Germany has committed itself to reducing its carbon emissions by 25 percent in 2005 as compared to 1990 emission levels. To achieve this goal, the government has recently launched an environmental tax reform which entails a continuous increase in energy taxes in conjunction with a...

Division of labor, outsourcing in manufacturing and just-in-time production require the provision of a good and sufficient road infrastructure system. The society is used to mobility, preference for it even increases, and the full benefit of competition can only be realized if special distances...

In Europe traffic congestions make it impossible to estimate travel time. The increasing number of cars calls for a transportation policy towards an improved efficiency of the transportation system. However, extending road infrastructure to reduce the congestion externality implies another type...

This paper presents an empirical study of productivity comparison between Japan and Germany with focus on the R&D and infrastructure. By using time-series datasets from auto vehicle industry and electronic engineering industry, the study shows the reversal of productivity advantage from Germany...

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a modification of a standard four input production process where energy is used in an inefficient way due to partly unnecessary waste of energy. In this production process, R&D investment is an additional input in order to improve energy efficiency. It...

The objective of our approach is to develop a model which captures horizontal product differentiation under environmental awareness, product innovation under network effects, and price competition whereby environmentally friendly products are costlier to produce. As an example, we refer to...

The paper addresses the problem of entry barriers for a new technology – hydrogen powered cars or cars with fuel cell engines – if the network of its filling stations is missing or thin. We use Hotelling's model of product differentiation to characterize a situation where an incumbent firm...

Increasing environmental awareness may affect the pleasure of consuming a good for which an environmental friendly substitute is available. When deciding to buy differentiated products, a compromise is sometimes made between preferred characteristics of the good and its environmental properties....

The management of solid waste has become an urgent problem. Product responsibility means that a product will accompany its producer from cradle to grave; prevention, recycling and disposal of waste are part of a theory of the firm which we develop under solid residual management. We assume that...

A standard critique of the strategic, two-stage industrial and trade policy models is that trade policy recommendations depend on the nature of competition between firms. Brander and Spencer (1985) have shown that under quantity competition in an international market governments opt for export...