This paper studies the causal effect of giving first birth and how that effect changes by the 2007 reform in parental benefits in Germany. We further investigate how the reform affects the selection of women into motherhood and how that selection effect affects labor market outcomes. A large...

This paper explores the role of the birth control pill on divorce. To identify its effect, we use a quasi experiment exploiting the differences in the language of the Comstock anti-obscenity statutes approved in the 1800s and early 1900s in the US. Results suggest that banning the sales of oral...

We analyse a model in which families may either be “traditional” single-earner with caring for the child at home or “modern” double-earner households using market child care. Family policies may favour either the one or the other group, like market care subsidies vs. cash for care....

We analyse the effect of a mandatory kindergarten for four-year-old children on mothers' labour supply in Switzerland. Since education policy is regulated on a federal level, we exploit spatial variation as well as staggered implementation. Using a difference-in-differences approach, we find an...

This paper studies how the statutory right to work part-time affects mothers' post-birth labor market outcomes and higher-order fertility. I use a differences-in-differences design to investigate the introduction of a German law in 2001 that grants the right to work part-time to employees...

We analyse the effect of a mandatory kindergarten for four-year-old children on maternal labour supply in Switzerland by using two quasi-experiments: Firstly, we use a large administrative dataset and apply a non-parametric Regression Discontinuity Design to evaluate the effect of the reform at...

Standard program evaluations implicitly assume that individuals are perfectly informed about the considered policy change and the related institutional rules. This seems not very plausible in many contexts, as diverse examples show. However, evidence on how incomplete information affects the...

Exploiting the natural experiment of the German reunification, we examine how consumers adapt to a new environment in their macroeconomic forecasting. We document that East Germans expect higher inflation and make larger forecast errors than West Germans even decades after reunification....

Using an international sample of more than 65,000 rating actions by Fitch, Moody's and S&P, we analyze the effect of the Dodd-Frank Act on credit ratings. We document that (i) rating report content changes significantly after Dodd-Frank and (ii) show, by exploiting within firm-quarter variation,...

We analyze the impact of obtaining a residence permit on foreign workers' labor market and residential attachment. To overcome the usually severe selection issues, we exploit a unique migration lottery that randomly assigns access to residence permits for workers with an employment contract in...