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Top of the Class: the Importance of Ordinal Rank

This paper establishes a new fact about educational production: ordinal academic rank during primary school has long-run impacts on later achievement that are independent from underlying ability. Using data on the universe of English school students, we examine a setting in which the same baseline score on a national standardized test can correspond to different ranks among students situated in...

The gender gap in financial literacy: income, education, and experience offer only partial explanations

In most countries, women have a lower level of financial literacy than men on average. This report demonstrates that differences in income and education and less experience in financial matters only provide a partial explanation for the gender gap. Data from various countries show that cultural differences may also play a role. In order to close the gender gap in financial literacy, schools should ...

"On average, women know less about financial matters than men do in most countries": seven questions for Antonia Grohmann

Ms. Grohmann, you have examined the gender gap in financial literacy. In general, do women know more or less about financial matters than men do? On average, women know less about financial matters than men in most countries. There are exceptions – Thailand and Russia, for example – but in 135 out of 144 countries, women know less about finances than men.  [...] The ...

The Gender Gap in Financial Literacy: Income, Education, and Experience Offer Only Partial Explanations

In most countries, women have a lower level of financial literacy than men on average. This report demonstrates that differences in income and education and less experience in financial matters only provide a partial explanation for the gender gap. Data from various countries show that cultural differences may also play a role. In order to close the gender gap in financial literacy, schools should ...

On Average, Women Know Less about Financial Matters than Men Do in Most Countries: Seven Questions for Antonia Grohmann

Do Caseworkers Reduce Unemployment? Evidence from Unexpected Work Absences

Caseworkers are the primary human resource used by governments to match unemployed workers to jobs. This paper provides first estimates on the role of caseworkers in reducing the duration of unemployment spells, using register data from the Swiss UI. For identification, I exploit caseworker-time specific variation in unexpected work absences, which I show to be independent of job seeker...

Family Ownership: Does It Matter for Funding and Success of Corporate Innovations?

Using the Mannheim innovation panel, we investigate whether family firms have higher financial need and how this affects both innovation input and innovation outcomes such as firm or market novelties, or process innovation. Applying the CDM framework, we find that family firms are more likely to have a latent financial need for innovation, which means that they have innovation ideas which they have ...

Resource Curse Contagion in the Case of Yemen

This study analyses the economic developments in Yemen from the 1970s to today in the context of the resource curse hypothesis. After a brief survey of the resource curse literature, using empirical data, historical accounts, and political (economic) analyses, I confirm that post-reunification Yemen suffers from an intense oil curse. The curse is evidenced by low genuine savings rates, oil-dependency, ...

Is the German Retail Gasoline Market Competitive? A Spatial-Temporal Analysis Using Quantile Regression

We explore whether noncompetitive pricing prevails in Germany’s retail gasoline market by examining the influence of the crude oil price on the retail gasoline price, focusing specifically on how this influence varies according to the brand and to the degree of competition in the vicinity of the station. Our analysis identifies several factors other than cost—including the absence of nearby competitors ...

We Are Largely Responsible for Our Own Happiness