Topic Regional Economy

The Effect of Public Sector Relocations on Regional Development in Germany

Regional economic disparities within countries have become increasingly large, often surpassing the disparities observed between countries. To address regional inequality, governments have been turning away from standard subsidies and are experimenting with public employment reallocation as a place-based policy. This paper estimates the causal effect of public employment reallocation on local...

Municipal Investment: Potential and Limitations of the Special Fund for Infrastructure and Climate Neutrality

Municipalities play a key role in providing public services, but despite rising gross investment, there is a significant erosion of assets: real investment growth remains insufficient and net investment continues to be negative. The Special Fund for Infrastructure and Climate Neutrality (SVIK) can help strengthen local government investment activity and reduce regional disparities. Based on a scenario ...

Local Market Prices Can Reduce Electricity Costs

With the liberalization of the electricity markets in 1998, Germany opted for a single, nationwide wholesale price. Regional differences in supply and demand are not taken into account. In the event of grid congestion, electricity generators are paid to adjust their output. This leads to rising costs, an overestimation of grid expansion requirements and increased bureaucracy. Reforms are therefore ...

Fostering Sustainable and Resilient Coastal Communities Through Combining Nature-Based Solutions and Empowerment Tools: A Review

Nature-based Solutions (NbS) have proven successful to address major coastal environmental challenges. Participatory approaches to NbS planning, design and implementation are increasing, yet community empowerment remains an underexplored aspect of NbS. This paper aims to assess the current state of knowledge on the contribution of community empowerment in NbS approaches to address coastal challenges ...

Evaluation Support Study for the Revision of the Guidelines on State Aid to Airports and Airlines: Final Report

This Study supports the revision of the EU Guidelines on State Aid to Airports and Airlines in light of evolving market dynamics, the impact of COVID-19, and the challenges of the green transition for the European aviation sector. Evidence was collected through literature review, data analysis, stakeholder consultations, and six case studies. The findings show that profitability remains a structural ...

The gap between the rich and poor states is widening more and more

Productivity gap has nearly disappeared in rural regions

Strukturwandel in den Regionen: Was sich ändert und wie die Politik reagieren sollte

In Germany, the structural shift away from industry has long been much slower than in other similarly developed countries. Now, it is increasingly being shaped by global megatrends such as digitisation, decarbonisation, demographic change and changing international economic relations. There are significant regional differences in the adaptation processes: urban areas benefit from inno¬vation density ...

Fiscal Capacity of German Federal States: East-West Gap Narrows, but Rich-Poor Divide Grows

Even now, 35 years after German unification, the economic power and fiscal capacity of the eastern German federal states remain below average. In Germany’s system of fiscal federalism, this leads to substantial financial transfers, a fact that repeatedly triggers political debate. Thereby, the low tax revenue of the economically weak states is also a consequence of the tax system—and by no means a ...

Productivity: East-West Gap Replaced by Urban-Rural Gap

In 1991, the average labor productivity of the then-new federal states (plus West Berlin) only reached nearly half of the total national productivity level. Since then, the average labor productivity of these states has climbed up to nearly 90 percent. However, the ranking of the individual states has barely changed: Hamburg and the southern German states are still at the top, while most eastern German ...