This paper aims to show that public sector reforms, in the 1980s and 1990s, underemphasized the importance of human resource management, because, a) the reformers made strong emphasis on the need to reduce the size of the government apparatus; and, b) because they made war on state bureaucracy....

The Brazilian experience is of particular interest as a case study into the fiscal scope for public sector investments, especially in infrastructure. Brazil has one of the highest tax burdens in the world and, at the same time, the public sector has been registering a historic low in investment,...

The paper examines the role of the vertical structure of the public sector for economic growth in Germany in a long-term perspective. A theoretical model shows that, due to spillover effects of public service provision across lower level governments, federal government activities could have...

We study management practices and performance in a representative sample of German municipalities, which provide the bulk of direct administrative services for citizens and firms in Germany. Surveyed municipalities differ substantially in their use of structured management practices, and this...

This paper analyzes peer effects among university scientists. Specifically, it investigates whether the number of peers and their average quality affects the productivity of researchers in physics, chemistry, and mathematics. The usual endogeneity problems related to estimating peer effects are...