Despite the recent financial crisis the UK financial pay premium has continued to rise. To some extent this is a consequence of increased skill intensity in the finance sector, but this paper shows that finance workers have higher cognitive skills, on average, and this partly explains their...

The response of hours to technology shocks is a key controversy in macroeconomics. We show that differences between RBC and NK models hinge on highly restrictive views of technology. We introduce CES production technologies and demonstrate that the response of hours depends on the...

This paper builds a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model of endogenous growth that generates large medium-frequency cycles while robustly matching the near trend-stationary path of observed output. This requires a model in which standard business cycle shocks lead to highly...

The purpose of this paper is to contribute a new model of the Gold Standard, focusing on the interaction between resource scarcity and demographics. In a dynamic micro-founded model we find that: i) prices and equilibrium gold holdings increase with population (a scale effect), but decrease with...

Following the Arab-Spring protests, we examine macroeconomic interactions between a productive firm and a rent-seeking government characterized by a continuous probability of regime shift. The model is able to rationalize the early growth leaps witnessed in many Arab economies (the “Social...

Most growth models imply positive impacts on economic growth from greater openness. And a key factor linking openness and growth is the efficiency with which resources are used. Empirically, however, the efficiency impacts of trade have been ambiguous. Using a stochastic frontier analysis, we...

Despite the evidence on incomplete financial markets and substantial risk being borne by innovators, current models of growth through creative destruction predominantly model innovators as risk neutral. Risk aversion is expected to reduce the incentive to innovate and we might fear that without...

We study relative preferences in a general equilibrium model where households make social comparisons and/or get habituated to levels of labour-effort they supply and goods they consume. Bayesian estimations for the US support the existence of a society based on such preferences. In particular,...

This paper considers aspects of the competitive selection process in China - firm entry, survival, and exit - in an important sector of manufacturing, looking in particular for changes resulting from the latest stage of reforms. Using industry survey data from a province in North-East China, we...

In this paper general CES consumption preferences are introduced into an endogenous growth model `a la Bernard, Eaton, Jensen, and Kortum (2003) and Eaton and Kortum (2001). This is in contrast to the more generally used assumption of logarithmic preferences. The paper shows that the CES...