infonet-economy

This paper tests the effect of a matching mechanism on donations in a controlled fieldnexperiment. We match the donations of students at the University of Zurich who, each semester,nhave to decide whether they wish to contribute to two Social Funds. Our results support thenhypothesis that a matching mechanism increases contributions to a public good. However, theneffect depends on…

We provide a framework for analyzing bilateral mergers when there is two-sided asymmetric information about firms’ types. We show that there is always a "no-merger" equilibrium where firms do not consent to a merger, irrespective of their type. There may also be a "cut-off" equilibrium if the expected merger returns satisfy a suitable single crossing condition,…

Based on a nonparametrically estimated model of labor market classifications, this paper makes suggestions for immigration policy using data from western Germany in the 1990s. It is demonstrated that nonparametric regression is feasible in higher dimensions with only a few thousand observations. In sum, labor markets able to absorb immigrants are characterized by above average age…

This paper evaluates the German health care reform of 1997, using the individual number of doctor visits as outcome measure and data from the German Socio-Economic Panel for the years 1995–1999. A number of modified count data models allow us to estimate the effect of the reform in different parts of the distribution. The overall effect of the reform was a 10% reduction in the number…

The objective of this contribution is to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the Swiss health care system after the new Law on Health Insurance (LHI) that took effect at the beginning of 1996. The LHI just barely survived a popular referendum. An important argument of the campaign in its favor had been that health insurance premiums would fall thanks to increased competition…

It is argued that the binational state model is and should be considered as a model sui generis. Concentrating on three levels of analysis (recognition, autonomy, and authority i.e the majority prolem), an operational definition of binationalism allows for an idealtypical discussion of the homogeneity problem and the question of state sovereignty, showing that the problem of power…