In standard models of spatial harvesting, the resource is distributed over the complete domain and the agent is able to control the harvesting activity everywhere all the time. In some cases though, it is more realistic to assume that the resource is located at a single point in space and that...

Land subsidence threatens the living conditions of roughly 1.2 billion people worldwide in deltaic regions characterized by soft top soil. Economic activity in deltaic regions requires lowering the groundwater levels to keep the land sufficiently dry to maintain productivity, which, however,...

This interdisciplinary paper explains how mathematical techniques of stochastic optimal control can be applied to the recent subprime mortgage crisis. Why did the financial markets fail to anticipate the recent debt crisis, despite the large literature in mathematical finance concerning optimal...

We use stochastic optimal control-dynamic programming (DP) to derive the optimal foreign debt/net worth, consumption/net worth, current account/net worth, and endogenous growth rate in an open economy. Unlike the literature that uses an Intertemporal Budget Constraint (IBC) or the Maximum...

What is an optimal or a sustainable external debt - for a country, region or sector? How should one monitor and evaluate debt to preclude a crisis? We use stochastic optimal control/dynamic programming to derive an optimal debt. The deviation of the actual from the optimal will serve as a...

We provide benchmarks to evaluate what is an optimal foreign debt and a maximal foreign debt (debt-max), when risk is explicitly considered. When the actual debt exceeds debt-max, then the economy will default when a bad shock occurs. This paper is an application of the stochastic optimal...

A healthy financial system encourages the efficient allocation of capital and risk. The collapse of the house price bubble led to the financial crisis that started in 2007. There is a large empirical literature concerning the relation between asset price bubbles and financial crises. I evaluate...

In accordance with Basel Capital Accords, the Capital Requirements (CR) for market risk exposure of banks is a nonlinear function of Value-at-Risk (VaR). Importantly, the CR is calculated based on a bank’s actual portfolio, i.e. the portfolio represented by its current holdings. To tackle...

We study the interplay between tenure decisions, stock market investment and the public social security system. Housing equity not only serves a dual purpose as a consumption good and as an asset, but also provides insurance to buffer various risks in retirement. Our life cycle model captures...

In this paper I explore a model where citizens of a country vulnerable to damages from climate change may migrate to a second country, from which a steady stream of greenhouse gases occur. If this migration imposes costs on the emitting country, then migration induces a sort of pseudo carbon...