphasizes and argues for the importance of lifelong learning and availability of high-quality health care as economic development prerequisites. While the education and health is by its own nature bound to an individual and its investments, the question of equal chances to educate and consume health care is highly important in the modern society. Based on the identified attributes and relationships of education and health, the article shows their economic characteristic, social aspects and summarizes their importance for the economic development.

The paper is focused on the disputation with Mojmir Hajek on the field of the measurement of the total factor productivity index. We point out the interpretation obstacles connected to this measurement and its results at a level of the whole economy as well as of its industries. We also refer to the sensitivity of the analysis on the methodology used and bring up the alternative computations based on the methodology recommended by ESA 95 standard. Comparing these alternative approaches, it is obvious that the analysis is sensitive both on the later data revisions and on the indicators of input as well. In this case, the differences on the average annual growth of the total factor productivity can reach almost four percentage points. We also point out the difficulty of the contribution analysis of growth while chain-linked data are used.

We predict that GDP will grow 1.5 % in 2000 after falling 0.2 % in 1999. Sluggish growth in 2000 will be driven by domestic demand, namely fixed investment. Interest rates set by the CNB are now in a "parking zone". Two-week repo rate remains at 5.25 %. We do not expect any significant (upward) changes during the course of this year. We expected average annual inflation (CPI) to increase to 3.8 % in 2000. Unemployment will rise to 10.8 % (at yearend) and employment will decline by 2 %. Real wages will grow by modest 1.6 %. We predict that the trade gap will widen to CZK 85 bil. and the current account deficit will comprise some 2.4 % of GDP in 2000. The CZK against the euro will be more or less nominally stagnant.

Total factor productivity is defined as a relation of product to total factor inputs. Its growth is result of qualitative changes, i.e. intensive factors of growth. For measurement of total factor inputs is used production function with two factors, labor and capital (extensive factors). The paper shows the possibility of direct measurement of total factor productivity. Further, there are derived dynamic parameters which measure the share of intensive and extensive factors in economic growth. They also include the case of fall of product and counter (opposite) changes of growth factors. Average annual growth of real GDP of the Czech Republic between periods 1995-2000 and 2001-2007 accelerated from 1.5 % to 4.5 %. Total factor productivity increased from 1.1% to 3.5 % and was the main factor of this acceleration. Dynamic parameter of intensity in the period of slower growth 1995-2000 shows, that the share of intensive factors was 74 %, while in the period of stronger growth 2001-2007 was 78 % (parameter of extensity was 26 % and 22 % respectively).

The aim of the article is to answer the question if the Czech stock market price dynamics is generated by non-linear deterministic dynamic process. To solve this complex problem requires using sophisticated computational operations to analyze huge amount of data input. To overcome this obstacle the visual recurrence analysis is applied in this article. This method enables visualization of the state space reconstructed from a time series in the so called recurrent plot. Further, it quantifies various geometric structures occurred in recurrent plots and gives us more exact information about the nature of the underlying process generating the time series. This analysis is then applied to the most liquid stock returns and the Czech stock market index PX series

The paper presents the evolution of the role of land in the economic thought. Land is a rare space for location of producing activities, living and others. The article points out main ideas and approaches from the very beginning of economic literature till nowadays, having used many citations of the authors. The main concern in the article is given to the land rent. The terms of differential rent, monopoly rent or bid rent and bid price curves are explained. Models of monocentric city by Thünen and Alonso are described in details.

In this paper we discuss the issue of the choice of exchange rate regimes in transitive economies and the effect of exchange rate policy on the development of macroeconomic indicators (e. g. the average growth rate of real GDP in domestic currency and the development of domestic inflation). It is obvious that exchange rate policy is not a passive factor, at least in the medium term. Our analysis indicates that the fixed foreign exchange rate arrangements policy does not necessarily mean stability of the foreign exchange rates. Neither percentage exchange rate changes of fixed rates, nor their volatility measured by the standard deviation are lower than the average change is over the examined period. Our analysis indicates also that the inflation rate is growing in accordance with the growth of depreciation of the foreign exchange rate and the growth of its volatility measured by the standard deviation. It was cleared that the higher volatility of the effective nominal exchange rate is reflected by the lower average economic growth rate of transitive countries.

This paper analyses various approaches to dealing with problematic assets of the banking sector. These approaches include the establishment of an asset management company, capital injection and sale of the bank, purchase and assumption transactions, liquidation or bridge bank. All these approaches are evaluated with respect to Czech transformation experience and with respect to experience of other foreign countries. The paper concludes that the establishment of Czech Consolidation Agency (Czech Consolidation Bank, respectively) was the least suitable approach to dealing with problematic assets in the Czech banking sector during the period of the transformation. The paper furthermore suggests that other methods, such as the liquidation accompanied with deposit insurance payments, publicly assisted mergers and acquisitions, or finally privately or publicly assisted purchase and assumption transactions should have been used instead. The knowledge of these alternative approaches to weak-bank restructuring is supposed to guarantee that Czech authorities will not step up to establish a similar inefficient asset management company, should banking-sector problems emerge once again.

The Czech Republic has introduced new energy taxation in connection with implementation of the directive 2003/96/EC, restructuring the Community framework for the taxation of energy products and electricity. New energy taxes are imposed on electricity, solid fuels and natural gas, with term of initiation on 1st January 2008. This paper discusses impact of new energy taxation on sectors NACE in the Czech Republic, particularly on prices of production. I have created the simple short-term price model for the Czech Republic, which is based on input-output methodology by Leontief. The paper is divided into six parts. The first part is introduction, where are formulated both the main target of the paper and two hypotheses for testing. The theoretical problems, which are connected with the impact of taxation and tax incidence, are discussed in the second part. The third part describes possibilities of analysing and modelling in the area of changes of tax system and tax rates. In the fourth part I describe the methodology and then I am creating the short-term price model for the Czech Republic. The next part consists of the main results, emerged from the price model and the two hypothesis testing, with focus on energy intensive sectors of NACE. The last part, conclusion, summarizes the main results and formulates the possibilities of additional research in energy taxation area.

The paper works with assumptions, that the conclusions of mainstream approaches to the growth theory are problematical; there are alternative social-economic approaches to the theory of economic growth that offer more plausible explanations of the fundamental economic questions than the traditional views; both social-economic lines of thought and social-economic approaches to the growth theory are not systematized. Considering of these matters, the main aim of this paper is to propose original classification of contemporary social-economic approaches to the growth theory and consecutively to characterize these classified approaches. Two partial streams within the social-economic approaches to the growth theory based on formal conception of institutions (the approach primarily emphasizing the importance of political institutions, the approach primarily emphasizing the importance of economic institutions) have many common features (subjects, methodology, conclusions, exponents) and they together make prevailing stream of the contemporary social-economic growth theory. The growth theory of the new institutional economics based on the North's path dependency concept is still less profiled. This approach really accepts the conception of institutions of Douglas North.

In the last years there has been a growing discrepancy between gross domestic product and gross disposable income (more than a double of government budget deficit in 2006)in favour of non-residents. The difference between the real interest rate and the rate of growth of GDP has been negative in 2000-2006 and is expected to be negative in the near future suggesting that even a small deficit in primary budget balance can stabilize the debt ratio (30 % of GDP). But in a world of uncertainty even in the Czech republic the capital sector is on net a spout and not a sink (the profit rate has been higher than the investment rate in 1995-2008). Hence the czech economy seems to be dynamically efficient and an increase in national saving is necessary.

The spatial and regional analysis has a long tradition but until very recently the mainstream economics has not given careful attention to space. This article surveys recent contributions on the spatial or regional economics, which often overlaps with urban economics. As this literature is very heterogeneous, we use the concept of spatial externalities as the common criterion for the basic classification of the studies. The pecuniary externalities, which are by-product of the market transactions, became the cornerstone of the New Economic Geography (NEG) introduced by Krugman. NEG is presently the dominant theory in the economics of space as it builds on robust microeconomic foundations. Yet its empirical verification is at the very beginning. On the contrary the technological externalities are believed to arise rather spontaneously because of the physical proximity rather then intentional economic transactions. The existing research on these externalities is predominately empiric. Meanwhile the human capital externalities are example of static technological externalities; the related externalities of labour pooling are of pecuniary nature. Finally, the knowledge externalities or spillovers are pure technological externalities. There are three main strands of literature that employ this concept: studies on local economic growth, empirical studies on the localized knowledge spillovers (part of it known as spatial econometrics) and Italian New Industrial Geography. Many of the studies give important insight on the formation of economic space but all lacks generality. For this reason it would be vital in the future to extent the studies that they could deal with different kinds of spatial externalities and directly compare their individual importance in territory.

The article contains Komerční banka's analysis of the Czech economy. The authors conclude that the economy goes through a classical recession, caused by the joint working of the following main factors: waves in firms' and households' investment, volatility of foreign capital, stabilization policy mismanagement, and a credit cycle. An important part of the recession was a result of the restrictive monetary and fiscal policy of 1997, which had an impact on the economy with a one-year lag. The authors conclude that a slight recovery of demand will not come earlier than in the second half of 1999, and that it will be driven mainly by the revival of real household incomes.

This paper attempts to contribute to the analysis of links between state aid and competitiveness of manufacturing industries during 1998-2002. Statistical source on subsidies include all subsidies to capital gathered on enterprise level by Czech Statistical Office. The enterprise data have been aggregated by economic activity on 3digit level and competitiveness was defined as adjusted market shares of 3digit industries. Competitiveness on domestic markets is defined as the share of industry output sold on domestic market on the total domestic demand and competitiveness on the European market is defined as the share of industry export to EU market on the total European demand. In the first step we described subsidies to manufacturing industries and we aimed to answer the question what industries get the subsidies. In the second step we identified competitive industries on domestic and foreign markets. In the core part we analyzed links between subsidies and competitiveness of manufacturing industries in both static as well as dynamic perspective based on correlations. Our analysis confirmed that state subsidies are allocated to industries that have a strong position on the domestic markets and that state subsidies are not related to the competitiveness improvement.

The paper examines the sources of economic growth in the ten new member states of the European Union (EU-10) and in previous member states (EU-15) as a whole. Special attention is devoted to the Czech republic, both from macroeconomic point of view and from the view of nine industries. For the analyses is used growth accounting method, where factors of production are labour, capital and total factor productivity. With the exception of the Czech Republic and EU-15 the reconstruction of capital stock was needed. We have used perpetual inventory method. The analyses has shown, that the main factor of economic growth in EU-10 was total factor productivity, mainly in the Baltic states. In the Czech Republic the main driving force of macroeconomic total factor productivity was manufacturing industry. The fast growing total factor productivity in EU-10 was the main factor of convergence to EU-15.

The article analyses the influence of the undervalued rate of depreciation of the investment property, resulting from the Czech tax legislation, on the inflation, economic structure and economic growth. In this connection, the article also tries to analyse the high gross investment rate in money terms in the Czech Republic.
The analysis results in suggestions regarding a possible change both in the depreciation policy and the policies seen as potentially capable of increasing the savings rate in the Czech Republic. The proposals aim at the modification of the tax system.

In the paper we analyze economic university research and education in transition countries. University system differs from industry in the nature of output that it produces. University system is engaged in production of public goods rather than private goods. The sector also suffers from the measurement problem of quality of its output. We argue that because of these factors reforms were slower in this sector leading to low productivity growth. Pressure groups succeeded in gaining significant control inside administrative structures regulating the sector. By creating the accreditation commission the state decreases the communication cost of pressure groups making lobbing activity cheaper. A case study from the Czech Republic and Slovakia shows that the accreditation commission which is composed from representatives of state universities and established research institutes succeeded in maintaining their dominant position and set evaluation criteria fitting their interests. This institutional setting led to low university research productivity. The results also show that in Slovakia economic research is still predominantly carried out by central research institutes and universities are engaged mainly in teaching.

The article contributes to the growing body of literature dealing with the bibliometric evaluation of the Czech economic research. In particular, this article introduces a recently invented measure of both the scientific output and impact - the Hirsch index (h) - into the Czech academic economics. While the theoretical part of the article contains a discussion of the strenghts and weaknesses of the Hirsch approach, the empirical part presents two original top50s of the Czech economists ranked by their individual h's. The first of our charts comes from the Web of Science's General Search dataset, and the second one reflects the use of the Web of Science's Cited Reference Search dataset. Both datasets cover the 1980-2006 period. It appears that the rate of correspondence among the top 25 economists in each chart and the top25 of the celebrated Turnovec's citation-based ranking (2005) amounts to 60%. In addition, our empirical results reveal that the elite Czech economists attain h's being 3-10 times lower than the h's of the foreign academic "superstars".

The economic development of the Czech Republic and Slovakia after the split of former Czechoslovakia in 1993 shows some important differences, caused by different economic policy and the starting level. The convergence of the Slovak economic level to the Czech one was very fast after the World War II, due to the massive reallocation of resources (the transfer of resources in favour of Slovakia represented 11 % of the Slovak GDP). The Slovak economy adjusted to the lower economic level after the split by sinking real wages and by depreciation of the Slovak koruna, so that the ULC are now the lowest among the Central European countries. Slovakia enjoyed very fast growth of GDP in recent years fluctuating from 7 to 10 %, while in the Czech Republic it reached from 6 to 7 %. The abundant inflow of FDI and economic reforms helped to speed the real convergence in Slovakia, which continued fluently after a deep fall accompanying the split of Czechoslovakia. In 2007, the Slovak GDP per capita measured in PPS reached 84 % of the Czech one. The common challenge for both economies is to overcome the one-sided orientation on cost/price competitiveness based on low wages and pass over to the qualitative competitive advantage, based on the innovations and production of high quality goods and services.

The paper presents the evolution of the natural monopoly term in the economic literature. Using the citations of the authors the article shows various approaches to the natural monopoly concept from the very beginning till nowadays. The definition of natural monopoly has been changing over time and even today there is not the only one view used widespread.

Economic growth of the Czech Republic differed strongly in two periods: 2001-2003 and 2004-2006. While in the first period the average annual rate of growth of GDP reached only 2,7 %, in the second period the growth accelerated to 5,7 %. The economic growth measured by the indicators of real income (namely of real gross domestic income) was faster. This was caused by positive contribution of the terms of trade. On the supply side the main contributing factors were labour and total factor productivity. On the demand side the growth was pulled by domestic demand which grew in the period 2001-2003 even faster than GDP. The contribution of foreign trade becomes positive in the years 2004-2006 with very strong contribution in the year 2005. Macroeconomic stability of the Czech economy improved substantially in the field of foreign trade. The trade balance becomes positive from the year 2004 and growing imbalance persists in the balance of income. The negative gap between savings and investments is caused mainly by households and general government. The process of real convergence accelerated in the years 2000-2006 and was based on the growth of labour and total factor productivity. In 2006 the GDP per capita in purchasing power standards reached almost 80 % of the average level in EU-27. The comparative price level of the Czech Republic in this year reached only 61 % despite accelerated process of catching-up.

The theory "corporate social responsibility" (CSR) is characterized in the paper. The paper expresses the authors' opinion, that CSR as a mere proclamation of necessity of the firms' ethic behavior does not enforce this into praxis. The internal economic motivation to CSR is the necessary condition for firms to invest in CSR. The necessary conditions for such motivation are than formulated.

The personality and economic theory of Albín Bráf (1851-1912), professor of political economy at the Prague university, were milestones in the development of Czech economic thought.He started lecturing at the university in the Czech language (1877), and he defined the subject-matter of political economy, methods and relations between the disciplines. He adopted a new approach to the relationship between national-economy theory and economic policy. He devised a concept of the "Czech national-economy revival" on the basis of this approach as a vision addressing the ripe social and economic problems of the Czech society. Albín Bráf won over the whole generation of Czech economists by his concept. The dissemination of his ideas was facilitated by his pedagogic mastery on the ground of Charles University and Institute of Technology in Prague. His legacy was promoted, among others, by Cyril Horáček (1862-1943) and Josef Gruber (1865-1925), Albín Bráf's successors at the Prague university.