Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-dlnhk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-27T18:38:11.744Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Exhaustible Resource Allocation, Intergenerational Equity, and Sustainability

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 September 2016

Keith C. Knapp*
Affiliation:
Department of Soil and Environmental Sciences, University of California, Riverside
Get access

Abstract

An OLG model with exhaustible resources and solar energy is developed, and equilibrium time paths are characterized numerically using recursive methods. For the parameter values considered, resource prices increase over time, and extractions, output, and utility decline over time until a steady-state is reached. Decreasing the intertemporal elasticity of substitution or raising consumers' subjective discount rate hastens exhaustion of the resource stock. Market equilibrium can result in much quicker use of the stock than social optimality under a constant discount rate, with consequent higher utility for early generations and lower utility for future generations in contrast to social optimality.

Type
New Issues and Fresh Approaches for Agricultural and Resource Economics
Copyright
Copyright © 1996 Northeastern Agricultural and Resource Economics Association 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bertsekas, D.P. Dynamic Programming and Stochastic Control. New York: Academic Press, 1976.Google Scholar
Coleman, W.J. II. “Equilibrium in a Production Economy with an Income Tax.” Econometrica 59 (1991): 1091–104.Google Scholar
Dasgupta, P.S., and Heal, G.M. Economic Theory and Exhaustible Resources. Oxford: Cambridge University Press, 1974.Google Scholar
Devarajan, S., and Fisher, A.C.Hotelling's ‘Economics of Exhaustible Resources’: Fifty Years Later.” Journal of Economic Literature 19 (1981): 6573.Google Scholar
Diamond, P.A.National Debt in a Neoclassical Growth Model.” American Economic Review 55 (1965): 1126–50.Google Scholar
Epstein, L.G., and Zin, S.E.Substitution, Risk Aversion, and the Temporal Behavior of Consumption and Asset Returns: An Empirical Analysis.” Journal of Political Economy 99 (1991): 263–86.Google Scholar
Hall, R.E.Intertemporal Substitution in Consumption.” Journal of Political Economy 96 (1988): 339–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hotelling, H.The Economics of Exhaustible Resources.” Journal of Political Economy 39 (1931): 137–75.Google Scholar
Howarth, R.B.Intergenerational Competitive Equilibria under Technological Uncertainty and an Exhaustible Resource Constraint.” Journal of Environmental Economics and Management 21(1991a): 225–43.Google Scholar
Howarth, R.B.Intertemporal Equilibria and Exhaustible Resources: An Overlapping Generations Approach.” Ecological Economics 4(1991b): 237–52.Google Scholar
Howarth, R.B., and Norgaard, R.B.Intergenerational Resource Rights, Efficiency, and Social Optimality.” Land Economics 66 (1990): 111.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kehoe, T.J.Intertemporal General Equilibrium Models.” In The Economics of Missing Markets, Information, and Games, ed. Hahn, F., 363–93. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989.Google Scholar
Kemp, M.C., and Long, N.V.The Under-Exploitation of Natural Resources: A Model with Overlapping Generations.” Economic Record 55 (1979): 214–21.Google Scholar
Long, N.V., Mitra, T., and Sorger, G.Equilibrium Growth and Sustained Consumption with Exhaustible Resources.” CAE Working Paper #95–02, Center for Analytic Economics, Cornell University, March 1995.Google Scholar
Love, D.R.F.Exhaustible Resources in an Overlapping Generations Economy.” Discussion Paper #844, Institute for Economic Research, Queen's University, 1991.Google Scholar
Manresa, A.An Overlapping Generations Model with Exhaustible Resources.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Minnesota, 1984.Google Scholar
Mitra, T.Efficient Growth with Exhaustible Resources.” Journal of Economic Theory 17 (1978): 114–29.Google Scholar
Mitra, T.On Optimal Depletion of Exhaustible Resources: Existence and Characterization Results.” Econometrica 48 (1980): 1431–50.Google Scholar
Samuelson, P.A.An Exact Consumption-Loan Model of Interest with or without the Social Contrivance of Money.” Journal of Political Economy 66 (1958)467–82.Google Scholar
Solow, R.M.Intergenerational Equity and Exhaustible Resources.” Review of Economic Studies 41 Symposium (1974): 2945.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stiglitz, J.E.Growth with Exhaustible Natural Resources: Efficient and Optimal Growth Paths.” Review of Economic Studies 41 Symposium (1974a): 123–37.Google Scholar
Stiglitz, J.E.Growth with Exhaustible Natural Resources: The Competitive Economy.” Review of Economic Studies 41 Symposium (1974b): 139–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stokey, N.L., and Lucas, R.E. (with Prescott, E.). Recursive Methods in Economic Dynamics. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989.Google Scholar
van Geldrop, J., Jilin, S., and Withagen, C.Existence of General Equilibria in Economies with Natural Exhaustible Resources and an Infinite Horizon.” Journal of Mathematical Economics 20 (1991): 225–48.Google Scholar