This paper analyses and compares potential efficiency gains induced by the introduction of product market competition and cross boarder trade in the piped water market. We argue that due to the specific circumstances in the water sector product market competition, i.e. competition by common...

This paper presents a dynamic North-South general-equilibrium model where households have non-homothetic preferences. Innovation takes place in a rich North while firms in a poor South imitate products manufactured in North. Introducing non-homothetic preferences delivers a complete...

This paper examines how trade liberalization affects investments in R&D at the firm level. In a model where entrepreneurs are heterogeneous in their wealth endowment, they rely differently on external funds. In the presence of capital market imperfections, this implies heterogeneous access to...

We study the recent evolution of top incomes in Switzerland, analyzing both social security data on labor incomes and tax data on total income. The results show that in the last 20 years, the share of top incomes has risen, and the top 0.01 percent’s share even doubled, putting Switzerland...

We introduce non-homothetic preferences into an innovation-based growth model and study how income and wealth inequality affect economic growth. We identify a (positive) price effect-where increasing inequality allows innovators to charge higher prices and (negative) market-size effects-with...

This paper presents a dynamic North-South general- equilibrium model where households have non-homothetic preferences. Innovation takes place in a rich North while firms in a poor South imitate products manufactured in North. Introducing non-homothetic preferences delivers a complete...

We study a model of growth and mass production. Firms undertake either product innovations that introduce new luxury goods for the rich; or process innovations that transform existing luxuries into mass products for the poor. A prototypical example for such a product cycle is the automobile....

This paper examines how trade liberalization affects investments in R&D at the firm level. We provide a model with entrepreneurs differing in their wealth endowment, causing them to rely differently on external funds. In the presence of capital market imperfections, this implies heterogeneous...

We introduce non-homothetic preferences into a general equilibrium model of monopolistic competition and explore the impact of income inequality on the medium-run macroeconomic equilibrium. We find that (i) a sufficiently high extent of inequality divides the economy into mass consumption...