External refereed essays

Policy Targets: Lessons for Effective Implementation of Climate Actions

Policy targets are used to improve the implementation of domestic and international actions, in a national context and in international frameworks. But how can domestic and international experience be useful for climate policy? Case studies point to the value of defining policy targets more broadly than final outcomes, which in the case of climate policy are CO2 emission reductions. There is a need ...

Understanding the Roles and Interactions of International Cooperation on Domestic Climate Policies: Editorial

Introduction: The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change defines the principle of common but differentiated responsibility (Art. 4.1 of UNFCCC). It is the common responsibility of all countries to pursue mitigation actions so as to achieve climate stabilization. The differentiated nature of historic responsibility, capabilities and economic situation creates a responsibility for developed ...

Employer Size, Wages and Unobserved Skills: Evidence from Moonlighters in the UK

In this paper we examine the labour quality explanation of the employer size-wage gap: larger firms pay higher wages because they employ more skilled workers. Most previous studies control for unobserved skills of workers by applying the fixed-effects estimator to longitudinal data, thus assuming time-invariant unobserved individual heterogeneity. We release this assumption by using a sample of moonlighters; ...

Sports Rules as Common Pool Resources: A Better Way to Respond to Doping

Dynamics of Health and Labor Market Risks

While there is little doubt that the probability of poor health increases with age, and that less healthy people face a more difficult situation on the labor market, the precise relationship between facing the risks of health deterioration and labor market instability is not well understood. Using 12 years of data from the German Socio-Economic Panel we study the nature of the relationship between ...

The Impact of Household Capital Income on Income Inequality: A Factor Decomposition Analysis for the UK, Germany and the USA

This paper analyses the contribution of capital income to income inequality in a cross-national comparison. Using micro-data from the Cross-National Equivalent File (CNEF) for three prominent panel studies, namely the BHPS for the UK, the SOEP for West Germany, and the PSID for the USA, we use the factor decomposition method described by Shorrocks (Econometrica 50:193-211, 1982). The factor decomposition ...

GEE Estimation of the Covariance Structure of a Bivariate Panel Data Model with an Application to Wage Dynamics and the Incidence of Profit-Sharing in West Germany

We propose a generalized estimating equations (GEE) approach to the estimation of the mean and covariance structure of bivariate time series processes of panel data. The one-step approach allows for mixed continuous and discrete dependent variables. A Monte Carlo Study is presented to compare our particular GEE estimator with more standard GEE-estimators. In the empirical illustration, we apply our ...

Revisiting Friendship Networks

We extend the model of friendship networks developed by Brueckner (2006) in two ways. First, we extend the level of indirect benefits by incorporating benefits from up to three links and explore its implication for the socially optimal and individual effort levels. Next, we generalize the magnetic agent problem by allowing for more than 3 players by restricting ourselves to regular networks that include ...

Explaining the Hump in Life Cycle Consumption Profiles

This paper documents life cycle (or age) profiles of (log) household income, durable and non-durable consumption for Dutch households after explicitly controlling for time (or business cycle) effects and birth cohort effects. We find that both measures of consumption as well as income is clearly hump shaped over the life cycle. Hence, real consumption per household seems to track income over the life ...

Hysteresis in the Development of Unemployment: The EU and US Experience

We examine hysteresis in EU and US unemployment by panel unit root tests. First generation tests indicate that unemployment is stationary. Second generation tests show mixed results. Idiosyncratic components are stationary in the US. A unit root in the US common component depends on the starting point of the sample. While the common component is nonstationary over the whole period, it is mean-reverting ...

Variable Selection and Oversampling in the Use of Smooth Support Vector Machines for Predicting the Default Risk of Companies

In the era of Basel II a powerful tool for bankruptcy prognosis is vital for banks. The tool must be precise but also easily adaptable to the bank's objectives regarding the relation of false acceptances (Type I error) and false rejections (Type II error). We explore the suitability of smooth support vector machines (SSVM), and investigate how important factors such as the selection of appropriate ...

Voting on Redistribution with Tax Evasion

This paper analyzes voting on a linear income tax whose proceeds are redistributed lump sum to the taxpayers. Individuals can evade taxes, which leads to penalties if evasion is detected. Since preferences satisfy neither single peakedness nor single crossing, a voting equilibrium may not exist. When an equilibrium does exist, there are several possible outcomes. There may be 'conventional' equilibria ...

Zur Entwicklung der Vermögensungleichheit in Deutschland

For a long time, the social policy discussion in Germany has been heavily dominated by income inequality and poverty risk rates, while at the same time the analysis of personal wealth distribution was underdeveloped, last but not least due to a severe lack of appropriate data. Using representative micro data from the German Socio-Economic Panel Study (SOEP), this paper analyzes individual level information ...

Sollen Freiberufler und Landwirte Gewerbesteuer zahlen? Steuersystematische Überlegungen und empirische Wirkungsanalysen

In vielen Ländern gibt es kommunale Unternehmensteuern, in Deutschland hat die Gewerbesteuer ein großes Gewicht bei der Gemeindefinanzierung. Wenn solche kommunalen Unternehmensteuern erhoben werden, gibt es keinen steuer- oder wirtschaftspolitischen Grund für eine Differenzierung zwischen Gewerbebetrieben sowie freien Berufen oder der Land- und Forstwirtschaft. Daher sollten alle Personenunternehmen ...

Natural Gas Vehicles: An Option for Europe

In Europe natural gas vehicles play a minor role. A decisive reason for this is the dependence of most European countries from gas imports. Except for Italy, there is no tradition to use natural gas as fuel. In addition, there is a lack of infrastructure (e.g. fuelling stations). In contrast to Europe, in Latin American and Asian countries natural gas vehicles are widespread. Some countries foster ...

Zum Aufstieg und Niedergang des Normalarbeitsverhältnisses in Deutschland 1800-2010: ein Forschungsprojekt

Measuring State Dependence in Individual Poverty Histories When there Is Feedback to Employment Status and Household Composition

This paper argues that the assumption of strict exogeneity, which is usually invoked in estimating models of state dependence with unobserved heterogeneity, is violated in the poverty context as important variables determining contemporaneous poverty status, in particular employment status and household composition, are likely to be influenced by past poverty outcomes. Therefore, a model of state dependence ...

The Role of Social Networks in Determining Migration and Labour Market Outcomes

This paper empirically examines social network explanations for migration decisions in the context of German reunification. Using longitudinal data from the German Socio-Economic Panel, we first show that the presence of a family in West Germany is an important predictor for the migration hazard rate of East Germans. We then explore whether pre-migration networks have a discernible impact on the economic ...

Demand Side Analysis of Microlending Markets in Germany

In developing and transition economies, microlending has become an effective instrument for providing micro businesses with the necessary financial resources to launch operations. In industrialized countries, with their highly developed banking systems, however, there has been ongoing debate on the question of whether an uncovered demand for microlending services exists. The present pilot study explores ...

Climate Change and Modelling of Extreme Temperatures in Switzerland

This study models maximum temperatures in Switzerland monitored in twelve locations using the generalised extreme value (GEV) distribution. The parameters of the GEV distribution are determined within a Bayesian framework. We find that the parameters of the underlying distribution underwent a substantial change in the beginning of the 1980s. This change is characterised by an increase both in the level ...