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Many public goods are characterized by rivalry and/or excludability. This paper introduces both non-excludable and excludable public inputs into a simple endogenous growth model. We derive the equilibrium growth rate and design the optimal tax and user-cost structure. Our results emphasize the role of congestion in determining this optimal financing structure and the consequences this has in turn for the government’s budget. The latter consists of fee and tax revenues that are used to finance the entire public production input and that may or may not suffice to finance the entire public input, depending upon the degree of congestion. We extend the model to allow for monopoly pricing of the user fee by the government. Most of the analysis is conducted for general production functions consistent with endogenous growth, although the case of CES technology is also considered.
This paper analyzes conditions for existence of a strongly rational expectations equilibrium (SREE) in models with private information, where the amount of private information is endogenously determined. It is shown that the conditions for existence of a SREE known from models with exogenously given private information do not change as long as it is impossible to use the information transmitted through market prices. In contrast, these conditions are too weak, when there is such learning from prices. It turns out that the properties of the function which describes the costs that are associated with the individual acquisition of information are important in this respect. In case of constant marginal costs, prices must be half as informative than private signals in order for a SREE to exist. An interpretation of this result that falls back on the famous Grossman–Stiglitz–Paradox is also given.
The EU electricity directive (96/92/EC) established the right of the member states to choose between Regulated and Negotiated Third Party Access (RTPA and NTPA). The interest group theory is able to explain whether the introduction of NTPA in Germany had been an interest group equilibrium under the restriction of EU-directive. Using the NTPA associations of electricity power suppliers, network monopolists and industrial consumers negotiated three agreements. The last one (AA VVII+) in December 2001 introduced a market comparison scheme with three structural features: “East-/West-Germany”, “consumption/population density”, and “cable rate”. These features are variables which are supposed to reflect cost differences between network suppliers. The theoretical analysis will derive the hypothesis that this conception allows to introduce a cost irrelevant factor and therefore to increase prices without harming firms which do not hold this factor. This hypothesis could be tested by analyzing the German low and medium voltage network suppliers in 2002 and 2003. Our estimations show that the use of structural feature “East-/West Germany” and “consumption/population density” could be explained by this hypothesis. But because we have no firm specific information about cost differences other explanations could not be excluded: Monopoly prices differ with marginal costs, and regulation could reflect real cost differences. The third structural feature “cable rate” has no influence in low voltage networks, but has an impact on access charges levied in medium voltage networks. This relationship is only given if we use the borderlines given by AA VVII+. Hence, we are not able to reject the interest group theory: The feature “cable rate” was introduced successfully to increase access charges for medium network suppliers which have high cable rates without having higher costs.
While the role of exports in promoting growth in general, and productivity in particular, has been investigated empirically using aggregate data for countries and industries for a long time, only recently have comprehensive longitudinal data at the firm level been used to look at the extent and causes of productivity differentials between exporters and their counterparts which sell on the domestic market only. This papers surveys the empirical strategies applied, and the results produced, in 45 microeconometric studies with data from 33 countries that were published between 1995 and 2004. Details aside, exporters are found to be more productive than non-exporters, and the more productive firms self-select into export markets, while exporting does not necessarily improve productivity.
This paper investigates the redistributive effects of taxation on occupational choice and growth. We discuss a twoñsector economy in the spirit of Romer (1990). Agents engage in one of two alternative occupations: either selfñemployment in an intermediate goods sector characterized by monopolistic competition, or employment as an ordinary worker in this sector. Entrepreneurial pro_ts are stochastic. The occupational choice under risk endogenizes the number of _rms in the intermediate goods industry. While the presence of entrepreneurial risk results in a suboptimally low number of _rms and depresses growth, nonñlinear tax schemes are partly capable of compensating the negative by effects by ex post providing a social insurance.
This paper presents the first empirical test with German establishment level data of a hypothesis derived by Helpman, Melitz and Yeaple in a model that explains the decision of heterogeneous firms to serve foreign markets either trough exports or foreign direct investment: only the more productive firms choose to serve the foreign markets, and the most productive among this group will further choose to serve these markets via foreign direct investments. Using a non-parametric test for first order stochastic dominance it is shown that, in line with this hypothesis, the productivity distribution of foreign direct investors dominates that of exporters, which in turn dominates that of national market suppliers.
Diese Studie untersucht die Wirkung einer verpflichtenden externen Begutachtung von Gründungsvorhaben im Rahmen der Ich-AG-Förderung der Bundesagentur für Arbeit. Unter Verwendung von prozessproduzierten Daten zu den Gründern und ihren Vorhaben wird geprüft, inwieweit sich Unterschiede zwischen Gründern im Arbeitsagenturbezirk Lüneburg, die unter diese Regelung fallen und solchen, die dies nicht tun, ergeben. Die Ergebnisse der Studie deuten darauf hin, dass keine Unterschiede in beobachtbaren Merkmalen zwischen diesen Gründern bestehen, was ein Hinweis auf die Wirkungslosigkeit der externen Begutachtung sein kann.
This paper traces the profound decline in German unionism over the course of the last three decades. Today just one in five workers is a union member, and it is now moot whether this degree of penetration is consistent with a corporatist model built on encompassing unions. The decline in union membership and density is attributable to external forces that have confronted unions in many countries (such as globalization and compositional changes in the workforce) and to some specifically German considerations (such as the transition process in postcommunist Eastern Germany) and sustained intervals of classic insider behavior on the part of German unions. The ‘correctives’ have included mergers between unions, decentralization, and wages that are more responsive to unemployment. At issue is the success of these innovations. For instance, the trend toward decentralization in collective bargaining hinges in part on the health of that other pillar of the dual system of industrial relations, the works council. But works council coverage has also declined, leading some observers to equate decentralization with deregulation. While this conclusion is likely too radical, German unions are at the cross roads. It is argued here that if they fail to define what they stand for, are unable to increase their presence at the workplace, and continue to lack convincing strategies to deal with contemporary economic and political trends working against them, then their decline may become a rout.
Works Councils, Labor Productivity and Plant Heterogeneity: First Evidence from Quantile Regressions
(2006)
Using OLS and quantile regression methods and rich cross-section data sets for western and eastern Germany, this paper demonstrates that the impact of works council presence on labor productivity varies between manufacturing and services, between plants that are or are not covered by collective bargaining, and along the conditional distribution of labor productivity. No productivity effects of works councils are found for the service sector and in manufacturing plants not covered by collective bargaining. Besides demonstrating that it is important to look at evidence based on more than one data set, our empirical findings point to the efficacy of supplementing OLS with quantile regression estimates when investigating the behavior of heterogeneous plants.
This paper analyzes the growth impact of fiscal and institutional governmental policies in a regional context. The government provides a productive input that is complementary to private capital. Institutional policies include the decision about the type of public input as well as on the size of the region as determined by the number of firms. Fiscal policies decide on the extent of the public input. Private capital accumulation incurs adjustment costs that depend upon the ratio between private and public investment. After deriving the decentralized equilibrium, fiscal and institutional policies as well as their interdependencies and welfare implications are discussed. Due to the feedback effects both policies may not be determined independently. It is also shown that depending on the region’s size different types of the public input maximize growth.
In the course of railway reforms at the end of the last century, European national governments, as well the EU Commission, decided to open markets and to separate railway networks from train operations. Vertically integrated railway companies argue that such a separation of infrastructure and operations would diminish the advantages of vertical integration and would therefore not be suitable to raise economic welfare. In this paper, we conduct a pan-European analysis to investigate the performance of European railways with a particular focus on economies of scope associated with vertical integration. We test the hypothesis that integrated railways realize economies of joint production and, thus, produce railway services on a higher level of e±ciency. To determine whether joint or separate production is more e±cient we apply an innovative Data Envelopment Analysis super-e±ciency bootstrapping model which relates the e±ciency for integrated production to a virtual reference set consisting of the separated production technology and which is applicable to other network industries as energy and telecommunication as well. Our ¯ndings are that for a majority of European Railway companies economies of scope exist.
In the face of uncertainty, ecosystems can provide natural insurance to risk averse users of ecosystem services. We employ a conceptual ecological-economic model to analyze the allocation of (endogenous) risk and ecosystem quality by risk averse ecosystem managers who have access to financial insurance, and study the implications for individually and socially optimal ecosystem management, and policy design. We show that while an improved access to financial insurance leads to lower ecosystem quality, the effect on the free-rider problem and on welfare is determined by ecosystem properties. We derive conditions on ecosystem functioning under which, if financial insurance becomes more accessible, (i) the extent of optimal regulation increases or decreases; and (ii) welfare, in the absence of environmental regulation, increases or decreases.
An empirical analysis of various waves of the ALLBUS social survey shows that union density fell substantially in western Germany from 1980 to 2004 and in eastern Germany from 1992 to 2004. Such a negative trend can be observed for men and women and for different groups of the workforce. Regression estimates indicate that the probability of union membership is related to a number of personal and occupational variables such as age, public sector employment and being a blue collar worker (significant in western Germany only). A decomposition analysis shows that differences in union density over time and between eastern and western Germany to a large degree cannot be explained by differences in the characteristics of employees. Contrary to wide-spread perceptions, changes in the composition of the workforce seem to have played a minor role in the fall in union density in western and eastern Germany.
Spitzenlastpreisbildung bei natürlichen Monopolen wurde bisher nur mit einer Produktionsstufe und konstanten Durchschnittskosten untersucht. Elektrischer Strom unterliegt jedoch einem mehrstufigen Produktionsprozeß, auf dem mindestens eine Stufe sinkende Durchschnittskosten aufweist. Ein privater, vertikal separierter Stromnetzbetreiber wird gewinnmaximale Spitzenlastpreise nehmen und aufgrund seiner Monopolstellung einen hohen Wohlfahrtsverlust verursachen. Das Papier untersucht in einem zweistufigen Modell mit sinkenden Durchschnittskosten auf der Transportstufe, wie sich das Verbot für den Netzmonopolisten, verschiedene Preise zu nehmen, auswirkt. In der beschriebenen Situation erhöht das Verbot, verschiedene Preise zu nehmen, die Wohlfahrt, wenn der Monopolist weiterhin beide Märkte (Peak und Off-Peak) bedient. Die untersuchte Regulierungsregel "nur ein Preis erlaubt" hat den Vorteil der einfachen Anwendung und Überwachung; sie ist somit praxistauglich und sehr kostengünstig.
Vier Jahre nach Inkrafttreten der letzten Reform des Betriebsverfassungsgesetzes wurden ihre Auswirkungen auf die Arbeitbeziehungen in 600 mittelständischen Betrieben im Regierungsbezirk Lüneburg erneut empirisch untersucht. Bei der Studie handelt es sich um die zweite Befragung derselben Grundgesamtheit. Damit lassen die Ergebnisse sowohl Aussagen über die aktuelle Mitbestimmungssituation als auch über die Veränderungen seit 2003 zu. Im Blickpunkt der Befragung stand, ob der erweiterte Mitbestimmungskatalog zwischenzeitlich von den Betriebsräten genutzt wird und in welchem Umfang seit 2001 neue Betriebsräte entstanden sind. Ferner galt es zu überprüfen, welches die Schwerpunkte der Betriebsratsarbeit sind, welche Rolle dem Betriebsverfassungsgesetz hierbei zukommt und welche Effekte dies – nach Einschätzung der Arbeitgeberseite –auf die Arbeitsbeziehungen hat. Dieser Beitrag stellt Ergebnisse der Untersuchung vor und vergleicht diese mit Erkenntnissen anderer Studien.
Abstract. The ecological literature suggests that biodiversity reduces the variance of ecosystem services. Thus, conservative biodiversity management has an insurance value to risk-averse users of ecosystem services. We analyze a conceptual ecological-economic model in which such management measures generate a private benefit and, via ecosystem processes at higher hierarchical levels, a positive externality on other ecosystem users. We find that ecosystem management and environmental policy depend on the extent of uncertainty and risk-aversion as follows: (i) Individual effort to improve ecosystem quality unambiguously increases. The free-rider problem may decrease or increase, depending on the characteristics of the ecosystem and its management; in particular, (ii) the size of the externality may decrease or increase, depending on how individual and aggregate management effort influence biodiversity; and (iii) the welfare loss due to free-riding may decrease or increase, depending on how biodiversity influences ecosystem service provision.
Neben bereits seit längerer Zeit laufenden Kooperationsprojekten zwischen Statistischen Ämtern und externen Wissenschaftlern sind in jüngster Zeit bei den großen amtlichen Datenproduzenten Forschungsdatenzentren (FDZ) entstanden, die Wissenschaftlern den Zugriff auf Mikrodaten aus zahlreichen Erhebungen gestatten. In diesem Vortrag soll an ausgewählten Beispielen gezeigt werden, welche politikrelevanten Folgerungen aus Ergebnissen von Analysen mit den für die Wissenschaft neu erschlossenen wirtschaftsstatistischen Einzeldaten für Betriebe und Unternehmen gezogen werden können. Hierbei werden die Bereiche Arbeitsplatzdynamik, Exportverhalten und technische Effizienz betrachtet. Die zentrale Botschaft aus zahlreichen Studien für die Wirtschaftspolitik läßt sich in einem Satz zusammenfassen: Wirtschaftspolitische Maßnahmen sollten sich nicht an Kategorien wie Wirtschaftszweig oder Firmengröße orientieren, denn diese Einteilungen sind nicht trennscharf im Hinblick auf Eigenschaften von Betrieben wie Wachstum, Exporterfolg oder Effizienz.
Handwerksreform 2004 - Rückwirkungen auf das Ausbildungsverhalten Lüneburger Handwerksbetriebe?
(2006)
Die Befragung Lüneburger Handwerksbetriebe, die im Rahmen eines Projektes zur Regulierung auf dem deutschen Handwerksmarkt in Zusammenarbeit mit der Kreishandwerkerschaft Lüneburg durchgeführt wurde, soll Auswirkungen der Anfang 2004 erfolgten Handwerksreform erfassen. Dabei liegt der Schwerpunkt dieses Artikels auf der Ausbildungsleistung des Handwerks. Die theoretischen Ansätze zur Erklärung betrieblicher Lehrstellenangebote sollen mit den Ergebnissen der ersten Befragungsrunde über die Determinanten der Ausbildungsentscheidung im Lüneburger Handwerk konfrontiert werden.