Economists have long discussed the correlation between the quality of competition policies and a country's productivity growth. It is, however, very difficult to prove this connection, to determine its extent or to quantify it. Commissioned by the European Commission, a team of international...

The role of merger control is to protect the interests of consumers over those of major corporations. To improve this protection, European merger control underwent comprehensive reforms in 2004. The aim was to increase the importance of economic principles in reaching verdicts. An empirical...

Energy sectors-primarily power generation and gas production, but also energy transmission and distribution-require significant capital investment in infrastructure. Market structures as well as the degree of competition and regulation are key factors that determine firms' incentive to invest....

Der Energiesektor zeichnet sich durch den Bedarf an kapitalintensiven Investitionen in Infrastruktur aus - vor allem in der Stromerzeugung und der Gasgewinnung, aber auch in der Energieübertragung und -verteilung. Sowohl die Marktstrukturen als auch der Grad an Wettbewerb und Regulierung sind...

We investigate the impact of competition policy enforcement on the functioning of European energy markets, and how sectoral regulation influences these outcomes. For this purpose, we compile a new dataset on the European Commission's (EC) and EU member states' competition policy decisions, and...

We study the impact of broadband availability on firms' total factor productivity (TFP) using German firm-level data between 2010 and 2015. We adopt a control function approach to causally identify and separately estimate productivity for 46 two-digit manufacturing and service sectors. Over the...

In der Diskussion über die staatliche Förderung des Breitbandausbaus wird immer wieder die Frage aufgeworfen, ob und in welchem Umfang Unternehmen von neuen Netzen profitieren. Empirische Analysen auf Grundlage von Unternehmensdaten und Daten zur Breitbandverfügbarkeit in Deutschland zeigen,...

The advent of cloud computing promises to improve the way firms utilize IT solutions. Firms are expected to replace large and inflexible fixed-cost investments in IT with more targeted variable spending in cloud solutions. In addition, cloud usage is expected to increase the productivity of...

The advent of cloud computing promises to improve the way firms utilize IT solutions. Firms are expected to replace large and inflexible fixed-cost investments in IT with more targeted variable spending in cloud solutions. In addition, cloud usage is expected to increase the productivity of...

Cloud-Computing ist für Unternehmen eine kostengünstige und flexible Art der IT-Nutzung, ohne dass Investitionen in die eigene, teure und starre IT-Infrastruktur notwendig sind. Daher wird erwartet, dass die Nutzung von Cloud-Diensten sich in geringeren IT-Investitionen niederschlägt und...