Expected Utility theory is not only applied to individual choices but also to ethical decisions, e.g. in cost-benefit analysis of climate change policy measures that affect future generations. In this context the crucial question arises whether EU theory is able to deal with 'catastrophic...

Expected Utility theory is not only applied to individual choices but also to ethical decisions, e.g. in cost-benefit analysis of climate change policy measures that affect future generations. In this context the crucial question arises whether EU theory is able to deal with 'catastrophic...

Health expenditure data almost always include extreme values, implying that the underlying distribution has heavy tails. This may result in infinite variances as well as higher-order moments and bias the commonly used least squares methods. To accommodate extreme values, we propose an estimation...

How do patient and provider incentives affect the provision of long-term care? Our analysis of 551 thousand nursing home stays yields three main insights. First, Medicaid-covered residents prolong their stays instead of transitioning to community-based care due to limited cost-sharing. Second,...

This article reviews the current debate about sick pay mandates and medical leave in the United States. The United States is one of three industrialized countries that do not guarantee access to paid sick leave for all employees. We first provide a categorization of the different paid leave...

We report empirical evidence from the first field experiments to be conducted in Germany with program and control groups between 1999 and 2002. The evaluated program called ?Targeted Negative Income Tax (TNIT)? is a time-restricted employee subsidy for means-tested welfare recipients. We focus...

This paper evaluates the linkage between social security strategies and redistributive effects in EU social transfer systems. It is argued that the various European systems produce different patterns of redistribution that may be explained by the adoption of different mixes of social security...

This paper advocates the cautious and constitutional evolution of existing basic income schemes (?unemployment benefit II?) and Targeted Negative Income Tax (TNIT = "Einstiegsgeld") into a means-tested combi-wage model for the future long-term unemployed (gradualism strategy). The paper argues...

Wie lässt sich die Grundsicherung in Deutschland effizienter und gerechter ausgestalten, wenn das Arbeitslosengeld II aus politischen Gründen nicht generell gesenkt werden soll und keine zusätzlichen unteren Lohngruppen durch die Tarifpartner vereinbart werden? Das Mannheimer...

Assar Lindbeck has pointed to the problem that generous welfare state institutions may in the long-run undermine those social norms which limit the costs and incentives effects of the welfare state and thus guarantee its viability. This study is the first to assess the empirical validity of...