We demonstrate the existence of an intergenerational equity-efficiency tradeoff in policy-making that aims at Pareto-efficiency across generations and sustainability, i.e. non-decreasing utility over time. Our model includes two salient characteristics of sustainability problems and policy: (i)...

We develop and formalize a utilitarian notion of responsibility for sustainability which is inspired by Singer's (1972) principle and the Brundtland Commission's notion ofsustainability (WCED 1987). We relate this notion of responsibility to established criteria forthe assessment of...

This note investigates the suitability of unilateral consumption taxes for alleviating climate change in a two-period two-country general equilibrium model with a finite stock of fossil fuel. We analyze the incidence of a unilateral consumption tax in the first period on world carbon emissions....

This paper analyses the influence of the exchange rate regime of a country on the level of tolerated corruption with a special focus on the interdependency of monetary and fiscal policies. Using a simple theoretical framework based on Barro-Gordon-Model I compare independent monetary policy with...

We study the effects of high skilled immigration on employment and net income in the receiving economy where the market for low skilled labour is distorted by union wage setting and a redistributive unemployment benefit scheme. Based on the empirical fact that high and low skilled workers are...

Internalizing the global negative externality of carbon emissions requires flattening the extraction path of world fossil energy resources (= world carbon emissions). We consider governments having sign-unconstrained emission taxes at their disposal and seeking to prevent world emissions from...

A small open economy operates a carbon emission trading scheme and subsidizes green energy. Taking cap-and-trade as given, we seek to explain the subsidy as the outcome of a trilateral tug of war between the green energy industry, the black energy industry and consumers. With parametric...

The paper models the incentives of a politician to delegate the decision making power in a sovereign wealth fund to an independent external manager. It formalizes the learning-effects as well as the increase of transparency of the SWF and the rise of investment possibilities associated with...