Econometrica

Journal Of The Econometric Society

An International Society for the Advancement of Economic
Theory in its Relation to Statistics and Mathematics

Edited by: Guido W. Imbens • Print ISSN: 0012-9682 • Online ISSN: 1468-0262

Econometrica: Jan, 1981, Volume 49, Issue 1

Resource Depletion Under Technological Uncertainty

https://www.jstor.org/stable/1911128
p. 85-104

Joseph Stiglitz, Partha Dasgupta

The purpose of this paper is to study the effect of uncertainty in the arrival date of a new technology on the rate of depletion of an exhaustible natural resource. It is shown that under a large class of circumstances uncertainty leads to a faster initial depletion rate if the initial resource stock is small and to greater conservation if it is large. A particular kind of certainty equivalence result is proved and the results of the paper are used to comment on possible interpretations of certain historical episodes of resource exhaustion.


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