I provide evidence that task use at work by men and women in the same occupations is significantly different. The observed difference can account for the within-occupational gender-wage gap that is prevalent in many developed countries. Using data for thirteen European countries, I find that...

What effect does using open (as opposed to closed) lists in proportional representation elections have on party performance and the quality of candidate selection? We provide novel evidence by studying local elections in Colombia, where parties have discretion to field either open or closed...

A number of papers have compared the effectiveness of private and public schools in different institutional settings. However, most of these studies are observational and do not utilize experimental or quasi-experimental design to evaluate the value-added or the effectiveness of private schools...

This paper studies voters' preferences on municipal borders in a setting with cohabiting linguistic communities. It takes advantage of unique data from referendum results in the Canadian province of Quebec in 2004, which allows a direct investigation of voter preferences. I find that differences...

We study the effects of municipal mergers on voter turnout in a difference-in -differences framework, using data from a wave of municipal mergers in Finland in 2009. Analysing two pre-merger elections and three post-merger elections, spanning a total of 17 years, we find that municipal mergers...

We study parties' optimal ideological cohesion across electoral rules, when the following trade-off is present: A more heterogenous set of candidates is electorally appealing (catch-all party), yet, it serves policy-related goals less efficiently. When the rule becomes more disproportional, thus...

We study the effects of intergovernmental grants on school spending within the Finnish system of high school education funding. The system allocates lump-sum intergovernmental grants to local education organizers using a kinked grant rule. Utilizing the quasi-experimental variation in grants...

This paper studies consumers' sensitivity to energy costs at the moment of making a long-term energy technology investment. The analysis exploits within-region variation in local, regulated electricity distribution prices that are very persistent over time and therefore a good measure of...

In Finland, children start school during the calendar year they turn seven years old. This creates a discontinuous jump in school starting age. I utilize a regression discontinuity design and rich register data to study whether this discontinuous jump in the school starting age affects...

The effectiveness of transfer programs can be significantly reduced if eligible individuals fail to apply for them. In this paper we study the impact of information provision on the take-up of social benefits. We exploit the implementation of the guarantee pension program in Finland in 2011,...