A common assumption in the optimal taxation literature is that the social planner maximizes a welfarist social welfare function with weights decreasing with income. However, high transfer withdrawal rates in many countries imply very low weights for the working poor in practice. We reconcile...

This paper addresses the question of whether a decentralized government is subject to a stronger level of electoral control than a centralized government. When electoral control is strong an incumbent investing a low level of effort in providing public goods will face a serious threat of being...

Cities, home to more than half of the world's population and important economic hubs, are vulnerable to impacts of climate change and worthy to protect. To address these challenges, implementing climate change adaptation measures is inevitable. The paper provides insights into climate change...

The recycling of packaging waste is an objective of the Community with very ambitious recycling rate targets laid down in the European law. Research on the operations and on the financial and economic costs that resulted from this environmental policy is an ongoing effort. Currently, there is...

All European Union (EU) member states have to comply with the demanding recycling rates targets that were set for the recovery of packaging waste in the Directive 94/62/EC. Nevertheless, each country has its own system for accomplishing these targets. Some already had national legislation when...

This paper develops an analytical framework for studying the Baumol-Oates efficiency of traditional single instrument abatement policies vis-a-vis green defaults in the face of price inertia and deliberate defaulting of subpopulations. In this special case of behavioural heterogeneity command...

The unilateral introduction of an emissions price can induce firms to relocate to other countries with less stringent environmental regulation. However, firms may be able to reduce the emissions costs in their home country by investing into low-carbon technologies or equipment (abatement...

Will individuals contribute to a public good, even if doing so imposes a negative externality on an outsider? This paper describes the results of an experiment in which decision makers could contribute to a real public good, while (part of) the contribution costs were passed on to another...

This paper analyzes the political economy of government debt when elected politicians decide about the distribution of public funds between a clean and a polluting public good. When provision of the polluting good creates a stock of climate externalities, strategic incentives for the incumbent...

We analyze the relationship between institutional quality and firm efficiency. Using rich data on firms in the European Union between 2005 and 2012, we show that high institutional quality lowers the share of persistently inefficiently used assets. The adverse effect of low institutional quality...