Publications

We analyse voter turnout as a function of referendum types. An advisory referendum produces advice that a legislature may or may not take into account when choosing between two alternatives, whereas a…

This paper presents a new approach to the theory of the firm by identifying factor complementarities as central to the determination of the firm's boundaries. The factor complementarities may take a v…

The expansion of welfare-state arrangements is seen as the result of dynamic interaction between market behaviour and political behaviour, often with considerable time lags, sometimes generating eithe…

The regional voting pattern of the Swedish EU-membership referendum is analyzed to determine voters' preferences over two fiscal regimes: an autonomous Sweden, or Sweden as part of the EU. A major dif…

This paper aims to explain the spatial variations of crime, both between and within cities. Two types of mechanisms are put forward: Social interactions that stipulate that an individual is more likel…

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 shar…

We analyze the development of the Swedish ownership model after World War II. The controlling ownership in Swedish firms is typically concentrated to one or two owners. Often, but not always, the cont…

In Europe, accounting standards prevent larger expenditures on employer-sponsored training from being treated as investments. Using Sweden as example, we discuss two consequences for training. First,…

We classify social security pension systems in three dimensions: actuarial versus non-actuarial, funded versus unfunded, and defined-benefit versus defined-contribution systems. Recent pension reforms…

A "chain of replacement" model is used to examine the effects of automobile taxes and of a scrappage premium on the life length of cars, and on the size of the car fleet. The predictions of the model…

The Knowledge Capital Model (KC-model), described in Markusen (2002), encompasses both market size (horizontal) as well as factor endowment (vertical) explanations to why multinational production occu…

In imperfectly competitive markets firms with high costs produce positive output. The market’s ability to minimize costs is also constrained by the fact that firms’ costs are often private information.…

We investigate experimentally how the share of experienced traders in double-auction asset markets affects trading, in particular the occurrence of bubble-crash pricing patterns. In each session, six…

The achievements of social-welfare arrangements in Western Europe are well known: considerable income security, relatively little poverty and, in some countries, ample supply of social services. But t…

At the end of the last millennium, we experienced a boom in merger and acquisition (M&A) deals in the world. The value of all M&As as a share of world GDP rose from 0.3 per cent in 1980 to 8 p…

This book addresses the controversial call for international labor standards, seeking to productively further this debate by considering the economic implications and history of these standards. A res…

This book was the first in a groundbreaking series of annual volumes utilized in the development of an American Law Institute (ALI) project on World Trade Organization Law. The project undertakes year…

‘These eleven small, open economies teach us a great deal about the behaviour of money and financial markets. This volume sets the standard for investigating them. Any future serious work must take ac…

This thesis consists of three essays, which all concern the dynamics ofpension reform. The first essay analyzes the dynamic properties of therecently reformed Swedish pay-as-you-go pension system. The…

We provide a cultural explanation to the phenomenon of corruption in the framework of an overlapping generations model with intergenerational transmission of values. We show that the economy has two s…

The growth effects of international financial liberalization and integration are investigated using the methodology and data developed by Rajan and Zingales (1998). The main result is that industries…

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 shar…

This paper considers the effects of union-bargained minimum wages on transitions into and out of employment in the hotels and catering industry over the period 1979–99. This industry is characterised…

In this paper, I analyze the commercialization of patents in the Swedish medicine & hygiene sector. A unique database makes it possible to use a new method, where I follow the commercialization pr…

We construct a model in which a number of equally powerful ethnic groups compete for power by engaging in civil war. In non-redistributive equilibrium, ethnically homogeneous and ethnically diverse co…

If protectionist trade policies aim to insure domestic industries against swings in world market prices, the development of financial markets could lead to trade liberalization. Likewise, trade libera…

A people's culture, norms and habits are important determinants not just of the quality of social life but of economic progress and growth. In this paper we take the view that while the importance of…

Developing countries, in particular the least developed ones, probably have more to learn from social policies in Europe during the early 20th century than from the elaborate welfare-state arrangement…

We characterize pension systems along three dimensions: 1) actuarial vs. non-actuarial, 2) funded vs. pay-as-you-go, 3) defined-contribution vs. defined-benefit. Increasing the degree of actuarial fai…

An important issue in the debate on voucher systems and school choice is what effects competition from independent schools will have on public schools. Sweden has made a radical reform of its system f…

This study explores how relative skilled-wage premia affect FDI. Contrary to previous studies based on factor endowment differences, we find strong support for vertical FDI, in the sense that more FDI…

Dynamic decision-making without commitment is usually modelled as a game between the current and future selves of the decision maker. It has been observed that if the time-horizon is infinite, then su…

Real exchange and interest rates may still fluctuate inside the EMU and give rise to changes in competitiveness. We find, in contrast to what is generally expected, no convergence in these variables a…

Is discounting of future instantaneous utilities consistent with altruism towards future selves? More precisely, can temporal preferences, expressed as a sum of discounted instantaneous utilities, be…

Value Based Management (VBM) has become a common tool for ex ante and ex post evaluation of corporate strategies and projects from the perspective of shareholder value maximization (SVM). VBM-framewor…

This paper analyses simultaneous regulation of cost and quality when firms have private, correlated information about productivity and the regulator receives a signal about quality. It is shown that m…

We investigate whether temporal preferences expressed as a sum of discounted consumption utilities can be derived from a welfare representation in the form of a sum of discounted total utilities. We f…

Increased integration and growing macroeconomic fluctuations require more attention to be paid to the link between the ”noise” that these fluctuations represent and the company’s own development. For…

We investigate the interaction between cross-border acquisitions and greenfield entry in a multi-firm setting. It is shown that the net profits of the acquirer may decrease when the acquisition gives…

In the traditional trade literature, there is a well-developed area analyzing the effect of growth on trade and its reflection on income growth. This literature developed already in the 1950s and 1960…

This paper analyzes the simultaneous relationship between R&D and foreign sales in Swedish multinational enterprises (MNEs). We argue that this two-way relationship should especially apply to mult…

Experiences of social policies during the first decades of the 20th century in Europe underline the important role of informal systems for income security and personal services at low levels of econom…

Investment liberalizing countries are often concerned that cross-border mergers & acquisitions might have an adverse effect on domestic firms and benefit multinational enterprises (MNEs). However,…

This study examines the effect of foreign (Anglo-American) board membership on corporate performance measured in terms of firm value (Tobin’s Q). On a basis of firms with headquarters in Norway or Swe…

In Search of FDI-Transmitted R& D Spillovers: A Study Based on Swedish Data. — This paper analyzes empirically whether inward and outward foreign direct investment (FDI) work as channels for inter…

The paper examines the implications for wage bargaining of an important aspect of the ongoing reorganization of work – the move from occupational specialization toward multi-tasking. The analysis show…

This paper focuses on the role of corporate financial strategies to improve their market valuations and lower their cost of capital. The identification of successful strategies is accomplished within…

This paper studies a model of how political parties use resources for campaigning to inform voters. Each party has a predetermined ideology drawn from some distribution. Parties choose a platform and…

We investigate the dramatic transformation of ownership policies and ownership structure in Sweden during the postwar period. After WWII, Swedish ownership policies were guided by a socialist vision w…

This paper deals with the interplay between economic incentives and social norms in firms. We outline a simple model of team production and provide preliminary results on linear incentive schemes in t…

We provide a cultural explanation to the phenomenon of corruption in the framework of an overlapping generations model with intergenerational transmission of values. We show that the economy has two s…

This paper tests the insiders' dilemma hypothesis in a laboratory experiment. The insiders' dilemma means that a profitable merger does not occur, because it is even more profitable for each firm to u…

This paper provides a simple explanation for why some minority groups are economically successful, despite being subject to government-mandated discriminatory policies. We study an economy with privat…

This paper analyzes a three-stage optimization problem in which a firm chooses (i) its technology, by deciding on a level of R&D, (ii) whether this technology is to be used in a domestic or a forei…

A number of cross-country comparisons do not find a robust negative relationship between government size and economic growth. In part, this may reflect the prediction in economic theory that a negativ…

This article argues that the body of foreign direct investment (FDI) literature in general and the ownership, location, and internalization (OLI) paradigm in particular would be enriched if finance-sp…

Government firms and authorities often sell services in the free market via affiliated consulting firms (CFs). In this study, I analyze whether these agents have an unfair competitive edge compared to…

The competitive effect of international market integration in industries with imperfect competition is of great policy interest. This paper focuses on the link between monopolization and market segmen…

What is the impact of the increasing dominance of conventional firms in e-commerce? We use a simple model to show that retailers who only sell through Internet have lower on-line prices than retailers…

Markets with imperfect competition do not induce a cost-minimizing allocation of production between firms. The market's ability to rationalize production is even more limited if costs are private info…

This paper considers a small open economy with an input–output industrial structure that creates vertical linkages and multiple equilibria. An imperfect labor market is introduced by assuming unionize…

This report studies the importance of efficiency gains from horizontal mergers. A general theme throughout this report is that efficiency gains, and their pass-on to consumers, may vary substantially…

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 ef…

In Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy Joseph A. Schumpeter concluded that socialism would eventually displace capitalism in Western democracies. This would come about as a result of the superior perf…

In intermediate goods markets, both buyers and sellers normally have market power, and sales are based on bilaterally negotiated contracts specifying both price and quantity. In our model, pairs of bu…

This article argues that the body of foreign direct investment (FDI) literature in general and the ownership, location, and internalization (OLI) paradigm in particular would be enriched if finance-sp…

Multinational enterprises (MNEs) are important in transmitting technology across national borders. Not only do they allow for transfer of technology within the firm, but it is also believed that they…

The poorest nations of the world suffer from extreme disease burdens, which go largely untreated because weak incomes and the prevailing system of intellectual property rights fail to provide sufficie…

Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) is the dominant form of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), but has only received scarce attention in the theory literature on trade and investment. This paper highligh…

Most econometric studies of equity market integration suggest that national markets are increasingly becoming part of a global equity market. As regards the extent of this integration, however, the re…

Recent developments in society have generated misalignment between the welfare state and socio-economic conditions and preferences. This paper emphasis developments in the labor market and the structu…

We analyse the effect on agglomeration tendencies of allowing multi‐region firms in a standard trade and location model, the core–periphery (CP) model developed by Kurgman (1991). The introduction of…

Unlike previous analyses, we consider (i) that IT may affect productivity growth both directly and indirectly, through human capital interactions, and (ii) possible externalities in the use of IT. Exa…

The paper discusses the consequences for the functioning of different pension systems of various types of socioeconomic changes, mainly demographic developments, variations in productivity growth and…

A unique database on individual proposals is used to analyse competition among consulting firms (CFs) for international projects. CFs, which sell services based on human capital, focus on developing c…

Standards and technical regulations which govern the admissibility of imported goods into an economy raise costs of exporters entering new markets, and may have a particularly high impact on firms see…

imports is unlimited, the manufacturer chooses deterrence and international prices converge. Second, with endogenously limited arbitrage the manufacturing firm accommodates and the price in the home m…