Due to tight public budget constraints, the efficiency of publicly financed universities in Germany is receiving increasing attention in the academic as well as in the public discourse. Against this back ground we analyze the efficiency of 72 public Ger-man universities for the y ears...

Since its inception, the traditional form of providing survivor benefits through public pension schemes has lost much of its legitimacy. As a result of fundamental changes in marriage behaviour and the typical division of labour between married spouses, offering non-contributory benefits of this...

The consequences of introducing or tightening time limits on receiving high unemploymentbenefits are studied in a shirking model. Stricter time limits have an ambiguousimpact on the net wage, and changes of utility levels of employed workers and recipientsof high unemployment benefits have the...

We consider lifetime health insurance contracts in which ageing provisions are used tosmooth the premium profile. The capital stock accumulated for each individual can bedecomposed into two parts: a premium insurance and an annuitised life insurance, onlythe latter being transferable between...