This paper tests for discriminatory treatment of the Roma minority by public officials in the Czech Republic. Our focus is on public servants at local job centers whose job is to advise unemployed individuals and process applications for unemployment benefit. Our experimental design facilitates...

Theoretical models of social capital (David, Janiak, and Wasmer 2010; Bräuninger and Tolciu 2011) predict that communities may find themselves in one of two equilibria: one with a high level of local social capital and low migration or one with a low level of local social capital and high...

We exploit a historical experiment that occurred in Czechoslovakia after World War Two to study the drivers of social capital accumulation in an extremely unfavorable environment. Between 1945 and 1948, the Sudetenland became the scene of ethnic cleansing, with the expulsion of nearly three...

Malaria – a disease caused by parasitic microorganisms of the Plasmodium genus – has been shown to impede economic growth and socioeconomic development in the long-term. In this paper we use annual regional data from India to show that malaria outbreaks are associated with an immediate...

Homophily in Voting Behavior: Evidence from Preferential Voting Abstract: Homophily is a strong determinant of many types of human relationships. It affects, for example, whom we marry and potentially also whom we vote for. We use data on preferential voting from Czech parliamentary elections in...

This paper studies the impact of expected transport accessibility improvement on house prices. We identify the effect exploiting a quasi-natural experiment created by the approval and construction of the Ryfast tunnel system in Rogaland, Norway, which shortened the travelling time to the...

Through a correspondence study, this paper investigates whether employers discriminate job applicants based on their living conditions. Exploiting the natural setting provided by a Rapid Re-housing Program, we sent 1,347 job applications for low-qualified front-desk jobs in Brno, Czech Republic....

The effect of ranking and the effect of attention both increase the chances that candidates running in the top positions of electoral lists will win voters' support. We exploit a variation in ballot layout (the location of the break between the first and second sides of the ballot) in the...

We analyze the impacts of three major unexpected border regime changes that occurred during the course of 20th century on population growth along the Austrian-Czech border. Using historical municipal-level census data reaching back to 1880, we find no effects of the dissolution of the...

This paper examines the impact of regional development on democracy building in the Czech Republic following the fall of the Iron Curtain and the autocratic communist regime in 1989. By exploiting the variation in regional development arising from the economic transition process, we identify...