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Where Does the Fair Trade Money Go? How Much Consumers Pay Extra for Fair Trade Coffee and How This Value Is Split along the Value Chain

Fair Trade certification aims at transferring wealth from the consumer to the farmer; however, coffee passes through many hands before reaching final consumers. Bringing together retail, wholesale, and stock market data, this study estimates how much more consumers are paying for Fair Trade-certified coffee in US supermarkets and finds estimates around $1.50 per lb. The study then assesses how this ...

2D:4D Does Not Predict Economic Preferences: Evidence from a Large, Representative Sample

The digit ratio (2D:4D) is considered a proxy for testosterone exposure in utero, and there has been a recent surge of studies testing whether 2D:4D is associated with economic preferences. Although the results are not conclusive, previous studies have reported statistically significant correlations between 2D:4D and risk taking, altruism, positive reciprocity, negative reciprocity and trust. Many “researcher ...

2D:4D and Self-Employment Using SOEP Data: A Replication Study

The 2D:4D digit ratio, the ratio of the length of the 2nd digit to the length of the 4th digit, is often considered a proxy for testosterone exposure in utero. A recent study by Nicolaou et al. (2018) reported an association between the left-hand 2D:4D and self-employment (in a sample of about 1,000 adults). In this pre-registered study we replicate these results on a new and larger sample of about ...

Identifying Effective Combinations of Economic Policy Measures for the Coronavirus Recession in Europe

As the coronavirus pandemic spread across the globe in early 2020, the European Central Bank as well as national governments in the euro area enacted or announced numerous economic policy measures to counteract the severe economic consequences of the resulting lockdowns. In this paper, the immediate effect of the announcements on government bond and stock markets are estimated in a panel study. The ...

Does Unemployment Make Better Fathers? The Effect of Job Loss on Fathers’ Time Investment in the Household

Commonly described as the “gender care gap“, there is a persistent gender difference in the division of child care and housework responsibilities within households in most developed countries. Existing literature on paternal child care involvement and parental leave take-up largely suffers from sample size and selection issues. This paper provides evidence on the effect of an...

Accelerating Transformation: the Role of Investment in Germany and the EU to Support Recovery from the Pandemic Shock

Europe and Germany are being hit by a historic shock due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Economic activity is going to shrink substantially this year, with lockdown measures having led to sharp contractions in economic output, household spending, corporate investment and international trade. Will we see a strong and sustainable recovery? Investment is central to reboot economic activity and to...

Mobile Money is Driving Financial Development in Africa

Mobile money is an innovation that allows financial transactions to be performed via a cell phone. Even in poor regions of Africa, almost everyone has a cell phone; therefore, mobile money could both contribute to the continent’s economic growth and ensure that no Africans are excluded from access to financial services. However, DIW Berlin data from Uganda show that mobile money is actually used less ...

SOEP-IS 2018 – Survey Report on the 2018 SOEP Innovation Sample

Green Guarantee Pension

The Green Guarantee Pension is designed to ensure that people who have worked the majority of their lives, brought up children, looked after other people or have acquired other rights under the statutory pension insurance (Gesetzliche Rentenversicherung) receive a pension in old age that is above the means-tested basic pension. The Guarantee Pension increases pension entitlements within the...

Trajectories of Multiple Subjective Well-Being Facets Across Old Age: The Role of Health and Personality

Subjective well-being is often characterized by average stability across old age, but individual differencesare substantial and not yet fully understood. This study targets physical and cognitive health andpersonality as individual difference characteristics and examines their unique and interactive roles forlevel and change in a number of different facets of subjective well-being. We make use of medicaldiagnoses, ...