Wage posting models of job search typically assume that firms can commit to paying workers the posted wage. This paper investigates the consequences of relaxing this assumption. Under ``downward'' commitment, firms can commit only to paying at least their advertised wage. We show that wage...

In Shapiro and Pincus (2008), we proposed a method for arriving at just compensation of private owners of urban land, in cases like Kelo v New London, in which government has plans to use eminent domain to `take' private properties, to be assembled into a single parcel for some public purpose....

Trade theorists and policymakers have until recently ignored trade costs, but as tariffs have fallen it is apparent that trade costs are a significant obstacle to trade and they are not simply determined by geography or commodity characteristics. We analyse country-by-country variations in trade...

Despite recent reforms, world agricultural markets remain highly distorted by government policies. Traditional indicators of those price distortions can be poor guides to the policies? economic effects. Recent theoretical literature provides indicators of trade and welfare-reducing effects of...

Financial sector innovation and development has been an integral part of the rise of capitalism over the last half millennium. The innovations of the last three decades of the twentieth century were a continuation of the trend; they contributed to an era of global prosperity, but also increased...

Currently, the legitimate transfer of ownership of an asset occurs either through voluntary means - gift, bequest, sale - or through the use of state power - compulsory acquisition, resumption, eminent domain, court order. In Australia and elsewhere, compulsory acquisition of private property is...

The Zollverein, a customs union, of 1834 was the outcome of sequential accession negotiations between Prussia and other German states. This paper applies a bargaining model to analyse the choices of negotiation structure and institutional form of a customs union. The existence of negative...