16.01.2025 • 3/2025
Medium-term projection for the German economy and scenarios for achieving the targets of the Climate Protection Law
The potential growth rate of the German economy is declining. According to the medium-term projection of the Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH), potential output is likely to increase by an annual average of just 0.3% in the medium term (2023-2029). The target of climate neutrality by 2045 is likely to be missed by a wide margin without further emission-reducing measures. It could be achieved by means of higher CO₂ prices at significantly lower macroeconomic costs than by means of non-market-based regulatory measures.
Oliver Holtemöller
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Media Response
Media Response January 2026 IWH: Ein seltsamer Rekord in: Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, 11.01.2026 Steffen Müller: Zahl der Insolvenzen auf 20-Jahres-Hoch in: Welt am…
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Halle Institute for Economic Research
Slight upturn on the horizon, structural problems remain As the year draws to a close, it remains uncertain whether the German economy is on a path to recovery, as export weakness…
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Mittelfristige Projektion der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Entwicklung und Szenarien für die Erreichung der gesetzlichen Emissionsziele
Andrej Drygalla, Katja Heinisch, Oliver Holtemöller, Axel Lindner, Alessandro Sardone, Christoph Schult, Götz Zeddies
Konjunktur aktuell,
No. 4,
2024
Abstract
Das Produktionspotenzial der deutschen Wirtschaft wächst mittelfristig (2023 bis 2029) mit einer jahresdurchschnittlichen Rate von 0,3% und damit deutlich schwächer als in den Jahren zuvor. Dies ist auf eine ungünstigere Entwicklung aller drei Faktoren (Arbeitsvolumen, Kapitalstock, totale Faktorproduktivität) zurückzuführen. Das potenzielle Wachstum wird insbesondere durch den Rückgang der durchschnittlichen Arbeitszeit gedämpft.
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Archive
Media Response Archive 2021 2020 2019 2018 2017 2016 December 2021 IWH: Ausblick auf Wirtschaftsjahr 2022 in Sachsen mit Bezug auf IWH-Prognose zu Ostdeutschland: "Warum Sachsens…
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Banks’ foreign homes
Kirsten Schmidt, Lena Tonzer
Deutsche Bundesbank Discussion Papers,
No. 46,
2024
Abstract
Our results reveal that higher lending spreads between foreign and home markets redirect real estate backed lending towards foreign markets offering a higher interest rate, which provides evidence for "search for yield" behavior. This re-allocation is found especially for banks with more expertise on the foreign market due to a higher local activity and holds for commercial and residential real estate backed loans. Furthermore, "search for yield" behavior and a resulting increase in foreign real estate backed lending is found when macroprudential regulation is missing or misaligned between a bank’s country of residence and the destination country. When turning to the question of whether the detected search for yield behavior results in more risk, we find that especially better capitalized banks report higher forbearance ratios as they might face less stigma effects compared to low capitalized banks.
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East Germany
The Nasty Gap 30 years after unification: Why East Germany is still 20% poorer than the West Dossier In a nutshell The East German economic convergence process is hardly…
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Policy Output
Reports › CompNet’s flagship and special reports provide in-depth, data-driven analysis on productivity, competitiveness, and related economic trends, using the latest CompNet…
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Church Membership and Economic Recovery: Evidence from the 2005 Hurricane Season
Iftekhar Hasan, Stefano Manfredonia, Felix Noth
Economic Journal,
No. 664,
2024
Abstract
This paper investigates the critical role of church membership in the process of economic recovery after high-impact natural disasters. We document a significant adverse treatment effect of the 2005 hurricane season in the Southeastern United States on establishment-level productivity. However, we find that establishments in counties with higher rates of church membership saw a significantly stronger recovery in terms of productivity for 2005–10. We also show that church membership is correlated with post-disaster entrepreneurship activities and population growth.
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Forecast Combination and Interpretability Using Random Subspace
Boris Kozyrev
IWH Discussion Papers,
No. 21,
2024
Abstract
This paper investigates forecast aggregation via the random subspace regressions method (RSM) and explores the potential link between RSM and the Shapley value decomposition (SVD) using the US GDP growth rates. This technique combination enables handling high-dimensional data and reveals the relative importance of each individual forecast. First, it is possible to enhance forecasting performance in certain practical instances by randomly selecting smaller subsets of individual forecasts and obtaining a new set of predictions based on a regression-based weighting scheme. The optimal value of selected individual forecasts is also empirically studied. Then, a connection between RSM and SVD is proposed, enabling the examination of each individual forecast’s contribution to the final prediction, even when there is a large number of forecasts. This approach is model-agnostic (can be applied to any set of predictions) and facilitates understanding of how the aggregated prediction is obtained based on individual forecasts, which is crucial for decision-makers.
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