Using two matched plant level skills and productivity datasets for UK manufacturing we document that (i) more productive firms hire more skilled workers: in 2000, plants at the top decile of the TFP distribution (controlling for their four-digit industry) hired workers with, on average, around...

Nearly all post-war recessions were preceded by oil-price shocks, but is this because spikes in the price of oil cause economic downturns? At the heart of this question lies an identification problem: oil prices and the state of the world economy are endogenously determined. This paper uses...

When a supply and demand model is recursive, with errors uncorrelated across the two equations, ordinary least squares (OLS) is the recommended estimation procedure. Supply to a daily fish market is determined by the previous night’s catch, so this would appear to be a good example of a...

Learning by exporting refers to the mechanism whereby firms improve their performance (productivity) after entering export markets. Although this mechanism is often mentioned in policy documents, a significant share of econometric studies has not found evidence for this hypothesis. This paper...

The literature on research joint ventures (RJVs) has emphasized internalizing spillovers and cost-sharing as motives for RJV formation. In this paper we develop two additional explanations: product market complementarities and firm heterogeneity. We analyse a model of RJVs with asymmetric firms...

Frequently, aspiring entrants have only limited information about their potential rivals’ entry decisions. As a result, the outcome of the entry game may be that more firms enter than the market can sustain; or, at least, that unnecessary entry investments are made. We refer to these outcomes...

We analyse productivity growth in UK manufacturing 1980-92 using the newly available ARD panel of establishments drawn from the Census of Production. We examine the relative importance of 'internal' restructuring (such as new technology and organizational change) and 'external' restructuring...

This paper uses a case study approach to explore the effects of NAFTA and GATT membership on innovation and trade in the Mexican soaps, detergents and surfactants (SDS) industry. Several basic findings emerge. First, the most fundamental effect of NAFTA and the GATT on the SDS industry was to...

We analyze a dynamic stochastic general-equilibrium (DSGE) model with an externality---through climate change---from using fossil energy. A central result of our paper is an analytical derivation of a simple formula for the marginal externality damage of emissions. This formula, which holds...

What should be the West's top priority for climate-change policy? This article is a revised and updated version of my talk to the Potsdam Global Sustainability Symposium (which drafted the Potsdam Declaration presented to the 2007 UN Climate Change Conference in Bali).