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VdF: Best Presentation Prize 2006

Prize committee


  • Ada Ferrer-i-Carbonell (University of Amsterdam)
  • Markus M. Grabka (DIW Berlin)
  • Ulrich Kohler (WZB), Martin Kroh (DIW Berlin)
  • Regina T. Riphahn (Universität Erlangen)

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Honored papers


Marco Caliendo and Katharina Wrohlich, DIW Berlin: "Evaluating the German "Mini-Job" Reform Using a True Natural Experiment" (first prize)
Committee comments: The paper investigates the causal effect of a reform of the German marginal/secondary job regulation as of April 1, 2003. It clearly addresses the evaluation problem and provides a convincing solution. It shows evidence that political claims of additional 930,000 jobs were not corroborated by the evidence. It was a very good presentation, clearly structured. The paper had a clear research design and is highly policy relevant.

Thorsten Schneider, University of Bamberg: "Does the Effect of Social Origins on educational Participation Change over the Life Course?" (second prize)
Committee comments: The paper looks at the role of social origin for educational outcomes with a focus first on the decision to attend Gymnasium and second on the risk of dropping out. It advances sociological theory by considering the social selection issue in the drop out decision. The paper executes a competent survival analysis and finds strong origin effect on the probability of entering and weaker effects on the probability of dropping out. The timely analysis as selection by origin has been intensely discussed.  

Christoph Wunder, Universität of Bamberg: "The Intergenerational Linkage between Children and their Parents - Empirical Evidence of Upstream Transfers in Germany" (third prize)
Committee comments: The paper looks at the determinants of the incidence and amount of financial transfers from children to their parents. It juxtaposes a household production model to the standard altruism models which are applied to explain these issues. The paper tests whether it is altruism or exchange motive which drives the individual transfer decision and concludes that the exchange motive is central. The paper was very clearly presented and the empirical methods appropriate.  

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Best Poster 2006


This year, for the first time a prize for the Best Poster has been awarded.  

Thomas Bauer, Silja Göhlmann and Mathias Sinning, RWI Essen: "Gender Differences in Smoking Behavior"
Committee comments: The poster tries to explain the difference in smoking frequency between men and women. It applies the traditional Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition which differentiates between the effect of individual characteristics and behavior. It uses six different count data models and innovatively applies Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition to these estimators. The findings give evidence that women smoke less not because of characteristics but because of different behavior. Nice design of poster, good presentation.

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