In many different contexts individuals take decisions on the behalf of others. However, little is known about how this circumstance affects the decision making process and influences the ultimate individuals' choices. In this paper, we focus on the context of investment decisions and study if...

Social contacts influence decisions and economic outputs in a variety of contexts. Does social network matter also in financial markets? In this paper I investigate the effect of social networks on mutual funds performance by exploiting data on the education of U.S. fund managers. The results...

This paper develops a financial network, designated the “Macro-Network”, that depicts the connections between the main financial and non-financial sectors of the economy in the various financial instruments of the euro area. The Macro-Network comprises of linkages across financial and...

In this paper, we study the Ph.D academic job market. Based on the Gale and Shapley algorithm, we analyse whether a social planner can improve market efficiency by truncation, i.e., exogenously imposing a limit on the number of possible applications. Using simulations, we derive the optimal...

In many different contexts individuals take decisions on the behalf of others. However, little is known about how this circumstance affects the decision making process and influences the ultimate individuals' choices. In this paper, we focus on the context of investment decisions and study if...

We use financial accounts data at sector level to construct financial networks for individual euro area countries. We then connect the country-level networks to one large “Macro Network”, using information on cross-border linkages between the national banking sectors. We then evaluate the...

The tax deductibility of interest payments in most corporate income tax systems coupled with no such measure for equity financing creates economic distortions and exacerbates leverage. This paper discusses the consequences of this debt bias and the possible remedies.

This paper explores whether collective insurance schemes of various kinds could improve the degree of cyclical income stabilisation and the operation of fiscal stabilisers in the European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU). We review the potential issues, the underlying trade-offs and the...

Economic integration has intensified international competition to attract productive capital. This paper analyzes, both theoretically and empirically, the effect of tax policies and institutional quality on the allocation of FDI -- two aspects that the economic literature has extensively...

Using survey data from a cross-section of European countries, this paper analyzes the determinants of individual support for a large government motivated by redistributive policies and for progressive tax schedules. Preferences for political redistribution, as well as fairness beliefs, aversion...