Individualism and the Formation of Human Capital
Katharina Hartinger, Sven Resnjanskij, Jens Ruhose, Simon Wiederhold
Journal of the European Economic Association,
forthcoming
Abstract
There is an ongoing debate about the economic effects of individualism. We establish that individualism leads to better educational and labor market outcomes. Using data from the largest international adult skill assessment, we identify the effects of individualism by exploiting variation between migrants at the origin country, origin language, and person level. Migrants from more individualistic cultures have higher cognitive skills and larger skill gains over time. They also invest more in their skills over the life-cycle, as they acquire more years of schooling and are more likely to participate in adult education activities. In fact, individualism is more important in explaining adult skill formation than any other cultural trait that has been emphasized in previous literature. In the labor market, more individualistic migrants earn higher wages and are less often unemployed. We show that our results cannot be explained by selective migration or omitted origin-country variables.
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The (Heterogeneous) Economic Effects of Private Equity Buyouts
Steven J. Davis, John Haltiwanger, Kyle Handley, Ben Lipsius, Josh Lerner, Javier Miranda
Management Science,
Vol. 71 (11),
2025
Abstract
The effects of private equity buyouts on employment, productivity, and job reallocation vary tremendously with macroeconomic and credit conditions, across private equity groups, and by type of buyout. We reach this conclusion by examining the most extensive database of U.S. buyouts ever compiled, encompassing thousands of buyout targets from 1980 to 2013 and millions of control firms. Employment shrinks 12% over two years after buyouts of publicly listed firms—on average, and relative to control firms—but expands 15% after buyouts of privately held firms. Postbuyout productivity gains at target firms are large on average and much larger yet for deals executed amid tight credit conditions. A postbuyout tightening of credit conditions or slowing of gross domestic product growth curtails employment growth and intrafirm job reallocation at target firms. We also show that buyout effects differ across the private equity groups that sponsor buyouts, and these differences persist over time at the group level. Rapid upscaling in deal flow at the group level brings lower employment growth at target firms. We relate these findings to theories of private equity that highlight agency problems at portfolio firms and within the private equity industry itself.
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Alumni
IWH Alumni The IWH maintains contact with its former employees worldwide. We involve our alumni in our work and keep them informed, for example, with a newsletter. We also plan…
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Media Response
Media Response May 2026 IWH: Jedes zwölfte Unternehmen sieht seine Existenz bedroht in: Schwäbische Zeitung Ravensburg, 12.05.2026 IWH: Jede zwölfte Firma fürchtet um ihre…
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IWH-CompNet 5th FINPRO
IWH-CompNet 5th Finance and Productivity Conference 24-25 April, 2026 - Tokyo, Japan The IWH-CompNet 5th Finance and Productivity Conference (FINPRO5), held on 24–25 April 2026 at…
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Scientific Advisory Board
Scientific Advisory Board As an association established and registered under German civil law the IWH is composed of different internal bodies through which it is led and…
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Macroeconomic Reports Local and global: IWH regularly provides current economic data – be it about the state of the East German economy, the macroeconomic development in Germany…
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Three Research Clusters Each IWH research group is assigned to a topic-oriented research cluster. The clusters are not separate organisational units, but rather bundle the…
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Research Data Centre (IWH-RDC) Direct link to our Data Offer The IWH Research Data Centre offers external researchers access to microdata and micro-aggregated data sets that…
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Economic Outlook
Joint Economic Forecast Spring 2026 Energy Price Shock Dampens Recovery – Inflation Rises April 1, 2026 Although the leading economic research institutes consider the German…
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