We study the role of technology subsidies in climate policies, using a simple dynamic equilibrium model with learning-by-doing. The optimal subsidy rate of a carbon-free technology is high when the technology is first adopted, but falls significantly over the next decades. However, the...

This paper addresses the impact of endogenous technology through research and development (R&D) and learning by doing (LbD) on the timing of environmental policy. We develop two models, the first with technological change through R&D and the second with LbD. We study the interaction between...

In this paper, we view health insurance as a combined hedge against the two consequences of falling ill: treatment expenditures and loss in income. We discuss how an individual’s ability when healthy affects her decision on whether to buy health insurance with treatment to full recovery if ill...

We consider an economy where most of the health care is publicly provided, and where there is waiting time for several types of treatments. Private health care without waiting time is an option for the patients in the public health queue. We show the effects of a tax (positive or negative) on...

We explore the efficacy of price and quantity controls as environmental policy instruments in a stochastic setting in which agents are risk averse. We demonstrate that the assumption of risk aversion may improve the performance of a tax relative to that of a system of tradable quotas, and that...

The statistical properties of the efficiency estimators based on Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) are largely unknown. Recent work by Simar et al. and Banker has shown the consistency of the DEA estimators under specific assumptions, and Banker proposes asymptotic tests of whether two subsamples...

We present a model that illustrates the close relationship between the possibility of a currency crisis and the amount of private-sector debt within a four-stage sequential game framework. In the first stage, the government announces its exchange rate policy, and all agents in the economy...

We show that our general result (Withagen and Asheim [8]) on the converse of Hartwick’s rule also applies for the special case of Solow’s model with one capital good and one exhaustible resource. Hence, the criticism by Cairns and Yang [1] of our paper is unfounded.

In most European countries, nominal wages are given in collective agreements or individual employment contracts, and the employer cannot unilaterally cut wages, even after the expiration of a collective agreement. Ceteris paribus, workers have a stronger bargaining position when they try to...