Climate change policies have been rising to the top of the global political agenda, but how should governments finance them? Public economists propose solutions based on economic theory, but their political feasibility depends on voters’ support, and ordinary households often neglect economic...

We exploit the unexpected announcement of an immediate, temporary VAT cut in Germany in the second half of 2020 as a natural experiment to study the spending response to unconventional fiscal policy. We use survey and scanner data on households’ consumption expenditures and their perceived...

We study the redistributive effects of inflation combining administrative bank data with an information provision experiment during an episode of historic inflation. On average, households are well-informed about prevailing inflation and are concerned about its impact on their wealth; yet, while...

Rising government debt levels around the world are raising the specter that authorities might seek to inflate away the debt. In theoretical settings where fiscal policy “dominates” monetary policy, higher debt without offsetting changes in primary surpluses should lead households to...

A German policy experiment from 2012 allows me to identify the short-run and longrun causal effects of decentralization on the placement efficiency of public employment services (PES). I exploit variation over time and across districts with different types of PES in a difference-in-differences...

Die Arbeitsmarktindikatoren für Sachsen und Ostdeutschland insgesamt entwickelten sich im Mai mehrheitlich positiv. Allerdings verharrt die saisonbereinigte Arbeitslosenquote seit März auf gleich bleibendem Niveau, während die Zahl der geringfügig Beschäftigten seit Jahresbeginn sogar...

In diesem Beitrag werden regionale Unterschiede in Bezug auf die erwerbsfähigen Leistungsberechtigten (eLb) untersucht. Die Analyse gliedert sich in zwei Teile. Der erste Teil widmet sich dem Anteil der eLb in verschiedenen Bevölkerungsgruppen (Betroffenheit), der zweite dem Anteil der...