The theory of fiscal federalism points out that decentralisation should be pursued in order to fit differences in individual preferences. However, the presence of externalities and the need of providing merit goods to citizens suggest that centralisation is likely to produce more efficient...

The aim of the paper is to analyze a model of local public good provision with positive interjurisdictional spillovers comparing decentralized and centralized system. As in the recent Second Generation Theory (SGT) of fiscal federalism (Seabright 1996; Lockwood 2002, 2006; Besley and Coate 2003; Weingast...

The theory of fiscal federalism points out that decentralization should be pursued in order to fit differences in individual preferences. However, the presence of externalities and the need of providing merit goods to citizens suggest that centralization is likely to produce more efficient...

This article investigates the patronage phenomenon in the italian, so called, Second Republic. In particular, the analysis argues that (ex) members of parliament are appointed to managerial boards in italian (partially) state-owned enterprises responding to political selection rationales....

The Arab Spring has led to very different outcomes across the Arab world. I present a highly stylized model of the Arab Spring to better understand these differences. In this model, dictators from the ethnic or religious majority group concede power if their country is oil-poor, but can stay in...

This paper studies how the risk of divorce affects the human capital decisions of a young couple. We consider a setting where complete specialization (one of the spouses uses up all the education resources) is optimal with no divorce risk. Symmetry in education (both spouses receive an equal...

In this paper we investigate optimal harvesting of a renewable natural resource. While in the standard approach the resource is located at a single point in space we allow for the resource to be distributed over the plane. Consequently, an agent who exploits the resource has to travel from one...

Authority and power permeate political, social, and economic life, but empirical knowledge about the motivational origins and consequences of authority is limited. We study the motivation and incentive effects of authority experimentally in an authority-delegation game. Individuals often retain...

Banks and the financial sector have come under increased scrutiny since the 2008 financial crisis. Regulations concerning the banking sector have been re-written and there have been calls for increased taxation of banks (as companies) and the remuneration of bankers. In general, two sorts of...

Three sources of strategic tax interactions among local jurisdictions are usually considered in the literature: public expenditure spill-over, tax competition and yardstick competition. However, another source has now been suggested: the intellectual trend. According to that hypothesis,...