One of the most significant changes for Cubans since the start of the Special Period has been the development of a range of new income-earning opportunities ranging from work in the formal state sector, to a newly established "private" sector, and/or in growing informal and black markets. While the significance of the increasing heterogeneity of Cuba's labour market may be difficult to imagine ...

This paper compares the welfare costs of business cycles in a dollarized economy to those arising in economies with different monetary arrangements. The alternative monetary policy regimes studied belong to three broad families: devaluation rate rules, inflation targeting, and money growth rate rules. The analysis is conducted within an optimizing model of a small open economy with sticky price...

Abstract How, if at all, does self-interest bear on individuals’ economic policy preferences? Though conventional theories of preference formation usually assume a role for self-interest, the informational demands associated with understanding policies can prevent individuals from forming attitudes an egocentric basis. Building work showing that policy-specific information facilitates egocentri...