Browsing by Author "Orhangazi, Ozgur"

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The Intellectual Odyssey of James R. Crotty: From the War on Vietnam To a Socialist Alternative To Global Capitalism
(Sage Publications inc, 2023) Orhangazi, Ozgur; Orhangazi, Özgür; Dymski, Gary
We summarize the intellectual journey of James R. Crotty in this tribute. We discuss how Crotty's approach to macroeconomics based on Marxian and Keynesian insights led to a series of flexible models based on realistic assumptions that help us better understand the contradictory evolution of capitalism from the 1970s to the 2010s. The basic building blocks of Crottyian macroeconomics consist of the emphasis on macro foundations, focus on the concrete capitalist processes with their endogenous, dynamic, and conflict-ridden nature, and the centrality of money, credit, and competitive dynamics of the capitalist system. We also discuss how a study of these dynamics led to his final work on "liberal socialism" as the way to end the disruptive cycles of capitalism. We argue that those aiming to construct a solid theoretical foundation to guide the understanding, transformation, and transcending of contemporary capitalist societies would find much inspiration in Crotty's intellectual legacy.JEL Classification: E11, E12, B51
Profitability and Drug Discovery
(Oxford Univ Press, 2022) Isik, Enes; Orhangazi, Özgür; Orhangazi, Ozgur
Pharmaceutical firms are highly profitable due to high markups enabled by high drug prices. This is justified by the argument that high profits provide incentives for innovation and help fund high research and development (R&D) costs. We investigate the link between past profitability and drug discovery for large publicly-listed pharmaceutical firms between 1980 and 2018. Our sample includes 118 firms with 2534 firm-year observations and in terms of sales corresponds to 55% of the global spending on drugs. By merging three data sets on firm financials, new patent applications, and new drug approvals, we show that pharmaceutical firms' markups and profitability are consistently higher than average nonfinancial firm profitability, with secularly increasing trends since 1980. Whereas R&D spending has also increased, the number of new drug approvals has not increased at the same pace and the productivity of R&D spending has been declining. In statistical analysis, we fail to identify any strong positive relationship between profitability and new drug discovery. Results are broadly in line with the earlier findings of research on the pharmaceutical industry and provide a contribution to the discussion on the link between profitability and innovation as well as on formulating policies for increasing drug innovation and ensuring the provision of essential drugs while keeping their costs low.
Turkey in Turbulence: Heterodoxy or a New Chapter in Neoliberal Peripheral Development?
(Wiley, 2023) Orhangazi, Özgür; Yeldan, Alp Erinç
While global monetary tightening by central banks, led by the US Federal Reserve, has heightened concerns about a slowdown in the world's economy and an increased likelihood of debt crises across developing countries, Turkey has attracted attention for doing the opposite. Indeed, the country's economic policy makers have intensified monetary easing towards credit expansion at the risk of increased exchange rate instability. This article analyses the Turkish case and makes four contributions. First, it establishes a framework through which we can understand and interpret the policy choices of the government. Second, it shows the binding effects of the trilemma in the context of an economy fully integrated in the global economy and discusses how the government tried to tackle these effects through a series of ad hoc policy measures. Third, the article discloses the distributional consequences of such policy manoeuvres and argues that the burden of adjustment fell on the shoulders of wage labour, while various competing rentier interests benefited from these policies. Fourth, the authors analyse these policies from a broader perspective of whether they can be interpreted as a courageous attempt by a peripheral developing economy to claim some policy space, or whether these policy choices in essence only amount to a deepening of neoliberal peripheralization.