infonet-economy

This paper shows that a stock market is evolutionary stable if andnonly if stocks are evaluated by expected relative dividends. Any othernmarket can be invaded by portfolio rules that will gain market wealthnand hence change the valuation. In the model the valuation of assetsnis given by the wealth average of the portfolio rules in the market. Thenwealth dynamics is modelled as a...

This study reports data from a field experiment that was nconducted to investigate the relevance of gift-exchange for charitable ngiving. Roughly 10,000 solicitation letters were sent to potential donors nin the experiment. One third of the letters contained no gift, one third ncontained a small gift and one third contained a large gift. Whether a npotential donor received a letter...

Terrorism will be high on the political agenda for many years to come. Various policies are open to a government fighting terrorism but, in any case, considerable costs are involved. In the competition for politicalnsupport, the costs and benefits of anti-terrorism policies will be debated. Better information about terrorism and its consequences can improve policy outcome if there is...

This paper reports on a re-evaluation of the German health care reform of 1997. A previous evaluation found a limited effect of a 4.4 percent reduction of the number of doctor visits in a sample of pharmacy customers. The re-evaluation based on a representative household survey, the German Socio-Economic Panel, yields a much larger effect. The paper uses this case study to discuss...

Extracts of this paper were presented at the conference "Work Beyond 60: Preparing for the Demographic Shock", 6–7 March 2003 in Vienna organized by The Geneva Association, The Club of Rome, and The Risk Institute. Parts were also presented at the Bertelsmann Foundation conference "Strategien gegen den Fachkräftemangel" in Berlin, 2 July 2002 and at the...

The German health care reform of 1997 provides a natural experiment for evaluating the price sensitivity of demand for physicians’ services. As part of the reform, copayments for prescription drugs were increased by up to 200 percent. However, certain groups of people were exempted from the increase, providing a natural control group against which the changed demand for physicians’...

"A crucial aspect of constitutional design is the provision of rules on how anconstitution is to be amended. If procedures for constitutional amendment are very restrictive,nchanges will take place outside the constitution. These changes are likely to be against thencitizens’ interests and their ability to influence the political process. We argue that thendevelopment...

Die Landwirtschaft war weltweit jahrzehntelang von den multilateralen Handelsregeln faktisch ausgenommen. Marktabschottung nach aussen sowie ein Wildwuchs bei internen Stützungsmassnahmen und Exportsubventionen führten zu verzerrten Produktions- und Handelsmustern.Erst mit der Uruguay-Runde der WTO hat eine Rückführung des Agrarhandels unter die multilaterale Handelsdisziplin...

Antidumping ist zum bevorzugten Instrument für temporäre Handelsbeschränkungen avanciert. Diese Entwicklung gibt Anlass zur Sorge, da Antidumping mit stark negativen Wohlfahrtseffekten einhergeht. Zahlreiche Reformvorschläge wurden in der Vergangenheit gemacht. Sie beinhalten im wesentlichen strengere Vorbedingungen für die Benutzung des Instruments, was zu einer Schmälerung...