We develop a two sector general equilibrium model with capital accumulation and convex adjustment costs. We use the model to study capital asset pricing and reallocation, as well as optimal consumption and investment decisions. With two sectors, the consumer balances diversification against the...

This paper argues that in the presence of liquidation costs, portfolio diversification by financial institutions may be socially inefficient. We propose a stylized model in which individual banks have an incentive to hold diversified portfolios. Yet, at the same time, diversification may...

We develop a tractable continuous-time consumption-savings model for a liquidity-constrained agent who faces both permanent and transitory income shocks under incomplete markets. We derive an explicitly-solved consumption function and show that the marginal (certainty equivalent) value of...

We study the interaction between competitive markets that produce unequally distributed welfare gains and elections through which the poor majority can redistribute income away from the rich minority. In our simple laboratory democracy, subjects first earn their income by trading in a double...

We decentralize incentive efficient allocations in large adverse selection economies by introducing a Walrasian market for mechanisms, that is, for menus of contracts. Facing a budget constraint, informed individuals purchase (lottery) tickets to enter mechanisms, while firms sell tickets and...

We use a combination of lab and field evidence to study whether preferences for immediacy and the tendency to procrastinate are connected as in O'Donoghue and Rabin (1999a). To measure immediacy, we have participants choose between smaller-sooner and larger-later rewards. Both rewards are paid...

We consider a principal who repeatedly interacts with a strategic agent holding private information. In each round, the agent observes an idiosyncratic shock drawn independently and identically from a distribution known to the agent but not to the principal. The utilities of the principal and...

Over the past four decades, government debt as a fraction of GDP has been on an upward trajectory in advanced economies, approaching levels not reached since World War II. While normative macroeconomic theories can explain the increase in the level of debt in certain periods as a response to...

Housing affordability is the main policy challenge for many large cities in the world. Zoning changes, rent control, housing vouchers, and tax credits are the main levers employed by policy makers. But how effective are they at combatting the affordability crisis? We build a new framework to...

Asset managers face increasing pressure to only hold firms that meet net-zero carbon emissions targets. We model how these mandates incentivize firms to address the global-warming externality through investments in decarbonization capital. A firm that invests receives a lower cost of capital by...