There is an extensive empirical literature on political business cycles, but its theoretical foundations are grounded in pre-rational-expectations macroeconomic theory. Here the authors show that electoral cycles in taxes, government spending, and money growt h can be modeled as an equilibrium...

This paper considers the desirability of the observed tendency of central banks to adjust interest rates only gradually in response to changes in economic conditions. It shows, in the context of a simple model of optimizing private-sector behaviour, that assignment of an interest-rate smoothing...

This paper considers the desirability of the observed tendency of central banks to adjust interest rates only gradually in response to changes in economic conditions. It shows, in the context of a simple model of optimizing private-sector behaviour, that assignment of an interest-rate smoothing...

We study the (perfect Bayesian) equilibrium of a sequential learning model over a general social network. Each individual receives a signal about the underlying state of the world, observes the past actions of a stochastically generated neighbourhood of individuals, and chooses one of two...

This paper develops a model to analyse how skill premia differ over time and across countries, and uses this model to study the impact of international trade on wage inequality. Skill premia are determined by technology, the relative supply of skills, and trade. Technology is itself endogenous,...

We study the formation of a ruling coalition in non-democratic societies where institutions do not enable political commitments. Each individual is endowed with a level of political power. The ruling coalition consists of a subset of the individuals in the society and decides the distribution of...

This paper shows that in a frictional labor market part of the productivity gains from general training will be captured by future employers. As a result, investments in general skills will be suboptimally low, and contrary to the standard theory, part of the costs may be borne by the employers....