This study evaluates the impact of fuel prices on new car purchases, using exhaustive individual-level data of monthly registration of new private cars in France from 2003 to 2007. Detailed information on the car holder enables us to account for heterogeneous preferences across purchasers. We...

This paper investigates whether self-employed households use consumer loans - in particular installment loans and overdrafts - to finance business activities. Controlling for financial and non-financial household variables we show that self-employed households particularly use personal...

From standard portfolio-choice theory it is well-understood that background risk, overwhelmingly due to wage risk, is one of the central determinants of individuals’ portfolio composition: higher background risk reduces risky investments. However, if background risk is negatively correlated...

This paper estimates ordered logit and probit regression models for bank ratings which also include a country index to capture country-specific variation. The empirical findings provide support to the hypothesis that the individual international bank ratings assigned by Fitch Ratings are...

Using new data on 590 Turkish households in Berlin, we investigate the determinants and impact of integration on economic performance. We find that the usual suspects, such as time spent in Germany and education, have positive impact, while networks have no impact on integration. There is strong...

Crowding on public transport (PT) is a major issue for commuters around the world. Nevertheless, economists have rarely investigated the causes of crowding discomfort. Furthermore, most evidence on the costs of PT crowding is based on contingent valuation studies. First, this paper assesses...

International offset certificates trade at lower prices than European Union Allowances (EUAs), although they are substitutes within the EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) for CO₂. Firms therefore had a strong incentive to use the cheaper certificates. However, a considerable number of firms...

Motivated by the lack of literature linking actual to perceived relative deprivation, this paper assesses the role of visibility in the deprivation of goods and assets vis-à-vis income behind perceptions of relative deprivation. We rely on household survey data that includes unique information...

This paper analyses the determinants of Chinese direct investment (DI) in the European Union (EU). Evidence is based on panel Poisson models drawing on two investment monitors for individual projects. We distinguish between the numbers of greenfield investments (GIs) and mergers and acquisitions...

We analyze a client's choice of contract in auctions where Dutch law firms compete for cases. The distinguishing feature is that lawyers may submit bids with any fee arrangement they prefer: an hourly rate, a fixed fee or a "mixed fee," which is a time-capped fixed fee plus an hourly rate for...