Why are certain movies more successful in some markets than others? Are the entertainment products we consume reflective of our core values and beliefs? These questions drive our investigation into the relationship between a society's oral tradition and the financial success of films. We combine...

We seek to estimate the prestige value of winning beyond monetary prizes in Cutthroat Kitchen, a cooking show in which dishes are judged in a series of elimination rounds, with the twist that action is periodically paused to auction sabotages against rivals. We estimate the distribution of...

This paper overviews theoretical and empirical studies of political borders from an economic perspective. It reviews theories of the number and size of nations focused on the trade-off between economies of scale in public-good provision and heterogeneity of preferences over public policies as...

Governments use their countries' economic strength from existing financial and trade relationships to achieve geopolitical and economic goals. We refer to this practice as geoeconomics. We build a framework based on three core ingredients: input output linkages, limited contract enforceability,...

In International Relations the canonical model of inter-estate interactions is a one-shot security competition game. The model has the structure of a prisoners dilemma, which results in an equilibrium with two sources of inefficiency: excessive arming and possibly the destruction associated with...

We present an economic rationale for countries resorting to foreign influence to export their ideology to other nations. Our model incorporates two fundamental elements: redistribution of the tax burden between capital owners and workers, and international capital mobility. The model highlights...

We develop a simple model to explain why a powerful importer country like the United States may provide political support for international collusive agreements concerning certain commodities (e.g., coffee). This behavior raises questions due to the fact that an importer country should have...

We document the rise of China in offshore capital markets. Chinese firms use global tax havens to access foreign capital both in equity and bond markets. In the last twenty years, China's presence went from raising a negligible amount of capital in these markets to accounting for more than half...

As billions of people in the developing world seek to increase their living standards, their aspirations pose a challenge to global efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions. The emerging middle class are buying and operating energy intensive durables ranging from vehicles to air conditioners to...

This paper applies principles of adverse selection to overcome obstacles that prevent the implementation of Pigouvian policies to internalize externalities. Focusing on negative externalities from production (such as pollution), we consider settings in which aggregate emissions are known, but...