We construct a model integrating the efficiency wage model of Shapiro-Stiglitz (1984) with the matching-bargaining models of Diamond, Mortensen and Pissarides (DMP). Firms and workers form pairwise matches, workers may shirk on the job, and the wage is set in an asymmetric Nash bargain over the...

We study the effects of mobility costs in a model of wage bargaining between workers and firms, where there is instantaneous matching, free firm entry, heterogeneous labour, and workers' individual productivities are discovered by firms only after being hired. We derive the employment level and...

This paper explores water pricing policy in Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras, in a political economy perspective. I argue that current water prices are too low and significantly below long-run marginal cost, and demonstrate that water prices must be raised significantly over the next ten...

Energy-intensive infrastructure may tie up fossil energy use and carbon emissions for a long time after investments, making the structure of such investments crucial for society. Much or most of the resulting carbon emissions can often be eliminated later, through a costly retrofit. This paper...

We study a labor market where worker’s disutilities of effort differ, firm’s outputs depend on the joint efforts of many workers, and individual worker characteristics cannot be observed or inferred by firms. Under assumptions similar to those in Holmström (1982), we demonstrate that an...

We present a stated-preference study where values of statistical lives (VSL) are derived both as public and private goods, and we distinguish between three different death causes, heart disease, environmentally related illnesses and traffic accidents. 1000 randomly chosen individuals in Norway...

This lecture discusses relationships between environmental and resource qualities and loads, and economic development, theoretically and empirically. We start in section 2 with a list of theoretical arguments that may or may not justify a tendency for environmental quality to first deteriorate,...

I derive the marginal value of a public good in multiperson households, measured alternatively by one household member’s willingness to pay (WTP) for the good on behalf of the household, or by the sum of individual WTP values across family members. Households are assumed to allocate their...

We model the exchange rate market for a country that initially follows a band policy, as a four-stage sequential game of complete information, where a stochastic shock is realized in the last stage. Given a fixed cost of leaving the band, we show that three types of equilibria may exist,...

We study an economy where a required amount of household production can be carried out either by each household itself, or purchased in the regular or ”black” market. We assume that the economy has two types of individuals, one with low productivities, and another with high productivities...