This paper investigates the effectiveness of benefit sanctions in reducing unemployment duration. Data from the Swiss labor market allow making a distinction between the effect of a warning that a person is not complying with eligibility requirements and the effect of the actual enforcement of a...

This paper studies the role of culture in shaping unemployment outcomes. The empirical analysis is based on local comparisons across a language barrier in Switzerland. This Röstigraben separates cultural groups, but neither labor markets nor political jurisdictions. Local contrasts across the...

Swiss policy makers created a unique link between unemployment benefits and Active Labor Market Programs (ALMPs) by making benefit payments conditional on program attendance after 7 months of unemployment duration. We evaluate the effect of Active Labor Market Programs and benefit entitlement on...

This paper studies the role of culture in shaping unemployment outcomes. The empirical analysis is based on local comparisons across a language barrier in Switzerland. This Röstigraben separates cultural groups, but neither labor markets nor political jurisdictions. Local contrasts across the...

A unique dataset is used to separately analyze the social origins of left-wing and nationalist-separatist terrorism in 17 Western European countries between 1970 and 2007. We argue that the differences in the historic roots, ultimate goals as well as their negotiability, levels of domestic and...

This paper studies how changes in the two key parameters of unemployment insurance the benefit replacement rate (RR) and the potential duration of benefits (PBD) affect the duration of unemployment. In 1989, the Austrian government made unemployment insurance more generous by changing,...