The literature on optimum currency areas argues that in the presence of countryspecific real shocks, the cost of fixing exchange rates is decreasing in the degree of trade openness. This study uses a stochastic dynamic general equilibrium model of endogenous specialization to assess the benefit...

This study quantifies dynamic learning effects behind the tariff wall in the American pig iron industry in 1870-1940. First, we present new datasets to argue that imported and domestic pig iron were close substitutes. Next, we provide evidence for dynamic learning effects. Finally, we use the...

Most problems with formal sector credit lending to the poor in developing countries can be attributed to the lack of information and inadequate collateral. One common feature of successful credit mechanisms is group-lending, where the loan is advanced to an individual if he/she is a part of a...

This paper considers issues related to testing for multiple structural changes in cointegrated systems. We derive the limiting distribution of the Sup-Wald test under mild conditions on the errors and regressors for a variety of testing problems. We show that even if the coefficients of the...

Families with children receive preferential treatment in the U.S. federal income tax. Over the past 15 years, the real value of child tax benefits approximately doubled reaching nearly $1,900 per child in 2006. This paper examines the efficiency cost of providing child tax benefits. A...

We present a new proof of the interiority of the policy function based on the Inada conditions. It is based on supporting properties of concave functions.

In an experiment we study market outcomes under alternative incentive structures for thirdparty enforcers. Our transactions resemble an anonymous credit market where lenders can give loans and borrowers can repay them. When borrowers default, judges are free to enforce repayment but are...

The pure exchange model is the foundation of the neoclassical theory of value, yet equilibrium predictions and models of price adjustment for this model remained untested prior to the experiment reported in this paper. With the exchange economy replicated several times, prices and allocations...

We study the emergence of norms of cooperation in experimental economies populated by strangers interacting indefinitely and lacking formal enforcement institutions. In all treatments the efficient outcome is sustainable as an equilibrium. We address the following questions: can these economies...

In this study we offer a new approach to proving the differentiability of the value function, which complements and extends the literature on dynamic programming. This result is then applied to the analysis of equilibrium in the recent class of monetary economies developed in [13]. For this type...