Journal of Public Economic Theory最新文献

This paper examines donations to social causes, generating public good-like externalities. Inspired by Bergstrom et al. (1986) and Andreoni (1989, 1990), our approach incorporates pure and impure altruism. We define an equilibrium notion, show an existence result, and its indeterminacy, which is real and comes from the decentralization of contributions by multiple private commodity bundles and how the aggregate and individual gifts enter the utility functions. In addition, we establish that the degree of indeterminacy of equilibrium prices increases with the number of private commodities. By adapting Andreoni's altruism index to our setting, we show that impure altruism can coexist with neutrality, highlighting the role of wealth in shaping perceptions of altruistic behavior.

In this theoretical article, I develop a unified framework that encapsulates: (i) a system of heterogeneous cities, (ii) unspecified transportation costs, and (iii) different land ownership structures that generate different fiscal externalities. I classify these land ownership structures into two categories: egalitarian versus inegalitarian. I then provide a full characterization of the decentralized and centralized economies. In particular, I prove that a spatial equilibrium can be a potential game equilibrium and can be a Cournot–Nash equilibrium. I also derive new conditions for existence, uniqueness, stability, optimality, and numerical approximation (Uzawa algorithm). This permits to disentangle the role of land ownership structures and fiscal externalities in the formation of cities. This also permits to demonstrate that land ownership structure is detrimental in determining the characteristics of a spatial equilibrium. In an egalitarian society, a spatial equilibrium sustains the social allocation. In an inegalitarian society, a spatial equilibrium is always suboptimal. Notably, I find a large spatial misallocation and substantial welfare costs by simulating the new framework using a version of the Uzawa algorithm and with a standard calibration. More globally, this establishes a new prediction that across-city inequalities have a link with global inefficiency.

The uncertainty of the tax base is the central issue we consider in this paper. Top-income earners benefit from the wealth management industry's supply of sophisticated schemes, allowing them to adopt a gray-area avoidance/evasion position. This fact makes the assessment of the tax base uncertain, even for the tax authority. Our research questions are: when should sophisticated evasion be deterred? How should a utilitarian government set tax rates accordingly? Does the uncertainty of the tax base disadvantage less fortunate taxpayers? We show that risk aversion plays a role. It has to be quite low for the tax authority not to enforce compliance. When compliance is enforced, if the rich are concentrated enough at the top of the income distribution—a mild condition—we find that the tax rate applied on the lower income should be minimized, a parallel with Edgeworth's old utilitarian proposition on equal marginal sacrifice. Our analysis also suggests that government uncertainty about the tax base will actually benefit the poor, provided tax compliance is enforced.

I study a dynamic game of innovation and takeover between an incumbent and a potential entrant where the entrant knows whether it has the resources to complete a project and compete, but the incumbent does not and can wait to learn about it. Under the assumption that the entrant lacks bargaining power, the equilibrium is inefficient. Killer acquisitions, by which the incumbent takes over and then drops the innovation, occur early and attract the resource-constrained entrant. Continuation acquisitions happen later and always keep the constrained entrant out, blocking socially desirable innovations. To stop killer acquisitions, merger policies require a cap on takeover bids. To encourage continuation acquisitions, they require both a cap and a possibly time-dependent floor. Policies that apply both before and after innovation achieve the optimum with complete information. Those applying only before cause delays, waste entry costs, and may even be unfeasible. The results call for stricter merger control, such as stronger notification rules and unified theories of harms that treat takeovers of nascent and established competitors in the same way.

This article analyzes the provision of public goods in a two-player game setting, employing the Game with Observable Delay (GOD) framework to investigate how endogenous timing influences contribution strategies and welfare outcomes. Our analysis shows that, for both symmetric and asymmetric valuation cases, the endogenous timing outcome leads to simultaneous play. This result arises from players' strong aversion to the follower position, driven by the leader's free-riding incentives. The outcome is good for welfare, since in both the symmetric and asymmetric cases, simultaneous play leads to greater total contributions compared to the sequential equilibrium. If the framework for contributions was of the Game with Action Commitment type, the outcome would be simultaneous, leading to an inferior welfare result. These findings indicate that fostering environments with a structure akin to the GOD could strategically encourage players to maximize their contributions and improve welfare outcomes in public goods scenarios.