This course aims at giving tools to students for entering the frontier of research regarding two new lines of research: (a) models of wealth-inequality determinants and dynamics, and (b) models of financial stability. The focus will be on presenting general-purpose analytical and computational techniques that enable students to replicate and extend frontier-research papers in these areas. The course will focus on wealth-inequality/household portfolio models and on theoretical models of credit cycles, models of inside-money and liquidity, and models connecting endogenous financial-stability risk with macroeconomic performance.

What is the “right” geographic definition of relevant markets? We study how unexpected and exogenous increases in excise duties in petroleum products were passed-through to retail prices in the Athens region and examine how the degree of the pass-through varies across different geographic relevant markets. Using various definitions of the relevant geographic market, we find that the most appropriate model that fits the Athens region, is one of perfect competition. Contrary to expectations and previous arbitrary geographic market definitions, we deduct that gas stations in Athens compete fiercely and that the role for geographic differentiation is minimal.

(joint work with Christos Genakos)

Join us for an insightful presentation on the global impact of COVID-19 on public debt and the challenges it poses for policymakers. This lecture explore the effectiveness of different approaches to reducing debt-to-GDP ratios, considering econometric analyses and historical experiences. Followed by a discussion.

Key findings include:

• Fiscal consolidations: Timely and well-designed fiscal adjustments, preferably during economic expansions, can significantly reduce debt ratios. Structural reforms and strong institutional frameworks further enhance the debt-reducing effects, although these conditions may not always be present

joint with Alexander Schmidt-Catran, Goethe-Universität Frankfurt

This study analyses the impact of a high-profile crime event on perceived public safety. At the 2015 New Year's Eve celebrations in Cologne (NYE), Germany, refugees allegedly committed thousands of crimes, ranging from theft to sexual assault. The widespread media coverage of these incidents has made a shift in the publics’ perceived safety plausible. We empirically analyze this proposition using a difference-in-differences strategy. Using the European Social Survey, we estimate the differential response of German respondents to those of other European countries in terms of perceived safety after NYE. We find that Germans feel less safe after the NYE incidents. Women and individuals leaning toward the political right are affected the most. The analysis of search queries suggests that the loss of perceived safety may also translate into higher demand for defense goods.

Am 17. Juni 2023 von 17 bis 24 Uhr öffnen etwa 70 wissenschaftliche Einrichtungen in Berlin und auf dem Potsdamer Telegrafenberg ihre Türen und laden herzlich zur Langen Nacht der Wissenschaften ein. An über 100 Veranstaltungsorten heißt es: staunen, berühren, begreifen!

Gemeinsam mit sechs anderen Leibniz-Instituten nimmt das DIW Berlin in den Räumen der Geschäftsstelle der Leibniz-Gemeinschaft in Berlin-Mitte an der Langen Nacht der Wissenschaften teil.

How are different components of subjective well-being (SWB) concurrently and prospectively related to each other? Several studies already addressed this research question. However, they suffer from a combination of important limitations such as exclusive attention on cognitive or affective indicators of SWB, over-reliance on cross-sectional data, or no explicit consideration of age effects or associations across domains. To overcome these limitations, we utilize the analytical exploratory power of psychometric network analysis combined with longitudinal data (years 2015-2019) from the most recent version (V37) of the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP). We analyze the associations between general life satisfaction, domain satisfaction (e.g., health, work, personal income, leisure time, family life, and dwelling), as well as positive and negative affect with a multi-level graphical vector auto-regression (GVAR) model. The estimations are performed with functions from the psychonetrics R Package. Longitudinal psychometric network analysis allows us to examine the complex multivariate relationships across the different components of subjective well-being while simultaneously differentiating between temporal, contemporaneous and between-subject associations. These associations are additionally compared across different age groups. Thus, our study provides new insights into the relationship of subjective well-being and satisfaction with different domains as well as their association with age.

We are soliciting the first ARGE MASTERCLASS for doctoral Students and Postdoctorates of members of the ARGE (Arbeitsgemeinschaft deutscher wirtschaftswissenschaftlicher Forschungsinstitute).

The Masterclass consists of a combination of lecture and four presentations. The Masterclass is given by Christiane Baumeister (University of Notre Dame; NBER; CEPR). Structural vector autoregressions are the workhorse models in empirical macroeconomics. The goal of this course is to equip participants with state-of-the art Bayesian methods for empirical research and policy analysis. The first part of the course challenges the current practice of identifcation of VAR models by introducing a more general Bayesian framework that encompasses standard identifcation approaches as special cases. Drawing structural inference from VAR models requires making use of prior information.

This course provides formal tools of Bayesian analysis that allow to incorporate prior beliefs about both the structural coefficients and the impacts of shocks in a flexible way and to characterize the contribution of prior information. The second part of the course applies this framework to modeling the global oil market to study the determinants of oil price fluctuations and the macroeconomic consequences of oil price shocks.

Submission:
Please send CV and in case of applying for a place in the student presentations, a paper/ extended abstract by March 15, 2023 to arge@diw.de.
Decisions will be sent by March 31, 2023.

Schedule:

July 4:
Morning 2x90 minutes Lecture with Christiane Baumeister
Afternoon 2x90 minutes Lecture with Christiane Baumeister
Dinner/ Get together

July 5:
Morning 2x90 minutes Lecture with Christiane Baumeister

Afternoon: Slots for presentation and discussion

Jonathan Berrisch, University of Duisburg Essen
“Modeling volatility and dependence of European carbon and energy prices”

Adelina Garamow, DIW Berlin
“Global Commodity Markets and Sovereign Risk across 150 Years”

Ider Gökhan/Frederik Paul Kurcz/ Ben Schumann, DIW Berlin
"The Energy-Price Channel of (European) Monetary Policy"

3.30pm End

To register for the masterclass please contact Christiane Zschech (arge@diw.de)

The course provides participants with the tools to develop and analyze business cycle models with heterogenous agents. This class of models has become the new standard in the business cycle literature and allows to analyze the interaction of the business cycle and the distribution of consumption, income, and wealth.

The focus of the course is on numerical methods. Coding exercises in class are an important element of the course, such that participants should be able to apply the methods straight out of the class.

The German Socio-Economic Panel Study is a representative panel study for the German population, collecting data on a broad variety of topics of everyday life, including general wellbeing, household composition, educational aspirations and educational status, income and occupational biographies, leisure time activities, housing, health, political orientation and more. With its long running panel structure, the breadth of topics and the representative nature of the data, the SOEP has become a central resources for quantitative research in the social sciences in Germany.

The Berlin IO Day is a one-day workshop sponsored by the Berlin Centre for Consumer Policies (BCCP) and supported by the Berlin's leading academic institutions, including DIW Berlin, ESMT Berlin, Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, and Technische Universität Berlin. The aim is to create an international forum for high quality research in Industrial Organization in the heart of Berlin, one of Europe's most vibrant and intellectually lively cities.

Leibniz ScienceCampus
Berlin Centre for Consumer Policies (BCCP) Research Day

At this BCCP Research Day (formerly known as BCCP Forum), Fellows will give short pitches of their current research. Since we also want to have enough time for discussions and networking, we plan long coffee breaks between the presentation sessions as well as get-together afterwards.

The event will bring together all BCCP fellows in law and economics who are engaged in the activities of the science campus. We will have the opportunity to learn about each other’s research during short presentations by the different partner institutions followed by open discussion. The objective of the meeting is to encourage discourse and exchange and clarify the themes and aims of BCCP.