The mainly used welfare criterion in the social network literature is Bentham´s utilitarian concept. The shortcomings of this concept are well-known. We compare the outcomes of the utilitarian concept with the Nash social welfare function. By using a Taylor approximation we deduce a formula...

With the exception of Ireland most OECD countries can be described by a similar demogrphic development which forces the welfare state to reform their social security systems and especially their pension systems. The populations of all the member states are shrinking and getting older. This holds...

This paper analyzes the regional dimension of the German digital divide. It considers the impact of regional characteristics on differences in the share of Internet use between German counties. In addition, it studies the influence of regional factors as well as individual characteristics on the...

This paper analyzes computer use by older male employees and estimates the impact of computer use on their employment status, based on individual data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (GSOEP) for the years 1997 and 2001. In line with previous research on the diffusion of new technologies, a...

In this paper it is shown that it matters a lot for empirical research whether policy is taken to be exogenously set or to be endogenous. In the model investment depends on policy which depends on economically important fundamentals and is, thus, endogenous. Conditioning on factor accumulation...

It is sometimes argued that more advertising raises consumption which in turn stimulates output and so economic growth. We test this hypothesis using annual German data expressed in terms of GDP for the period 1950-2000. We find that advertising does not Granger-cause growth but Granger-causes...

This paper analyzes the link between growth and public policy when the latter depends on economically important fundamentals. When policy is endogenous the measured effects of policy on growth will generally be biased. Using a widely quoted theoretical model, the signs of the biases are derived....