Most contracts that individuals enter into are not written from scratch; rather, they depend upon forms and terms that have been successful in the past. In this paper, we study the structure of form construction contracts published by the American Institute of Architects (AIA). We show that...

The paper deals with impulsive consumption and highlights the roles that cognitive and motivational aspects of reflexive thought (namely self-control and self-image motives, respectively) play in intertemporal decisions. While self-control inhibits individuals from consuming impulsively,...

I show that an advertising ban is more likely to increase — rather than decrease — total consumption when advertising does not bring about a large expansion of market demand at given prices and when it increases product differentiation (thus allowing firms to command higher prices). In this...

Obwohl heute ein weitgehender Konsens darüber vorliegt, dass der Qualitätssicherung bei Humandienstleistungen ein ganz besonderer Stellenwert zukommt, fehlt eine systematische Auseinandersetzung mit den Gründen und Möglichkeiten einer solchen Qualitätssicherung. Am Beispiel der Bildung,...

The "revolving door" phenomenon has become very common in most industrialised countries, and is leading to conflicts of interest as well as economic distortions. The purpose of this paper is to develop an indicator of the distortionary effects of the revolving door - The Revolving Door Indicator...

Starting from the objective of banking supervision - to minimize the overall costs of banking to the general public - we show that the current standard of quantifying market risk is flawed. It is perfectly aligned with the interests of banks' shareholders and management, but not with the...

This paper analyzes the effect of inter urban buses competing on a few routes against trains within an established railway network. In line with expectations, we show that this can lead to unprofitable train service on these routes. However, within an established railway network with every track...

Ein Jahr nach Inkrafttreten der deutschen Energierechtsnovelle sind die Konturen der zukünftigen Strommarktregulierung noch zu weiten Teilen ungeklärt. Vor diesem aktuellen wirtschaftspolitischem Hintergrund wird in diesem Papier die Frage nach einer sachgerechten Ausrichtung der...

This paper proposes and empirically validates four theories of why legal origin influences growth and welfare through finance. It is a natural extension of "Law and finance: why does legal origin matter?" by Thorsten Beck, Asli Demirgüç-Kunt and Ross Levine (2003). We find only partial support...

A general theoretical and empirical framework is developed for assessing the potential of a vertically integrated firm to foreclose downstream competitors. Using this framework a policymaker may also evaluate the empirical welfare effects from a vertically integrated firm raising rivals' costs....