Estimates of the effect of education on GDP (the social return) have been hard to reconcile with micro evidence on the private return to schooling. We present a simple explanation combining two ideas: imperfect substitution and endogenous skill-biased technological progress and use cross-country...

This paper investigates the relation between human capital andretirement when the age of retirement is endogenous. This relation isexamined in a life-cycle earnings model. An employee works full timeuntil retirement. The worker accumulates human capital by training-on-the-job and by...

We apply theories of capital market failure to ana1yzeoptima1 financing of risky higher education. In the market solution,students can only finance their education through debt. There isunderinvestment in human capita1, because some students with socia1lyprofitable investments in human capita1...

This paper analyzes optimal linear taxes on capital and labor incomes in a life-cyclemodel of human capital investment, financial savings, and labor supply with heteroge-nous individuals. A dual income tax with a positive marginal tax rate on not onlylabor income but also capital income is...

Progressive income taxes moderate wage demands by trade unions and thereby reduce unemployment, but alsothey reduce incentives to acquire skills and lower productivity of workers. The optimal response of the governmentto this dilemma is to choose a system of progressive taxes and to (partly)...

The paper studies the determinants of income distribution and growth in an overlapping generations economy withheterogenous households. Our framework has the following main features:heterogeneity of consumers with respect to wealth and parental human capital;intergenerational transfers,...

We investigate the manifold posed question: To what extent does investment in human and social capital, besides the effect of talent, enhance entrepreneurial performance? We distinguish between three different performance measures: survival, profits, and generated employment. On the basis of the...