Most nations have responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by locking down parts of their economies to reduce infectious spread. The optimal timing of the beginning and end of the lockdown, together with its intensity, is determined by the tradeoff between economic losses and improved health outcomes....

We propose a theoretical model to study individual lifestyle choices related to calorie intake and physical activity, depending on personal fitness level and body weight. The model builds on the rational eating literature and can generate a variety of behaviors that are consistent with the...

This paper focuses on the dynamic aspects of individual behavior affected by its social embedding, either at large (society-wide norms or averages) or at a local neighborhood. The emphasis is on how initial conditions can affect the long run outcome and to derive, discuss and apply the...

This paper addresses the spatial evolution of countries accounting for economics, geography and (military) force. Economic activity is spatially distributed following the AK model with the output being split into consumption, investment, transport costs and military (for defense and expansion)....

Due to the deployment of distributed renewable energy sources (e.g., solar), the introduction of communication technologies, and the digitalization of the power system (e.g., smart meters, control devices), energy consumers are switching from passive to active in the management of their energy...

We examine within a life-cycle set-up the simultaneous choice of health care and retirement (together with consumption), when health care contributes to both a reduction in mortality and in morbidity. Health tends to impact on retirement via morbidity, determining the disutility of work, and...

China and India, two Asian countries that experienced a rapid decline in fertility since the middle of the twentieth century, are the focus of this paper. Although there is no doubt that lower fertility levels have many positive effects on the economy, development and sustainability, little is...

We examine within a life-cycle set-up the choice of health and retirement. Health care contributes to a reduction in both mortality, determining the need to accumulate retirement wealth, and in morbidity, determining the disutility of work. The retirement age affects health through the value of...

We show that in a large class of distributed optimal control models (DOCM), where population is described by a McKendrick type equation with an endogenous number of newborns, the reproductive value of Fisher shows up as part of the shadow price of the population. Depending on the objective...

In this paper, we discuss the role of a diverse set of policies aimed at regulating the number and age structure of elections on the size and age structure of five European Academies of Sciences, namely the Austrian, Berlin-Brandenburg, Russian and Norwegian academies and the Royal Society. We...