Human capital plays an important role in the theory of economic growth, but it has been difficult to measure this abstract concept. We survey the psychological literature on cross-cultural IQ tests, and conclude that modern intelligence tests are well-suited for measuring an important form of a...

Economic phenomena are interrelated. From a growth perspective, time analysis concerning the choices of present and future consumption and the choices between the allocation of scientific resources should be combined with a space analysis regarding the dissemination of economic activity through...

We may distinguish between two concepts of technology: a theoretical level of technology (that is, a technology possibilities frontier) and a level of technology in practice (that is, ready to use in production technology). Having these two concepts in mind, the paper develops an intertemporal...

I show that in a conventional Ramsey model, between one-fourth and one- half of income differences across countries can be explained by a single factor: The steady-state effect of large, persistent differences in national average IQ on worker productivity. These differences in cognitive...

This paper studies the effects of distortionary taxes and public investment in an endogenous growth OLG model with knowledge transmission. Fiscal policy affects growth in two respects: First, work time reacts to variations of prospective tax rates and modifies knowledge formation; second, public...

The city size distribution of many countries is remarkably well approximated by a Pareto distribution. We study what constraints this regularity imposes on standard urban models. We find that under general conditions urban models must have (i) a balanced growth path and (ii) a Pareto...

In standard economic growth theory it is usually assumed that labor force follows exponential growth. That is not a realistic assumption. In this paper we introduce a generalized logistic equation (Richards law) that describes more accurately population growth. Then we analyze the neoclassical...

The Solow growth model assumes that labor force grows exponentially. This is not a realistic assumption because, exponential growth implies that population increases to infinity as time tends to infinity. In this paper we propose replacing the exponential population growth with a simple and more...

W. Arthur Lewis’s distinction between factors and forces of production, and Paul Romer’s insightful identification of the poverty of objects and the lack of ideas, as central to economic growth rate differences across economies, have enriched economic growth theory. However, both object-...

A growing literature argues that the Information Technology rev- olution caused the stock market crash of 1973-1974, its subsequent stagnation and eventual recovery. This paper employs general equi- librium theory to test whether this good news hypothesis is consistent with the behavior of US...