ZEW Discussion Papers

We investigate the characteristics of cities gaining access to the German interurban bus network in the first two years following the deregulation of the industry in January 2013. Applying both parametric and…

Two years after the deregulation of the German interurban bus industry in January 2013, two new entrants emerged as market leaders: MeinFernbus (MFB) and FlixBus (FB). We use a comprehensive route-level data set…

A fast-growing literature shows that technological change is replacing labor in routine tasks, raising concerns that labor is racing against the machine. This paper is the first to estimate the labor demand…

Flood insurance helps to cope with the risk of flooding, but take-up rates are relatively low. Insurance density could rise if index-based insurance (IBI) were provided as an alternative to traditional…

We apply a quadratic expenditure system to estimate price and expenditure elasticities of residential energy demand (electricity and heating) in Germany. Using official expenditure data from 1993 to 2008, we…

This article documents a structural change in the production of science in the U.S. semiconductor industry over almost three decades. We observe a change in scientific productivity over time, where smaller firms…

This paper analyzes the distribution of discretionary transfers from higher tiers of government in the process of fiscal adjustment in local jurisdictions which were hit by a negative revenue shock in formula…

China recently surpassed the USA as the greatest global source of patent applications. However, without internationally comparable measures of patent quality it remains questionable whether China's patent…

We contribute to the literature on the long-run effect of fiscal consolidation on economic growth by applying a novel method for quantitative case studies. Relying on a qualitative (narrative) definition of…