In this paper, we study how, depending on the sociological and technological characteristics of the economy, a “unified” or, on the contrary, a stratified way of communicating may emerge. Communication takes place less efficiently in the stratified case, because people who spend different languages cannot communicate with each other.

The main results of the paper are as follows. First, the equilibrium degree of literacy is suboptimally low because of the “thin market externality” associated with the language. Second, social stratification generates linguistic stratification and the associated output and welfare losses due to communication failure. Third, because of the thin market externality, there is too much stratification. Fourth, specialized technologies are less vulnerable to stratification than flexible ones, or, equivalently, increased flexibility may have adverse effects on output when society is stratified.

This paper outlines a theoretical framework to think about the role of NIT on earnings inequality at a domestic level. Two main ideas inspired a growth model. First, to be connected is only meaningful for people who are already literate. Second internet, like the invention of printing, permits to increase the part of knowledge that an individual can use. The results are obtained in terms of the Lorenz criterion. The role of some key parameters is emphasized like the elasticity of substitution between talent and knowledge. Two forces are at work. On the one hand, the gap between literate and non literate people will increase. On the other hand, the incentive to become literate increases. Policy implications are derived.

In this paper we examine the effect of innovation on job creation and job destruction in Spanish manufacturing. Our empirical analysis is based on firm-level longitudinal data from which we have information on employment and innovation activity. The estimation approach consists of a two-step procedure that takes into account the fact that firms endogenously choose positive, negative or zero growth in employment, in which the selection mechanism is an ordered probit. Our results point out the importance of innovation variables on employment growth: innovative firms create more jobs -and destroy fewer- than non-innovative, and the degree of technological effort has a strong positive effect on net employment creation.

This paper explores the relationship between employment protection legislation (EPL) and the share of employment in the IT sector. Evidence from several OECD countries suggests that the importance of the IT sector is smaller in economies with high levels of EPL than in economies with low levels. This shows up in the amount of resources dedicated to research on IT as well as in the share of employment in the sector. A simple model is provided to explain these facts. EPL affects both labor supply and labor demand in the same way resulting in lower employment equilibrium levels.

We build a model of endogenous destruction with credit and labor market imperfections, represented by a matching process between financiers and entrepreneurs on one hand, and entrepreneurs and workers on the other hand. Business creation, credit opening and job destruction represent three active margins of the model. Financial imperfections lead to financial fragility. This implies the existence of a forth latent margin which may be activated in the case of repudiation of financial contracts. This paradigm is applied to the recent development of the U.S. economy. An empirical test in panel of OECD countries further suggests the importance of venture capital for macroeconomic variables.

We study the relation of financial contracting and the pace of technological advance in a dynamic agency theoretic model. A firm which is financed by outside shareholders but run by managers has the prospect of a process innovation which arrives stochastically. Adopting the innovation requires firing old management and hiring new with skills appropriate for the new technique. We show that subgame perfect equilibria in this game can be of two types. In “entrenchment” equilibrium once the new technique has been announced old style management raises their dividend payout sufficiently to preempt the innovation. In “maximum rent extraction” equilibrium’ managers are unable or unwilling to match the impending productivity improvement and instead respond by increasing their perquisites for the remaining time of their tenure. We show that both equilibria involve several types of inefficiencies and can result in underinvestment in positive NPV projects. We discuss the role of financial innovation in reducing the inefficiencies identified.

This paper deals with some issues that recently arised from the puzzling evolution of Stock Markets during the nineties, in particular from the sharp increase of equity prices on the Nasdaq. We examine the hypothesis according to which such a bullish market could be explained by investors’ increasingly optimistic expectations about the ‘New economy’ perspectives. We then analyse to what extent the evolution of financial markets may have recently affected aggregate demand in a stronger way than in the past. Using a simple aggregate model with rational expectations, we finally show how monetary policy decisions should be influenced by such changes in the behaviour of investors and consumers.

This paper proposes a model of industrial innovation linked to financial liberalisation where agents are characterised by heterogeneous innovative abilities. Individual researchers may either be employed by a large firm and work together on the firm’s innovative project, or they may alternatively set up an individual firm in order to commercialise their own innovation. The large firm’s hiring decisions and the individual researcher’s decision to set up his own firm depends on the researcher’s innovative ability and on the financial conditions. Financial liberalisation leading to a lower cost of setting up a small firm will affect the size of the large firm and increase the number of small technology firms. A drop in the cost of starting a small firm may increase income inequality.

The most important claim of the ‘new economy’ is that a new wave of technologies is lifting potential GDP. The effects were first seen in the United States. In the first half of the nineties, information and communication technologies (ICT) stimulated capital accumulation and employment, without any visible impact on productivity growth - the so-called ‘Solow paradox’. Starting in the middle of the decade, the long-awaited increase in productivity growth at last came about: from 1995 to 2001, average labour productivity in the US grew at 2.4%, one percentage point above the rate that prevailed between 1973 and 1995.