I study the optimal taxation of robots and labor income. In the model, robots substitute for routine labor and complement non-routine labor. I show that while it is optimal to distort robot adoption, robots may be either taxed or subsidized. The robot tax exploits general-equilibrium effects to...

We provide a critique of the standard methodology which bases welfare comparisons between households on deflating household income and consumption by an equivalence scale. We argue that this leads to support for tax/transfer policies that significantly disadvantage low to middle in-come...

This is Part 2 of a two-part paper which surveys the historical evidence on the role of institutions in economic growth. The paper provides a critical scrutiny of a number of stylized facts widely accepted in the growth literature. It shows that private-order institutions have not historically...

This is Part 1 of a two-part paper which surveys the historical evidence on the role of institutions in economic growth. The paper provides a critical scrutiny of a number of stylized facts widely accepted in the growth literature. It shows that private-order institutions have not historically...

While the direct impact of geographic endowments on prosperity is present in all countries, in former colonies, geography has also affected colonization policies and, therefore, institutional outcomes. Using non-colonized countries as a control group, I re-examine the theories put forward by La...

Incorporating family decisions in a two-period.model of the world economy, we predict that trade liberalization raises the skill premium and reduces child labour in developing countries where the adult labour force is sufficiently well educated to attract production activities from abroad that...

Forced displacement as a consequence of wars, civil conflicts, or natural disasters does not only have contemporaneous consequences but also long-run repercussions. This eclectic overview summarizes some recent research on forced displacement in economic history. While many of the episodes...

This paper studies equilibrium unemployment in a two-region economy with matching frictions, where workers and jobs are free to move and wages are bargained over. Job-seekers choose between searching locally or searching in both regions. Search-matching externalities are amplified by the latter...

This article examines unemployment disparities and efficiency in a densely populated economy with two job centers and workers distributed between them. We introduce commuting costs and search-matching frictions to deal with the spatial mismatch between workers and firms. In a decentralized...

The direct impact of local public goods on welfare is relatively easy to measure from land rents. However, the indirect effects on home and job location, on land use, and on agglomeration benefits are hard to pin down. We develop a spatial general equilibrium model for the valuation of these...