Lukas Heim evaluates the performance of a price-level targeting rule compared to that of a standard inflation targeting rule. The comparison is based on a medium-scale DSGE model which has been estimated based on state-of-the-art Bayesian methods. The model for the Swiss economy is an expanded...

Fabian Schnell develops a model indicating that by keeping real interest rates too low, monetary policy can distort the allocation of resources across firms and potentially delay economic recovery after a recession. This is a new channel of monetary policy that is especially relevant in view of...

This paper analyzes a recent ballot in which two virtually identical popular initiatives, both demanding a decrease in the legal age of retirement in Switzerland, led to differences in approval rates of nearly seven percentage points. Based on this unique natural experiment, the existence of...

A common political claim is that decentralized governments undermine policy makers' ability to fight fiscal imbalance. This paper examines how different fiscal institutions influence the likelihood of a successful fiscal adjustment. Using a panel of the Swiss cantons from 1981 to 2001, we first...

This study empirically analyses on the basis of a panel of grant requests to the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF. From the results it can be concluded, that the different scientific disciplines react in very different ways to the institutional and financial framework conditions set by...

This paper examines the role of religious denomination for human capital formation. We employ a unique data set which covers, inter alia, information on numerous measures of school inputs in 169 Swiss districts for the years 1871/72, 1881/82 and 1894/95, marks from pedagogical examinations of...

For the first time it has been made possible to merge a German and a Swiss firm-level data set that include detailed information about costs and benefits of apprenticeship training. Previous analyzes based only on aggregate data showed that the net costs of training apprentices are substantial...