An important question in labour economics is whether the presence in a work environment of friends or relations lowers or raises productivity. We examine the question using evidence from a simple field experiment in Uttar Pradesh, India with married wives and husbands. Teams of four are engaged...

Many sources of urban agglomeration involve departures from the first-best world. The benefit evaluation of a transportation project must then take into account agglomeration benefits along with any direct user benefits. Using a monopolistic competition model of differentiated intermediate...

NIMBY (not in my backyard) is the word used to describe the human behavior whereby a person agrees on an issue but refuses to accept it when it happens ‘in his own back yard’. This paper analyzes this type of NIMBY activity and, using evidence from England’s waste management policy,...

Although the number of people under the absolute poverty line has been dramatically reduced, there are still various challenges in poverty reduction. Inequality is growing in many middle income countries. The very poor people in some middle income countries are poorer than those in low income...

After the Great East Japan Earthquake and the subsequent nuclear accident, nuclear power stations cannot be considered safe any longer and, thus, can be hardly allowed to restart in Japan. In this study, we develop a nine-region spatial equilibrium model for the Japanese power market and...

By using a unique cross-sectional dataset of Chinese industrial firms, this paper investigates the external and internal effects of human capital on firms’ environmental performance. The result shows that firms have better environmental compliance because they are ‘pushed’ into making...

The Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station held by Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) had a serious nuclear accident in March of 2011. TEPCO's liability for the losses caused by this accident is speculated to reach several trillion yen. For this compensation, TEPCO is supposed to sell its...

The recent global crisis has demonstrated strongly that a systemic crisis victimizes a large number of innocent crisis “bystanders.” In order to prevent global crisis recurrence, and avoid victimization of such innocent crisis bystanders, the global financial safety net needs to be...

Can the renminbi develop into a global currency? In the near future it seems unlikely. The international political power of the United States remains far greater than that of China at the global level, and is likely to be a significant obstacle to global expansion in use of the renminbi....