The weight of the average American adult male and female has increased by 16 and 14 pounds respectively and obesity rates have doubled since the early 1960s. Recent studies show these changes in weight can be attributed to the dramatic rise in the consumption of food away from home. We...

In this paper we revisit the connection between changes in interest rates, loan-to-value ratios and expectations in inaÌuencing housing prices. We construct a two good general equilibrium model in which housing is a composite good produced using structures and land. We show that changes in...

Recessions typically bring about expansions in government expenditures. More important, when a strong sector-specific negative shock coincides with the onset of the recession, it is commonly argued that a government ``stimulus" may be beneficial. The logical argument is as follows: resources are...

Poor countries devote the largest fraction of their labor force to agriculture, which is also their least productive sector. This turns out to be key for understanding cross-country disparities in per capita incomes. A large and active literature aims at finding the causes behind these facts....

Changes in wealth, according to our simple calculations, can account for almost all of the observed consumption fluctuations of the past two decades.

A GIIPS crisis wouldn't have too strong an effect on the U.S. economy, but an EU-wide crisis may be a serious concern.

We construct a dynamic general equilibrium model of tax evasion where agents choose to report some of their income. Unreported income requires using a payment method that avoids recordkeeping in some markets—cash. Trade using cash to avoid taxes is the ‘shadow economy’ in our model. We...

This paper evaluates the role of the construction sector in accounting for the performance of the U.S. economy in the last decade. During the Great Recession (2008-09) employment in the construction sector experienced an unprecedented decline that followed the largest expansion in employment...

The boom in real estate prices during the early 2000s and the subsequent bust were key factors underlying the recessions in the United States and Europe.