This study tests for a break in the persistence of EMU government bond yield spreads examining data from France, Italy and Spain and using German interest rates as a kind of benchmark. The results reported here provide evidence for breaks between 2006 and 2008. The persistence of the yield...

We analyze the role of personality in occupational choice and wages using data from Germany for the years 1992 to 2009. Characterizing personality by use of seven complementary measures, the empirical findings show that it is an important determinant of occupational choice. Associated with that,...

In recent contributions, Weizsäcker (2014) and Summers (2014) maintain that mature economies accumulate too much capital. They suggest large and lasting public deficits as a remedy. This paper argues that overaccumulation cannot occur in an economy with land. It presents novel data of aggregate...

This paper presents some selective aspects of standard econometric methods and of new developments in econometrics that are important for applications with microeconomic data. The range includes variance estimators, measurement of outliers, problems of partially identified parameters, nonlinear...

In projects with a flexible project structure, the activities that have to be scheduled are not completely known beforehand. Instead, scheduling such a project includes the decision whether to carry out particular activities at all. This also effects precedence constraints between the finally...

This paper investigates the finite-sample properties of the smooth transition-based cointegration test proposed by Kapetanios et al. (2006) when the data generating process under the alternative hypothesis is a globally stationary second order LSTR model. The provided procedure describes an...

We provide a semiparametric copula approach for estimating a "classical" sample selection model. We impose that the joint distribution function of unobservables can be characterized by a specifc copula, but the marginal distribution functions are estimated semiparametrically. In contrast to...

This paper presents evidence from a natural-experiment which evaluates the effectiveness of a student mentoring program. The mentoring includes several compulsory, scheduled, faceto- face appointments between a mentor and a student in the first study year. All mentors are graduated and employed...

We consider hypothesis testing in a general linear time series regression framework when the possibly fractional order of integration of the error term is unknown. We show that the approach suggested by Vogelsang (1998a) for the case of integer integration does not apply to the case of...

Population projections – especially those of the Federal Statistical Office in Germany – are often used for research questions that depend on the future size and structure of the population. Nevertheless, by using the population projections of the Federal Statistical Office the scope of...