The distributional consequences of the recent economic crisis are still broadly unknown. While it is possible to speculate which groups are likely to be hardest-hit, detailed distributional studies are still largely backward-looking due to a lack of real-time microdata. This paper studies the...

Using a unique dataset of German members of parliament with information on total earnings including outside income, this paper analyzes the politicians' wage gap (PWG). After controlling for observable characteristics as well as accounting for selection into politics, we find a positive PWG...

Die in Aussicht gestellten Steuererleichterungen sind das beherrschende Thema der ersten Wochen nach Amtsantritt der neuen Bundesregierung. Die vorliegende Studie enthält eine Simulation der mutmaßlichen Effekte einer Umsetzung des von der FDP vorgeschlagenen Stufentarifs und Bürgergelds auf...

In Germany, there is an ongoing debate about how to increase the efficiency of the social security system. The aim of this paper is to simulate different financing systems for Germany with its typical Conservative welfare state regime. For our analysis, we rely on the European static...

This paper deals with the impact of electoral competition on politicians' outside earnings. We propose a simple theoretical model with politicians facing a tradeoff between allocating their time to political effort or to an alternative use generating outside earnings. The model has a testable...

Ökonomische Effizienz und soziale Gerechtigkeit stehen nicht im Widerspruch zueinander. Workfare ist sozial gerecht. Durch das Prinzip von Leistung und Gegenleistung wird dafür gesorgt, dass sich die Inanspruchnahme von Leistungen der Grundsicherung auf diejenigen beschränkt, die tatsächlich...