This paper explains both the onset of the financial crisis in 1998 and the striking economic recovery afterwards in Russia and other Former Soviet Union (FSU) economies. Before the crisis banks do not lend to the real sector of the economy and firms use non-bank finance, including trade credits...

In a Case Law regime Courts have more flexibility than in a Statute Law regime. Since Statutes are inevitably incomplete, this confers an advantage to the Statute Law regime over the Case Law one. However, all Courts rule ex-post, after most economic decisions are already taken. Therefore, the...

I model the ocean as an array of lines set within a two-dimensional frame, and show how the Exclusive Economic Zone emerged as an equilibrium in customary international law. I find that custom codifies the efficient Nash equilibrium of enclosure for nearshore fisheries. For highly migratory and...

We examine evidence for a systematic underperformance of Germany's state-owned banks in the current financial crisis and study if the bank losses can be traced to the quality of bank governance. For this purpose, we examine the biographical background of 593 supervisory board members in the 29...

Banks play a greater role in the German financial system than in the UnitedStates or Britain. Germany s large universal banks are admired by those whoadvocate bank deregulation in the United States. Others admire the universalbanks for their supposed role in corporate governance and industrial...

Why does venture capital work in some countries but not in others? This clinical study of the first German venture capital firm examines the difficulties of creating a venture capital market in a bank-based financial system. The analysis identifies the problem of creating appropriate governance...

A novel method is applied to evaluate the effect of capital constraints on entrepreneurial performance on a panel of 1,000 Dutch entrepreneurs. We find that initial capital constraints hinder entrepreneurs in their performance, even when we control for various human capital and other factors...

This paper describes the privatization program in Italy during the 1990s and puts that policy in the context of macroeconomic adjustment, general market deregulation, and promotion of private investment in the provision of public infrastructure. The wave of state divestitures reached Italy later...

In the nineties, average firm size decreased, organisations decentralized, and workers preferences shifted from large to small firms. Our model identifies the economic forces behind this trend. Small firms with little capital at risk are subject to risk-shifting. They realize more of their...

This paper reviews the economic effects of the EU Savings Taxation Directive. The Directive aims at enabling taxation of foreign interest payments received by individuals in accordance with the rules of their State of residence. The data suggest that the Directive, which is based on automatic...