This paper shows that, except in certain limiting cases, competitive equilibrium with moral hazard is constrained inefficient. The first section compares the competitive equilibrium and the constrained social optimum in a fairly general model, and identifies types of market failure. Each of the...

This paper is concerned with delineating conditions under which public financial policies have no real and/or price effects. In the absence of intergenerational distribution effects, public financial policy is irrelevant:an increase in government debt (whether indexed or not), an exchange of...

Modern technology provides the basis of an efficient low-cost electronic payments as an alternative to the current system where fiat money is the medium of exchange. This paper explores possible macro-economic implication, showing how such a financial system might enhance government's ability to...

This paper shows that there is a presumption that Pareto efficient taxation entails a positive tax on capital. When tax and expenditure policies can affect the market distribution of income in ways that cannot be directly offset, those effects need to be taken into account, reducing the burden...

This paper analyzes the role of real exchange rate (RER) policies in promoting economic development. Markets provide a suboptimal amount of investment in sectors characterized by learning spillovers. We show that a stable and competitive RER policy may correct for this externality and other...

Most recessions are a result of some shock to the economic system, typically amplified by financial accelerators, and leading to large balance sheet effects of households and firms, which result in the effects persisting. But, over time, the balance sheets get restored. Even banks recover. But...

This paper provides a critique of the DSGE models that have come to dominate macroeconomics during the past quarter-century. It argues that at the heart of the failure were the wrong microfoundations, which failed to incorporate key aspects of economic behavior, e.g. incorporating insights from...

The economics of information has constituted a revolution in economics, providing explanations of phenomena that previously had been unexplained and upsetting longstanding presumptions, including that of market efficiency, with profound implications for economic policy. Information failures are...

This paper endogenizes intervention in financial crises as the strategic negotiation between a regulator and creditors of distressed banks. Incentives for banks to contribute to a voluntary bail-in arise from their exposure to financial contagion. In equilibrium, a bail-in is possible only if...

A significant amount of the increase in the wealth income ratio in recent decades is due to an increase in the value of land. We present a series of models that explain why land prices may have increased. These models help us understand the increase in both the wealth income ratio and wealth...