Showing 1 - 10 of 18
A long-standing challenge for welfare economics is to develop welfare criteria that can be applied to allocations with different population levels. Such a criterion is essential to resolve the optimal population problem, i.e., the tradeoff between population size and the welfare of each person...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012493350
We investigate the positive and normative consequences of child-labor restrictions for economic aggregates and welfare. We argue that even though the laissez-faire outcome may be inefficient, there are usually better policies to cure these inefficiencies than the imposition of a child-labor ban....
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10003652670
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10001798839
Empirical evidence suggests that money in the hands of mothers (as opposed to their husbands) benefits children. Does this observation imply that targeting transfers to women is good economic policy? We develop a series of noncooperative family bargaining models to understand what kind of...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10009238664
We construct a theory of intergenerational preference transmission that rationalizes the choice between alternative parenting styles (related to Baumrind 1967). Parents maximize an objective function that combines Beckerian and paternalistic altruism towards children. They can affect their...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10009683250
Child labor is often condemned as a form of exploitation. I explore how the notion of exploitation, as used in everyday language, can be made precise in economic models of child labor. Exploitation is defined relative to a specific social welfare function. I first show that under the standard...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10009756103
We discuss the two-way link between culture and economic growth. We present a model of endogenous technical change where growth is driven by the innovative activity of entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurship is risky and requires investments that affect the steepness of the lifetime consumption profile....
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10009757305
The economic theory of fertility choice builds predominantly on the unitary model of the household, in which there is a single household utility function and potential intra-household disagreement is abstracted from. Empirical evidence suggests, however, that many (potential) mothers and fathers...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10010458481
This paper reviews Gary Becker's contributions to the economic analysis of fertility, from his 1960 paper introducing the quantity-quality tradeoff to later work linking the economics of fertility to the theory of economic growth.
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10010434627
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10003265466