In a model where seignorage provides the financing instrument for the government’s budget, public spending volatility has an adverse effect on long-run growth. This negative relationship arises because the incidence of volatility in this type of public policy is responsible for higher average...

We build an overlapping generations model in which reproductive households face a child quantity/child quality trade-off and bureaucrats are delegated with the task of delivering public services that support the accumulation of human capital. By integrating the theoretical analyses of endogenous...

We construct an overlapping generations model in which parents vote on the tax rate that determines publicly provided education and offspring choose their effort in learning activities. The technology governing the accumulation of human capital allows these decisions to be strategic complements....

We incorporate health-damaging pollution into a three period overlapping generations model in which life expectancy, fertility and economic growth are all endogenous. We show that environmental factors can cause significant changes to the economy’s demographics. In particular, the...

The current paper offers a new explanation on the emergence of threshold effects and multiple equilibria, for which the high (low) income equilibrium is associated with high (low) environmental quality. This new explanation rests on endogenous technological choice in the presence of...

In a two-period overlapping generations model with production, we consider the damaging impact of environmental degradation on health and, consequently, life expectancy. The government’s involvement on policies of environmental preservation proves crucial for both the economy’s short-term...

Recent evidence of increasing fertility rates in developed countries, offers support to the idea that, from the onset of early industrialisation to the present day, the dynamics of fertility can be represented by an N-shaped curve. An OLG model with parental investment in human capital can...

Existing evidence shows that activities promoting the formation of human capital are countercyclical. In a two period OLG model, I show that countercyclical investment in human capital arises as a result of a parametric combination relating to preferences and technologies. This countercyclical...

We build an overlapping generations model in which reproductive households face a child quantity–child quality trade-off and bureaucrats are delegated with the task of delivering public services that support the accumulation of human capital. By integrating the theoretical analyses of...

In a three-period overlapping generations model, I show that different combinations of preference and technological parameters can lead to different patterns on the joint evolution of human capital and (endogenous) fertility choices. These patterns may include threshold effects and multiple...