In this paper we consider a risk averse worker who is moving back and forth between employment and unemployment; layoffs are random and beyond the worker's influcence, while the re-employment chance is directly affected by search effort. We characterize the worker's optimal savings and...

This paper examines how revenues from a natural resource interact with growth and welfare in an overlapping generations model with altruism. The revenues are allocated between public productive services and direct transfers to members of society by spending policies. We analyze how these...

In this paper, Knowledge-Capital model estimates for a small country are compared to estimates obtained for larger economies. The model is based on unique panel data on foreign direct investment in Iceland. Estimates obtained for the Knowledge-Capital model differ considerable from what has been...

This paper deals with a Niskanen type of public-procurement agency. It is shown that the procurement game should be separated into an investment game and a project game, the first game to be played before nature determines the actual realizations of benefit and costs of the project, the second...

In the present paper the joint determination of long-run income per worker and capital utilization is studied. It is shown that comparatively low (optimal) rates of capital utilization may arise in poor economies in response to weak underlying structural characteristics. Moreover, the...

This paper interprets dispute settlement procedures and punishments as responses to the fact that trade agreements are incomplete contracts. If no weight is given to the adjudication phase and if the degree of trade relatedness is known with certainty, the negotiated trade agreement will feature...

We study the effects of stylized fiscal policy rules on the (global) determinacy of rational expectations equilibrium in perfectly competitive monetary model with constant returns to scale and labor as the unique input. Government spending on transfers and/or demand implies a distortion of the...

This paper tackles a number of issues that are central to cross-country comparisons of productivity. We develop a "dual" method to compare levels of total factor productivity (TFP) across nations that relies on factor price data rather than the data on stocks of factors required by standard...

The transition from unfunded pensions may impose a double burden on a transitional generation, which must both pay taxes to finance current pension liabilities and save for their own retirement. There are also economic gains which will accrue to future generations from increased rates of savings...