In this paper we study the problem of a city with access to two subcentres selling a differentiated product. The first subcentre has low free flow transport costs but is easily congested (near city centre, access by road). The second one has higher free flow transport costs but is less prone to...

Allaz and Vila (1993) show that the existence of futures markets increases the efficiency of markets in a Cournot setting. This paper looks at the efficiency effect of financial options in a similar framework. It shows that also the existence of financial options makes markets more efficient;...

We present a nonparametric approach for the equity and efficiency evaluation of (private and public) primary schools in Flanders. First, we use a nonparametric (Data Envelopment Analysis) model that is specially tailored to assess educational efficiency at the pupil level. The model accounts for...

We analyse the costs of a monetary union in West Africa by means of asymmetric aggregate demand and aggregate supply shocks. Previous studies have estimated the shocks with the VAR model. We discuss the limitations of this approach and apply a new technique based on the dynamic factor model. The...

In this paper we use a sample of administrative data coming from the `Dataware-house labour market and social protection' and the microsimulation model MIMOSIS to assess the labour supply effects of a reform of the rules for cumulating labour income with survival pension as proposed in the...

This paper is the first which provides evidence for rent-sharing in Belgium using firm level data. It uses a panel of annual firm level data and shows that a rise in the firm’s profitability leads after some years to an increase in worker’s income. The profit-per-head elasticity of wages is...

The number of preferential trade agreements has greatly increased over the past two decades, yet most existing bilateral arrangements take the form of free trade areas, and less than ten percent can be considered to be fully fledged customs unions. This paper develops a political economy model...

The model developed in this paper admits a systematic discussion of the normative rationale behind the use of two distributive instruments: negative income taxation, creating an unconditional basic income, on the one hand and wage subsidies on the other hand. The model integrates two opposite...

This paper presents an ordered logit approach to model the optimal timing of buying a house in the life cycle. The model is applied to three recent Belgian household budget surveys. We find that households postpone homeownership or choose to be lifelong tenant due to an increase of the...

In this paper we compare the stabilizing properties of the EMU to those of a ERM system, controlled by Germany. We find that in general the EMU will provide better stabilization of inflation, output and the interest rate than the EMS system. However, these results only apply if the ECB can...