Publications Based on SOEP Data: SOEPlit

Religious Heterogeneity and Fiscal Policy: Evidence from German Reunification

Theoretical work based on social identity theory predicts that population diversity undermines redistributive public policies. This article tests this proposition exploiting an exogenous shock in diversity due to Germany’s reunification. In contrast to previous work on ethno-linguistic or racial heterogeneity, we specifically analyze religious diversity, which is an increasingly relevant social cleavage ...

Spheres of trust: An empirical analysis of the foundations of particularised and generalised trust

While the literature on trust has produced various conceptual models, there is also some confusion concerning different types of trust and their formation. In this article, three contested points are empirically clarified. First, are there really different forms of trust as much of the literature suggests? Second, if so, then how are these different types of trust related to each other? Third, what ...

Happiness: A Revolution in Economics

Being Independent is a Great Thing: Subjective Evaluations of Self-Employment and Hierarchy

The Life Satisfaction Approach to Environmental Valuation

In many countries environmental policies and regulations are implemented to improve environmental quality and thus individuals' well-being. However, how do individuals value the environment? In this paper, we review the Life Satisfaction Approach (LSA) representing a new non-market valuation technique. The LSA builds on the recent development of subjective well-being research in economics and ...

What Can Economists Learn from Happiness Research?

Happiness Research: State and Prospects

Testing Theories of Happiness

Latter-day researches based on reported subjective well-being have improved the understanding of utility. The concept of utility has acquired a psychological content, and has proved to be operational in researches on income, unemployment, inflation, inequality, and democratic institutions in their relations with happiness. The authors plead for fostering happiness researches, and give examples in which ...

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 well-being 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 ...

Household composition and Savings: An Empirical Analysis based on the German SOEP data