After presenting some casual evidence about the difference between economists and the rest of the population, first the survey and experimental evidence which has been presented on this topic during the last 20 years is discussed. But can these results really be transferred to real world...

The basic idea behind this paper is that voters have to be able to distinguish the positions of the parties. Following Weber’s Law this depends on the relative distance with respect to their own optimal position. Using such a measure a model of voter participation is developed which allows for...

First, a brief sketch of the economic tasks government has to perform are given, before three issues are discussed in more detail: public production, competition policy, and government interventions in Corporate Governance. These three issues are of particular political relevance in Switzerland,...

We look at the relation between democracy and perceived subjective well-being, taking also into account the impact of income and culture. After briefly reviewing the empirical results for Switzerland, we re-estimate this relationship allowing for the relative income position of individuals and...

Using Allensbach survey data about how people look forward to the coming year, we construct true ex post-forecasts and compare them with the forecasts produced by the German Council of Economic Experts and by the Economic Research Institutes. Then, we perform rationality tests for these forecast...

Is the economic and financial crisis also a crisis of Economics? From different perspectives, today there is rather harsh criticism of Economics as a Social Science. In this paper, first, some of the recent failures of Economics are discussed. Then some of the criticisms are taken up that are...

There is a basic tension between the principle of democracy and the rule of law. This becomes obvious whenever the Swiss citizens accept an initiative that is incompatible with the European Convention on Human Rights. First, we discuss the traditions behind these two principles before we survey...

In this paper it is asked whether it is meaningful to state a ‘right to work’ as a basic human right to be written down in the constitution, for example, whether working time should generally be reduced, and whether those who do not have (or find) a job should get a guaranteed minimal...

In this paper we deal with two questions, (i) what are the origins of the current financial crisis, and (ii) what did economists contribute, or why did economists fail to provide a convincing answer for the origins of the crisis, and possible solutions to overcome it? Apparently, the economics...

In Switzerland, political concordance or direct popular rights and the resulting consociational democracy are often held responsible for delay or even cancellation of necessary political reforms. Switzerland is, however, not the only country with such a system, and direct democracy is just one...