We develop continuous-time models of capacity choice when demand fluctuates stochastically, and the firm's opportunities to expand or contract are limited. Specifically consider costs of investing or disinvesting that vary with time, or with the amount of capacity already installed. The firm's...

We address the long-standing challenge of adding optimal exploration to the classic Hotelling model of a non-renewable resource. We completely solve such a model, using impulse control. The model, extending Arrow and Chang (1982), has two state variables: "proven" reserves and a finite...

This paper develops a general methodology for analyzing shadow wage (and other shadow prices). Our approach is to identify those reduced form relationships describing the economy which are central to the determination of the shadow wage, and use these to obtain simple formulae for the shadow...

We use a mix of new and existing data to develop the Aggregate Hours Gap (AHG), a novel measure of labor market underutilization. Our measure differentiates individuals by detailed categories of labor market participation and uses data on their desired work hours as a measure of their potential...

We analyze how entrepreneurial opportunity cost conditions performance. We depart from the literature on entrepreneurship which identifies survival with performance. Instead, many entrepreneurs aim for a cash-out (IPO or acquisition), especially in innovation based industries. Striving for a...

This paper measures the risk-adjusted performance of US buyouts. It draws on a unique and proprietary set of data on 133 US buyouts between 1984 and 2004. For each of them we determine a public market equivalent that matches it with respect to its timing and its systematic risk. After a...

Most economic models for time allocation ignore constraints on what people can actually do with their time. Economists recently have emphasized the importance of considering prior consumption commitments that constrain behavior. This research develops a new model for time valuation that uses...

Medical care at the end of life, which is often is estimated to contribute up to a quarter of US health care spending, often encounters skepticism from payers and policy makers who question its high cost and often minimal health benefits. It seems generally agreed upon that medical resources are...

With the American Time Use Survey of 2003 and 2004 we first examine whether additional market work has neutral impacts on the mix of non-market activities. The estimates indicate that fixed time costs of market work alter patterns of non-market activities, reducing leisure time and mostly...

Health plans paid by capitation have an incentive to distort the quality of services they offer to attract profitable and to deter unprofitable enrollees. We characterize plans' rationing as imposing a show that the profit maximizing shadow price depends on the dispersion in health costs, how...