Hirsch (1976) suggested that as consumption grows, an increasing proportion of the benefits people derive from consumption is due to a status effect. Status is a relative concept that cannot be increased on average; thus it may seem reasonable to expect that as consumption grows, the marginal...

There is no consensus on how to measure interpersonally comparable, cardinal utility. Despite of this, people repeatedly make welfare evaluations in their everyday lives. However, people do not always agree on such evaluations, and this is one important reason for political disagreements. Thus,...

Aslaksen et al. (1990) concluded that the petroleum wealth of Norway, and hence the permanent income from petroleum extraction, was as uncertain as the yearly oil revenues. Their conclusion was based on wealth estimates using official price projections, with no independent empirical analysis of...

In this paper we provide a formal analysis to evaluate the subtraction of defensive expenditures from GDP. We consider expenditures that are used to produce non- market goods as candidates for being subtracted from GDP. It will be demonstrated that income net such expenditures will account for...

It is shown that if social welfare is the sum of logaritmic utility function, the optimal income distribution and the welfare effect of any income redistribution is independet of the equivalence scales. In optimum all households have the same per capita income. Based on this observation it is...

In this paper, we present an economic model of moral motivation. Consumers prefer regarding themselves as socially responsible individuals. Voluntary contributions to public goods are motivated by this preference. The self-image as socially responsible is determined by a comparison of one's...

This paper examines the implications of status-seeking behavior for long-term growth in a competitive economy. We explore the intuitive hypothesis that the quest for enhanced economic status leads to excessive levels of production and consumption. In a Ramsey growth model in which preferences...