This contribution starts out by noting a conflict of interest between consumers and insurers. Consumers face positive correlation in their assets (health, wealth, wisdom, i.e. skills), causing them to demand a great deal of insurance coverage. Insurers on the other hand eschew positively...

This study applies financial portfolio theory to determine efficient electricity-generating technology portfolios for the United States and Switzerland, adopting an investor point of view. Expected returns are defined by the rate of decrease of power generation cost (with external costs...

In this paper, we address the issue of spurious correlation in the production of health in a systematic way. Spurious correlation entails the risk of linking health status to medical (and nonmedical) inputs when no links exist. This note first presents the bounds testing procedure as a method to...

This study applies financial portfolio theory to determine efficient electricity-generating technology mixes for Switzerland and the United States. Expected returns are given by the (negative of the) rate of increase of power generation cost. Volatility of returns relates to the standard...

This paper investigates the relationship between income satisfaction of adult children and their relative economic status, using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel and income rank as an indicator of status. The results show that children appear to compare their actual economic status with...

This study investigates the prevalence and extent of altruism by examining the relationship between parents' and their adult children's subjective well-being in a data set extracted from the German Socio-Economic Panel. In order to segregate the share of parents with altruistic preferences from...

Empirical studies on the relationship between income and happiness commonly use standard ordered response models, the most well-known representatives being the ordered logit and the ordered probit. However, these models restrict the marginal probability effects by design, and therefore limit the...

We examine the effect of single motherhood on children’s secondary school track choice using 12-year-old children drawn from the German Socio-Economic Panel. In line with previous studies for the U.S., the U.K. and Sweden, we find a negative correlation between single motherhood and...

Much progress has been made in recent years on developing and applying a direct measure of utility using survey questions on subjective well-being. In this paper we explore whether this new type of measurement can be fruitfully applied to the study of interdependent utility in general, and...