The authors analyze the optimal replacement of assets under continuous and discontinuoustechnological change. They investigate the variable lifetime of assets in an infinite-horizonreplacement problem. Due to deterioration, the maintenance cost increases when the assetbecomes older. Because of...

This paper uses the adoption and invention of the spinning jenny as a test case to understandwhy the industrial revolution occurred in Britain in the eighteenth century rather than inFrance or India. It is shown that wages were much higher relative to capital prices in Britainthan in other...

We present a dynamic model where the probability of outsourcing production is increasing inthe firm’s expectation of technological change. As the pace of innovations in productiontechnologies increases, the less time the firm has to amortize the sunk costs associated withpurchasing and...

This research suggests that a Darwinian evolution of entrepreneurial spirit played asignificant role in the process of economic development and the dynamics of inequality withinand across societies. The study argues that entrepreneurial spirit evolved non-monotonicallyin the course of human...

Pecuniary externalities are crucial in shaping the strategies to value the distinctivecompetences and the economic success of innovative firms. The analysis of conditions forlocalized knowledge appropriation and exploitation makes it possible to identify idiosyncratic production factors....

Skill-biased technical change has occupied empirical economists for much of the 90s. However, the empirical literature has not progressed much beyond observing a positive correlation between technology indicators and demand shifts. Two hypotheses on the root causes of skill biases in technical...