This discussion paper resulted in an article in the 'European Economic Review' (2006). Volume 50, issue 8, pages 1937-1950.<P> The main contribution of this study is the finding that round numbers can act aspricebarriers for individual stocks. In addition, a first step is made to explain this and...</p>

Private toll roads are now seriously considered as an alternative to public (free-access) road infrastructure. Nevertheless, complete private provision without governmental control is only rarely considered. A main consideration against private roads would be that operators would be primarily...

Theory predicts that default breach remedies are immaterial whenever contracting costs are negligible. Some experimental studies, however, suggest that in practice default rules do matter, as they may affect parties' preferences over contract terms. This paper presents results from an experiment...

We present a theoretical framework which allows for the comparison of the effectiveness of tax measures, loans and funding, in supporting industry-oriented research. We estimate for each of the instruments the exact contribution required by a firm to decide on investing in R&D, given the costs...

This paper develops a novel approach to modeling and forecasting realized volatility (RV) measures based on copula functions. Copula-based time series models can capture relevant characteristics of volatility such as nonlinear dynamics and long-memory type behavior in a flexible yet parsimonious...

We present an equilibrium-search model with heterogenous workers whosearch for a job in one of two sectors and who lose part of theirskills during unemployment. We show that an import tariff increasethe wage and the employment prospects in the protected sector. Thisresults in a labor market...

From the viewpoint of the independence axiom of expected utility theory, an interesting empirical dynamic choice problem involves the presence of a “global risk,” that is, a chance of losing everything whichever safe or risky option is chosen. In this experimental study, participants have to...

We determine the importance of long-term and short-term components of state variables for asset allocation decisions. The long-term and short-term decompositions are performed using a variety of filtering techniques. We allow for a flexible semiparametric form of the dependence of asset...

This discussion paper led to a publication in <A href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1198/jbes.2011.10070">'Journal of Business & Economic Statistics'</A>, 29(4), 552-63.<P>We propose a new class of observation-driven time-varying parameter models for dynamic volatilities and correlations to handle time series from heavy-tailed distributions. The model adopts...</p></a>

This paper contributes to the productivity literature by using results from firm-level productivity studies to improve forecasts of macro-level productivity growth. The paper employs current research methods on estimating firm-level productivity to build times-series components that capture the...