ZEW Discussion Papers

A well-functioning bureaucracy is a precondition for efficient public goods provision. However, bureaucratic decision-making is still largely seen as a black box. We provide novel insights into the preferences…

We study the economic implications of mineral resource activity for non-mining regions at the grid-level across the African continent. We find that capital cities benefit from mineral resource activity anywhere…

We study the economic implications of regional favoritism, a form of distributive politics that redistributes resources spatially within countries. We use a large sample of enterprise surveys spanning…

We study the long-run implications of regional and ethnic favoritism in Africa. Combining geocoded individual-level survey data from the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) with data on national leaders’…

Based on panel data on around 5,500 German household heads originating from four years, this paper analyzes whether the experience of financial losses due to the Corona pandemic has affected three kinds of…

During the COVID-19 pandemic, comprehensive, accurate, and timely digital contact tracing serves as a decisive measure in curbing viral transmission. Such a strategy integrates corporate innovation, government…

Drastic emission reductions are necessary to combat climate change. However, despite several climate policies, carbon emissions from German manufacturing have actually increased between 2005 and 2017. In this…

We analyze the welfare implications of property taxation. Using a sufficient statistics approach, we show that the tax incidence depends on how housing prices, labor and other types of incomes as well as public…

We analyze both theoretically and empirically how monetary incentives and information about others’ behavior affect dishonesty. We run a laboratory experiment with 560 participants, each of whom observes a…