?Evaluitis? - i.e. ex post assessments of organizations and persons - has become a rapidly spreading disease. In addition to the well-known costs imposed on evaluees and evaluators, additional significant costs are commonly disregarded: incentives are distorted, ossification is induced and the...

The experimental literature and studies using survey data have established that people care a great deal about their relative economic position and not solely, as standard economic theory assumes, about their absolute economic position. Individuals are concerned about social comparisons....

This paper employs experiments to examine the effects of social comparisons in ultimatum bargaining. We inform responders on the average offer before they decide whether to accept or reject their specific offer. To provide a metric for social comparison effects, we compare them with another...

Who is the best formula 1 driver? Until today it was impossible to answer this question because the observable performance of a driver depends both on his talent and the quality of his cars. In this paper we for the first time separate driver talent from car quality by econometrically analyzing...

In recent years the topics of illegal activities such as corruption or tax evasion have attracted a great deal of attention. However, there is still a lack of substantial empirical evidence about the determinants of compliance. The aim of this paper is to investigate empirically whether women...

In this paper, we develop the concept of a psychological tax contract that goes beyond the traditional deterrence model and explains tax morale as a complicated interaction between taxpayers and the government. Based on crowding theory, the impact of deterrence and re-wards on tax morale is...

A central aspect of historical research is to provide explanations for the causes and effects of events that occurred in the past, in particular the Second World War. History can be analyzed and explained from different perspectives. Two such perspectives are considered, the first being the...

Corporate auditors review and evaluate financial statements. To enhance independence the selection process and mandatory auditor rotation requirements have been debated intensively. The available empirical evidence is not conclusive and suffers from serious endogeneity problems. We propose...

This paper analyzes the impact of rewards on tax compliance as an additional instrument to take into account. While social psychologists and neuroscientists have emphasized the importance of rewards, the tax compliance literature has strongly disregarded the possibilities of rewards. The use of...