Reviews and assesses the existing literature on the potential economic impact of introducing casino gambling into a community or region, first by discussing the casinos? effect on economic activity and growth within a community or region, and then by exploring their effect on government...

The authors report the results of the estimation of a rich dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model of the U.S. economy with both stochastic volatility and parameter drifting in the Taylor rule. They use the results of this estimation to examine the recent monetary history of the U.S. and to...

This paper assesses the relative importance of two key drivers of mortgage default: negative equity and illiquidity. To do so, the authors combine loan-level mortgage data with detailed credit bureau information about the borrower's broader balance sheet. This gives them a direct way to measure...

In this paper, the authors present a new approach to incorporating long-term debt into equilibrium models of unsecured debt and default. They make three sets of contributions. First, the authors advance the theory of sovereign debt begun in Eaton and Gersovitz (1981) by proving the existence of...

This paper compares the role of stochastic volatility versus changes in monetary policy rules in accounting for the time-varying volatility of U.S. aggregate data. Of special interest to the authors is understanding the sources of the great moderation of business cycle fluctuations that the U.S....

This paper quantitatively investigates the optimal capital income taxation in the general equilibrium overlapping generations model, which incorporates characteristics of housing and the U.S. preferential tax treatment for owner-occupied housing. Housing tax policy is found to have a substantial...

When contracts are unobserved, agents may have the incentive to promise the same asset to multiple counterparties and subsequently default. The author constructs an optimal mechanism that induces agents to reveal all their trades voluntarily. The mechanism allows agents to report every contract...

Few transactions have the potential to generate revelations about the market value of corporate assets and liabilities as mergers and acquisitions (M&A). Corporate governance and control mechanisms such as independent directors, independent blockholders, and managerial share ownership are...

The authors examine portage sites in the U.S. South, Mid-Atlantic, and Midwest, including those on the fall line, a geomorphologic feature in the southeastern U.S. marking the final rapids on rivers before the ocean. Historically, waterborne transport of goods required portage around the falls...

President Charles Plosser gives his views on the economy and shares some thoughts about the stance of monetary policy. He also counters the view that rates cannot be raised because the labor market has not "completely" healed and discusses what he thinks are two major risks with this strategy.