This paper aims to explain why firms do not use NPV for all capital budgeting decisions. Differential usage is attributed to the cost of information and the incomplete dissemination of knowledge of evaluation techniques. Analysis of Australian survey data indicates that 34% of informed managers...

Studies in both corporate fi nance and environmental economics have described how discount rates should vary with the maturity of a project. The former suggests that the cost of capital should increase with the time horizon of the cash flow, while the latter recommends declining term structures...

Climate change is real and dangerous. Exactly how bad it will get, however, is uncertain. Uncertainty is particularly relevant for estimates of one of the key parameters: equilibrium climate sensitivity—how eventual temperatures will react as atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations double....

As the most important driver of long-term project evaluation, from climate change policy to infrastructure investments, the social discount rate (SDR) has been subject to heated debate among economists. To uncover the extent and sources of disagreement, we report the results of a survey of over...

In this paper, we show that the way in which fund managers are compensated can, under plausible conditions, lead them to act in a way that does not maximise the wellbeing of their clients. Due to performance bonuses in fund managers' rewards, there is a highly non-linear relationship between the...

The initial hope for climate science was that an improved understanding of what the future might bring would lead to appropriate public policies and effective international climate agreements. Even if that hope is not realized, as now seems likely, scientific advances leading to a more refined...

Written as a contribution to the Long Finance Meta-Commerce programme, this paper examines the way that discount rates are used for the evaluation and management of pension schemes.The authors describe the role and function of a discount rate, and critique the methods presently in use for...