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Ex-Post Merger Evaluation in the UK Retail Market for Books

This paper empirically evaluates the price effects of the merger of two major book retail chains in the UK: Waterstone's and Ottakar's. We employ differences-in-differences techniques and use a rich dataset containing monthly scanner data information on a sample of 200 books sold in 60 stores in 50 different local markets for a period of four years around the merger. Since retail mergers may have either ...

SOEP @ ESRA 2013

SOEP will have an exhibition stand at the 5th Conference of the European Survey Research Association (ESRA) in Ljublijana/Slowenia, from July 15-19, 2013. Information will be provided about the wide range of analyses that can be carried out with the SOEP data. The following presentations will be given by SOEP staff members or their co-authors: Download list

Labour Productivity Growth in Good Old Germany: Is Germany Falling further Behind?

The Economic Incidence of Social Security Contributions: Evidence from German Administrative Data

Abstract: This paper applies a test for the economic incidence of social security contributions (SSC) based on the reaction of gross wages in response to a variation in social security contributions. Exploiting an increase of the East German taxable maximum of health insurance, a difference-in-differences approach is used to estimate its effects on yearly changes in gross wages.

Consent When Linking Survey Data with Administrative Records: The Role of the Interviewer

Linking survey data with administrative records is becoming more common in the social sciences in recent years. Regulatory frameworks require the respondent's consent to this procedure in most cases. Similar to non-response, non-consent may lead to selective samples and could pose a problem when using the combined data for analyses. Thus investigating the selectivity and the determinants of the consent ...

Andreas Thiemann granted FNA scholarship

Andreas Thiemann has been granted a scholarship from the Forschungsnetzwerk Alterssicherung (FNA) from September 2013 on. The Dean of the GC, Prof. Lütkepohl, congratulates him on his success!

Choices which Change Life Satisfaction: Similar Results for Australia, Britain and Germany

Using data from national socio-economic panel surveys in Australia, Britain and Germany, this paper analyzes the effects of individual preferences and choices on subjective well-being (SWB). It is shown that, in all three countries, preferences and choices relating to life goals/values, partner's personality, hours of work, social participation and healthy lifestyle have substantial and similar effects ...

What is the effort for? Employment histories and incomes in later life in Europe

The income situation of the elderly population in modern welfare states is the result of an interplay of individual developments over the life course and the national institutional and policy framework. While achievements on the labor market generally are the basis for the economic status in retirement, their actual effect, however, may vary according to the specific national conditions related to...

Economic Consequences of Mispredicting Utility

In a simple conceptual framework, we organize a multitude of phenomena related to the (mis)prediction of utility. Consequences in terms of distorted choices and lower wellbeing emerge if people have to trade-off between alternatives that are characterized by attributes satisfying extrinsic desires and alternatives serving intrinsic needs. Thereby the neglect of asymmetries in adaptation is proposed ...

Forecasting Contemporaneous Aggregates with Stochastic Aggregation Weights

Many contemporaneously aggregated variables have stochastic aggregation weights. We compare different forecasts for such variables, including univariate forecasts of the aggregate, a multivariate forecast of the aggregate that uses information from the disaggregated components, a forecast which aggregates a multivariate forecast of the disaggregate components and the aggregation weights, and a forecast ...