We asked economic experts polled by the CESifo World Economic Survey how to handle the fiscal crisis in Greece in the year 2015. The sample includes about 850 experts from 110 countries. We find systematic differences in experts’ recommendations. Our results suggest that policy advice is...

We asked economic experts polled by the CESifo World Economic Survey how to handle the fiscal crisis in Greece in the year 2015. The sample includes about 850 experts from 110 countries. We find systematic differences in experts' recommendations. Our results suggest that policy advice is related...

Do experts adjust their policy recommendations when the facts change? We conduct a large-scale randomized experiment among 1,224 economic experts across 109 countries that includes two treatments. The first treatment is the geographic and temporal variation in the initial spread of Covid-19...

Do experts adjust their policy recommendations when the facts change? We conduct a large-scale randomized experiment among 1,224 economic experts across 109 countries that includes two treatments. The first treatment is the geographic and temporal variation in the initial spread of Covid-19...

In many European countries established leftwing and rightwing parties have been threatened by policy convergence and, in turn, new populist parties that offer more polarized platforms. I investigate whether government ideology influences dragnet-controls - controls of persons conducted by the...

We examine how Green governments influence macroeconomic, education, and environmental outcomes. We exploit that the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan gave rise to an unanticipated change in government in the German state Baden-Wuerttemberg in 2011. Using the synthetic control method, we find...

Fiscal sustainability tests have largely ignored the institutional setting of fiscal policy making. Fiscal equalization schemes in federal states are one such institution. We examine whether German state governments pursue sustainable fiscal policies taking into account fiscal equalization...

We introduce a new dataset that includes quantitative harmonized indices of tax reforms based on qualitative information of about 900 Economic Surveys from the OECD and 37,000 tax-related news from the IBFD archives. The data set provides indicators on tax reforms for tax rates and tax bases,...

I use new data on central and general governments for 23 OECD countries over the period 1960-2015 (unbalanced panel) to examine fiscal performance under minority governments. The results do not suggest that minority governments had higher fiscal deficits and public expenditure than majority...

Scholars have been active in investigating causes and consequences of austerity policies. We examine how economists use the term “austerity” in scientific studies and measure austerity in empirical analyses. The sample includes around 3,500 journal articles published in the top 400 journals...