This paper analyzes government commitments to ongoing spending programs that require future outlays. Spending commitments are important for understanding partisan politics because they constrain future governments. In a model with one government good, a 'stubborn liberal' policy maker can use...

A cap on greenhouse gas emissions makes total emissions a fixed common-property resource. Population increases under a cap are therefore self-limiting: a population increase raises labor and reduces emissions per unit of labor, which lowers incomes and fertility. Because a marginal birth under a...