Sustainability in the Stochastic Ramsey Model

Abstract

In this paper we provide a self-contained exposition of the problem of sustaining a constant consumption level in a Ramsey model. Our focus is on the case in which the output capital-ratio is random. After a brief review of the known results on the probabilities of sustaining a target consumption from an initial stock, we present some new results on estimating the probabilities by using Chebyshev inequalities. Some numerical calculations for these estimates are also provided.