Organisation of Research
Tasks of the IWH Guided by its mission statement , the IWH places the understanding of the determinants of long term growth processes at the centre of the research agenda. Long…
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Committing to Grow: Employment Targets and Firm Dynamics
Ufuk Akcigit, Harun Alp, André Diegmann, Nicolas Serrano-Velarde
IWH Discussion Papers,
No. 17,
2023
Abstract
We examine effects of government-imposed employment targets on firm behavior. Theoretically, such policies create “polarization,“ causing low-productivity firms to exit the market while others temporarily distort their employment upward. Dynamically, firms are incentivized to improve productivity to meet targets. Using novel data from East German firms post-privatization, we find that firms with binding employment targets experienced 25% higher annual employment growth, a 1.1% higher annual exit probability, and 10% higher annual productivity growth over the target period. Structural estimates reveal substantial misallocation of labor across firms and that subsidizing productivity growth would yield twice the long term increases in employment.
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Department Profiles
Research Profiles of the IWH Departments All doctoral students are allocated to one of the four research departments (Financial Markets – Laws, Regulations and Factor Markets –…
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Productivity
Productivity: More with Less by Better Available resources are scarce. To sustain our society's income and living standards in a world with ecological and demographic change, we…
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Charts
Info Graphs Sometimes pictures say more than a thousand words. Therefore, we selected a few graphs to present our main topics visually. If you should have any questions or would…
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Wage and Employment Effects of Insolvencies
Wage and employment effects of bankruptcies Although the consequences of bankruptcies for affected employees are frequently debated in the public (e.g. due to the bankruptcy of…
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Brown Bag Seminar
Brown Bag Seminar Financial Markets Department The seminar series "Brown Bag Seminar" was offered on a regular basis by members of the Financial Markets department and their…
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Projects
Our Projects 07.2022 ‐ 12.2026 Evaluation of the InvKG and the federal STARK programme On behalf of the Federal Ministry of Economics and Climate Protection, the IWH and the RWI…
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Uncovering Disaggregated Oil Market Dynamics: A Full-Information Approach to Granular Instrumental Variables
Christiane Baumeister, James D. Hamilton
Working Paper,
2023
Abstract
The world price of oil is determined by the interactions of multiple producers and consumers who face different constraints and shocks. We show how this feature of the oil market can be used to estimate local and global elasticities of supply and demand and provide a rich set of testable restrictions. We develop a novel approach to estimation based on full-information maximum likelihood that generalizes the insights from granular instrumental variables. We conclude that the supply responses of Saudi Arabia and adjustments of inventories have historically played a key role in stabilizing the price of oil. We illustrate how our structural model can be used to analyze how individual producers and consumers would dynamically adapt to a geopolitical event such as a major disruption in the supply of oil from Russia.
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People
People Job Market Candidates Doctoral Students PhD Representatives Alumni Supervisors Lecturers Coordinators Job Market Candidates Tommaso Bighelli Job market paper: "The…
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