This article analyses the design of optimal unemployment insurance in a search equilibrium framework where search effort among the unemployed is not perfectly observable. We examine to what extent the optimal policy involves monitoring of search effort and benefit sanctions if observed search is...

This paper presents a model where the form of innovations is endogenous. It is shown that with labour market imperfections, which raise the wage above the shadow price of labour, firms over-invest in innovations cutting labour costs and under-invest in increasing quality. As a result, the market...

This article explores use of auctions for privatising public assets. In our model, a single 'insider' bidder possesses information about the asset's common value. Bidders are privately informed about their costs of exploiting the asset. Due to the insider's presence, uninformed bidders face a...

This article introduces a new way to measure competition based on firms' profits. Within a general model, we derive conditions under which this measure is monotone in competition, where competition can be intensified both through a fall in entry barriers and through more aggressive interaction...