In their seminal paper, Bovenberg and De Mooij (1994) elucidate why an ecological tax reform will not yield a double dividend, i.e. fails to increase the efficiency of the tax system. The present paper slightly modifies the Bovenberg and De Mooij model by introducing money illusion. With this modification, an environmental tax reform that raises the price level may generate a double dividend, s...

We estimate an empirical model of consumption disasters using new data on consumption for 24 countries over more than 100 years, and study its implications for asset prices. The model allows for partial recoveries after disasters that unfold over multiple years. We find that roughly half of the drop in consumption due to disasters is subsequently reversed. Our model generates a sizable equity p...

Addiction creates an intertemporal link between a consumer’s past and present decisions, altering their responsiveness to price changes relative to nonaddictive products. We construct a dynamic model of rational addiction and endogenous consumption to investigate how consumers respond to policy interventions that aim to reduce purchases of cigarettes. We find that, on average, the category elas...

We study a multi-sector model of growth with differences in TFP growth rates across sectors and derive sufficient conditions for the coexistence of a balanced aggregate growth path, with all aggregates growing at the same rate, and structural change, characterized by sectoral labor reallocation. The conditions needed are weak restrictions on the utility and production functions: goods should be...

Though risk aversion and the elasticity of intertemporal substitution have been the subjects of careful scrutiny, the long-run risks literature as well as the broader literature using recursive utility to address asset pricing puzzles has ignored the full implications of their parameter specifications. Recursive utility implies that the temporal resolution of risk matters and a quantitative ass...

In a market with stochastic investment opportunities, we study an optimal consumption investment problem for an agent with recursive utility of Epstein-Zin type. Focusing on the empirically relevant specification where both risk aversion and elasticity of intertemporal substitution are in excess of one, we characterize optimal consumption and investment strategies via backward stochastic differ...

In an influential article Tornell and Lane (1999) considered an economy, populated by multiple powerful groups, in which property rights in the formal sector are not protected. They argued that then investment in an informal sector may be optimal and set up conditions for “voracity” such that a permanent positive shock in the formal sector leads to lower economic growth. Here I show that whenev...

Motivated by the effects of COVID-19 pandemic, we present a theory Keynesian supply shocks: shocks that reduce potential output in sector economy, but that, reducing demand other sectors, ultimately push aggregate activity below potential. A shock is more likely when elasticity substitution between sectors relatively low, intertemporal high, and markets are incomplete. Fiscal policy can display...

Preliminary. Do not distribute. In this paper, we report the results from a large-scale field experiment with bicycle messengers. We increased the messengers comission rate, their sole form of compensation by 25 percent during four weeks. We find a positive and large intertemporal elasticity for the supply of hours. In response to the wage increase, messengers work roughly 30 percent more shift...