Vehicle-to-grid (V2G) electric vehicles can return power stored in their batteries back to the power grid and be programmed to do so at times when power prices are high. Since providing this service can lead to payments to owners of vehicles, it effectively reduces the cost of electric vehicles....

The financial crisis and recession of 2008-2010 have witnessed the biggest reduction in money-supply multipliers in U.S. history. In contrast to what occurred during the Great Depression, the Fed has avoided decreases in monetary aggregates by dramatically increasing the monetary base. A...

Did the 2008 rebate fail to stimulate consumer spending? In their recent influential AER articles, John Taylor and Martin Feldstein each claim that BEA aggregate time series data show that the 2008 rebate failed. Re-examining the BEA data, we find that the data instead show there is a high...

We study the relationship between long term child health and human capital. Child health may suffer if a child is inadequately nourished or is exposed to disease early in life and this may affect subsequent accumulation of human capital. We use data from rural Vietnam to examine the impact of...

Previous work on the effect of taxes on foreign direct investment (FDI) focused primarily on capital income taxes. We investigate the proposition that other forms of taxation may also deter FDI. We use tax ratios, i.e., average effective tax rates, on consumption, labor and capital income for a...

A new approach to explaining the value of colonial paper money that relies on their distinctive character as bills of credit is presented. The market value of these bills is decomposed into their real asset present value and their liquidity premium value. This approach is applied to the newly...

Economic theory and empirical evidence indicate that technological innovation is an important determinant of long-term economic development. Various country policies have been launched in favour of private research and development (R&D) with economic development as the main objective. As often...

Policy makers and the healthcare industry have proposed changes to physician payment structures as a way to improve the quality of health care and reduce costs. Several of these proposals require healthcare providers to employ a valuebased purchasing program (also known as pay-for-performance...

The economics profession has consistently demonstrated an interest in increasing the number of students exposed to economics, providing students with a quality education and identifying the key determinants of student success in the economics curriculum. Several strategies have been recommended...

A sobering lesson from the Great Recession is that widespread worry about government debt generates strong political resistance to enacting a fiscal stimulus large enough to overcome a severe recession. Fortunately there is a way to implement fiscal stimulus without increasing government debt....