TY  - JOUR
AU  - King,Robert G.
TI  - Discretionary Policy and Multiple Equilibria
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 12076
PY  - 2006
Y2  - March 2006
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w12076
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w12076.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Robert King
Department of Economics
Boston University
270 Bay State Road
Boston, MA  02215
Tel: 617/353-5941
E-Mail: rking@bu.edu
AB  - Discretionary policymaking can foster strategic complementarities between private sector decisions, thus leading to multiple equilibria. This article studies a simple example, originating with Kydland and Prescott, of a government which must decide whether to build a dam to prevent adverse effects on floods on the incomes of residents of a floodplain. In this example, it is socially inefficient to build the dam and for people to live on the floodplain, with this outcome being the unique equilibrium under policy commitment. Under discretion, there are two equilibria. First, if agents believe that few of their fellow citizens will move to the floodplain, then they know that the government will choose not to build the dam and there is therefore no incentive for any individual to locate on the floodplain. Second, if agents believe that there will be many floodplain residents, then they know that the government will choose to build the dam and even small benefits of living on the floodplain will lead them to choose that location. In this second equilibrium, all individuals are worse off.
ER  -