We propose a new theory of the demographic transition based on the evidence that body development during childhood is an important predictor of adult life expectancy. This theory is embodied in an OLG framework where fertility, longevity and education all result from individual decisions. The...

The choice of language is a crucial decision for firms competing in cultural goods and media markets with a bilingual or multilingual consumer base. To the extent that multilingual consumers have preferences over the intrinsic characteristics (content) as well as over the language of the...

Empirical studies assume that the macro Mincer return on schooling is con- stant across countries. Using a large sample of countries this paper shows that countries with a better quality of education have on average relatively higher macro Mincer coeficients. As rich countries have on average...

Properties of GMM estimators for panel data, which have become very popular in the empirical economic growth literature, are not well known when the number of individuals is small. This paper analyses through Monte Carlo simulations the properties of various GMM and other estimators when the...

In this paper, we study how access pricing affects network competition when subscription demand is elastic and each network uses non-linear prices and can apply termination-based price discrimination. In the case of a fixed per minute termination charge, we find that a reduction of the...

We present evidence about the loss of the so-called ?plucking effect?, that is, a high-growth phase of the cycle typically observed at the end of recessions. This result matches the popular belief, presented informally by different authors, that the current recession will have permanent effects,...

In the presence of cost uncertainty, limited liability introduces the possibility of default in procurement with its associated bank-ruptcy costs. When financial soundness is not perfectly observable, we show that incentive compatibility implies that financially less sound contractors are...

This paper uses sequential stochastic dominance procedures to compare the joint distribution of health and income across space and time. It is the First application of which we are aware of methods to compare multidimen- sional distributions of income and health using procedures that are robust...

This paper aims at providing a Bayesian parametric framework to tackle the accessibility problem across space in urban theory. Adopting continuous variables in a probabilistic setting we are able to associate with the distribution density to the Kendall's tau index and replicate the general...

We study manager-employee interactions in experiments set in a corporate environment where payoffs depend on employees coordinating at high effort levels; the underlying game being played repeatedly by employees is a weak-link game. In the absence of managerial intervention subjects invariably...