It is frequently argued that unemployment plays a crucial role for the occurrence of right-wing extremist crimes. We empirically test this hypothesis using data from Germany. We find that right-wing criminal activities occur more frequently when unemployment is high. The big difference in...

A Single European Labor Market, particularly involving the free movement of workers within Europe, has been a goal of the European community since the 1950s. Whereas it may entail opportunities and drawbacks alike, the benefits—such as greater economic welfare for most citizens—are supposed...

Abstract Job characteristics can affect worker turnover through their effect on utility and through their effect on outside job opportunities. We separately identify and estimate the roles of these two channels. Our method exploits information on job changes and relies on an augmented sample...

In this paper we investigate the positive and normative consequences of child-labour restrictions for economic aggregates and welfare. We argue that even though the laissez-faire equilibrium may be inefficient, there are usually better policies to cure these inefficiencies than the imposition of...

This paper analyses the interplay between social structure and information exchange in two competing activities, crime and labour. We consider a dynamic model in which individuals belong to mutually exclusive two-person groups, referred to as dyads. There are multiple equilibria. If jobs are...

In middle-income countries, the informal sector often accounts for a substantial fraction of urban employment. We develop a general equilibrium model with matching frictions in the urban labour market, the possibility of self-employment in the informal sector, and scope for rural-urban...

We provide, for the first time, comparative evidence of the impact of various types of extreme events – natural disasters, terrorism, and violent conflicts – on the perceptions of entrepreneurs concerning some key entrepreneurial issues – such as fear of failure in starting a business...

We document the empirical properties of revisions to major macroeconomic variables in the United States. Our findings suggest that they do not satisfy simple desirable statistical properties. In particular, we find that these revisions do not have a zero mean, which indicates that the initial...

Inaccurate measures of the aggregate price level may distort short-run policy decisions and may produce misleading comparisons of productivity growth across decades and among nations. Primarily intended for non-US readers, this paper serves the dual purpose of reviewing compactly the vast US...

Comparisons of economic performance over space and time largely depend on how statistical evidence from national accounts and historical estimates are spliced. To allow for changes in relative prices, GDP benchmark years in national accounts are periodically replaced with new and more recent...