ZEW Discussion Papers

Corporate scientific publications are often presented as a strategic means for firms to create prior art with the objective to prevent rivals from patenting related inventions. This defensive disclosure strategy…

While profits are taxed, no immediate tax refund is granted if a corporation suffers losses. Losses can only be used to offset profits generated in other periods or by affiliated companies. The tax loss offset…

Firm behavior is largely affected by the major institutions of an economy, like the legal system, civil liberties or political rights. If institutions are not well developed, ownership concentration as a feature…

We investigate consumer welfare in transalpine freight transport using micro-data on individual route choice, tackling two core questions. First, to what extent does the way we model unobserved heterogeneity…

The residential building sector is a major emitter of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2) due to the high energy demand for electricity and heating, particularly in industrialised countries. In Germany, for…

This paper investigates the impact of an individual’s level of locus of control, a concept commonly used in social psychology (Rotter, 1966), on educational choices and wages. We establish that more internal…

In this paper, we present a new approach to disclose the impact of policy preferences of parties on economic growth. We derive policy preferences of parties, such as political ideology and preferences restricted…

Basic income schemes are discussed among all political parties in Germany. A basic income is a specific form of a guaranteed minimum income for every citizen. Distributed unconditionally it could simplify the…

After the liberalization of energy markets in Germany in the 1990s, many municipalities have sold their shares in local or regional electricity providers to private owners in order to reduce budget deficits.…