[...]In this paper, I review the three existing studies ofthe effects of the choice schools on student achievement.Two of the studies report significant gains in math forthe choice students and two report no significant effectsin reading. I also extend the analysis to compare theachievement of...

[...]In this paper, we argue that a major obstacle tohigher student achievement is a lack of good informationcomparing achievement levels to labor marketrequirements—the kind of information that can comethrough academic standards and assessments. Without this information, parents are unable to...

This paper examines the economic organization of the trans-Saharan slave trade between the fourteenth and the nineteenth centuries on those routes that moved slaves from Sudanic Africa via entrepôts in the Sahel and Sahara to the Maghrib. The commercial framework of this trade was integrated...

One of the key goals of political economy is to understand how in-stitutional arrangements shape policy outcomes. This paper studiesa comparatively neglected aspect of this - the forces that shape het-erogeneous performance of autocracies. The paper develops a simpletheoretical model of...

Nicht die Großen fressen die Kleinen, sondern die Schnellen fressen die Langsamen. Das ist, auf den Punkt gebracht, die Standardfolklore im aktuellen Innovationsdiskus. Nicht mehr die Portersche Strategiewelt mit ihren Großalternativen von Qualität versus Preis bestimmt danach den Rahmen des...

Wir diskutieren die Faktoren für eine erfolgreiche Umsetzung eines Systems desbetrieblichen Vorschlagswesens und anderer Maßnahmen zur Stimulierung desInnovationserfolgs. Im Anschluss wird die Wirkung des betrieblichenVorschlagswesens auf den Innovationserfolg empirisch überprüft....

Theoretical analyses of (optimal) performance measures are typically performed within therealm of the linear agency model. This model implies that, for a given compensation scheme,the agent's optimal effort is unrelated to the amount of noise in the performance measure...

Market imperfections may cause firms and workers to under-invest in specific training. Thispaper shows that profit sharing may be a suitable instrument to enhance specific traininginvestments, either by enhancing wage flexibility or by increasing the returns to training...

This paper empirically analyzes whether the character-based approach, which is based onthe personality structure and the human capital of business founders, allows prediction ofentrepreneurial success...