What shapes the optimal degree of progressivity of the tax and transfer system? On the one hand, a progressive tax system can counteract inequality in initial conditions and substitute for imperfect private insurance against idiosyncratic earnings risk. At the same time, progressivity reduces...

This paper develops a theoretical model to analyse how a General Purpose Technology (GPT) shapes within-group wage inequality when workers are ex-ante equal, but their adaptability to new technologies is subject to stochastic factors that are history dependent. It is argued that the diffusion of...

In this Paper we propose a tick time model for dealer quote interactions using ultra-high-frequency data. This model includes duration functions to measure the time dependence of volatility as well as information asymmetry. In order to assess price discovery we define several measures in tick...

This Paper proposes a structural time series model for the intra-day price dynamics of fragmented financial markets. We generalize the structural model of Hasbrouck (1993) to a multivariate setting. We discuss identification issues and propose a new measure for the contribution of each market to...

This paper studies the joint dynamics of US output and unemployment rates in a nonlinear VAR model. The nonlinearity is introduced through a feedback variable that endogenously augments the output lags of the VAR in recessionary phases. Sufficient conditions for the ergodicity of the model,...

This paper uses Reuters exchange rate data to investigate the contributions to the price discovery process by individual banks in the foreign exchange market. We propose multivariate time series models as well as models in tick time to study the dynamic relations between the quotes of individual...