Young Liberals and Old Conservatives - Inequality, Mobility and Redistribution

The paper examines the impact of income inequality and mobility on income redistribution in a modified median voter model where redistributive conflict takes place both between educational groups and age-groups. The effects of inequality and mobility are not unambiguous but depend on factors such as how mobility changes in different groups and causes of inequality. We also examine the effect of the length of electoral periods on redistribution and welfare for different groups and allow for majority voting on the length of electoral periods. Finally, we extend the model to encompass retirement and baby booms.inequality, mobility, income redistribution, median voter, age-earnings profiles

Raising Children to Work Hard: Altruism, Work Norms and Social Insurance

Children who can count on support from altruistic parents may not try hard to succeed in the labor market. Moreover, parental altruism makes withdrawal of such support non-credible. To promote work effort, parents may want to instill norms which later cause their children to experience guilt or shame associated with failure to support themselves. While social insurance pools risk across families, we show that it also creates a free-rider problem among parents in terms of norm formation. We also examine the formation of norms requiring children to support their parents financially in old age.Work norms, social insurance, altruism

Young Liberals and Old Conservatives - Inequality, Mobility and Redistribution

The paper examines the impact of income inequality and mobility on income redistribution in a modified median voter model where redistributive conflict takes place both between educational groups and age-groups. The effects of inequality and mobility are not unambiguous but depend on factors such as how mobility changes in different groups and causes of inequality. We also examine the effect of the length of electoral periods on redistribution and welfare for different groups and allow for majority voting on the length of electoral periods. Finally, we extend the model to encompass retirement and baby booms.Inequality; mobility; income redistribution; median voter; age-earnings profiles

Raising Children to Work Hard: Altruism, Work Norms and Social Insurance

Children who can count on support from altruistic parents may not try hard to succeed in the labor market. Moreover, parental altruism makes withdrawal of such support non-credible. To promote work effort, parents may want to instill norms which later cause their children to experience guilt or shame associated with failure to support themselves. While social insurance pools risk across families, we show that it also creates a free-rider problem among parents in terms of norm formation. We also examine the formation of norms requiring children to support their parents financially in old age.Work norms; social insurance; altruism

Price Competition, Advertising and Media Market Concentration

In media markets, the value of advertisement exposure depends on circulation, and media consumers’ valuation is affected by advertising. This paper analyzes media market competition in a duopoly framework. There exist symmetric and asymmetric equilibria in terms of firm size. There is less scope for asymmetry when products are more differentiated or of higher intrinsic quality. Some media exhibit public good features. This increases the scope for asymmetry when consumers value advertising positively. If their valuation is negative only symmetric equilibria exist. Regulations limiting price competition increase the scope for natural monopoly. Finally, monopoly is a less likely outcome in subscription-based media markets.Market Concentration; Oligopoly; Demand Externalities; Advertising; Media Markets

Cross-Ownership and the Takeover Deterrence

Firms having significant shareholdings in one another is not an unusual phenomenon in countries where the law admits such ownership arrangements, like Sweden and Japan. In this paper the role of cross-ownership as means for deterring takeovers is examined in the framework of a simple two-firm, two-period model with raiders, differing with respect to their valuation of a potential target, turning up randomly. The paper argues the following points: If cross-ownership increases managerial influence - the consequences for the shareholders depend on the probability that the firm would have received a tender offer in absence of cross-ownership and managers benefit from it up to a point but their gains are negatively related to the their ability to resist takeover attempts

Social Norms and Welfare State Dynamics

The paper analyses the interaction between economic incentives and work norms in the context of social insurance. If the work norm is endogenous in the sense that it is weaker when the population share of beneficiaries is higher, then voters will choose less generous bene.ts than otherwise. We also discuss welfare-state dynamics when there is a time lag in the adjustment of the norm in response to changes in this population share, and show how a temporary shift in the unemployment rate may cause persistence in the number of beneficiaries.welfare state, social norms, social insurance

Young liberals and old conservatives : inequality, mobility and redistribution

The paper examines the impact of income inequality and mobility on income redistribution in a modified median voter model where redistributive conflict takes place both between educational groups and age-groups. The effects of inequality and mobility are not unambiguous but depend on factors such as how mobility changes in different groups and causes of inequality. We also examine the effect of the length of electoral periods on redistribution and welfare for different groups and allow for majority voting on the length of electoral periods. Finally, we extend the model to encompass retirement and baby booms