Does the salience of a topic affect polarization in related parliamentary debates? When discussing a salient topic, politicians might adopt more extreme stances to gain electoral consensus. Alternatively, they could converge towards more moderate positions to find a compromise. Using...

This paper asks how social movements against gender-based violence (GBV) spread on Twitter. To this end, I construct a novel dataset measuring 10 large social movements against GBV on Twitter. I show that these movements start suddenly and fade out quickly and that there is considerable...

Using an unbalanced panel of 27 OECD countries over the period 1970–2011, I examinewhether electoral motives influenced creative accounting. Governments engage in“below-the-line” operations, such as transactions in financial assets, that do not show upin the deficit figures but give rise...

Principal-agent problems can arise when preferences of voters are not aligned with preferences of political representatives. Often the consequence of the political principalagentproblem is political catering to special interests. In this paper I provide examples of principal-agent problems...

Deutschland wurde bereits zweimal, 1966–1969 und 2005–2009, von einer großen Koalition regiert. Deskriptive Zeitreihenanalysen wirtschaftspolitischer Kennzahlen zeigen nicht auf, dass es unter diesen großen Koalitionen signifikante Kurswechsel in der Wirtschaftspolitik gab. Qualitative...

I investigate how political uncertainty influences corporate investment decisions employinga unique panel dataset of German manufacturing firms. I use data on firms’ self-reportedinvestment realizations, plans and revisions. The firm-specific user cost of capital capturesthe current...

Using microdata that serve as the foundation of the ifo Business Climate Index, Germany’s leading business cycle indicator, I examine whether political uncertainty influences how firm owners perceive their present state and future development of business. I use state election months as...

Seit Jahrzehnten fusionieren westliche Industrienationen kommunale Gebietskörperschaften in der Hoffnung auf Kosteneinsparungen, eine höhere Leistungsfähigkeit der Verwaltung sowie lokale Wachstumsimpulse. Verlässliche wissenschaftliche Evidenz zu Gebietsreformenist jedoch erst seit wenigen...

We examine whether changes of government influence compliance with international agreements. We investigate compliance with the NATO two percent target to which all NATO countries committed themselves during the NATO summit in Wales in 2014. The dataset includes the military expenditure by NATO...

The political business cycle theories describe that election-motivated politicians manipulate economic policy-making. Election cycles occur in many fiscal variables, for example tax rates. I examine whether electoral motives influence communal fees in Germany. Fees have to be paid for the use of...