This paper asks whether the results obtained from using the standard approach to testing the influential Grossman and Helpman "protection for sale" model of political economy might arise from a simpler setting. A model of imports and quotas with protection occurring in response to import surges,...

This paper models investment/entry decisions in a competitive industry that is subject to a quantity control on an input for production. The quantity control is implemented by auctioning licenses for the restricted input (e.g., a pollution permit or a production license). The paper shows that...

CHAPTER 1: The Great Russian Devaluation and Labor DemandDoes a greater degree of integration into world markets lead to a more elastic demand for labor? Often referred to as the Rodrik hypothesis, this question, despite being important from both theoretical and applied policy standpoints, is...

The first chapter, Trasferability of Migration Licenses and the Distribution of Potential Rents,compares the effects of migration restrictions using licenses which are freelytraded to those that occur when licenses are allocated tofirms who are not permitted to trade them. Both domestic and...

CHAPTER 1: Income Distribution, Market Structure, and Individual WelfareThis essay proposes a new insight on how income distribution influences market structure and affects the economic well-being of different groups. It shows that inequality may be good for the poor via a trickle-down effect...

CHAPTER 1: Productivity Improvements and Falling Trade Costs: Boon or Bane?This essay looks at two features of globalization, namely, productivity improvements and falling trade costs, and explores their effect on welfare in a monopolistic competition model with heterogeneous firms and...

CHAPTER 1: Immiserizing Deindustrialization: A Dynamic Trade Model with Credit ConstraintsIn this essay I develop an open economy dynamic model with bequests and credit constraints. The agricultural sector uses only labor, the industrial sector needs an indivisible investment. Under autarky,...