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,...

In 2005, Austria modified its group taxation regime and now provides an option for crossborder loss-offset. We analyse the combined impact of Austria's new group taxation and lossoffset limitations on cross-border investment decisions of domestic corporations. Monte Carlo simulations in an...

Using Austrian and Danish administrative data, we examine the impacts of parenthood on mental health. Parenthood imposes a greater mental health burden on mothers than on fathers. It creates a long-run gender gap in antidepressant prescriptions of about 93.2% (Austria) and 64.8% (Denmark). These...

According to Becker's (1957) famous theory on discrimination, entrepreneurs with a strong prejudice against female workers forgo profits by submitting to their tastes. In a competitive market their firms lack efficiency and are therefore forced to leave. We present new empirical evidence for...

Sick workers in many countries receive sick pay during their illness-related absences from the workplace. In several countries, the social security system insures firms against their workers' sickness absences. However, this insurance may create moral hazard problems for firms, leading to the...

This paper presents new evidence on the effects of retirement benefits on labor force participation decisions. The analysis is based on a mandated rule for employer-provided retirement benefits in Austria that creates discontinuities in the incentives for workers to delay retirement. We present...

Immigration may impact income distribution both by affecting the skill composition of a country's residents, and, by changing relative factor supplies, its relative factor prices. We provide some background evidence on compositional factors but focus primarily on factor prices. We first consider...

This paper offers quasi experimental evidence of the existence of spillover effects of UI extensions using a unique program that extended unemployment benefits drastically for a subset of workers in selected regions of Austria. We use non-eligible unemployed in treated regions, and a...

This paper investigates the question whether long-term human capital outcomes are affected by the duration of maternity leave, i.e. by the time mothers spend at home with their newborn before returning to work. Employing RD and difference-in-difference approaches, this paper exploits an...

We study experimentally the protection of property in five widely distinct countries- Austria, Mexico, Mongolia, South Korea and the United States. Our main results are that the security of property varies with experimental institutions, and that our subject pools exhibit significantly different...