We explore the impact of the age structure of human capital on average regional productivity by applying a spatial econometric analysis based on an augmented Lucas-type production function. We also apply a new definition of regional human capital focusing on its availability. The estimates...

We explore the impact of the age structure of human capital on average regional productivity by applying a spatial econometric analysis based on an augmented Lucas-type production function. We also apply a new definition of regional human capital focusing on its availability. The estimates...

The red herring hypothesis contends that the high health care expenditure in old age is caused by proximity to death rather than calendar age. Dissenters point to longitudinal data and claim that health care expenditure age profiles tend to steepen over time. The present paper tests the...

We study the impact of transparency in a commodity market on the decision problem of a competitive firm under price uncertainty and hedging opportunities. Market transparency is modeled by means of the informational content of publicly observable signals which are correlated with the random...

This paper investigates how the abolishment of a ban on tuition fees affects the quality of higher education with centralized and decentralized decision making. It is shown that tuition fees fully crowd public funds under centralization and quality of university education does not improve....

Maintaining sufficient levels of competition ranks among the core interests of any national – and increasingly international – antitrust policy; however, the formal proof that a cartel really functioned economically and did not only exist in a legal sense is hard to deliver: market power is...

This paper applies parametric and non-parametric and parametric tests to assess the efficiency of electricity distribution companies in Germany. We address traditional issues in electricity sector benchmarking, such as the role of scale effects and optimal utility size, as well as new evidence...

Ziel des vorliegenden Diskussionspapiers ist es, einen Beitrag zur Verbesserung der Vergleichbarkeit der Schätzgüteergebnisse von Insolvenzprognosestudien zu leisten. Hierzu werden zunächst in der Literatur verwendete kategoriale, ordinale und kardinale Schätzgütemaße vorgestellt. Es wird...