This paper studies the difference between public production and public finance of public goods in a dynamic general equilibrium setup. By public finance, we mean that the public good is produced by private providers with the government financing their costs. When the model is calibrated to match...

This paper studies the difference between public production and public finance of public goods in a dynamic general equilibrium setup. By public finance, we mean that the public good is produced by private providers with the government financing their costs. When the model is calibrated to match...

We reconsider the conventional wisdom that, in the presence of public goods and distortionary taxation, Nash tax rates are inefficiently low due to free riding. We use a model in which the public good is natural resources. Specifically, a general equilibrium model of a world economy, in which...

We revisit the classical result that financing a pure public good through taxation of private consumption is inefficient. To this standard setup we add a consumption contest in which consumers can win a prize. We show that an appropriately chosen contest—which we call a ‘tax lottery’—can...

We study fiscal spending by supranational unions, where participation is voluntary and countries bargain over contributions to and the allocation of a central budget. We explore the link between the allocation and nations’ contributions that occurs since bargaining power is endogenous, and...

We develop a model that combines competitive exchange of private commodities across endogenously formed groups with public good provision and global collective decisions. There is a tension between local and global collective decisions. In particular, we show that group formation and collective...

We examine the role of CSR as a mechanism for private provision of public goods. We argue that corporations are using CSR to signal high product quality and demonstrate that signaling gives rise to an excessive level of contributions that offsets the positive externality, which causes the...

We investigate the link between leadership, beliefs and pro-social behavior. This link is interesting because field evidence suggests that people’s behavior in domains like charitable giving, tax evasion, corporate culture and corruption is influenced by leaders (CEOs, politicians) and beliefs...

We study the role of self-interest and social preferences in referenda. Our analysis is based on collective purchasing decisions of university students on deep-discount flat rate tickets for public transportation and culture. Individual usage data allows quantifying monetary benefits associated...

To investigate the external validity of laboratory results, we combine a public good experiment with three treatments in a field experiment. One treatment offers the opportunity to free-ride, the other two are placebo treatments. We compare results within subjects. In the free-riding treatment,...