Using novel quantitative historical data on 2,483 British privateering cruises, we show that state-licensed commerce raiding by merchants was not only a popular and potentially flourishing business, but also effective in harming enemy trade during the long eighteenth century (1688-1815). Why,...

What mechanisms account for the long-run differences in economic development across historical settings? Current scholarship has renewed the argument that institutions are essential for promoting market transactions, industrialization, trade and economic growth. In particular, recent work in...

Emergent economies suffer from underdeveloped market infrastructures and insufficient public institutions to enforce contract commitments and property rights. Informal reputation-based arrangements may substitute for government enforcement but they require close-knit networks that enable...

There has been a longstanding debate about the link between political representation and health. In this article, I provide novel evidence that electoral reforms that shifted from a majoritarian to a proportional system of voter representation generated substantive health benefits for the...

We study the political determinants of policy experimentation during the US welfare reform. Among other changes, this reform shifted the autonomy to implement welfare policies from the federal government to the individual states. In line the predictions from a political agency model, we find...

Many governments have introduced generous childcare subsidies to allow all children access to early childhood education. The effects of these costly programs are however still debated. In this paper, we use the introduction of free public childcare in several states in Germany to analyze its...

We study whether the option to naturalize improves social and cultural integration of immigrants in the host country. The empirical analysis relies on two immigration reforms in Germany, a country with a traditionally weak record of immigrant integration both in terms of labor market performance...

We study the political economy of policy innovations during the U.S. welfare reform in 1996. Specifically, we investigate how reputation concerns among governors influence the decision to experiment with welfare policies. In line with a political agency model, our empirical results suggest that...