Due to globalization competitive firms face increasing economic opportunities for locating their activities in countries, regions and cities that provide the best business environment for their specific needs. In our study we focus on the impact of economic risk and risk preferences upon...

Tax legislation, fiscal authorities, and tax courts create tax uncertainty by frequent tax reforms and various different interpretations of the tax law. Moreover, investors generate model-specific tax uncertainty by using simplified models that anticipate the actual tax base incorrectly. I...

Is time-varying firm-level uncertainty a major cause or amplifier of the business cycle? This paper investigates this question in the context of a heterogeneous-firm RBC model with persistent firm-level productivity shocks and lumpy capital adjustment, where cyclical changes in uncertainty...

Using a German firm-level data set, this paper is the first to jointly study the cyclical properties of the cross-sections of firm-level real value added and Solow residual innovations, as well as capital and employment adjustment. We find two new business cycle facts: 1) The cross-sectional...

Mit dem vorliegenden Aufsatz wird das Ziel verfolgt, die Erklärung der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Unternehmensinvestitionen (Ausrüstungsinvestitionen der Unternehmen und Wirtschaftsbauinvestitionen) durch die Einbeziehung von Variablen, mit denen sich Unsicherheit abbilden läßt, zu ergänzen. In...

The impact of uncertainty on firms' investment outlays is subject to an ongoing debate. Theory identifies several channels. Irreversibility, financing constraints and risk aversion make a negative relationship between uncertainty and investment likely. On the other hand, the ability of firms to...

Traditional models of capital budgeting including taxes are based on deterministic tax rates and tax bases. In reality, however, there are multiple sources of tax uncertainty. Tax reforms induce frequent changes in both tax rates and tax bases, making future taxation of investments a stochastic...

Is time-varying firm-level uncertainty a major cause or amplifier of the business cycle? This paper investigates this question in the context of a heterogeneousfirm RBC model with persistent firm-level productivity shocks and lumpy capital adjustment, where cyclical changes in uncertainty...

Using a unique German firm-level data set, this paper is the first to jointly study the cyclical properties of the cross-sections of firm-level real value added and Solow residual innovations, as well as capital and employment adjustment. We find two new business cycle facts: 1) The...

This paper experimentally investigates investment behavior.We find that global risk – i.e. risk independent of an agent’sinvestment decision (like political risk) – substantiallydecreases investment. Also effort to obtain the capital usedfor investment decreases investment substantially....