This paper analyzes the roles of innate talent versus family background in shaping intergenerational mobility and social welfare under different education systems. We establish an overlapping-generations model in which the allocation of workforce between a high-paying skilled labor sector and a...

This book presents an accessible and sometimes controversial economic exploration of numerous issues surrounding sex, marriage and family. It analyses the role of 'vanity', defined as social status and self-esteem, in social and economic behaviours. In Veblen's theory of conspicuous consumption,...

Extending the literature on quality and trade and supported by the empirical evidence obtained from China, this paper demonstrates that in a developing country, a firm’s export to developed countries has a potential signaling effect on domestic consumers’ perception of its product quality....