Many studies of producer behavior consider cost and input demand functions de-rived from microeconomic theory and estimate them on the basis of aggregate data. If firms' characteristics differs, the neglect heterogeneity can lead to estimation bias. An alternative is to restrict individual...

The obvious difference in the economic performance of countries has led to the question why some countries are so much wealthier than others, and whether the size, the structure, and the organisation of the public sector contribute to cross-country income and growth gaps. Public sector...

To fulfil their tasks, governments rely on public expenditures and taxes. Both influence the incentives and shape the decisions and actions of private economic agents. As governments resort to both instruments simultaneously, their combined theoretical impact on economic performance is a priori...