The economic impact of an institutional transplant depends on the underlying cultural envi-ronment of the receiving country. This paper provides the first evidence that the positive effect of importing good institutions cancels out when the receiving territories are characterized by cultural...

Does self-governance, a hallmark of democratic societies, foster or erode norms of generalized cooperation? Does this effect persist, and if so, why? I investigate these questions using a natural experiment in Switzerland. In the middle-ages, the absence of an heir resulted in the extinction of...

This paper tests the hypothesis that international migration experiences may promote better institutions at home by raising the demand for political accountability. In order to examine this question, we use a simple postcard voting experiment designed to capture the population’s desire for...

'Ancillary experiments' are a new technique whereby researchers use a completed experiment conducted by others to recover causal estimates of a randomized intervention on new outcomes. The method requires pairing new outcome data with randomized treatments the researchers themselves did not...

Does democracy increase economic growth? Previous literature tends to find a positive effect but does also suffer from possible endogeneity problems: democratization is typically not random and might be affected by factors that also have an impact on economic growth. This paper narrows down the...

The opportunity to voice one's opinion about a decision is a fundamental aspect of procedural fairness and applies to a large variety of economic interactions. Voice may influence decision makers, but at the same time it shapes behavior of those who can voice their opinion. We study the latter...

Economic theory suggests that gasoline retail markets are prone to collusive behavior. Oligopoly market structures prevail, market interactions occur frequently, prices are highly transparent, and demand is rather inelastic. A recent sector inquiry in Germany backed suspicions of tacit collusion...

This paper experimentally studies the role of search cost in duopoly markets where sellers may be able to coordinate pricing decisions. We vary the level of search cost and whether sellers can communicate. While we find that consumers are more likely to invest in search when cost is reduced, we...

Inspired by the controversial public and political debate in the European Union (EU) about legal initiatives to protect human rights and the environment along supply chains (e.g., the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive, CSDDD), this paper examines individual preferences for...

We study experimentally the protection of property in five widely distinct countries-Austria, Mexico, Mongolia, South Korea and the United States. Our main results are that the security of property varies with experimental institutions, and that our subject pools exhibit significantly different...