Five leading German political parties and their coalitions are evaluated with regard to party manifestos and results of the 2005 parliamentary elections. For this purpose, the party manifestos are converted into Yes/No answers to 95 topical questions (Relax the protection against dismissals?...

The outcomes of the 2013 German Bundestag (federal parliament) are analyzed from the viewpoint of direct democracy. For this purpose, the party positions on 36 topical issues are compared with the results of public opinion polls, and the party and coalition indices of popularity (the average...

Reducing disparities among regions within European countries is the aim of European and national structural policies. In particular, a European grant contributes to the German governmental program for equalizing regional unemployment. The goal is to bring it down to the national average by...

The social security systems in 22 European countries are evaluated with a specially constructed indicator. It is based on a census-simulating model which combines both empirical (statistical) and normative (rule-based) approaches. The individual answers of unemployed on social security benefits...

Reducing disparities among regions within European countries together with economic development is the aim of European and national structural policies. In particular, a European grant contributes to the German governmental program for reducing and equalizing regional unemployment. The goal is...

German structural policy is characterized by a composite indicator with three targets:(1) minimization of unemployment, (2) maximization of GDP, and (3) equalization of regional unemployment rates. The composite indicator with given target weights is maximized subject to budget constraints and...