Browsing by Author "Helmy, Heba E"

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Cities and development
(Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd, 2023-11) Helmy, Heba E
Urbanization is becoming the world’s mega-trend, but it has been accompanied by increasing or persistent inequalities. While many social scientists have, therefore, advocated rural development, mainstream urban economists have viewed these trends as both natural and temporary, suggesting that, in the process of development, inequalities first rise, plateau, and then decline with more and more urbanization. Bearing in mind the disparities in the causes and effects of urbanization in the Global North and the Global South, this chapter revisits the urbanization and development debate. It does so by focusing on the urban-urban income gap, both in the Global North and in the Global South. The focus, then, is mainly on the evolution of poverty and inequality among cities, thereby excluding all other crucial problems that have an urban dimension, such as conflict and environmental damage as being out of the scope of this chapter. Will the current trend in urbanization lead to a convergence of urban incomes? By empirically estimating the current levels and patterns of long-term income inequalities, the chapter shows that it is not cities, but their form, economic structure, and institutions that shape the distribution of their wealth.
The external debt-inflation nexus in Egypt
(Wiely, 2021-12) Helmy, Heba E
Egypt has a long history with external financing dating back to the 19th century. Nevertheless, Egypt's external debt has been mounting remarkably in the past few years. This paper examines the impact of Egypt's external debt on its price level, a topic ignored by researchers. Nonetheless, as inflation is a hydra-headed problem, this paper develops several models which incorporate fiscal and monetary policies besides other inflation-inducing internal and external factors using monthly data extending from 2000M1 to 2020 M1. By employing ARDL cointegration analyses on monthly time series variables and using Egypt's wholesale price index to account for inflation, the paper concludes that external debt raises prices both in the short and long runs. Moreover, money supply and interest rate were also found to increase prices in the long run long despite decreasing them in the short run. Finally, upsurges in the international prices of primary products stimulate domestic prices both in the short and long terms, while depreciation in the local currency aggravates inflation in the short and long terms as well. As external debt raises inflation and affects many other inflation-inducing factors indirectly, the paper concludes that reducing Egypt's external debt may help in curbing Egypt's inflation
New Estimates of the Economic Independence Index: Is Economic Independence Necessary for Sustaining Economic Growth?
(Taylor and Francis Ltd., 2022-10) Helmy, Heba E
Is economic independence necessary for sustaining economic growth? In the past, political—and therefore economic—independence was a prelude to economic growth. With most countries gaining their political independence in the twentieth century, countries’ economic independence was understated assuming its existence with the end of colonialism. Yet economic independence began to be increasingly circumscribed by measures and pressures imposed by the more powerful countries, multinational corporations and international organizations on the less powerful countries. Due to the rising importance of economic independence, the first composite index to quantify it, with its two versions EII-1 and EII-2, was published in 2017 and estimated values for economic independence for some selected countries for the period 2010–2013. This study aims to measure the levels of economic independence for 104 of these selected countries for the period 2014–2019 using the 2017 index, and compare the countries’ scores in the two periods. The Russian Federation topped the two indexes making it without dispute the strongest economically independent country. As economic growth proved to be contingent on real economic independence, countries may need to assess their vulnerability or resilience to external economic shocks through their new scores in the EII in order to sustain economic growth. © 2022, Journal of Economic Issues / Association for Evolutionary Economics.