Consumers often cannot judge the quality of goods and services at the time of the purchase decision. The goodwill model explains how the market participants deal with this problem. It makes a distinction between markets for search goods, experience goods and credence goods. In markets for...

Increasingly, China is planning to move to nuclear power. The plan for China is to double its nuclear capacity in the near future. A critical component is that a regulatory framework has to be developed to accompany this move towards nuclear energy. An important component of such a framework is...

We analyze the German Capital Markets Model Case Law (KapMuG") enacted to reduce transaction costs in securities mass litigation. The KapMuG is often seen as a European role model trying to enhance investor rights without running the risk of frivolous claims known from US class actions. We show...

The exemption for Value Added Taxation (VAT) can be used to pursue distributive objectives. Goods like food, housing, medicine, or infrastructure services (water, telecommunication, postal) are very often partially or totally exempted from VAT. The exemption of infrastructure services had been...

Mit dem Krankenhausstrukturgesetz (KHSG), das zum 1.1.2016 in Kraft treten soll, möchte der Gesetzgeber den Strukturwandel über eine qualitativ hochwertige Krankenhausplanung erreichen. In der gewählten Ausgestaltung ist dies eher unwahrscheinlich, da die Bedeutung der Struktur-, Prozess- und...

Der straßengebundene öffentliche Personennahverkehr wurde bislang von Liberalisierungsbestrebungen ausgenommen. Im Personenbeförderungsgesetz sind objektive Marktzugangsbeschränkungen verankert, die lediglich im Fernverkehr, nicht aber im Nahverkehr abgebaut werden sollen. Der Autor...

Transmission networks are crucial for gas wholesale markets. In the past, the individual networks of transmission system operators (TSOs) determined market areas in the European Union, but driven by the prospect of higher liquidity in the wholesale market, welfare gains for society as well as...

We propose a difference-in-differences (DiD) approach to estimate the impact of incentives on cost reduction. We show theoretically, and estimate empirically, that German electricity distribution system operators (DSOs) incur higher costs when subject to a lower powered regulation mechanism. The...