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The aim of this paper is to apply the rules and principles of international trade in services - in formulation of the General Agreement on Trade in Services - in the rapidly developing sphere of environmental services. The paper characterizes the development and structure of environmental services, the dimension of the environmental market of EU countries and discusses shortcomings in the existing classification of environmental services. Special attention is devoted to the different forms of private sector participation in environmental service markets. The final part examines the export potential of environmental services in the Czech Republic and analyzes the main obstacles to the future development of this sphere.

Economic growth of the Czech Republic measured by GDP reached 3,4 % per annum in the decade 2001-2010 and was substantially faster than average annual growth of the European Union. Strong acceleration in the years 2005-2007 was followed by stagnation in the years 2008-2012 caused by strong decline of GDP in the year 2009 and milder recession in the year 2012. The modest recovery in the years 2010 and 2011 was pulled namely by foreign trade, while final consumption and gross fixed capital formation stagnated. Alternative indicator of national income was negatively influenced by growing outflow of primary incomes. Real gross domestic income indicates different results in comparison with gross domestic product because of changes in the terms of trade. Macroeconomic stability improved substantially in the field of foreign trade while general government deficit contributed to its deterioration.

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 most cases, the rules of the game in international trade are shaped by political economy, but this interplay is more noticeable in politically sensitive sectors such as agriculture. The balance between domestic political interests and the considerations concerning international relations changes over time in response to the joint action of a variety of factors, and this is mirrored in the multilateral trade regime governing this sector. Combining a broad set of empirical evidence available at the international level, this paper aims to capture the pattern of tariff and non-tariff protectionism in the global agricultural trade. The investigation leads to some stylized facts emerging from the selected data and provides interesting conclusions on the behaviour of governments in the equation of balancing domestic interests with the need for international collaboration. The pattern of protectionism in international trade in agricultural products is tariff--based, with a tendency towards softening of this protection in both developed and developing economies. Tariff protection is accompanied by a much lower level of non-tariff protection, where the most frequently used instrument is sanitary and phytosanitary standards, for reasons dictated partly by the specific nature of the sector.

The main topic of this article is the bilateral trade in value added between the USA and China. The goal is to look at this bilateral trade in the context of "the new wave of globalization". To fulfill this broadly specified goal the article tries to answer following questions: How much are the USA and China involved in global value chains (GVC)? What is the development of the classical bilateral trade using the balance of payments methodology? Where does the value added in exports come from (geographical structure)? Are there any differences between different industry sectors? One of the main findings is that domestic value added in trade between these two countries is relatively high (US almost 90%, China more than 80%). There was also a trend of stagnation in the United States and a volatility across most of the indicators in the case of China.

The article focuses on the relationship between the general government balance and the current account of the balance of payments. The aim is to summarize the existing knowledge about the relationship based on the twin deficit theory and to carry out an empirical verification. As part of the analysis, the Granger causality method is first applied to each EU country separately, and then the threshold panel regression method is used. For the subsequent estimation of the threshold panel model, the direction of the relationship from the general government balance to the current account is considered based on the results of Granger causality. Within the panel, the dependence of the balances on the level of the general government debt to GDP is tested. First, the relationship and its strength are verified in all EU countries. Due to the diversity of EU countries, the economies are subsequently aggregated into sub-panels. Threshold values for general government debt affecting the strength of the relationship between balances are different for individual panels and depend, among other things, on the perception of these countries by the financial markets and often also on the (high) indebtedness of the private sector, which usually requires a more drastic fiscal policy response.

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.

This study aims to investigate the relationship between service exports and productivity in 27 OECD countries by using a panel dataset for the years 1995-2018. In the theoretical context, this relationship is basically handled by the learning-by-exporting and self-selection mechanisms. Additionally, product life cycle and technological gap theories also have implications related to the export and productivity association. In the study, after detecting the cross-sectional dependence, the stationarity characteristics of the exports and productivity series were investigated by Pesaran's (2007) panel unit root tests. The findings of Westerlund (2007) panel co-integration test indicated that there is a long-run equilibrium relationship between service exports and productivity. Common correlated effects estimators also supported this finding and showed that productivity affects exports positively in both short and long run. Finally, Dumitrescu and Hurlin's (2012) heterogeneous panel causality tests showed that there is a unidirectional causal relationship running from productivity to service exports. The findings support the predictions of product life cycle theory and technological gap theory regarding the exports and productivity linkage and indicate the validity of the self-selection mechanism for OECD countries' service exports.

The sovereign debt crisis inside the European Monetary Union (EMU) as well as competitiveness problems of some EMU members made the members and non-members of the club address one question: Is a monetary union advantageous? This paper deals with the issue whether or not the Maastricht criteria are good indicators for deciding to join the eurozone, namely for a small open economy, as the Czech Republic. In particular, this analysis addresses the issue of price competition, which can be measured by the real effective exchange rate. In fact, the Maastricht criteria do not reflect the competitiveness of a country. Thus the arguments concerning the advantages/disadvantages of the adoption of a common currency should not be based only on the Maastricht criteria, but at first on the philosophy of the real effective exchange rate. We define a basis for setting new criteria to decideing on joining the monetary union. To sum up, if depreciation/devaluation of the real exchange rate is not a competitive advantage for both Czech exports and the Czech economy (especially in the long term), then the main economic argument against joining the EMU disappears.

Corporate Sector-Selected Aspects of Empirical Analysis of the EU Member States The paper attempts to shed light on selected problems of mainly non-fi nancial corporations of EU Member States in the period 1995-2013 (2014) using financial balance sheets (SNA, 2008). The relations between domestic sectors and non-residents have revealed that the Member States have been mainly debtors during the examined period. Having measured leverage (ratio of debt to GDP created in the sector of non-financial corporations) we have found out the increase of the ratio in the crisis period (2008-2013) in the sample of 17 member states. As concerns the ratio of debt to shares we have stressed the heterogeneity in the sample of 8 eurozone countries. The heterogeneity has been discovered also examining the role of trade credit as an alternative source of financing in the random effects model (panel analysis).

Reflection on Political Economy of Global Society Today Recently we could observe an accumulation of problems in the global society. Beeing more serious and complicated these problems have become a kind of the historical excess when all possibilities of the countinous development have been exhausted and consequently a crucial societal transformation must be done. This article deals with the reflection on the roots of the present political and economical problems and how to solve them. It demonstrates some theoretical conclusions of the articles published in the Political Economy in the previous ten years. Successively, the attention is paid to the most important works which illustrate the possibilities of a radical societal transformation from the different perspectives. To be concrete there are presented works of R. Richta (the 50th anniversary of his well - known work will be commemorated in 2016), of Francis Fukuyama (whose very optimistic original visions had to be reviewed later) and of S. Huntington (who focused on searching the causes of global conflicts in a broader context). Finally, it is proposed a new concept of solving problems - a transition to the society whose economy is based on the productive services which means on the services linked to the human capital in its three phases: gaining, preservation and realization. At the same time the barriers of this transition and possibilities how to overcome them are identified.

The aim of this paper is to specify the determinants from the real economy causing long-term disequilibrium in the trade balance. The analysis is carried out for all countries of the world for the period 1980-2016 (according to data availability) using panel and cross-sectional regression. We employ the absorption approach as the basic theoretical model. From the supply side of the economy, the main determinants are: export of primary resources, e.g. oil and gas, geographical factors and institutional quality of the economy. From the demand side of the economy, the trade balance is influenced mainly by the demographic structure of the population and its consumption, saving and investment habits in the context of life cycle hypothesis, marginal propensity to consume and the participation of the government sector in the economy (e.g. health care provision, social security, etc.).

Economic growth of the Czech Republic differed strongly in two periods: 1996-1999 and 2000-2004. While in the first period the economy was hit by the recession and the average annual rate of growth of GDP reached only 0,9 %, in the second period the growth accelerated to 3,2 %. 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 even faster than GDP. The contribution of foreign trade becomes positive in the year 2004 and mainly in 2005. Macroeconomic stability of the Czech economy improved substantially in the fields of inflation, monetary development and foreign trade. Imbalances persist in general government budget and on the current account of the balance of payment. The process of real convergence accelerated in the years 2000-2004 and was based on the growth of labour and total factor productivity. In 2004 the GDP per capita in purchasing power standards surpassed 70 % of the average level in EU-25. The comparative price level of the Czech Republic in this year reached only 53 % despite accelerated process of catching-up.

The paper uses Heckman correction to estimate gravity models of trade of the Czech and Slovak Republics for the period 1995-2012. Additionally, separate gravity models are estimated for 4-year panels of the period using Tobit method. The research shows that importance of common border for the countries' bilateral trade with third countries has been gradually declining. This is in line with accelerating globalization and lower shipping prices. On the other hand, contrary to expectations importance of distance in bilateral trade has not been decreasing; it appears that the so-called "distance puzzle" is present in the Czech and Slovak Republics. The model also confi rms that membership in the European Union is an important determinant of bilateral trade - its statistical signifi cance has been detected since 2004.

We analyze the effect of the large set of theoretically motivated determinants on international trade among European countries during the period 1992-2008. The determinats cover areas of culture, institutions, infrastructure, and geography, including trade directions. We analyze trade in three types of goods: raw materials, parts and components, and capital goods. For each type of goods we differentiate trade in flows, extensive margin, and intensive margin. Methodologically we first derive fixed effects related to unique pairs of countries in terms of exports andimports. Then we explain the fixed effects with the set of trade determinants. We show number of detailed results that could be summarized in a following way. Geographical, cultural, and institutional determinants exhibit intuitively correct but varying effects. Soft and hard infrastructures exhibit strong and positive effect. Trade directions between new and old EU members plays a key role in the European trade.

The study is focused on macroeconomic stability of the Czech economy. The first part (methodological) stems from the system of national accounting which offers two approaches: from the point of view of relationship between domestic supply and demand and between savings and investments. Analytical part examines domestic supply and demand, which is reflected in the balance of foreign trade. There was a positive tendency due to a favourable development in foreign trade. The relation between savings and investments, which is equal to current account balance, looks less favourable. The main source of imbalance is a negative balance of incomes expressing bigger outflow of primary incomes in relation to their inflow. Public finances can be identified as the weakest chain link of economic development. International comparison with new EU Members from middle Europe indicates that keeping macroeconomic stability in acceptable boundaries represents a serious problem.

The paper deals with effects of trade liberalization of EU goods exports to the USA. Despite the current protectionist tendencies of US President Donald Trump, the USA is strongly motivated to promote a deeper trade liberalization in the longer horizon, further strengthening bilateral trade flows, increasing economic efficiency, and thus contributing to the growth of both economies. The primary objective is to evaluate a hypothesis which states that reducing political trade barriers could notably increase the flows. We use gravity models and our own constructed non-tariff trade barrier time series based on tens of thousands of values for EU-28 countries in relation to the USA between 1995–2014. The data are obtained from an analysis of US legislature, in contrast to previous studies which used subjective survey data. The secondary goal is to assess whether a substantial reduction of non-tariff barriers is realistic or not, an issue which other researchers have overlooked. The level of bilateral non-tariff barriers imposed by the USA against EU exporters is rather low in the international comparison, a substantial reduction is not a reasonable assumption. We conclude that dealing with non-tariff trade barriers is crucial as it can substantially increase the bilateral trade flows. Even a less optimistic scenario, with a smaller decrease in trade barriers, suggests that the EU goods exports to the USA could be increased by more than 20%.

The purpose of this paper is to create a financial fragility model for the Czech financial sector. We adapt the Goodhart-Tsomocos model which is based on general equilibrium with incomplete markets, money and default. The calibration of the model is based on publicly available data from the period 2003-2011. Finally, we perform comparative statics to show how the key variables of the model respond to possible events. The model can be used by government institutions to stress-test the banking sector, as well as by banking and other financial institutions to estimate the development of, inter alia, the default rates of their clients. The model also incorporates default of households and may be used, after further extension, in predicting households' default rates with respect to the behaviour of banks in consequence of changes in macroeconomic parameters of the environment.

Czech society is ageing, and the availability of these services should be important part of social strategy for the Czech Republic. Thus, the development in this area is not optimal and much more attention should be put on. Increasing life expectancy cause not only higher demands on the pension systems but also higher demands on social services. This is emphasised by the slower increase of healthy life expectancy and therefore it can be assumed that more people in higher age will require more social services. The paper deals with the issue of the macroeconomic costs and benefits of satisfying the requirements for residential care activities, especially for homes for the elderly as one of the most important area of social care. The aim of the paper is to estimate overall direct and indirect macroeconomic effects for the Czech Republic at the level of the regions. The relation between demand and supply of residential care activities is illustrated for 2013. While some issues can simply be related to the Czech population as a whole, some estimates are presented at the regional level. Economic impacts on the gross domestic product, employment and government finance are estimated by the semi-dynamic input-output analysis. It is illustrated how the investments into social facilities are transformed into economic development with different regional scale.

This article is a contribution to the discussion of national competitiveness as a concept for analysis of international economic relations. The main goal is the critical reflection of the concept. We consider the Paul Krugman's and Richard Baldwin's remarks regarding the problems associated with using competitiveness as an analytical concept still valid when restrained to the domain of neoclassical economics. Moreover - even though the competitiveness is widely accepted as an analytical concept - we believe a number of problems associated with its current use exist (both in theory and in process of policy formations). Mainly, there is confusion between the micro and macro-economic understanding of concept which stems from confusion between individual and national/territorial level of analysis. We also believe that even if new trade theory (increasing returns and strategic trade) is taken into account, it is quite problematic to formulate policy recommendation for structural and industrial policy on its grounds. When the assumptions of neoclassical economics are loosened, the concept of competitiveness might prove valid. Finally we stress than even if this is the case the sensitiveness of the most of recommendations for competitiveness promotion to retaliation and potential damage resulting to international economic regime from its enforcement is rather high.

The paper deals with an analysis of economic impacts of ICT implementation within the public administration, which is called e-Government. The current situation in the Czech Republic is discussed using data about particular implemented tools, such as the contact points of public administration, data mailboxes or basic registries of public administration and more. In the paper there are evaluated impacts of these projects not only on public administration and public sector, but on the overall economic environment of the state including discussion of the rate of bureaucratic burden, transparency of the legal system or cyberspace security. In spite of the fact that a number of significant e-Government projects has been already implemented in the Czech Republic, there is still unused potential of other projects, whose adaptation could have positive economic impacts.

Foreign and Internal Trade as the main disciplines in the field of research and study have developed theoretical systems that reflected historical development of international economic and business environment, governmental trade policy and international and domestic businesses. They created a basis, on which the Faculty of International Relations after 1989 has designed a new profile discipline "International Trade" in the framework of the "International Economic Relations" program. Very important features of the discipline, both of study and research areas, are a deep internationalization and an interdisciplinary approach. The discipline's development reflects world trends, international scientific knowledge and domestic specificities and introduces new terminology for new qualitative processes of international business to the Czech economy. To the discipline's development, very many excellent teachers and important personalities of the Czechoslovak and Czech economy contributed. The modern discipline comprehends analysis of global economic and institutional relations and of theoretical concepts, together with practical managerial branches. A prove of high standards of teaching and research is a prestigious accreditation EPAS by which the discipline "International Trade" has been awarded by the European Foundation of Management Development in 2012.

In this paper, we analyze the extent of the impact of FDI on the host economy according to theoretical predictions. Within a broader context of international trade flows, we focus on inter-industry interactions between a multinational enterprise (MNE) that enters the domestic market and other firms in the economy. We seek to determine if the MNE uses domestic suppliers of intermediate goods or if it purchases its supplies from abroad or from other MNEs entering the downstream sector. Our analysis covers both Western and Eastern European countries over the period 2001-2007. Our results show that FDI increases the demand for intermediary goods. However, domestic producers of these goods can benefit only partially from this positive shock, since they are at the same time crowded-out by MNEs entering the upstream sector as well as by importers.

The article is focused on the analysis of export performance of the German economy, including the model scenarios that illustrate the transmission of shocks to the external environment of the Germany into the Czech economy. The analysis is motivated by the fact that the German economy is by far the largest trading partner of the Czech Republic since its establishment in 1993 and that Germany plays the role of an economic "locomotive" in the broader European region.

The aim of the article is to explore the doctor - patient relationship using the information asymmetry framework and principal-agent theory. From the perspective of economic exchange, this relationship is relatively specific, as an uneven rank and position of the agents involved play an important role here. It is argued that this unevenness arises from several different factors, such as education and qualification, work experience, path dependence, and the nature of goods and services provided. The relationship specificity is then discussed from a theoretical point of view while its most important elements are highlighted and put into a wider context. Further, market approach in healthcare system and healthcare services is partially debated and a simple model analyzing he "double-standard treatment is developed. Subsequently, this type of treatment is analyzed with the aid of vertical differentiation approach. Based on economic rationale, the authors claim that "medical knowledge/information obligation should play a crucial role in all healthcare services. This type of instrument is to be applicable for both parties in the doctor - patient relationship, as it may help overcome the inherently present information asymmetry by rendering the healthcare services provision more transparent.

A phenomenon of globalization of world economy leads to diminishing of the borders between states. There is an important role of international trade in this process, which appears in much more heterogeneous forms than in the past. While the classical theory of foreign trade basically assumed commodity trade with the final products, due to fragmentation of production chains the major part of trade is performed with intermediate goods and also the trade in services becomes more and more dynamic. Increasing volume of the trade between countries is carried out without changing the ownership of traded goods, and vice versa - changing the ownership of goods without crossing the border of the country. There is important role of multinational enterprises, which are currently behind most of the economic operations. The major implication of these phenomena is increasingly difficult possibility to capture the statistical data correctly and therefore to obtain objective data on the behaviour of the economy for analytical purposes and economic policy.

This paper aims to contribute to the theoretical discussion of free trade and protectionism in international trade within the context of International political economy. Presented approach broadens the standard political economy view of trade policy and goes beyond the redistribution consequences and the political consideration of policy makers. Our interpretation of trade policy works with broader economic values and preferences of individual actors and understands the nation state and its policies as institutions. Social, cultural and historical context is taken into consideration, when interpreting the trade policy. More complex understanding of these determinants helps to explain contemporary trade policies and also their dynamic change. Paper also discuss the links between the trade policy and other economic (structural and industrial) policies and attract attention to possible misunderstandings in contemporary free trade discourse.

In this paper we are presenting an analysis of shift of tax burden from income onto consumption. The analyzed consumption tax is value added tax, while destination principle is applied. The result of analysis is finding that the contemporary tax policy in the Czech Republic is suboptimal from the point of view of tax burden distribution between production factors and consumption. Theoretical findings are confirmed by analysis of data from European countries. Every percentage above the EU27 average of consumption taxes share on total tax quota results into increase of GDP growth by 0,04% to 0,05% p.a. The Czech political "elite" determines the fiscal policy to be popular and recent surveys confirmed Czechs' dislike towards consumption taxes, especially value added tax. Therefore the huge cost of the Czech tax system - high taxation of wages and low value added tax - can be viewed also as agency cost.

The article focuses on new possible approaches of total factor productivity measurement. The standard computation takes into account the number of hours worked as the labour input and net or gross fixed capital stock as the capital input. This article improves the computation by using labour services as the labour input (it is necessary to take into account the skills and efforts of the workers) and capital services as the capital input. Substitution of capital stocks by capital services means that only flow indicators are used for TFP measurement. This issue became more popular in recent time in line with the revision of the manual for national accounts - SNA 2008. This paper concentrates on the development of the Czech economy between the years 2002 and 2008.

The authors of the article point out that the theory of economics has failed to yield a solid theoretical background in such critical situations as the period of the current fi nancial and economic crisis and the transformation period of post-communist economies. Mainly present crisis opens the question of unsatisfactory status of economic science. While classical liberal or Keynesian concepts are failing, theorists cannot look to mathematical modelling for help. It seems that traditional concepts are malfunctioning. Financial market is particularly predisposed for this process. The use of mathematical model is overvalued. The article calls attention on asymmetry of information problem and possible influence and adequacy of regulatory attitudes on return to equilibrium level, particularly in EU. The challenge for today's theoretical economists is to find a new concept for today's global era.