The objective of this paper is to describe two new administrative Swedish databases, referred to as the Belinda databases. Together, these databases contain the most detailed individual-level data on estates, bequests, and inheritances currently available. We present descriptive statistics for...

Do voters respond to political parties׳ promises or to their past actions? We use a suitable sequence of events in Swedish politics to provide the first answer to this question. In the 1994 election campaign the Social Democrats proposed major cuts in transfers to parents with young children,...

Since the sinking of the Titanic, there has been a widespread belief that the social norm of ‘women and children first’ gives women a survival advantage over men in maritime disasters, and that captains and crew give priority to passengers. We analyze a database of 18 maritime disasters...

In 2008, the Swedish property tax was reformed and a cap on yearly tax liabilities was introduced. A large fraction of owner occupied houses was subject to a substantial decrease in the tax. When the reform was announced, most analysts projected – in line with tax capitalization theory –...

In 2008, the Swedish property tax was reformed and a cap on yearly tax liabilities was introduced. A large fraction of owner occupied houses was subject to a substantial decrease in the tax. When the reform was announced, most analysts projected - in line with tax capitalization theory - that...

In 2008, the Swedish property tax was reformed and a cap on yearly tax liabilities was introduced. A large fraction of owner occupied houses was subject to a substantial decrease in the tax. When the reform was announced, most analysts projected - in line with tax capitalization theory - that...

Cognitive dissonance theory predicts that the act of voting makes people more positive toward the party or candidate they have voted for. Following Mullainathan and Washington (Am. Econ. J. Appl. Econ. 1:86–111, <CitationRef CitationID="CR30">2009</CitationRef>), I test this prediction by using exogenous variation in turnout provided by...</citationref>

We showed, in Berggren and Elinder (<CitationRef CitationID="CR2">2012</CitationRef>), that tolerance toward homosexuals is negatively and quite robustly related to economic growth. In a comment, Bornhoff and Lee (<CitationRef CitationID="CR3">this issue</CitationRef>) question this finding on model-specification grounds. By undertaking three changes, they purport to show that our...</citationref></citationref>

Cognitive dissonance theory predicts that the act of voting makes people more positive toward the party or candidate they have voted for. Following Mullainathan and Washington (2009), I test this prediction by using exogenous variation in turnout provided by the voting age restriction. I improve...

This paper estimates voters’ response to municipality and regional level unemployment and economic growth, in Swedish general elections from 1985 to 2002, using data on 284 municipalities and 9 regions. An increase in regional growth or a reduction in regional unemployment by one percentage...