Recent studies suggest a considerable amount of horizontal strategic interaction amongst governments exists. The empirical approach in these studies typically relies on estimating reaction functions in a uni-dimensional policy framework, where a nonzero slope estimate suggests strategic...

In the presence of a time-inconsistency problem with optimal agency contracts, we show that competitive markets implement allocations that Pareto dominate those achieved by a benevolent planner, they induce strictly more effort, and they sometimes make the commitment problem disappear entirely....

This paper aims to present an extension of the ICES model to capture the public sector. Departing from a demand system mainly derived from the GTAP model, ICES-XPS model disentangles the private and the public actors. The paper reviews the changes in both the database and the model equations...

In actual environmental policy, the design of actual pollution emission taxes differs significantly with the optimal Pigovian tax. In particular, earmarking prevails and actual taxes are usually combined with regulation. Furthermore tax rates are generally too low to significantly influence...

When a firm undertakes risky activities, the conflict between social and private incentives to implement safety care requires public intervention which can take the form of both monetary incentives but also ex ante or ex post monitoring, i.e., before or after an accident occurs. We delineate the...

Nearly all the macroeconomic literature on environmental policies deals with taxes and tradable permits. A policy instrument that still needs to be looked at is a switch in government expenditure away from environmentally-damaging goods, in particular fossil fuels, and toward resource- and...