German reunification in 1990 marked the first sudden integration of a socialist and capitalist economy. Despite East Germany’s (EG) economic catch-up with West Ger- many (WG), the integration remains unfinished, as indicated by per capita output in EG still being about one-third lower. To...

This paper examines the long-term impact of West German television exposure on smoking behavior in East Germany, with a focus on gender-specific responses. Using data from 1989 and 2002 and leveraging quasi-random variation in West German TV signal availability across East German regions, we...

After the German Reunification in 1990, East Germany transitioned from a centrally planned economic system to a market economy. To tackle surging unemployment, upskilling through adult education was deemed essential at the time. Besides substantial mandatory training programs provided by active...

We investigate the wage assimilation of East Germans who migrated to West Germany after reunification (1990-1999). We compare their wage assimilation to that of ethnic German immigrants from Eastern Bloc countries and international immigrants to West Germany who arrived at the same time. The...

We investigate differencesin bribing decisions among two generationsfrom East and West Germany in a bribery game conducted as an online study (N=168). This way, we aim to exploremoral considerations ofindividualsinfluenced by two formerly different institutional systems. We find a higher...

We develop a labor demand model that encompasses pre‑match hiring cost arising from tight labor markets. Through the lens of the model, we study the effect of labor market tightness on firms' labor demand by applying novel Bartik instruments to the universe of administrative employment data on...

We investigate the wage assimilation of East Germans who migrated to West Germany after reunification (1990-1999). We compare their wage assimilation to that of ethnic German immigrants from Eastern Bloc countries and international immigrants to West Germany who arrived at the same time. The...

We investigate the role of cultural norms in shaping women's labor supply decisions after childbirth. Specifically, we are interested in the interplay between childhood socialization and adulthood environment. To that end, we leverage the setting of the German reunification when East Germany's...

After the German Reunification in 1990, East Germany transitioned from a centrally planned economic system to a market economy. At the time, upskilling through adult education was deemed essential for the successful integration of the workforce into the labor market. Besides substantial...

The Italian credit and financial system was the result of progressive developments that accelerated during the process of Italian unification. Our essay analyses the role of local private bankers in modernizing the economic and financial system of the country and the way in which the gradual...

This paper examines the possibilities for, and obstacles to, the reunification of North and South Korea based on the experiences of the reunifications of Italy, the United States and Germany in the 19th and 20th centuries. Common elements of these reunifications include a slow convergence of...

If North Korea's economic transformation has been largely informal and contested at the level of the state, to what extent is North Korea's economic transformation reflected in North Korean economic research? In this article, we analyze a dataset of North Korean domestic journal articles on...

There is a large literature on the role infrastructure plays in economic development, but few papers document the causal effect of infrastructure on the sustainability of natural resources. We examine the effect of the arrival of two new national highways on ground water levels in a small...

This paper investigates a unique policy designed to maintain employment during the privatization of East German firms after the fall of the Iron Curtain. The policy required new owners of the firms to commit to employment targets, with penalties for non-compliance. Using a dynamic model, we...

This document consists of a general introduction to family reunification according to the Dublin procedure, followed by the recommendations. The recommendations are linked to a certain step or action in the overall procedure. The steps described in this document represent the general workflow of...

In most countries, men are the principal asylum applicants, while women are admitted through family-reunification procedures. Family reunification implies that women's residence permits are contingent on remaining married to their husbands. Using a staggered Difference-in-Differences (DID)...

The Italian credit and financial system was the result of progressive developments that accelerated during the process of Italian unification. Our essay analyses the role of local private bankers in modernizing the economic and financial system of the country and the way in which the gradual...

This working paper was written by Michael Funke (Hamburg University) and Holger Strulik (Hamburg University).The paper discusses the impact and implications of Korean unification by setting up a two-region endogenous growth model. The numerical solutions are based on the formal analytical model,...

In their daily reserving tasks, general insurance actuaries often use a mix of chain-ladder, Bornhuetter-Ferguson and Cape-Cod methods to estimate the ultimate reserve amounts. These methods are usually applied on cumulative triangles and a payment or incurred pattern is derived from the...

This research provides a comprehensive study of the linkages between unification and related policy choices on income inequality by examining the cases of Italy and Germany in the context of 19th century unification. To conduct this analysis, the study puts forward estimates of income inequality...

By a business-cycle CAPM, we price options. It unifies asset pricing portfolio diversification and option pricing no-arbitrage. We retrieve the American and European option values by intersecting the individual martingale security and the 9-degree multipiece-polynomial portfolio implicit...

We examine how the legalization programs of the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA) have affected immigration to the United States since the late 1980s. Our empirical approach exploits variation in IRCA’s timing and the magnitude of the legalization shock across metropolitan...

This study evaluated China's model of “One Country, Two Systems” (一國兩制) 20 years into operation and the bilateral relationship between Taiwan and Mainland China ‒ focusing on Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan ‒ and examined future prospects. The study is meaningful in that it conducts...

This paper advances the hypothesis that the EUS crisis was caused by German unification. The unification has implied a massive resource demand which parallels the US resource demand following Reagan's tax reforms in the eighties. The resource demand revised the German interest rates relative to...

Migration is a family decision. Often the family is separated after the migration of one of its members and the desire to reunify can drive many decisions and choices made by the family. Will there be a reunification? After how long will the family reunify? Where will the reunification occur -...

This paper focuses on how business interests and neoliberal ideas have come together in Germany during the past two decades. It is based on a detailed analysis of the INSM, a large-scale campaign founded and funded by the metal industry employers’ association Gesamtmetall in 2000 to shape...

The paper comments on the economic effects of the German unification. Apart from discussing the unification in an international perspective, analyzing the distributional consequences, and pointing to structural adjustment problems, it emphasizes the distinction between the frequently cited money...

This paper studies the equilibrium determination of the number of political jurisdictions in different political regimes, democratic or not, and in different economic environments, with more or less economic integration. We focus on the trade off between the benefits of large jurisdictions in...

Does the culture in which a woman grows up influence her labor market decisions once she has had a child? And to what extent can exposure to a different cultural group in adulthood shape maternal labor supply? To address these questions, we exploit the setting of the German reunification. A...

This paper discusses the timing of monetary integration and supporting economic policies during a rapid and largely uncontrolled process of Korean unification. The paper concludes that the transitory use of a separate currency in each region and supporting economic policies would help limit the...

This paper uses Generational Accounting to assess the fiscal impacts of Korean reunification. Our findings suggest that early reunification will result in a large increase in the fiscal burden for most current and future generations of South Koreans. The Korean reunification's fiscal impact...

Does the culture in which a woman grows up influence her labor market decisions once she has had a child? And to what extent can exposure to a different cultural group in adulthood shape maternal labor supply? To address these questions, we exploit the setting of the German reunification. A...