Environmental public good provision under robust decision making

We study public good provision in a two-country dynamic setup with environmental externalities. In this framework, we examine robust decision making under potential misspecification of the process that describes the evolution of the environmental public good. Robust policies, arising from fear of model misspecification, help to correct for the inefficiencies associated with free riding and thus increase the provision of the public good. As a result, there can be welfare gains from robust policies even when the fear of model misspecification proves to be unfounded

Bias of the Quasi Score Estimator of a Measurement Error Model Under Misspecification of the Regressor Distribution

In a structural error model the structural quasi score (SQS) estimator is based on the distribution of the latent regressor variable. If this distribution is misspecified the SQS estimator is (asymptotically) biased. Two types of misspecification are considered. Both assume that the statistician erroneously adopts a normal distribution as his model for the regressor distribution. In the first type of misspecification the true model consists of a mixture of normal distributions which cluster round a single normal distribution, in the second type the true distribution is a normal distribution admixed with a second normal distribution of low weight. In both cases of misspecification the bias, of course, tends to zero when the size of misspecification tends to zero. However, in the first case the bias goes to zero very fast so that small deviations from the true model lead only to a negligible bias, whereas in the second case the bias is noticeable even for small deviations from the true model

Acknowledgement Misspecification in Macroeconomic Theory

We explore methods for confronting model misspecification in macroeconomics. We construct dynamic equilibria in which private agents and policy makers recognize that models are approximations. We explore two generalizations of rational expectations equilibria. In one of these equilibria, decision makers use dynamic evolution equations that are imperfect statistical approximations, and in the other misspecification is impossible to detect even from infinite samples of time-series data. In the first of these equilibria, decision rules are tailored to be robust to the allowable statistical discrepancies. Using frequency domain methods, we show that robust decision makers treat model misspecification like time-series econometricians.