This paper investigates the influence of political regimes on personality, using the separation of Germany into the socialist GDR and the democratic FRG and its reunification in 1990 as a natural experiment. We show that there are significant differences between former GDR and FRG residents...

This paper investigates the influence of political regimes on personality, using the separation of Germany into the socialist GDR and the democratic FRG and its reunification in 1990 as a natural experiment. We establish significant differences between former GDR and FRG residents regarding...

This paper investigates the influence of political regimes on personality, using the separation of Germany into the socialist GDR and the democratic FRG and its reunification in 1990 as a natural experiment. We show that there are significant differences between former GDR and FRG residents...

This paper investigates if and how confidence at the individual level changes over the course of a life. We provide age profiles of a novel continuous confidence measure and the probability of overconfidence, conditioning on personality traits (including the Big Five and optimism), economic...

We use the separation and later reunification of Germany after World War II to show that a political regime shapes time preferences of its residents. Using two identification strategies, we find that former residents of the German Democratic Republic exhibit a significantly less pronounced...

This paper presents detailed evidence about who compares to whom in terms of relative income. We rely on representative survey data on the importance of income comparisons vis-á-vis seven reference groups, allowing us to exploit within-subject heterogeneity. We explore the prevalence and...

This paper presents detailed evidence about who compares to whom in terms of relative income. We rely on representative survey data on the importance of income comparisons vis-a-vis seven reference groups, allowing us to exploit within-subject heterogeneity. We explore the prevalence and...

This paper presents evidence on the impact of political regimes on time preferences using survey measures of present bias and patience. Treating the German separation and reunification as a natural experiment, our results indicate that the GDR's socialist regime significantly diminished the...

This paper investigates the influence of political regimes on personality, using the separation of Germany into the socialist GDR and the democratic FRG and its reunification in 1990 as a natural experiment. We show that there are significant differences between former GDR and FRG residents...

This paper presents detailed evidence about who compares to whom in terms of relative income. We rely on representative survey data on the importance of income comparisons vis-á-vis seven reference groups, allowing us to exploit within-subject heterogeneity. We explore the prevalence and...