Computer technology presents economists with new tools, but also raises novel methodological issues. This essay discusses the challenges faced by computational researchers, and proposes some solutions.

Numerical dynamic programming algorithms typically use Lagrange data to approximate value functions over continuous states. Hermite data is easily obtained from solving the Bellman equation and can be used to approximate value functions. We illustrate this method with one-, three-, and...

There is great uncertainty about the impact of anthropogenic carbon on future economic wellbeing. We use DSICE, a DSGE extension of the DICE2007 model of William Nordhaus, which incorporates beliefs about the uncertain economic impact of possible climate tipping events and uses empirically...

We characterize and demonstrate a solution method for an optimal commodity (sales) tax problem consisting of multiple goods, heterogeneous agents, and a nonconvex policy maker optimization problem. Our approach allows for more dimensions of heterogeneity than has been previously possible,...

We show how to enhance the performance of a Smolyak method for solving dynamic economic models. First, we propose a more efficient implementation of the Smolyak method for interpolation, namely, we show how to avoid costly evaluations of repeated basis functions in the conventional Smolyak...

First, we propose a more efficient implementation of the Smolyak method for interpolation, namely, we show how to avoid costly evaluations of repeated basis functions in the conventional Smolyak formula. Second, we extend the Smolyak method to include anisotropic constructions; this allows us to...

We introduce an algorithm for solving dynamic economic models that merges stochastic simulation and projection approaches: we use simulation to approximate the ergodic measure of the solution, we construct a fixed grid covering the support of the constructed ergodic measure, and we use...

Continuous time is a superior representation of both the economic and climate systems that Integrated Assessment Models (IAM) aim to study. Moreover, continuous-time representations are simple to express. Continuous-time models are usually solved by discretizing time, but the quality of a...