Over the last twenty years the wage-education relationships in the US and Germany have evolved very differently, while the education composition of employment has evolved in a surprisingly parallel fashion. In this paper, we propose and test an explanation to these conflicting patterns. The...

We investigate the Expectations Hypotheses of the term structure of interest rates and of the foreign exchange market using vector autoregressive methods for the U.S. dollar, Deutsche mark, and British pound interest rates and exchange rates. In addition to standard Wald tests, we formulate...

Based on explicit present value calculations, the paper criticizes the view that the PAYGO system wastes economic resources. In present value terms, there is nothing to be gained from a transition to funded system even though the latter offers a permanently higher rate of return. The sum of the...

Using high-frequency data on Deutschemark and Yen returns against the dollar, we construct model-free estimates of daily exchange rate volatility and correlation, covering an entire decade. In addition to being model-free, our estimates are also approximately free of measurement error under...

Spatial differences in labor market performance are large and highly persistent. Using data from the United States, Germany, and the United Kingdom, we document striking similarities in spatial differences in unemployment, vacancies, job finding, and job filling within each country. This robust...

Green assets delivered high returns in recent years. This performance reflects unexpectedly strong increases in environmental concerns, not high expected returns. German green bonds outperformed their higher-yielding non-green twins as the "greenium" widened, and U.S. green stocks outperformed...

We use a detailed micro dataset on product availability to construct a direct high-frequency measure of consumer product shortages during the 2020-2021 pandemic. We document a widespread multi-fold rise in shortages in nearly all sectors early in the pandemic. Over time, the composition of...

Urban public transit agencies spend billions of dollars each year on workers, durable capital and energy to supply transportation services. During a time of rising concern about climate change, the urban public transit sector has not significantly reduced its carbon footprint. Using data for the...

This chapter provides new evidence on educational inequality and reviews the literature on the causes and consequences of unequal education. We document large achievement gaps between children from different socio-economic backgrounds, show how patterns of educational inequality vary across...