The macroeconomic effects on growth, investment and private sector employment of different ways of rolling back the welfare state are analysed. Cutting public spending on private goods induces a lower interest rate, a higher wage, a lower capital stock and a fall in employment. Cutting public...

This short paper reconsiders the popular result that the lower the probability of getting reelected, the stronger the incumbent politicians' incentive to follow short-sighted, inefficient policies. The set-up is a general equilibrium model of endogenous growth and optimal fiscal policy, in which...

We reexamine the properties of optimal fiscal policy and their implications for implementable capital accumulation. The setup is a standard endogenous growth model with public production services, augmented by elastic labor supply. We show that, when a benevolent government chooses a distorting...

This paper studies the determinants of income distribution and growth in an overlapping generations economy with heterogenous households. Our framework has the following main features: (1) heterogeneity of consumers with respect to wealth and parental human capital; (2) intergenerational...

This paper studies a model of the distribution of income under bounded needs. Utility derived from any given good reaches a bliss point at a finite consumption level of that good. On the other hand, introducing new varieties always increases utility. It is assumed that each variety is owned by a...

In an interesting and influential paper Robert Lucas (1993) considering the experience of East Asian small economies, suggests that on the job" learning could be the principal engine of their miraculous growth in the last 20 years. In this paper I develop an overlapping generation model where on...

The importance of innovation for the economic performance of industrialized countries has been largely stressed recently by the theoretical and empirical literature. Moreover the intensity of knowledge externalities in generating innovation, is the key parameter in determining sustained growth...

In the presence of endogenous growth intergenerational transfer from the young to the old reduce per capita income growth and harm future generations. On the other hand, competitive equilibria are inefficient if externalities sustain long-run growth. This paper shows that if individuals retire...

The paper considers a two-country model of overlapping generations economies with intergenerational transfers carried out in the form of bequest and investment in human capital. The authors examine in competitive equlibrium the optimal provision of education with and without capital markets...