This paper analyses the effects of minimum wages on competition in the German roofing sector. The case is particularly interesting since this sector is faced with a uniform minimum wage despite significant regional disparities in productivity and wages. As a control industry we take the plumbing...

This paper explores the effect of bargaining in vertical relationships on the profitability of suppliers' R&D investments. Studies on the relationship between R&D and firm profitability mostly concentrate on the impact of horizontal market structure and neglect vertical interac-tions. Building...

In dieser Analyse wird auf Basis der Mikrozensen aus den Jahren 1991, 1993 und 1995 die zunehmende Verbreitung der Arbeitszeitflexibilisierung in der Bundesrepublik nachgezeichnet. Anschließend wird untersucht, inwieweit diese auf die Veränderung der Wirtschaftsstruktur zurückzuführen ist....

The paper provides empirical evidence for the causal impact of broadband Internet on the economic performance of German firms. Performance is measured in terms of labour productivity and realised process and product innovations. The analysis refers to the early phase of DSL expansion in Germany...

The paper analyses the relationship between two major challenges firms are faced to: using the potentials of information technologies (IT) as an enabler of process innovations on the one hand and an ageing workforce that might interfere these potentials on the other hand. Econometric results...

The paper investigates the construction of a low cost airline network by analyzing JetBlue Airways' entry decisions into nonstop domestic U.S. airport-pair markets between 2000 and 2009. Adopting duration models with time-varying covariates, we find that JetBlue consistently avoided concentrated...

We analyze the effects of captive off-shoring of innovation activities on the firms' ability to adapt their organizational processes and structures. Starting from complexity theory, we use three consecutive waves of the German part of the Community Innovation Survey to test our hypotheses. We...

Using a unique German firm-level data set, we provide empirical evidence for a productivity sorting along two dimensions: international activity and technology choice. We consider domestic and exporting firms and measure technology choice by firms' actual use of advanced information technology...

R&D encompasses plenty of activities which are usually summarized under the terms of basic research, applied research and development. Although basic research is often associated with low appropriability it provides the fundamental basis for subsequent applied research and development....