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Export Intermediation: An Empirical Test of Peng and Ilinitch

This paper provides empirical evidence from France on the role of export intermediary firms. Using data from 20,000 French firms, this paper tests two of the five transaction cost-based propositions on the role of export intermediaries by Peng and Ilinitch (1998). While the empirical evidence only partially supports their first proposition on distance and familiarity, their second proposition on product ...

Coordination Failure with Multiple-Source Lending: The Cost of Protection against a Powerful Lender

We analyze how a firm might protect quasirents in an environment of imperfect capital markets, where switching lenders is costly to the borrower, and contracts are incomplete. As switching costs make the firm vulnerable to ex post exploitation, it may want to diversify lending. Multiple-source lending, however, suffers from coordination failure. An uncoordinated withdrawal of funds will force a financially ...

Portuguese Migrants in the German Labor Market: Selection and Performance

The labor market performance of Portuguese workers in Germany is analyzed in this article. While previous work has compared wages and characteristics of migrants to natives only, this study also matches the data set with an equivalent survey from the sending country. The findings show that Portuguese migrants as a whole are negatively selected, with the exception of blue-collar workers, the largest ...

Labour Market Attachment of People outside the Labour Force: An Explorative Analysis of the Hidden Labour Force in Europe

In addition to employed and unemployed persons, individuals outside the labour force also often enter gainful employment. Generally they are not taken into account in the determinations of a country's labour supply. This is mainly due to the difficulty of identifying this "hidden labour force". Based on the European Community Household Panel (ECHP) in the years 1994, 1995 and 1996, this study takes ...

Analysing the Dynamics of Social Change in Europe

Unemployment and Productivity Growth: An Empirical Analysis within an Augmented Solow Model

Does a country's level of unemployment have an impact on the long-run growth rate? Incorporating unemployment into a generalised Solow-type growth model yields some answers. In the traditional Solow model, unemployment has no long-run influence on the growth rate and the level of productivity. The long-run level of productivity is reduced if higher unemployment leads to less formal education or to ...

The Contribution of Local Public Infrastructure to Private Productivity and Its Political Economy: Evidence from a Panel of Large German Cities

This paper proposes a simultaneous-equation approach to theestimation of the contribution of infrastructure accumulationto private production. A political economy model for theallocation of public infrastructure investment grants isformulated. Our empirical findings, using a panel of largeGerman cities for the years 1980,1986, and 1988, suggest thatcities ruled by a council sharing the State (`Bundesland')government's ...

Occupational Mobility after Apprenticeship - How Effective is the German Apprenticeship System?

In this paper we provide evidence on the effectiveness of the German apprenticeship system in enhancing workers' productivity. More specifically, we estimate earnings differentials between those who subsequently leave the occupation they were apprenticed in and those who remain in their training occupation. Some authors have beenconcerned with the potential productivity- and earnings-decreasing effects ...

Jurisdiction Size, Political Participation, and the Allocation of Resources

This paper analyzes the effect of population size on politicalparticipation and allocative efficiency. Increasing populationis generally found to reduce political participation. However,since participation is not evenly spread throughout thepopulation, this will have consequences for allocation.Namely, we argue that increasing population size shifts powerto the rich. We discuss the consequences for ...

Immigrants, Natives and Social Assistance: Comparable Take-Up under Comparable Circumstances

Are immigrants on welfare because they are more likely to be eligible or because they are more likely to claim benefits for which they are eligible? The answer is politically important, but because most current research on immigration and welfare is based on data from the United States, the answer is difficult due to the complexities of the transfer system which make eligibility determinations difficult. ...