This paper uses detailed information on the latitude and longitude of conflict events in Sub-Saharan African countries to study the impact of external income shocks on the likelihood of violence. We consider a number of external demand shocks faced by the countries or the regions within...

Most-favoured-nation (MFN) trade liberalizations will always improve global economic welfare provided globally optimal environmental, and other, policies are in place. But since the latter proviso is not met in practice, empirical studies of the environmental and resource depletion effects of...

I solve numerically for stationary rational-expectations equilibria of a two-country, non-linear model of a storable commodity. With constant tariffs, price volatilities in both countries increase with an increase in the tariff rate of one country or with an increase in the storage cost in one...

This Paper analyses an overlapping generation model of public good provision under repeated voting. The public good is financed through age-dependent taxation that distorts human capital investment. Taxes redistribute income both across different skill groups and across generations. We contrast...

The analysis provides a new explanation for two widespread problems concerning European unemployment policy: the disappointingly small effect of many past reform measures on unemployment; and the political difficulties in implementing more extensive reform programmes. We argue that the heart of...

Generous early retirement provisions account for a large proportion of the drop in the labour force participation of elderly workers. The aim of this paper is to provide a political-economic explanation of the wide spread adoption of early retirement. We suggest that the political support for...

The paper develops a new approach to measuring the impact of government cash transfers on poverty alleviation that takes into account endogenous reactions and consumption smoothing of households. We use the methodology to study the impact of changes in government cash benefits on poverty rates...

The dramatic rise in the US social security and public health expenditure is only partially explained by the demographic trend. We suggest that the political complementarity between these two programmes induced a multiplicative response to the ageing process. Public health care increases the...

In this paper we argue that many of the rigidities that characterize European labour markets can be understood as the outcome of political influence by incumbent employees. We then empirically investigate the determinants of labour market institutions and show that the results are consistent...

Assessments of the East German transition commonly focus narrowly on the size of financial transfers from the West to the East. Of more relevance to other cases of transformation is the fact that East Germany was immediately brought into the trading and financial system of the world economy and...