External refereed essays

The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) as Reference Data Set

Living Standards in Retirement: Accepted International Comparisons are Misleading

Satisfaction with Life and Economic Well-Being: Evidence from Germany

SOEP after 25 Years: 8th International Socio-Economic Panel User Conference: Editorial

Inefficient Arbitrage in Inter-regional Electricity Transmission

This paper analyzes the efficiency of an explicit ex ante auction for network access to facilitating trade between two separate, but linked, electricity wholesale markets. It is generally assumed that greater regional interconnection will mitigate the exercise of local market power by dominant generators, but we show analytically that when a dominant player has access to a more competitive neighboring ...

Subsidiary Role and Skilled Labour Effects in Small Developed Countries

This paper considers the proportion of skilled labour employed by subsidiaries in small countries in the context of the strategic role of subsidiaries. Strategic role is connected to autonomy and intra-organisational relationships and the mandates given to the subsidiary. In the paper, we draw on the literature on the strategic development of multinational corporations, and insights from inward foreign ...

Divestitures in the Electricity Sector: Conceptual Issues and Lessons from International Experiences

Google Econometrics and Unemployment Forecasting

The Spill-over Effects of Conflict on Economic Growth in Neighbouring Countries in Africa

In this article, the influence of conflict on the economies of neighbouring countries is discussed. The results from previous papers show a strong negative effect for an entire area around a country suffering from conflict, but this paper reaches a different conclusion, by using more recent data and adjusting the methodology previously employed. Additionally, a new type of contiguity matrix is constructed ...

Credit for What? Informal Credit as a Coping Strategy of Market Women in Northern Ghana

This paper explores the use of informal credit as a strategy for managing risks by market women in northern Ghana. A broad concept of the costs of risk management strategies is introduced and encompasses both a time and monetary dimension. Based on qualitative data, the analysis reveals that market women invest a considerable amount of time in maintaining complex networks of informal credit providers ...

The Impact of Violent Conflicts on Households: What Do We Know and What Should We Know about War Widows?

This paper analyses how mass violent conflict and the legacy of conflict affect households in developing countries. It does so by pointing out how violent conflict impairs a household's core functions, its boundaries, its choice of coping strategies and its well-being. The paper contributes to the literature on the economics of conflict, reconstruction and vulnerability in three ways. First, it addresses ...

Smallholder Land Access in Post-War Northern Mozambique

This paper analyzes the inequality and determinants of flexibility in smallholder land access in post-war northern Mozambique. This paper demonstrates that high land endowments in aggregate do not imply equal access to cultivated or fallow land at the household level, even if land access has some flexibility across time. A formal test establishes the low extent of flexibility in land access at the ...

Comparing the Determinants of Concern about Terrorism and Crime

The Prospects for Liquefied Natural Gas Development in the US

The objective of our paper is to analyze the prospects for LNG development in the US. In particular, we discuss LNG investment projects with respect to natural gas supply and demand, existing transmission infrastructure, and competing pipeline projects. At the same time potential competition between natural gas and coal in power generation is taken into account. We conclude that in the mid-term, LNG ...

Linking Alternative Theories of the Firm: A First Empirical Application to the Liquefied Natural Gas Industry

This paper provides an empirical analysis linking two theories of firms' strategic behavior. We analyze corporate strategies in the emerging global market for liquefied natural gas. First, following Porter, we identify three strategic target market positions: chain optimization, flexibility strategy, and national oil companies (NOCs). Each target market position is supported by an underlying resource ...

Agriculture, Poverty, and Postwar Reconstruction: Micro-Level Evidence from Northern Mozambique

This article analyzes the effects of household-level activity choices on farm household welfare in a developing country affected by mass violent armed conflict. The study uses household survey data from postwar Nampula and Cabo Delgado provinces in Northern Mozambique capturing many activity choices, including market participation, risk and activity diversification, cotton adoption, and social exchange, ...

The Analysis of Conflict: A Micro-Level Perspective

This article introduces a special issue on the micro-level dynamics of mass violent conflict. While most analyses of conflict typically adopt a regional, national or global perspective, often using country-level data, this special issue takes an explicit micro-level approach, focusing on the behaviour and welfare of individuals, households and groups or communities. At a fundamental level, conflict ...

Analysepotenziale des Sozio-oekonomischen Panels (SOEP) für die empirische Bildungsforschung

In Deutschland stehen für Fragen der empirischen Bildungsforschung bislang überwiegend Querschnittserhebungen zur Verfügung, die ergänzt werden durch länderspezifische bzw. gruppenspezifische Längsschnitterhebungen. Zudem sind diese in der Regel auf einzelne Übergänge im Bildungssystem fokussiert. Die Herausforderung einer lebensverlaufstheoretischen Bildungsforschung liegt jedoch in der Analyse von ...

Inheritance and the Dynamics of Party Identification

Extensive research efforts notwithstanding, scholars continue to disagree on the nature and meaning of party identification. Traditionalists conceive of partisanship as a largely affective attachment to a political party that emerges in childhood through parental influences and tends to persist throughout life. The revisionist conception of partisanship is that of a running tally of party utilities ...

Disaggregated Trade Flows and the "Missing Globalization Puzzle"