It is common practice to summarise the economic performance of countries in terms of four dimensions (real growth, inflation, unemployment and the external account), which are visually captured by the magic diamond of the OECD. In this paper we present a synthetic performance measure which...

In the traditional approach to consumer behaviour it is assumed that households behave as if they were single decision making units. This approach has methodological, empirical and welfare economic deficiencies. A valuable alternative to the traditional model is the collective approach to...

Met deze paper wordt voor het eerst een consistente databank met betrekking tot de maritieme overslag in de Antwerpse haven voor de twintigste eeuw gereconstrueerd. We zijn erin geslaagd op basis van een hele reeks bronnen de overslag op vrij gedesaggregeerd niveau in kaart te brengen. Deze...

This paper studies the vertical distribution arrangement between manufacturers and retailers in a two dimensional horizontal product differentiation framework. Products are differentiated along consumers' taste and retailers' location. Consumers have to incur transportation costs to visit a...

Direct and indirect standardization procedures aim at comparing differences in health or differences in health care expenditures between subgroups of the population after controlling for observable morbidity differences. There is a close analogy between this problem and the issue of risk...

For each outcome (i.e. a payoff vector augmented with a coalition structure) of a TU-game with a non-empty coalition structure core there exists a finite sequence of successively dominating outcomes that terminates in the coalition structure core. In order to obtain this result a restrictive...

This paper analyses empirically how changes in productivity affect the real eurodollar exchange rate. We consider the two-sector new open macro model in Benigno and Thoenissen (2003). The model predictions are used, in the form of sign restrictions, to identify productivity shocks in a...

Housing prices vary geographically, even between municipalities. Local differences can be attributed to differences in incomes, demographic effects and real estate characteristics. This paper argues that one should additionally take into account the geographical location of municipalities. In...

In the spirit of Fleurbaey et al. (2001), it is tempting to introduce more reasonable lower and upper bounds in Atkinson and Bourguigon’s (1987) sequential generalized Lorenz dominance procedure. Unfortunately, our proposal leads, at best, to an average household income criterion, which is...

Capabilities and functionings are new and attractive concepts for assessing the well-being and advantage of individuals. Functionings refer to a person’s achievements, i.e. what she manages to do or to be. Capabilities refer to her real opportunities and incorporate the idea of freedom. We...