We illustrate the impact of detailed data in empirical economic research by considering how the increased data availability has changed the scope and focus of studies on retail gasoline pricing. We show how high-volume, high-frequency price data help to identify and explain long-term trends...

This discussion paper resulted in a publication in <A href="http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10645-005-2933-4">'De Economist'</A>, 2005, 153(2), 139-165.<P> How much does a nation spend on resources to 'grease the wheels of trade'? To examine this question the Dutch economy is used as an exemplary case as the Netherlands are known as a nation of traders. This...</p></a>

Institutional barriers to entry were removed to a considerable extent in 1996 in the Dutch retail sector. Three years before that the regulator decided to not take legal actions anymore against entrants violating institutional requirements. In the current analysis we investigate the effects of...

This paper studies asymmetric price responses of individual firms, via daily retail prices of almost all gasoline stations in the Netherlands and suggested prices of the five largest oil companies over more than two years. I find that 38% of the stations respond asymmetrically to changes in the...

We examine the influence of drivers’ environmental concerns on their preferences for different types of plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs). Our empirical approach is built around the results of a large-scale survey among Dutch drivers, where preferences for electric vehicles are elicited through...

We examine linkages between aggregate household income, distribution of that income, and aggregate cross-country expenditure patterns. We are able to decompose income effects into international income dispersion effects (from variations in average income) and national income dispersion (income...

This paper analyses the effect of risk attitudes of firm owners on profits among micro and small enterprises (MSEs) in Lagos, Nigeria. Higher risk perceptions are shown to have a significant positive effect on profits, whereas risk propensity has a negative or no effect. Education, age, being...

This discussion paper led to a publication in the <A HREF="http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268109000109">'Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization'</A>, 2009, 70(1-2), 374-388.<P> In this paper we analyze a large sample of individual responses to six lottery questions. Wederive a simultaneous estimate of risk aversion γ and the time preference discount...</p></a>

In Europe, company cars are offered by employers as fringe benefits to their employees at a lower price than employees pay in the car market, mainly due to favourable taxation of company cars. We analyse the welfare effects of favourable taxation of company cars for the Netherlands. The...

This paper proposes an alternative, dynamic framework for estimatingtime-varying values of travel time savings and values of schedule delay, in whichtime-preferences are represented as the time-varying excess willingness to pay(EWPT) to being in the one location, over being elsewhere. It is...