The paper studies a simple voting system that has the potential to increase the power of minorities without sacrificing aggregate efficiency. Storable votes grant each voter a stock of votes to spend as desidered over a series of binary decisions. By cumulating votes on issues that it deems most...

Two groups of voters of known sizes disagree over a single binary decision to be taken by simple majority. Individuals have different, privately observed intensities of preferences and before voting can buy or sell votes among themselves for money. We study the implication of such trading for...

We present a dynamic model of free riding in which n infinitely lived agents choose between private consumption and contributions to a durable public good g. We characterize the set of continuous Markov equilibria in economies with reversibility, where investments can be positive or negative; and...

We model a procedural reform aimed at restoring a proper role for the minority in the confirmation process of judicial nominations in the U.S. Senate. We analyze a proposal that would call for nominations to the same level court to be collected in periodic lists and voted upon individually with...

This paper proposes a simple scheme designed to elicit and reward intensity of preferences in referenda: voters faced with a number of binary proposals are given one regular vote for each proposal plus an additional number of bonus votes to cast as desired. Decisions are taken according to the...

The storable votes mechanism is a method of voting for committees that meet periodically to consider a series of binary decisions. Each member is allocated a fixed budget of votes to be cast as desired over the multiple decisions. Voters are induced to spend more votes on those decisions that...

The current debate in Western Europe centers on the relationship between economic and political integration. To address this problem, we construct a simple general equilibrium model in which the returns to trading are directly affected by the availability of a public good. In our model,...

Are there systematic forces such that countries of different sizes participating in a free trade bloc gain differently from the entry of new members? If economies of scale imply that firms located in large countries enjoy lower costs, then the gains from enlarging the bloc will fall...

Following the rationale for regional redistribution programs described in the official documents of the European Union, this paper studies a very simple multi-country model built around two regions: a core and a periphery. Technological spill-overs link firms' productivity in each of the two...

This paper questions the link between the establishment of a common currency among several countries and the necessity of political coordination. It begins by discussing why conducting a single monetary policy is thought to be easier within a single political unit. It then proceeds to enquire...