In this paper we analyse the role of ethnic networks in the location decision of migrants to the EU 15 at the regional level. Using a random parameters logit specification we find a substantially positive effect of ethnic networks on the location decision of migrants. The effect is, however,...

After the crisis years of 2008 and 2009 EU countries followed different employment paths. Employment and wage levels, for instance, are quite unevenly distributed across Europe. Some of the EU countries expect labour shortages due to demographic change in the future. If this is the case, wages...

Narratives - stories - prevail in social life, however little is known about their relation to economic behavior and outcomes. We shed light on this issue by studying the association between folktales' motifs and economic behavior across the world. First, we explore possible relations between...

I analyse about 160 estimates of the relationship between female migrants' labour force participation and ancestry culture, integrating studies from economics and sociology that were previously unconnected. The literature exhibits large heterogeneity in results that is only partly explained by...

This paper overviews theoretical and empirical contributions that study political borders from an economic perspective. It reviews theories of the number and size of nations focused on the trade-off between economies of scale in public-good provision and heterogeneity of preferences over public...

Fast ein Fünftel der in Deutschland lebenden Menschen hat einen Migrationshintergrund - Tendenz steigend. Ihre Integration in den Arbeitsmarkt stellt eine Aufgabe von nationaler Bedeutung dar. Dies gelingt nur, wenn die jeweiligen regionalen Gegebenheiten und die unterschiedliche nationale...

Anthropologists have long documented substantial and persistent differences across social groups in the preferences and taboos for particular foods. One natural question to ask is whether such food cultures matter in an economic sense. In particular, can culture constrain caloric intake and...

This paper investigates the economic growth impact of cultural diversity, both domestically and in neighbouring countries, in a balanced panel of 94 countries covering the period 1970 to 2004. The measures of cultural diversity used in this article were derived from a recently developed computer...

This volume was prepared by Jens Ruhose while he was working at the Ifo Institute. It was completed in December 2014 and accepted as a doctoral thesis by the Department of Economics at the University of Munich. It includes four self-contained chapters that contribute to the understanding of the...