This paper divides the population into two groups: the "inheritors" or "rentiers" (whose wealth is smaller than the capitalized value of their inherited wealth, i.e. who consumed more than their labor income during their lifetime); and the "savers" or "self-made men" (whose wealth is larger than...

Internet development holds the promise of transmitting economic value across physical space at zero marginal cost. In such a “weightless economy”, what factors matter for the location of economic activity and thus for economic development? This paper sketches a model of spatial dynamics over...

We argue that Nash’s solution to the bargaining problem should be modified such that it will be based on a New Reference Point (NRP). Such a point is needed so that a player is not considered ‘individually rational’ if he accepts an agreement that provides him with a utility lower than the...

We analyse self-reported measures of satisfaction with life in a transition country, Kyrgyzstan, using 1993 household survey data. We test whether higher levels of satisfaction are associated with greater economic well-being. This hypothesis is strongly supported by the data. Unhappiness is...

Sixteen years into the transition, the problem of high joblessness has not been solved. Of the three explanations commonly discussed (i.e. ongoing reallocation; finished reallocation with redundant labour; wrong choice of institutional framework), we concentrated on the ongoing reallocation...

Per capita incomes across European regions are not equal and do not stay constant; regional income distributions uctuate over time. Such a process could have many possible limiting outcomes: complete equal- ity (convergence), stratication, and continually increasing inequality are but three...

This paper develops a model of economic growth and activity locating endogenously on a 3- dimensional featureless global geography. The same economic forces influence simultaneously growth, convergence, and spatial agglomeration and clustering. Economic activity is not concentrated on discrete...

This paper examines the impact of mass media and information and commu- nications technologies (ICT) as knowledge-based infrastructures on economic development. The results suggest that both mass media and ICT penetra- tion are negatively associated with corruption. This result holds across both...

This paper reviews the cross-country record of economic growth, using as organizing framework how economic theory has guided that empirical analysis. The paper argues that recent studies of economic growth—both empirical and theoretical—distinguish from previous work in three distinct...