Subsidizing energy saving capital accumulation: a real option approach

Some environmental policies, like tax credit, have tried to induce the acquisition of energy efficient units and the replacement of old energy inefficient vintages. However, they have faced the energy paradox that is a slow diffusion of new vintages. We develop a stochastic model of irreversible investment, in which firms also face embodied technological progress. We compare in a dynamic example a deterministic and a stochastic model with embodied technological progress. In the embodied case under uncertainty, the option to postpone replacement becomes very large, reducing drastically the effectiveness of a tax credit.embodied technological progress; tax credit; option value

Double Irreversibility and Environmental Policy Design

The design of environmental policy typically takes place within a framework in which uncertainty over the future impact of pollution and two different kinds of irreversibilities interact. The first kind of irreversibility concerns the sunk cost of environmental degradation; the second is related to the sunk cost of environmental policy. Clearly, the two irreversibilities pull in opposite directions: policy irreversibility leads to more pollution and a less/later policy while environmental irreversibility generates less pollution and a more/sooner policy. Using a real option approach and an infinite time horizon model, this paper considers both irreversibilities simultaneously. The model first is developed by paying particular attention to the option values related to pollution and policy adoption. Solving the model in closed form then provides solutions for both the optimal pollution level and the optimal environmental policy timing. Finally, the model is "calibrated" with the purpose of appraising which irreversibility has the prevailing effect and what is the overall impact of both irreversibilities on pollution and policy design.Environmental Policy, Environmental Irreversibility, Policy Irreversibility

Financial Integration, Growth, and Volatility

The aim of the paper is to evaluate the welfare gains from financial integration for developing and emerging economies. To do so, we build a stochastic endogenous growth model for a small open economy that can (i) borrow from the rest of the world, (ii) invest in foreign assets, and (iii) receive FDI. The model is calibrated on 32 emerging and developing economies for which we evaluate the upper bound for the welfare gain from financial integration. For plausible values of preference parameters and actual levels of financial integration, the mean welfare gain from financial integration is about 10 percent of the existing wealth. Compared to financial autarky, actual levels of financial integration translate into slightly higher annual growth rates (around 0.4 percentage points per year.)financial integration; risk-sharing; endogenous growth; stochastic growth

Optimal Capital Accumulation, Energy Cost and the Nature of Technological Progress

This paper derives the optimal pace of capital accumulation at the firm level and the corresponding investment dynamics in the presence of an energy-saving technological progress. Energy and capital are complementary. When technical progress is disembodied, the firm invests once at the first period and never invests again. The optimal capital stock is a decreasing function of the energy price. When technical progress is embodied, the optimal scrapping time of capital goods is constant and investment is periodic. The optimal effective capital stock is shown to be lower than the optimal capital stock under disembodied technical change. A striking outcome of the paper is that under embodiment, the optimal effective capital stock is an increasing function of the energy cost, in contrast to the disembodiment caseInvestment theory;Embodied technological progress;Energy;Investment dynamics

Fiscal Harmonization and Portfolio Choice

In this paper, we consider a two-country model based on Svensson (1989) in order to analyze how fiscal harmonization impacts on economic growth and welfare through its effects on agents portfolio decisions in an uncertain world. We derive the conditions under which fiscal harmonization proves to be welfare enhancing and analyse how the set of initial tax rates leading to a welfare improving harmonization is affected by uncertainty and assets returns correlation. In particular, the results obtained suggest that the probability for tax harmonization to be welfare improving is first increasing and then decreasing with uncertainty while it monotonically decreases with the correlation between the assets returns shocks.fiscal harmonization; growth; uncertainty

Optimal Capital Accumulation and Embodied Technological Progress under Uncertainty

This paper proposes a stochastic model of investment with embodied technological progress, in which firms invest not only to expand the capacity as in Pindyck (1988) but also to replace old machines. The scrapping decision or the age of the oldest machine is then endogenous and evolves stochastically. Uncertainty may increase the optimal age of the machines in use, and due to uncertainty, not only capacity expansion but replacement as well, may be postponed. By introducing heterogenous capital units, the model may generate lumpy investment and it gets rid from the perfect ''procyclicity' of investment usually implied in the literature of irreversible investment under uncertainty. The so-called cleansing effect of recessions appears since replacement can occur even in bad realizations of the stochastic processEmbodiment Investment Uncertainty

Does public investment reduce private investment risk ? A real option approach

In this paper, the public investment provision takes place in a stochastic environnement. The role of the government is to remove a part of the uncertainty faced by the firm. If the government simply maximizes the value of the firm, then the optimal tax is smaller under imperfect competition then it is under perfect competition since more public capital reduces the selling price. But if the government seeks to maximize the consumer surplus, tax and public capital provision are a mean to correct the market and the optimal tax is then higherirreversible investment;public capital;uncertainty

Public capital and private investment, a real option approach

In this paper, public investment provision takes place in a stochastic environnement. The role of the government is to remove a part of the uncertainty faced by the firm. If the government simply maximizes the value of the firm, then the optimal tax is smaller under imperfect competition than it is under perfect competition since more public capital reduces the selling price. But if the government seeks to maximize the consumer surplus, tax and public capital provision are also a mean to correct the market and the optimal tax is then higher.irreversible investment; public capital; uncertainty

Fertility, Volatility, and Growth

Empirically, growth rates are negatively correlated with birth rates; they are also correlated with production risk. We argue that these stylized facts are related, and arise jointly from the decision of how many children to have in a risky economic environment.stochastic growth; fertility; volatility

Technological vs ecological switch and the environmental Kuznets curve

We consider an optimal technology adoption AK model in line with Boucekkine Krawczyk and Vallée (2011): an economy, caring about consumption and pollution as well, starts with a given technological regime and may decide to switch at any moment to a cleaner technology at a given permanent or transitory output cost. At the same time, we posit that there exists a pollution threshold above which the assimilation capacity of Nature goes down, featuring a kind of irreversible ecological regime. We study how ecological irreversibility interacts with the ingredients of the latter optimal technological switch problem, with a special attention to induced capital-pollution relationship. We find that if a single technological switch is optimal, one recovers the Environmental Kuznets Curve provided initial pollution is high enough. If exceeding the ecological threshold is optimal, then the latter configuration is far from being the rule.Technology adoption; ecological irreversibility; Environmental Kuznets Curve; Multi-stage optimal control