During the transition from plan to market, managers and politicians succeeded in maintaining control of large parts of the stock of socialist physical capital. Despite the obvious importance of this phenomenon, there have been no efforts to model, measure and investigate this process...

We study a vertically differentiated market where two firms simultaneously choose the quality and price of the good they sell and where consumers also care for the average quality of the goods supplied. Firms are composed of two factions whose objectives differ: one is maximizing profit while...

This paper investigates spatial variations in product prices using an exhaustive micro dataset on fish transactions. The data record all transactions between vessels and wholesalers that occur on local fish markets in France during the year 2007. Spatial disparities in fish prices are sizable,...

If some, but not all, countries are cooperating to reduce CO2 emissions, it can be argued that: A high carbon tax on carbon-intensive tradable sectors in the cooperating countries will reduce the production of goods from these sectors, and therefore CO2 emissions, in those countries. This will...

There is arguably a consensus that the current approach to drought relief is in need of reform and possibly replacement with an improved government financial assistance mechanism. Grants to farmers, in the form of interest rate subsidies, have several difficulties, which in summary are as...

This Paper reviews arguments and evidence on the impact of globalization on the environment, then presents evidence on production and international trade flows in five heavily polluting industries for 52 countries over the period 1981-98. A new decomposition of revealed comparative advantage...

The implications of more environmental concern for the optimal provision of public goods, taxation, environmental policy and involuntary unemployment are derived within a second-best framework in which lump-sum taxes and subsidies are not available and labour supply is rationed due to a rigid...

In many markets governments set minimum quality standards while some sellers choose to compete on the basis of quality by exceeding them. Such ‘high-quality’ strategies often win public acclaim, especially when ‘environmental friendliness’ is the dimension along which firms are...

Quarantine policy reviews are becoming more sophisticated following the Uruguay Round’s Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary (SPS) Measures and, in Australia’s case, following also the 1996 Nairn Report. Yet they still focus primarily on the effects of restrictions just on...

Despite the growing concern about actual on-going climate change, there is little consensus about the scale and timing of actions needed to stabilise the concentrations of greenhouse gases. Many countries are unwilling to implement effective mitigation strategies, at least in the short-term, and...