In this paper, I shall discuss how national income should be measured in an 'imperfect' economy, where feasible policy instruments such as taxes, tariffs, quotas, and quantitative controls do not operate in a lumpsum manner, and may be far from their optimum level. In particular, I want to...

This presentation is about poverty and redistribution in emerging economics. It was prepared for the Asian Development Bank’s Distinguished Speakers Program held on 25 October 2011 at the ADB Headquarters. Various types of poverty alleviation programs are discussed, and the central role of...

It is a natural presumption that there should be less distorting taxation when there are more decisions based on the prices distorted by taxation. This note shows the need for an additional assumption in order to reach the conclusion. We consider a competitive model with one consumption good,...

Prize Lecture to the memory of Alfred Nobel, December 9, 1996.

Interview with Professor James A. Mirrlees at the 1st Meeting of Laureates in Economic Sciences in Lindau, Germany, September 1-4, 2004. Interviewer is freelance journalist Marika Griehsel.

Newton Stewart is a town of two thousand people in the beautiful centre of Galloway, in the southwest of Scotland. My father came there in 1934, newly married, to be a teller in one of the six banks. In 1936 I was born, in a cottage across the river in the neighbouring village of Minnigaff....