In the context of international bargaining, standard models predict that a shift in military power can cause preventive war because it changes the relative bargaining position between states. We find that shifts in military power are not the only cause of war under commitment problems and that...

Aufgrund der derzeit breiten Einführung von Bachelor- und Masterstudiengängen sowie des zunehmenden Drucks vom Arbeitsmarkt sollte die Einführung von Angeboten zum Erwerb von Schlüsselkompetenzen möglichst schnell und flächendeckend erfolgen, wobei ein hoher Qualitätsstandard der Angebote...

With respect to the labor market participation of the elderly in welfare states, the economic literature focuses on the incentives to the worker in the light of generous early retirement opportunities. The sociological literature on the other hand addresses the problem of low productivity of...

Price discrimination is an extensively studied subject in monopoly behavior. Increasing profits, covering fixed cost and reducing distortions are reasons to sell a homogenous good at different prices. Price discrimination is however present also in oligopolistic markets. This paper is going to...

Staatsschuldenarithmetik: Zwei unerfreuliche Beispiele Zinssatz langfristig über der realen Wachstumsrate des Outputs liegt, ergibt sich für die Budgetpolitik in einer Situation "hoher" Defizite und Staatsschulden folgendes Dilemma: Um eine explodierende Entwicklung der Staatsschuldenquote zu...

In health service markets, patients often rely on the advice of their general practitioner (GP) to decide which treatment best fits their needs. Hospitals, in turn, influence GPs referral decisions through kickbacks. We formulate a model with competitive heterogeneous GPs who differ in the...

Given the significance of wastewater treatment and disposal for society and the economy together with the omnipresence of standards in the sector, we studied the development and prospects of the rules governing the formal standardization in the German municipal wastewater sector. We find that...