There are many stories of democracy but little consensus over which variables robustly determine its emergence and survival. We apply extreme bounds analysis to test the robustness of 59 factors proposed in the literature, evaluating over 3 million regressions. The most robust determinants of...

This paper examines whether a country's economic reforms are affected by reforms adopted by other countries. A simple model of economic reforms is developed to motivate the econometric work. Unsurprisingly, the model predicts that reforms are more likely when factors of production are...

This paper examines whether a country's economic reforms are affected by reforms adopted by other countries. A simple model of economic reforms is developed to motivate the econometric work. Unsurprisingly, the model predicts that reforms are more likely when factors of production are...

Recent literature proposes many variables as significant determinants of pollution. This paper gives an overview of this literature and asks which of these factors have an empirically robust impact on water and air pollution, i.e., do not depend upon the conditioning information set. For this,...

This paper examines how robust economic, political, and demographic variables are related to water and air pollution. Employing Bayesian Averaging of Classical Estimates (BACE) for a cross section of up to 74 countries, 33 variables and 3 proxies for air and water pollution over a period from...

Using a new consumer survey dataset, we document a new dimension of heterogeneity in inflation expectations that has implications for consumption and saving decisions as well as monetary policy transmission. We show that German households with the same inflation expectations differently assess...