This paper analyzes the effects of mixed public-private R&D incentives and empirically tests whether patents that were publicly sponsored are more important than non-subsidized ones. Blending patents and public subsidies will allow the funding agency to subsidize inventions that would otherwise...

Reducing tariffs and increasing consumption taxes is a standard IMF advice to countries that want to open up their economy without hurting government finances. Indeed, theoretical analysis of such a tariff-tax reform shows an unambiguous increase in welfare and government revenues. The present...

Economists have long acknowledged that the structure of the family (number of offspring, marital status, etc.) plays a crucial role in important economic decisions (e.g., labor supply, demand patterns, portfolio choice, educational attainment). In this paper we investigate the link between...

We set up a theoretical model to analyze the implications of coordination of immigration policies among destination countries. The model contains two types of spill-overs between destination countries: A terms of trade externality and a welfare policy externality. We show that while coordination...

Welfare ranking of policy instruments is addressed in a two-sector Ramsey model with monopoly pricing in one sector as the only distortion. When government spending is restricted, i.e. when a government is unable or unwilling to finance the required costs for implementing the optimum policy,...

Health care provision is undergoing major reforms in Europe as a reaction to rapidly increasing expenditure and lowered political acceptance to commit public finance to cover the deficits. The Dutch government will decide in 2007 if the current budget system will be replaced by a more...

In this paper, we propose and test a novel effect of immigration on the wages of native workers. Existing studies have focused on the wage effects that result from changes in the aggregate labour supply in a competitive labour market. We argue that if labour markets are not fully competitive,...

This paper analyses the importance of entrepreneurs for job creation and wage growth. Relying on unique data that covers all plants, firms and individuals in the Danish private sector, we are able to distil a number of different measures of entrepreneurial plants from the set of new plants,...

This paper studies the link between a firms education level, export performance and wages of its workers. We argue that firms may escape intence competition in international markets by using high skilled workers to differentiate their products. This story is consistent with our empirical...

In financing start-up firms, venture capitalists carefully select among alternative projects, design incentive compatible financial contracts and support portfolio companies with value enhancing managerial advice. This paper considers how venture capitalists can induce self-selection among...