We estimate a labor supply model with German data on engineering enrollments and starting salaries. In one model agents have backward looking expectations, in the other rational expectations on future wages. Only the model with backward looking expectations delivers significant coefficients with...

Economic theory suggests that incentives matter for people's decisions. This paper investigates whether this also holds for less self-evident areas of life such as the timing of births. We make use of a natural experiment when the German government changed its parental benefit system January 1,...

Whether individuals perceive their income as being fair has far reaching consequences in the labor market and beyond. Yet we know little on the determinants of variation in perceived income justice across individuals. In this paper we ask whether genes can explain parts of the variation. To this...

For standard economic models it is typically assumed that preferences are given and stable. But do economic systems shape individuals' risk preferences? Using the reunification of East and West Germany as a natural experiment I evaluate differences in financial risk taking comparing Eastern and...

The effects of helicopter money on expectations and economic outcomes are empirically largely unexplored. We fielded a representative survey among the German population, randomly assigning respondents to various unconventional monetary policy scenarios that raise household income. We find that...