Recently a wide and empirically-backed consensus has emerged arguing that direct democratic control over government's spending decisions through initiatives and referenda constrains government size. But what happens if budgetary matters are excluded from the voters' right of the initiative? I...

This paper is one of the first to analyse political influence on state-owned savings banks in a developed country with an established financial market: Germany. Combining a large dataset with financial and operating figures of all 457 German savings banks from 1994 to 2006 and information on...

With interest groups significantly affecting economic performance (according to Mancur Olson) and a vital interest of governments in economic growth and low unemployment in order to win elections, there should be a link between political business cycles and the evolution of lobbies over time...

In this paper, we acknowledge that the mitigation of and adaptation to climate change have differential fiscal impacts. Whereas mitigation typically raises fiscal revenues, adaptation is costly to the taxpayer and to a greater extent the more distortionary the tax system is. In an OLG model with...

In this paper, we employ a public choice perspective to analyze the development of policies for renewable energy sources (RES) in the EU in general and in Germany more specifically. In doing so, we explain the main characteristics of current RES policies in the EU by reference to the...

Using the health care reform of 2004 as an experience, the reaction of consumers (insured persons) and producers (pharmaceutical industry) based on electoral behavior and relating to drug prices and co-payments imposed on drugs is analyzed. The changes in prices and medications after this reform...

This article analyzes the shifts of power relation and influence between pharmaceutical industry (producers), pharmacies, and social health insurers (SHI) in Germany based on drug prices. Since the health care reform of 2004, these interest groups have negotiated fees and discounts among each...

Recently a wide and empirically-backed consensus has emerged arguing that direct democratic control over government's spending decisions through initiatives and referenda constrains government size. But what happens if budgetary matters are excluded from the voters' right of the initiative? I...

Do established parties change political institutions to disadvantage smaller, nonmainstream parties if the latters ́electoral prospects improve? We study this question with a natural experiment from the German federal state of Hesse. The experiment is the abolishment of an explicit electoral...

Is government ideology important for fiscal policy? I study this question with data from all German States over the period 1975-2005. To identify the effect of ideology, I rely on a fuzzy regression discontinuity design. I find that left-wing state governments spend more than state governments...