Physical stature is used as a proxy for the biological standard of living in thetwo Germanies before and after unification in an analysis of a cross-sectionalsample (1998) of adult heights, as well as among military recruits of the1990s. West Germans tended to be taller than East Germans...

This note generalizes the Solow-Stiglitz efficiency condition for natural resources to the problem of fossil fuel extraction with a greenhouse effect. The generalized optimality condition suggests that the greenhouse effect implies overextraction in the sense of leaving future generations a...

Judged by the principle of intertemporal Pareto optimality, insecure property rights and the greenhouse effect both imply overly rapid extraction of fossil carbon resources. A gradual expansion of demand-reducing public policies – such as increasing ad-valorem taxes on carbon consumption or...

Matching mechanisms are regarded as an important instrument to bring about Pareto optimal allocations in a public good economy and to cure the underprovision problem associated with private provision of public goods. The desired Pareto optimal interior matching equilibrium, however, emerges only...

This paper explores the role of trade instruments in globally efficient climate policies, focusing on the central issue of whether border tax adjustment (BTA) is warranted when carbon prices differ internationally. It shows that tariff policy has a role in easing cross-country distributional...

This paper develops a general-equilibrium model of skill-biased technological change that approximates the observed shifts in the shares of wage and non-wage income going to the top decile of U.S. households since 1980. Under realistic assumptions, we find that all agents can benefit from the...

We explore the benefits of intergenerational risk-sharing through both private funded pensions and via the public debt. We use a multi-period overlapping generations model with a PAYG pension pillar, a funded pension pillar and a government. Shocks are smoothed via the public debt and variations...