Thema Konjunktur

Testing Marx: Capital Accumulation, Income Inequality, and Socialism in Late Nineteenth-Century Germany

We study the dynamics of capital accumulation, income inequality, capital concentration, and voting up to 1914. Based on new panel data for Prussian regions, we re-evaluate the famous Revisionism Debate between orthodox Marxists and their critics. We show that changes in capital accumulation led to a rise in the capital share and income inequality, as predicted by orthodox Marxists. But against their ...

The Non-linear Impact of Risk Tolerance on Entrepreneurial Profit and Business Survival

Entrepreneurs tend to be risk tolerant but is higher risk tolerance always better? In a sample of about 2100 small businesses, we find an inverted U-shaped relation between risk tolerance and profitability. This relationship holds in a simple bilateral regression, and even after controlling for a large set of individual and business characteristics. Apparently, one major transmission goes from risk ...

Decline in Job Satisfaction and How it Relates to Investment Decisions of the Self-Employed

Despite substantial research on job satisfaction in self-employment, we know little about the specific consequences for the venture when job satisfaction declines after an external shock. Taking the COVID-19 pandemic as an example of an external shock and drawing on a sample of nearly 7,000 self-employed individuals living in Germany, we investigate how declines in job satisfaction are related to investment ...

35 Jahre Deutsche Einheit – wo stehen die ostdeutschen Länder heute? Editorial

Finanzkraft der Länder: Ost-West-Gegensatz verliert an Bedeutung – Kluft zwischen Arm und Reich wächst

Auch 35 Jahre nach der Deutschen Einheit bleiben die Wirtschafts- und Finanzkraft in den ostdeutschen Ländern unterdurchschnittlich. Im deutschen Finanzföderalismus führt das zu hohen Finanztransfers, die immer wieder politische Debatten auslösen. Dabei ist das geringe Steueraufkommen wirtschaftsschwacher Länder auch eine Folge des Steuersystems und bei weitem nicht ostspezifisch. Inzwischen haben ...

Der Finanzausgleich ist nicht nur ein Ost-West-Thema: Interview

Auch 35 Jahre nach der Deutschen Einheit bleiben die Wirtschafts- und Finanzkraft in den ostdeutschen Ländern unterdurchschnittlich. Im deutschen Finanzföderalismus führt das zu hohen Finanztransfers, die immer wieder politische Debatten auslösen. Dabei ist das geringe Steueraufkommen wirtschaftsschwacher Länder auch eine Folge des Steuersystems und bei weitem nicht ostspezifisch. Inzwischen haben ...

Wie sich Griechenland aus dem Schuldensumpf befreite

Nur mit höheren Steuern wird Deutschland verteidigungsfähig

Decline in Job Satisfaction and How it Relates to Investment Decisions of the Self-Employed

Despite substantial research on job satisfaction in self-employment, we know little about the specific consequences for the venture when job satisfaction declines after an external shock. Taking the COVID-19 pandemic as an example of an external shock and drawing on a sample of nearly 7,000 self-employed individuals living in Germany, we investigate how declines in job satisfaction are related to investment ...

Structural Change in Germany: Challenges for Growth and Productivity

Germany is at the onset of a profound structural change that will have a lasting impact on the dynamics of productivity and economic growth. Global megatrends such as changes in international trade, digitalisation, decarbonisation and demographic change will accelerate structural change and have far-reaching consequences for productivity growth, the international competitiveness of the German economy ...