Explains that there remain important gaps in the economic theory that underlies empirical models and that are reflected in a less than satisfactory empirical understanding of the determinants of charitable contributions, real estate investment, and business fixed investment.

The standard model of strategic tax competition assumes that government policymakers are perfectly benevolent. We depart from this assumption by allowing for the possibility that policymakers are influenced by the rent-seeking (lobbying) behavior of businesses. This extension implies that...

This study explores the impact of non-constant returns to scale and imperfectly competitive product markets on the empirical performance of the q-model of investment. We present an econometric specification linking the unobserved shadow price of capital to financial market data when...

This paper presents empirical evidence on one aspect of central bank communication policy – formal pronouncements by central bankers – to better understand whether this channel matters and, if so, the nature of the information being transmitted. We examine the relationship between three...

Parameters of taste and technology are central to a wide variety of economic models and issues. This article proposes a simple method for estimating production function parameters from panel data, with a particular focus on the elasticity of substitution between capital and labor. Elasticity...

This document describes the construction of and data sources for a state-level panel data set measuring output and factor use for the manufacturing sector. These data are a subset of a larger, comprehensive data set that we currently are constructing and hope to post on the FRBSF website in the...

The standard model of strategic tax competition – the non-cooperative tax-setting behavior of jurisdictions competing for a mobile capital tax base – assumes that government policymakers are perfectly benevolent, acting solely to maximize the utility of the representative resident in their...