On the Early Holocene: Foraging to Early Agriculture

We consider a world in which the mode of food production, foraging or agriculture, is endogenous, and in which technology grows exogenously. Within a model of coalition formation, we allow individuals to rationally form cooperative communities (bands) of foragers or farmers. At the lowest levels of technology, equilibrium entails the grand coalition of foragers, a cooperative structure which avoids over-exploitation of the environment. But at a critical state of technology, the cooperative structure breaks down through an individually rational splintering of the band. At this stage, there can be an increase in work and through the over-exploitation of the environment, a food crisis. In the end, technological growth may lead to a one-way transition from foraging to agriculture.Foraging, Agriculture, Transition, Coalition Formation, Cooperation

From Foraging to Agriculture

We consider a world in which the mode of food production, foraging or agriculture, is endogenous, and in which technology grows exogenously. Using a recent model of coalition formation, we allow individuals to rationally form cooperative communities (bands) of foragers or farmers. At the lowest levels of technology, equilibrium entails the grand coalition of foragers, a cooperative structure which avoids over-exploitation of the environment. But at a critical state of technology, the cooperative structure breaks down through an individually rational splintering of the band. At this stage there can be an increase in work and, through the over-exploitation of the environment, a food crisis. In the end, technological growth leads to a one-way transition from foraging to agriculture.

Tariff Wars and Trade Deals With Costly Government

We study a simple model of tariff wars and trade deals in which government revenue collection and disbursement uses resources. The introduction of a costly government leads to lower non-cooperative tariffs, the possibility that a less costly government may win a tariff war, and fully cooperative trade deals where countries lower tariffs but do not eliminate them, even with lump-sum taxes and transfers.

Tariff Wars and Trade Deals with Costly Government

We study a simple model of tariff wars and trade deals in which government revenue collection and disbursement uses resources. The introduction of costly governments leads to lower non–cooperative tariffs, the possibility that a less costly government may win a tariff war, and fully cooperative trade deals where countries lower tariffs but do not eliminate them, even with lump–sum taxes and transfers.

Rational Truth-Avoidance and Self-Esteem

We assume that people have beliefs about their abilities, that these generate self-esteem, and that self-esteem is valued intrinsically. Individuals face two choices; one of which strictly dominates the other in a pecuniary sense, but necessarily involves gathering information concerning one's (unobserved) ability. We lay out the circumstances under which an individual may find it rational to reject the dominant choice; an act which, in social psychology is described as avoiding the situation, but which we label truth-avoidance. We find that the incentive to avoid the truth is increasing in income and decreasing in self-esteem, the perceived accuracy of one's self-assessment, and the role which luck plays in generating opportunities.self-esteem, confidence, signal-extraction, truth-avoidance.

Towards a Better System for Immigration Control

We study different methods of immigration control using a simple model of a congested world. Our main comparison involves quota, the predominant instrument of immigration control, and a proposed system of immigration tolls and emigration subsidies. We show that the equilibrium of the proposed system is Pareto superior to the quota system. This is consistent with the tolls and subsidies creating a market for international migrants. When countries are price-takers the market becomes perfect and the exploitation of gains from trade complete. From a normative perspective, an open-borders policy is preferred to both control methods but will meet political opposition because it hurts the residents of the rich country.

Redistribution, Fiscal Competition, and the Politics of Economic Integration

The paper examines the redistributive consequences of the economic integration of factor markets. We consider two countries that redistribute income among their residents. The social benefits in each country are financed by a source based tax on capital which is democratically chosen by its inhabitants. If either capital or labour is internationally mobile, the countries engage in fiscal competiton, i.e., the partial integration of capital or labour markets is detrimental to the countries' redistributive ability. A move from partial to full integration, however, may alleviate rather than intensify fiscal competition, particularly, if the two countries face sufficiently similar economic and political conditions. In such a situation, increased integration of labour markets will soften the incentives compete for mobile capital. As a result, there is more redistribution in equilibrium and a majority of the population in each country is strictly better off.

Federations, Constitutions, and Political Bargaining

The paper studies a world where a region provides essential inputs for the successful implementation of a local public policy project with spill-overs, and where bargaining between different levels of government may ensure efficient decision making ex post. We ask whether the authority over the public policy measure should rest with the local government or be centralized, allowing financial relationships within the federation to be designed optimally. We show that centralization is always dominant when governments are benevolent, and that both governance structures are otherwise inefficient as long as political bargaining is disregarded. With bargaining, however, the first best can often be achieved under decentralization, but not under centralization. At the root of the result is the alignment of decision making over both essential inputs and final project size under decentralization.Federalism, Constitutions, Decentralization, Grants, Political Bargaining.

The first confirmed superoutburst of the SU UMa type dwarf nova SDSS J083931.35+282824.0

We report unfiltered CCD photometry of the first confirmed superoutburst of the recently discovered dwarf nova, SDSS J083931.35+282824.0 in April 2010. From a quiescence magnitude of ~19.8 it rose to 14.0, an outburst amplitude of at least 5.8 magnitudes. Only the plateau phase of the outburst was observed during which superhumps with peak-to-peak amplitude of up to 0.28 magnitudes were present, confirming this to be an SU UMa type dwarf nova. The mean superhump period was Psh = 0.07836(2) during the first 3 days and this subsequently decreased to 0.07800(3) d. Analysis of the data revealed tentative evidence for an orbital period Porb = 0.07531(25) d. The fractional superhump period excess was epsilon = 0.039(6), which is consistent with other dwarf novae of similar orbital period.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figures. Accepted for publication in the Journal of the British Astronomical Associatio