In recent years, German colonialism has received growing public attention - a history long overshadowed by the World Wars. Due to its short-lived character, a long-term comparative view of German colonialism has not featured prominently in most accounts of European imperialism. This chapter...

We study the long-term effects of inflation surges on inflation expectations using Germany as a laboratory. Households living in areas with higher local inflation during the hyperinflation of the 1920s expect higher inflation today, even after controlling for known determinants of historical...

The notion of a nation-specific inflation trauma among the German population is ubiquitous in the public debate in Germany and beyond. According to a widespread reading of history because of its experience with hyperinflation in 1923, the Germans not only fear rising prices but favor a...

Economic and social scientists are increasingly interested in historical data, but many relevant sources are still available in analog form, limiting accessibility and research potential. This article introduces the WBdigital database, which aims to improve this situation. The database provides...

As seldom before, the current war in Ukraine has seen the use of World War II analogies by belligerents and also some Western non-belligerents. They thereby follow in the footsteps of such political leaders as Anthony Eden, Margaret Thatcher, Joseph Stalin, or John F. Kennedy. Indeed, statesmen...

The Weimar Triangle countries - France, Germany, and Poland - could enhance Europe's defense and strategic autonomy thanks to their complementarities. Germany, enjoying fiscal space, opted for debt-financed rearmament but stagnant voluntary recruitment and sluggish procurement form bottlenecks....

This short article introduces the German Cliometrics Database as the foundation for an article by Jopp and Spoerer (2024) who trace cliometric research on German history. This newly constructed database of every publication that (1) contributes to the historiography of Germany and (2) employs,...

War is back in Europe and as it becomes long-lasting, the question of armament gains central importance. This report finds that Russian military industrial capacities have been rising strongly in the last two years, well beyond the levels of Russian material losses in Ukraine. Meanwhile, the...

What are the long-term economic effects of a more equal distribution of wealth? We investigate consequences of land inequality, exploiting variation in land inheritance rules that traverse political, linguistic, geological, and religious borders in Germany. In some German areas, inherited land...

We study the role of professional networks in facilitating emigration of Jewish academics dismissed from their positions by the Nazi government. We use individual-level exogenous variation in the timing of dismissals to estimate causal effects. Academics with more ties to early émigrés...

How do health crises affect election results? We combine a panel of election results from 1893-1933 with spatial heterogeneity in excess mortality due to the 1918 Influenza to assess the pandemic's effect on voting behavior across German constituencies. Applying a dynamic...

The notion of a nation-specific inflation trauma among the German population is ubiquitous in the public debate in Germany and beyond. Because of its experience with hyperinflation in 1923, the German population fears rising prices and favors stability-oriented monetary as well as fiscal policy....

Vor 100 Jahren mündete die Große Inflation, die bereits 1914 mit dem Ersten Weltkrieg ihren Anfang nahm, in der Hyperinflation von 1923. Bis heute herrscht in der deutschen Bevölkerung und Politik eine Inflationsaversion. Anlässlich dieses Jubiläums und der zuletzt stark gestiegenen...

The German hyperinflation in 1923 was caused by monetary financing of the highly deficient German state budget by a de-pendent central bank. The social and economic consequences of the hyperinflation were disastrous. Combined with an instable politi-cal atmosphere, paving the way for the rise of...

The Weimar hyperinflation is a textbook example of how inflation develops. All the factors usually associated with inflation were present during this period. However, besides the quantifiable factors, such as money supply development, the political factors appear dominant in retrospect. There...

Why do public policies change little over time in individual places, sometimes for centuries? We investigate different mechanisms for policy persistence. Several city mayors serving in democratic Weimar Germany were expelled by the Nazis in 1933, but re-installed by the Allies after World War...

Unexpected inflation can redistribute wealth from creditors to debtors. In the presence of financing frictions, such redistribution can impact the allocation of real activity. We use the German inflation of 1919-1923 to study how a large inflationary shock is transmitted to the real economy via...

Guinnane and Hoffman (subsequently GH) comment on two of our papers: Voigtländer and Voth: “Persecution Perpetuated” (2012, subsequently PP) and Satyanath, Voigtländer and Voth: Bowling for Fascism (2017, subsequently BF). They allege that our econometric results are fragile and depend on...

Migration has always been an omnipresent topic in Germany. However, unlike today, in the 19th century the German territory was a country of emigration, not immigration. Using county-level data for the period from 1861 to 1871, this paper examines the determinants of emigration from and...

How do health crises affect election results? We combine a panel of election results from 1893 1933 with spatial heterogeneity in excess mortality due to the 1918 Influenza to assess the pandemic's effect on voting behavior across German constituencies. Applying a dynamic...

How do health crises affect election results? We combine a panel of election results from 1893–1933 with spatial heterogeneity in excess mortality due to the 1918 Influenza to assess the pandemic’s effect on voting behavior across German constituencies. Applying a dynamic...

We study the long-term effects of inflation surges on inflation expectations. German households living in areas with higher local inflation during the hyperinflation of the 1920s expect higher inflation today. Our evidence points towards a transmission of inflation experiences from parents to...

This research paper critically examines the role and impact of media in Weimar and Nazi Germany. The Weimar Republic (1919-1933) and the subsequent Nazi regime (1933-1945) were crucial periods in German history marked by significant political, social, and cultural transformations. Media played a...

This paper traces the transformation of the monetary architecture and concomitant sovereign debt issuance practices in Prussia and the German Empire from 1740 to 1914 in order to reflect on contemporary ideas regarding the appropriate relation between states' treasuries, central banks, and the...

Purpose - This paper aims at a qualitative investigation and analysis of the complicated situation of the four German Political Foundations (GPFs) - Friedrich Ebert Foundation, Konrad Adenauer Foundation, Friedrich Naumann Foundation and Hanns Seidel Foundation - as actors of democracy...

Can weakened religiosity lead to the rise of totalitarianism? The Nazi Party set itself up as a political religion, emphasizing redemption, sacrifice, rituals, and communal spirit. This had a major impact on its success: Where the Christian Church only had shallow roots, the Nazis received...

Can weakened religiosity lead to the rise of totalitarianism? The Nazi Party set itself up as a political religion, emphasizing redemption, sacrifice, rituals, and communal spirit. This had a major impact on its success: Where the Christian Church only had shallow roots, the Nazis received...

The outlook for the German economy has deteriorated over the last month. Although, the high level of sick leave and supply bottlenecks have noticeably eased, GDP has not yet returned to an expansionary course. Business surveys indicate that economic momentum will remain weak in the second half...

Why do public policies change little over time in individual places, sometimes for centuries? We investigate different mechanisms for policy persistence. Several city mayors serving in democratic Weimar Germany were expelled by the Nazis in 1933, but re-installed by the Allies after World War...

How do health crises affect election results? We combine a panel of election results from 1893-1933 with spatial heterogeneity in excess mortality due to the 1918 Influenza to assess the pandemic's effect on voting behavior across German constituencies. Applying a dynamic...