We analyze five education finance systems: local, state, foundation, power equalizing with recapture (PER), and power equalizing without recapture (PEN). In a calibrated model, we find that finance systems have large effects on educational resources and equity. The trade-off between equity and...

We use a dynamic Tiebout model to analyze the consequences of moving from a pure local system of education finance to a pure state system of finance in which each student receives the same resources. While much of the education finance literature focuses on the static or immediate effects of...

Why do governments so often fail to adopt policies that economists consider to be efficiency-enhancing? The authors answer to this question relies on uncertainty regarding the distribution of gains and losses from reform. They show that there is a bias toward the status quo (and, hence, against...

Commercial bank debts of developing countries are held by large international banks and smaller domestic banks. This paper investigates how debt concentration--the proportion of a country's debt held by large banks relative to small banks--affects the secondary market price for these loans. We...

We study culture by examining the work and fertility behavior of second-generation American women. Culture is proxied with past female labor force participation and total fertility rates from the woman's country of ancestry. The values of these variables capture not only economic and...

This paper models the wage-contract negotiation procedure between a union and a firm as a sequential bargaining process in which the union must decide, in each period, whether or not to strike for the duration of that period. We show that there exist subgame-perfect equilibria in which the union...

The past decade has witnessed a renewed interest in regional trade agreements, with many policymakers and academics seeming to believe that these provide more than the traditional gains from trade. This article examines several possible benefits that regional trade agreements may confer on their...

Many states are implementing school-finance reforms which will have complex effects on income distribution, intergenerational income mobility, and welfare. This paper analyzes the static and dynamic effects of such reforms by constructing a dynamic general equilibrium model of public-education...

The authors examine the effect of community zoning regulations on allocations and welfare in a two-community model. Individuals choose in which community to live and each community levies a tax, chosen via majority vote, on local property to finance local public education. The authors study both...