Empirical studies of intergenerational social mobility have found that women are more mobile than men. To explain this finding, we describe a model of multi-trait matching and inheritance, in which individuals’ attractiveness in the marriage market depends on their market and non-market...

Differences in gender-based labour market discrimination across countries imply that migration may affect husbands and wives differently. If migrant wives experience a relative improvement in their labour market position, bargaining theory suggests that they should experience comparatively...

Nearly all post-war recessions were preceded by oil-price shocks, but is this because spikes in the price of oil cause economic downturns? At the heart of this question lies an identification problem: oil prices and the state of the world economy are endogenously determined. This paper uses...

Using multivariate unit root test methods, this Paper investigates the Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) hypothesis at the sectoral level across six European countries over the last seventeen years. Evidence of mean reversion toward PPP is found for the relative prices of some sectors and countries....

This paper investigates the heterogeneous response of exporters to real exchange rate fluctuations due to product quality. We model theoretically the effects of real exchange rate changes on the optimal price and quantity responses of firms that export multiple products with heterogeneous levels...

We investigate theoretically and empirically the competitive effects of increased trade on prices, productivity and markups. Using disaggregated data for EU manufacturing over the period 1988-2000 we find increased openness exerts a negative and significant impact on sectoral prices. Increased...

Bargaining theory suggests that married women who experience a relative improvement in their labour market position should experience a comparative gain within their marriage. However, if renegotiation possibilities are limited by institutional mechanisms that achieve long-term commitment, the...

Based on the estimation of a theoretically consistent gravity equation, together with a careful computation of transportation costs across countries and industries, the Paper first provides estimates of ‘border effects’ among EU countries. The second objective is to examine the reasons for...

We offer a new explanation as to why international trade is so volatile in response to economic shocks. Our approach combines the uncertainty shock idea of Bloom (2009) with a model of international trade, extending the idea to the open economy. Firms import intermediate inputs from home or...

This paper derives a micro-founded gravity equation based on a translog demand system that allows for flexible substitution patterns across goods. In contrast to the standard CES-based gravity equation, translog gravity generates an endogenous trade cost elasticity. Trade is more sensitive to...