The authors study a Markov equilibrium for the case where a monopolist extracts a nonrenewable resource which is converted to a durable good, which then depreciates at a constant rate. They show that, in a stationary, continuous time model (infinite horizon, infinitesimal period of commitment),...

The authors study the dynamics of optimal trade policy in a model with costly intersectoral adjustment of labor, where migrants pay less than the marginal social cost of migration. If workers have rational expectations, a future tariff has an announcement effect on the current migration...

Apple’s original decision to market iPhones using a single downstream vendor prompted calls for mandatory universal distribution (MUD), whereby all downstream vendors would sell the iPhone under the same contract terms. The upstream monopoly may want eitherone or more downstream vendors,...

The tendency to foreshorten time units as we peer further into the future provides an explanation for hyperbolic discounting at an intergenerational time scale. We study implications of hyperbolic discounting for climate change policy, when the probability of a climate-induced catastrophe...

The successor to the Kyoto Protocol should impose national ceilings on rich countries’ greenhouse gas emissions and promote voluntary abatement by developing countries. Our proposal gives signatories the option of exercising an escape clause that relaxes their requirement to abate. This...

If a regulator is unable to measure firms’ individual emissions, an ambient tax can be used to achieve the socially desired level of pollution. With this tax, each firm pays a unit tax on aggregate emissions. In order for the tax to be effective,firms must recognize that their decisions...

Non-strategic firms with rational expectations make investment and emissions decisions. The investment rule depends on firms’ beliefs about future emissions policies. We compare emissions taxes and quotas when the (strategic) regulator and (nonstrategic) firms have asymmetric information...

NAFTA’s investment treaty has led to several expropriation compensation claims from investors hurt by new environmental regulations. Expropriation clauses in international treaties solve post-investment moral hazard problems such as hold-ups. However, these clauses can interact with...