Considerable prior analysis has gone into the study of zoning restrictions on locational choice and on fiscal burdens. The prior work on zoning - particularly fiscal or exclusionary zoning - has provided both inconclusive theoretical results and quite inconsistent empirical support of the...

This paper empirically assesses the incidence and efficiency of Round I of the federal urban Empowerment Zone (EZ) program using confidential microdata from the Decennial Census and the Longitudinal Business Database. To ground our welfare analysis, we develop a heterogeneous agent general...

We present a theory of spatial development. Manufacturing and services firms located in a continuous geographic area choose each period how much to innovate. Firms trade subject to transport costs and technology diffuses spatially across locations. The result is a spatial endogenous growth...

Should the national government undertake policies aimed at strengthening the economies of particular localities or regions? Agglomeration economies and human capital spillovers suggest that such policies could enhance welfare. However, the mere existence of agglomeration externalities does not...

This paper investigates the evolution of socio-emotional skills over the life cycle and across generations. We start by characterising the evolution of these skills in the first part of the life cycle. We then examine whether parents’ socio-emotional skills in early childhood rather than in...

This paper explores the economic incentives for medical procedure innovation. Using a proprietary dataset on billing code applications for emerging medical procedures, we highlight two mechanisms that could hinder innovation. First, the administrative hurdle of securing permanent, reimbursable...

This paper presents a synopsis of recent NBER studies of the history of corporate governance in Canada, China, France, Germany, Japan, India, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Together, the studies underscore the importance of path dependence, often as...

Most studies of the efficiency of the foreign exchange market focus on a single maturity -- usually a one month exchange rate. However, one observes that forward contracts of many maturities are simultaneously traded in the foreign exchange market. The hypothesis that the foreign. exchange...

We argue that the Great Inflation experienced by both the United Kingdom and the United States in the 1970s has an explanation valid for both countries. The explanation does not appeal to common shocks or to exchange rate linkages, but to the common doctrine underlying the systematic monetary...

Developments in open-economy modeling, and the accumulation of experience with the monetary policy regimes prevailing in the United Kingdom and the euro area, have increased our ability to evaluate the effects that joining monetary union would have on the U.K. economy. This paper considers the...