Publikationen der Forschungsgruppe Ungleichheit und Verteilungspolitik

  1. ZEW Discussion Paper Nr. 18-021 // 2018

    Inequality of Educational Opportunities and the Role of Learning Intensity: Evidence from a Quasi-Experiment in Germany

    Over the 2000s, many federal states in Germany shortened the duration of secondary school by one year while keeping the curriculum unchanged. Exploiting quasi-experimental variation due to the staggered…

  2. ZEW Discussion Paper Nr. 18-016 // 2018

    Idiosyncratic Risk, Aggregate Risk, and the Welfare Effects of Social Security

    We ask whether a pay-as-you-go financed social security system is welfare improving in an economy with idiosyncratic productivity and aggregate business cycle risk. We show analytically that the whole welfare…

  3. ZEW Discussion Paper Nr. 18-015 // 2018

    Cognition, Optimism and the Formation of Age-Dependent Survival Beliefs

    This paper investigates the roles psychological biases play in deviations between subjective survival beliefs (SSBs) and objective survival probabilities (OSPs). We model deviations between SSBs and OSPs through…

  4. ZEW Discussion Paper Nr. 18-014 // 2018

    Optimal Taxes on Capital in the OLG Model with Uninsurable Idiosyncratic Income Risk

    We characterize the optimal linear tax on capital in an Overlapping Generations model with two period lived households facing uninsurable idiosyncratic labor income risk. The Ramsey government internalizes the…

  5. ZEW policy brief Nr. 18-02 // 2018

    Verteilungswirkungen der Reformpläne der Großen Koalition: Rentner und Familien sind die Hauptprofiteure

    Das stabile Wirtschaftswachstum der vergangenen Jahre hat finanzielle Spielräume im deutschen Staatshaushalt geschaffen. Diese will die neu gebildete Große Koalition unter anderem nutzen, um breite…

  6. Referierte Fachzeitschrift // 2018

    Do retirement savings increase in response to information about retirement and expected pensions?

    How can retirement savings be increased? We explore a unique policy change in the context of the German pension system to study this question. As of 2005 (with a phase-in period between 2002 and 2004), the…