The European Union (EU) provides grants to disadvantaged regions of member states to allow them to catch up with the EU average. Under the Objective 1 scheme, NUTS2 regions with a GDP per capita level below 75% of the EU average qualify for structural funds transfers from the central EU budget....

We analyze the impact of EU structural and cohesion funds on economic growth of European regions, using 2SLS to tackle the potential problem of endogeneity, and estimating a spatial model to account for inter-regional spillovers. We use the presence of environmentally protected areas (under the...

We present a novel approach for analyzing the effects of EU cohesion policy on local economic activity. For all municipalities in the border area of the Czech Republic, Germany and Poland, we collect project-level data on EU funding in the period between 2007 and 2013. Using night light emission...

This paper quantitatively assesses the macroeconomic effects of the recently agreed U.S. bipartisan infrastructure spending bill in a neoclassical growth model. We add to the literature by considering a more detailed tax structure, different types of infrastructure spending and linkages between...

Although decision processes at the EU level are highly complex and often require unanimity, explicit side payments among member states are unknown. However, logrolling and redistributive policies are substitutes. This paper considers the EU regional policy as a substitute for explicit side...

Adaptation to climate change is gaining increasing relevance in the public debate of climate policy. However, detailed and regionalised cost estimates as a basis for cost-benefit-analyses are rare. We compose available cost estimates for adaptation in Europe, and in particular Germany, Finland...

This paper studies whether private adaptation to flood risk is economically efficient. We estimate the return to elevating houses, one of the most significant private defensive investments against flooding, using two decades of microdata on the universe of houses and flood damages in high-risk...

The paper addresses the question what effects the enlargement of a monetary union will have on necessary structural refoms in the (low distortion) member countries and the (high distortion) candidate country. While monetary union lowers reforms in the candidate country, members of the monetary...

Although many U.S. state policies presume that human capital is important for state economic development, there is little research linking better education to state incomes. In a complement to international studies of income differences, we investigate the extent to which quality-adjusted...