Dynamic Inefficiency in an Overlapping Generation Economy with Pollution and Health Costs

Revised 2008-08.-- Published as an article in: Journal of Public Economic Theory (2008), 10(4), 563-594.

Second-best tax policy in a growing economy with externalities

This paper investigates the exploitation of environmental resources in a growing economy within a second-best scal policy framework. Agents derive utility from two types of consumption goods one which relies on an environmental input and one which does not as well as from leisure and from environmental amenity values. Property rights for the environmental resource are potentially incomplete. We connect second best policy to essential components of utility by considering the elasticity of substitution among each of the four utility arguments. The results illustrate potentially important relationships between environmental amentity values and leisure. When amenity values are complementary with leisure, for instance when environmental amenities are used for recreation, taxes on extractive goods generally increase over time. On the other hand, optimal taxes on extractive goods generally decrease over time when leisure and environmental amenity values are substitutes. Unders some parameterizations, complex dynamics leading to nonmonotonic time paths for the state variables can emerge.

Terrorism and the World Economy

Published as an article in: European Economic Review, 2008, vol. 52, issue 1, pages 1-27.

Growth in an oil abundant economy: The case of Venezuela

This paper has been presented at DEGIT-X held in México 2005.-- Revised: 2008-08.

Optimal Minimum Wage in a Competitive Economy: an Alternative Modelling Approach

This paper analyzes whether a minimum wage can be an optimal redistribution policy when distorting taxes and lump-sum transfers are also available in a competitive economy. We build a static general equilibrium model with a Ramsey planner making decisions on taxes, transfers, and minimum wage levels. Workers are assumed to differ only in their productivity. We find that optimal redistribution may imply the use of a minimum wage. The key factor driving our results is the reaction of the demand for low skilled labor to the minimum wage law. Hence, an optimal minimum wage appears to be most likely when low skilled households are scarce, the complementarity between the two types of workers is large or the difference in productivity is small. The main contribution of the paper is a modelling approach that allows us to adopt analysis and solution techniques widely used in recent public finance research. Moreover, this modelling strategy is flexible enough to allow for potential extensions to include dynamics into the model.

The position of a social economy in the Czech Republic at present

The Social Economy is a new phenomenon in the Czech Republic. It means the economy with its social effects that is being supported within public politics. Some analyses have been done at J.E:purkynI University in Ústí nad Labem during the last years. The topics of this research were the transformation of public administration, non-profit sector(respectively the civil mix sector), co-operatives, and social enterprises, and it is still ongoing.

Income Taxation and Growth in an OLG Economy: Does Aggregate Uncertainty Play any Role?

We analyze the effects of capital income taxation on long-run growth in a stochastic, two-period overlapping generations economy. Endogenous growth is driven by a positive externality of physical capital in the production sector that makes firms exhibit an aggregate technology in equilibrium. We distinguish between capital income and labor income, and between attitudes towards risk and intertemporal substitution of consumption. We show necessary and sufficient conditions such that i) increments in the capital income taxation lead to higher equilibrium growth rates, and ii) the effect of changes in the capital income tax rate on the equilibrium growth may be of opposite signs in stochastic and in deterministic economies. Such a sign reversal is shown to be more likely depending on i) how the intertemporal elasticity of substitution compares to one, and ii) the size of second- period labor supply. Numerical simulations show that for reasonable values of the intertemporal elasticity of substitution, a sign reversal shows up only for implausibly high values of the second- period’s labor supply. The conclusion is that deterministic OLG economies are a good approximation of the effect of taxes on the equilibrium growth rate as in Smith (1996).

Lessons from History for Transitions to a Low Carbon Economy

4 p.

The basque ecological debt: global socioecological impacts of a small open economy

4 p.

From Shadow to Green: Linking Environmental Fiscal Reforms and the Informal Economy

47 p.

Financial Futures Markets and Their Impact on the Real Economy in Middle and Low Income Countries

This project analyses the influence of the futures market on middle and low income countries. In it, I attempt to show that investments made by large investment funds in this market, as well as by certain pension plans, bring major consequences whose effects are more evident in less developed countries. The cornerstones of the work are as follows; to attempt to see the existing relationship between the commodity futures market and its underlying assets; analysing products such as wheat, rice and corn in-depth, because these are the most basic foodstuffs at a global level; to determine how an increase in trading in these markets can affect the lives of people in the poorest countries; to analyse investor concern regarding the consequences that their investments may have. Throughout the project we will see how large speculators use production forecasting models to determine the shortage of a commodity in order to take a position in the futures market to profit from it. In addition we will see how an increase in trading in this market causes an increase in the price of the underlying asset in the spot market. As for investor concern, I can say it is negligible, but the idea of running pension plans or investment funds that follow some social criteria has been welcomed by those interviewed, which makes me think that different legislation is possible. This legislation will only come into existence if it is demanded by the people. A fact that now becomes complicated because without a minimum financial basis, they cannot even know how the large investment funds trade with hunger in the world. The day when most people understand how large speculators profit from famine will be the day to put pressure on governments to begin to put limits on speculation. This makes financial awareness necessary in order to achieve a curb in excessive speculation.

Mugilid Fish Are Sentinels of Exposure to Endocrine Disrupting Compounds in Coastal and Estuarine Environments

Effects on fish reproduction can result from a variety of toxicity mechanisms first operating at the molecular level. Notably, the presence in the environment of some compounds termed endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) can cause adverse effects on reproduction by interfering with the endocrine system. In some cases, exposure to EDCs leads to the animal feminization and male fish may develop oocytes in testis (intersex condition). Mugilid fish are well suited sentinel organisms to study the effects of reproductive EDCs in the monitoring of estuarine/marine environments. Up-regulation of aromatases and vitellogenins in males and juveniles and the presence of intersex individuals have been described in a wide array of mullet species worldwide. There is a need to develop new molecular markers to identify early feminization responses and intersex condition in fish populations, studying mechanisms that regulate gonad differentiation under exposure to xenoestrogens. Interestingly, an electrophoresis of gonad RNA, shows a strong expression of 5S rRNA in oocytes, indicating the potential of 5S rRNA and its regulating proteins to become useful molecular makers of oocyte presence in testis. Therefore, the use of these oocyte markers to sex and identify intersex mullets could constitute powerful molecular biomarkers to assess xenoestrogenicity in field conditions.

Wage factors in the Basque Economy

[EN] This project aims to determine the factors which influence workers’ wages in the Basque Country, taking data from the INE (Spanish Statistical Office). In first place, I will decide which variables to choose and describe them. Then they will be used to build a wage model. At this point I will observe their behaviour according to their values and the possible differences between them. Once these variables are described, they will be used to develop an econometric model that will allow to see the different effects of the variables on the endogenous variable, in this case the gross annual wage. Finally, all the analysed data will be taken and examined to draw the final conclusions and see how workers’ age, training or gender affect their salary. [EN]