Utilizing linked vital statistics, administrative employer, and state welfare records, the analysis in this paper investigates the determinants of a woman's intermittent labor force decision at the time of a major life event: the birth of a child. The results indicate that both direct and...

Many firms fail shortly after inception. Yet individuals continue starting businesses. Prewar economists such as Keynes invoked animal spirits and stressed psychological factors in their explanations of economic behavior. Using a large sample obtained from surveys conducted in 18 countries, we...

Auf der Basis eines mittels einer Onlinebefragung erhobenen Datensatzes wird auf der Basis der haushalts- bzw. konsumgütertheoretischer Überlegungen und verhaltenstheoretischer Konzepte untersucht, wie der Umfang der von ehrenamtlich Engagierten in Fußballvereinen geleisteten Arbeit von der...

We provide new evidence on the extent to which the demand for cigarettes is derived from the demand for weight control (i.e. weight loss or avoidance of weight gain). We utilize nationally representative data that provide the most direct evidence to date on this question: individuals are...

Contemporary approaches to decision making describe a decision problem by sets of states and outcomes, and a rich set of acts: functions from states to outcomes over which the decision maker (DM) has preferences. Real problems do not come so equipped. It is often unclear what the state and...

Many types of economic and social activities involve significant behavioral complementarities (peer effects) with neighbors in the social network. The same activities often exert externalities that cumulate in stocks affecting agents' welfare and incentives. For instance, smoking is subject to...

This study aims at the analysis of the possible self-referential effects of economic theories and models on its own subject and of the mechanisms through which bounded rational actors perceive the self-referential nature of economic theories and might absorb their prescriptions. Thus, the focus...

Die Bedeutung von Emotionen und Affekten bei ökonomischen Entscheidungen wird seit mehreren Jahren in der ökonomischen Literatur diskutiert (z. B. Rabin, 1998). Eine Erklärung der empirischen Evidenz in diesem Bereich, die über eine bloß phänomenologische Ebene hinausgeht, verlangt eine...

Until recently "deceleration" has been little recognized as a technical term or as an idea, but now it seems to be getting more attention. Despite time is a decisive factor for the productivity and competitive advantages of companies continual acceleration may well be counter-productive and lead...

Both, discussion and legislation in the field of corporate governance have been dominated by new institutional economics, especially agency theory. Due to its restrictive assumptions agency theory systematically disregards some important aspects that influence cooperative interaction between...