We develop an overlapping generations model to explore how the degree of aggregate substitutability between public and parental education expenditures impacts long run macroeconomic outcomes. Using a variable elasticity of substitution “education production function,” in which public and...

We provide two ways to reconcile small values of the intertemporal elasticity of substitution (IES) that range between 0.35 and 0.5 with empirical evidence that the IES is large. We do this reconciliation using a model in which all agents have identical preferences and the same access to asset...

We develop a model of directed technology adoption, frictional unemployment, and migration to examine the effects of a change in skill endowments on the wages, employment rates, and emigration rates of skilled and unskilled workers. We find that, depending on the elasticity of substitution...

Despite repeated calls for a thorough cleanup of water pollution in the Ganges river, there are only two papers in the social sciences by Batabyal and Beladi (2017, 2019) that have shed theoretical light on this cleanup problem and its connection to the sustainability of tourism in Varanasi....

The extent to which natural capital can be substituted with manufactured or human capital in production is a key determinant of the possibility of long-run sustainable economic development. We review empirical literature pertaining to the degree of substitutability between natural capital and...