Search

By employing a dynamic model with two limit order books, we show that fragmentation is associated with reduced competition among liquidity suppliers and lower picking-off risk of limit orders. Due to these countervailing channels, the impact of fragmentation on liquidity and welfare differs with asset volatility: When volatility is high (low), liquidity and aggregate welfare in a fragmented market are higher (lower) than in a single market. However, fragmentation always shifts welfare away from agents with exogenous trading motives and toward intermediaries. We empirically corroborate our model's predictions about liquidity. Our model reconciles the mixed results in the empirical literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Towards the end of the Cold War, the vocabulary of global power, space and economy received a qualitative update. Amongst the terms rapidly gaining prominence since the early 1990s has been the notion of geoeconomics, the coining of which has frequently been attributed to the strategist Edward N. Luttwak. In his interpretation, it signified a transition away from Cold War ideological and military geopolitical competition towards commerce and market‐based geo‐power. Over the past three decades, a 'geoeconomics boom' set in, characterised by think tanks and a varied body of politico‐economic literature making extensive use of the term. Conventionally treated as a neologism, the provenance and earlier iterations of geoeconomics, some dating back more than a century, have been largely ignored by both celebratory and critical accounts. In this paper, we trace and contextualise these earlier instances, leading us to the Geopolitik era in Germany and references to geoeconomics in the United States in the decades after WWII. We thereby offer a critical genealogy of geoeconomics, conceptualised as an object of definitional struggle. Proponents of the term sought to position it variously as a tool of national economic cohesion and competition or as a way of understanding and harnessing shifting global power relations, whilst others sought to subsume geoeconomics to geopolitics. These past struggles track forward into ongoing dialectical tensions between geoeconomics and geopolitics as competing but related geostrategic visions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using German establishment data, this article examines the relationship between product market competition and the extent of employer provided training. We demonstrate that high product market competition is associated with increased training except when the competition is so severe as to threaten liquidation to a firm. We take this as evidence of an inverted U-shaped relationship. We also make clear that while this relationship is very evident for the service sector, it is far less evident for manufacturing where we largely confirm earlier results of no relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Der Moderne Staat is the property of Verlag Barbara Budrich GmbH and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

From a theoretical viewpoint, there can be market failures and organizational failures resulting in an underprovision of occupational health and safety. Works councils may help mitigate these failures. Using establishment data from Germany, the empirical analysis in this article confirms that the incidence of a works council is significantly associated with an increased likelihood that the establishment provides more workplace health promotion than required by law. This result also holds in regressions accounting for the possible endogeneity of works council incidence. Furthermore, analysing potentially moderating factors such as collective bargaining coverage, industry, type of ownership, multi-establishment status and product market competition, the article finds a positive association between works councils and workplace health promotion for the various types of establishments examined. Finally, this study goes beyond the mere incidence of workplace health promotion and shows that works councils are positively associated with a series of different measures of workplace health promotion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From the mid-1990s several countries have introduced elements of the model of regulated competition in healthcare. In 2012 we assessed the extent to which in five countries ten important preconditions for achieving efficiency and affordability in competitive healthcare markets were fulfilled. In this paper we assess to what extent the fulfilment of these preconditions has changed ten years later. In 2022, as in 2012, in none of the five countries all preconditions are completely fulfilled. In the period 2012-2022 on balance there have been some improvements in the fulfillment of the preconditions, although to a different extent in the five countries. The only preconditions that were improved in most countries were 'consumer information and transparency' and 'cross-subsidies without incentives for risk selection'. On balance the Netherlands and Switzerland made most progress in the number of better fulfilled preconditions. For Belgium these preconditions no longer seem relevant because the idea of regulated competition has been completely abandoned. In Germany, Israel and Switzerland, the preconditions 'effective competition policy' and 'contestability of the markets' are not sufficiently fulfilled in 2022, just as in 2012. In Germany and Switzerland this also holds for the precondition 'freedom to contract and integrate'. Overall, the progress towards realizing the preconditions has been limited., Competing Interests: Declarations of competing interest None., (Copyright © 2024 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Copyright of Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Interactions in the healthcare system today involve an important new set of actors: evaluative health platforms (EHPs). These platforms are not neutral intermediaries, but active moderators of how patients express opinions, choose providers, and consume health-related information. This paper adds to our understanding of the varied and evolving commercial interests of EHPs and the implications these have for patient voice. We analyze 71 platforms in the USA, UK, and Germany and identify five ideal types: subscribers, analyzers, advertisers, regulators, and scammers. Each platform type enacts a unique competitive strategy through an evaluative infrastructure which constrains but also generates possibilities for patient voice. Based on our typology, we develop three contributions. First, we nuance universalizing claims about the consequences of platform capitalism by specifying the diverse strategies underpinning competition between EHPs in different countries, and showing how each strategy leads evaluative infrastructures to develop in ways that impact patient voice. Second, we show how patients can navigate the challenges of a complex EHP space by exercising their ability to choose between platforms. Finally, we outline the conditions platforms need to fulfil to become empowering. Overall, this study highlights the varied and complex relationship between platform business models and user voice, which exists not only in healthcare, but also in many other fields. • Typology of evaluative health platforms (EHPs) in the US, the UK, and Germany. • EHP business models and content moderation techniques vary considerably. • EHPs have a wide range of implications for patient voice. • More transparency and competition can help platforms increase patient empowerment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Nachrichten aus der Chemie is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Countries increasingly rely on competition among hospitals to improve health outcomes. However, there is limited empirical evidence on the effect of competition on health outcomes in Germany. We examined the effect of hospital competition on quality of care, which is assessed using health outcomes (risk-adjusted in-hospital and post-hospitalization mortality and cardiac-related readmissions), focusing on acute myocardial infarction (AMI) treatment. We obtained data on all hospital utilizations and mortality of 13.2% of the population from a large statutory health insurer and all AMI admission records from Diagnosis-Related Groups Statistic from 2015-19. We constructed the measures of hospital competition, which mitigates the possibility of endogeneity bias. The relationships between health outcomes and competition measures are estimated using linear probability models. Intense competition was associated with lower quality of care in terms of mortality and cardiac-related readmissions. Patients treated in hospitals facing high competition were 0.9 (1.2) percentage points more likely to die within 90 days (2 years) of admission, and 1.4 (1.6) percentage points more likely to be readmitted within 90 days (2 years) of discharge than patients treated in hospitals facing low competition. Our results indicate that hospital competition does not lead to better health outcomes for AMI patients in Germany. Therefore, additional measures are necessary to achieve quality improvement. • We examined the relationship between hospital competition and quality in Germany. • Health outcomes for acute myocardial infarction patients are examined. • We addressed the endogeneity in measuring hospital competition. • Hospital competition did not lead to better health outcomes. • Policies promoting hospital competition should be accompanied by additional measures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of FinanzRundschau is the property of De Gruyter and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Explanations of Italy's and Germany's position within the Eurozone commonly focus on trade 'competitiveness,' a concept measured in terms of unit labour costs. This trade-centric view offers a poor explanation for the evolution of the two countries external debt levels following the adoption of the Euro. It also fails to explain the external financial fragility that Italy has repeatedly experienced in the period since 2010. Both outcomes are better explained by dynamics in cross-border financial markets. Monetary union created large incentives for banks in the Eurozone's core states, including Germany, to direct funds to banks in the Eurozone's periphery (those countries whose banks had earlier faced higher currency-related risk premia in obtaining external financing). Domestic policy decisions in Germany further contributed to this outcome. In the period since 2010, the Eurozone's rules-based governance model and the failure of governments to create a common safe asset for banks became a major factor contributing to Italy's financial fragility. It remains to be seen whether Europe's response to the COVID-crisis will mark a watershed, and break these financial markets dynamics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article highlights opportunities, problems and interests and discusses arguments for and against the open car in a competition that has been intensifying since the authors first introduced the open car and its enemies in 2016 in Germany. It mentions about laws passed by legislators in the country for strengthening fair competition in the country.

Chlor-alkali electrolysis plays a significant role in Germany's electricity demand, with a share of >2%. It offers a promising avenue for leveraging demand response strategies. In times of escalating electricity prices, load shifting can help to maintain economic competitiveness of domestic industries. This study aims to assess the potential for electricity cost savings and related CO 2 emission reductions through optimal load shifting practices for chlor-alkali electrolysis, considering both current and projected future electricity prices. The research employs the mixed-integer energy system modeling framework IRPopt to model and optimize a chlorine value chain under various scenarios. A sensitivity analysis is conducted to identify the primary factors driving electricity cost savings. The findings reveal that, based on the 2019 electricity price distribution (before pandemic and energy crisis), load shifting can yield electricity cost savings of 5.8% and CO 2 emission reductions of 2.7%. As the share of variable renewable energy sources increases along with other driving factors, the electricity price spread is projected to rise from 28% in 2019 to an average of 87% in 2040 scenarios. Consequently, electricity cost savings rise up to 22% and CO 2 emission reductions up to 10%. The primary drivers behind electricity cost savings include electricity price spreads and the utilization and operating range of the electrolyzer. In addition to the business-level advantages, the resulting decrease in residual load and lower CO 2 emissions contribute to the integration of variable renewable energy sources and the achievement of decarbonization targets at the economic level. [Display omitted] • Model-based analysis of a chlor-alkali electrolysis for 2019, 2030 and 2040. • Electricity cost savings through load shifting range from 5.8% to 22%. • CO 2 savings through load shifting range from 2.7% to 10.1%. • Result is sensitive to electricity price spread and operating range of electrolyzer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although changes to the channel system are among a firm’s most critical decisions, prior research has neglected to examine the impact of channel expansions on firm value. This article investigates whether a firm’s announcement of an increase in distribution intensity or the establishment of a new channel influences firm value. The authors also consider the moderating role of context-specific firm, market, and channel strategy contingencies. They test their hypotheses with an event study of 240 announcements of major channel expansions in the United States, Germany, and China. The results indicate that channel expansions affect firm value (i.e., through abnormal stock returns). However, the two types of channel expansions affect firm value differently. Whereas the establishment of a new channel positively influences firm value, reactions to an increase in distribution intensity are highly contingent. For example, firms operating in exceedingly turbulent or competitive markets experience firm value reductions in response to an increase in distribution intensity. Notably, the same two environmental contingencies enhance firm value when the firm establishes a new channel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article examines one of the central elements of evolutionary thinking—competition formalized by the replicator dynamics mechanism. Using data on product characteristics of automobiles sold on the German domestic market over the period 2001–2006, we construct a competitiveness or fitness indicator for each car model applying non-parametric efficiency measurement techniques. The basic question we intend to answer is whether cars providing a higher quality–price ratio for consumers tend to increase their market share compared to variants with lower quality–price ratios. The relationship between a car models' fitness and its market performance is empirically tested in a regression framework. The results show that the principle of “growth of the fitter” is working as suggested by evolutionary theory. In particular, we find that car models with considerably lower fitness than the market average lose additional market shares, whereas models with above-average fitness gain additional market shares. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper examines behavioural and regional/geographic cultural antecedents of sustainability in SME contexts. The study identifies prevailing macro-representations of sustainability in the literature and highlights an over-focus on large firms constituting the predominant unit of analysis. Moreover, there is a propensity in the literature to view sustainability primarily in terms of 'environmental' – closely linked to a corporate strategic imperative narrative of economic competitiveness and profitability. Overall, this perspective tends to generate accounts which are acultural, apolitical and ahistorical in terms of innovative actions and sustainability practices. In response, using a conceptual framework of moral identity, the paper develops a more micro-foundational insight to sustainability (developing notions of 'tangible' and 'intangible') and examines regional economic development attitudes at individual owner-manager/managing director level in small-to-medium-sized firms. Methodologically, an inductively framed interview schedule was employed with owner-managers and managing directors (n = 30) of manufacturing SMEs in the Baden-Württemberg region (Germany). The study identified a range of micro-foundational behavioural antecedents operating in the sample companies. In particular, it underlined that many of the SME owner-managers/managing directors expressed views informed by a particular moral identity connected with a perspective rooted in regionally bound, longstanding and 'expected' behaviours of trust, fairness, honesty and community responsibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses American employers and the legal firm competition from which they developed. Topics covered include the distinction between liberal and coordinated market economies, and a comparison of the economic models of U.S. and Germany from a historical and development perspective. Also noted is the law's role in shaping these countries' models of employer organization and market economies.

In this latest update, we explore the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) enacted by the US Congress in August 2022, with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) recently releasing the list of the first ten drugs it will negotiate prices on. We also cover the consequences of price controls and rigid value assessment in Germany which have led to the withdrawal of a number of medicines. It will be important to see how the IRA balances cost-saving with holistic value assessment, incentives for innovation and patient access to treatment.

This paper presents a new approach to deal with spatial inequalities in risk adjustment between health insurances. The shortcomings of non-spatial and spatial fixed effects in risk adjustment models are analysed and opposed against spatial kernel estimators. Theoretical and empirical evidence suggests that a reasonable choice of the spatial kernel could limit the spatial uncertainty of the modifiable area unit problem under heavy-tailed claims data, leading to more precise predictions and economically positive incentives on the healthcare market. A case study of the German risk adjustment shows a spatial risk spread of 86 Euro p.c., leading to incentives for spatial risk selection. The proposed estimator eliminates this issue and conserves incentives for services optimisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quantification as a way to govern by numbers has colonised all sectors of modern societies. In the German higher education sector, a Performance-Based Resource Allocation scheme (commonly referred to as Leistungsorientierte Mittelverteilung -- LOM for short) has steadily been developed since the 1990s. In an organisational context characterised by increasing international competition and internal differentiation, universities and their regulators have embraced the notion of smart resource allocation through performance indicators. At the same time, the sector has historically been characterised by a traditional cameralistic resource allocation mechanism, where the interactions between the main financiers (state governments), and beneficiaries (universities) were underpinned by a desire to ensure continuity and predictability. Based on empirical evidence, we outline how the university has transformed from a bureaucratic public service deliverer to an adaptable organisation that is supposed to learn from quantified information. This perspective allows for the discussion of quantification as a contemporary steering mechanism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The delivery of public services by nonprofit and for-profit providers alters the nature of services and jobs, often in unintended and undesired ways. We argue that these effects depend on the degree to which the service is 'marketized', that is, subjected by the funder to price-based competition. Using case studies of British and German employment services, this article scrutinizes the link between funding practices and service quality. Of particular concern in marketized employment services is the problem of 'creaming and parking', in which providers select job-ready clients for services and neglect clients more distant from the labour market. We explore three questions. What are the mechanisms through which marketization produces creaming and parking? What are the differences between these mechanisms in commercial and non-commercial service providers? Which national institutions might serve as a buffer for the landscape of service provision facing price-based competition? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper focuses on the forming of expectations by regulatory authorities in the case of merger control after 1973, when the German legislator stipulated a decision by its officials on future competition in relevant markets. The regulatory and decision-making behavior of officials is analyzed on the basis of selected merger procedures in the chemical industry, which underwent far-reaching structural change in the 1970s and 1980s. Here, institutionalization processes for overcoming information asymmetries and the formation of market expectations can be diagnosed inside the office as well as inside the firms. Adaptive expectations with regard to current market diagnoses and legal assumptions ("Vermutungstatbestände") play a significant role for their forecast decisions. The study is based on previously unpublished files of the Federal Cartel Office. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Commission hopes that the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) will result in increasing wealth, more competitiveness and hundreds of thousands of new jobs. There are also plans to harmonize standards and to introduce or monitor new regulations and norms – beside and above national legislation – that go beyond the existing member state legal framework and are to be safeguarded by means of regulatory collaboration and legal supervision. To the extent observable after the 15th round of negotiations between the European Commission and the US administration, the debate on the TTIP has not yet reached planning law, construction law or procurement law in practice. However, the chapter on “investment” of the TTIP-draft is of paramount importance for the land policies in the member states. Land as immovable properties is mentioned explicitly as an investment asset covered by TTIP. Land policy is the “blind spot” in investment protection agreements. This paper analyses the undergoing dynamics for the comprehensive land policy structure in Germany and its capital Berlin. Berlin plays a leading role in the current discourse of the realignment of land policy and the renaissance of public affordable housing policies. The purpose test of TTIP − according to the hierarchy of norms from the constitutional and national sphere down to the municipal level – will comprise of the criteria fairness, legitimacy, the balancing of investors’ expectations (and potentially their claims), and states’ regulatory measures. My paper explains why the standards and provisions of TTIP potentially conflict with the constitutionally guaranteed locally self-government in land policy as community institution(s) and the efficiency of urban planning. The democratic legitimacy of TTIP remains to be verified since the controversial relation and distinction between lawful regulation, the fair and equitable treatment standard, and indirect expropriation under the “TTIP-regime” lack substantial empirical evidence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper shows how long-term value added driven competitiveness is widely adopted by German DAX 30 corporations and how it can be measured. It explains and shows how different measures such as shareholder value, economic value added (EVA), return on capital employed (ROCE), return on equity (ROE) and others are calculated and how they correlate to show longterm value added and, therefore, competitive differentiation. As part of the highly professionalized corporate governance approach, the German Corporate Governance Codex (Regierungskommision Deutscher Corporate Governance Kodex, 2015) asks for "sustainable creation of value". The analyses of 2015 and 2016 annual reports of all 30 corporations state that 80% of the firms show financially relevant value added data and as such measurable competitive advantage on the long run. The paper focuses on which measures are used to quantify the competitive value addition and then shows how EVA or company specific EVA-like measures in addition to ROCE are the most used ones. Furthermore, the paper shows that ROCE with a factor of 0.97 in 2015 and 0.74 in 2016 correlates best with EVA and, in absence of an EVA calculation, is the best measure to represent value creation as a competitive differentiator. The results can be useful to strengthen competitiveness for policymakers both in non-profit and for-profit social economy entities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Se investigan las diferencias salariales entre hombres y mujeres graduados universitarios al inicio de la vida activa en todos los percentiles de la distribución salarial. Tales diferencias se descomponen según el modelo de índice único de DiNardo, Fortin y Lemieux (1996) y Fortin y Lemieux (1998), analizando los efectos de la dotación, el precio y la función de rendimiento de competencias. Los salarios iniciales de los varones son más altos en todos los percentiles, con una brecha de magnitud variable. Los efectos de la dotación y el precio son favorables a los hombres. La diferencia en la función de rendimiento de competencias es ventajosa para las graduadas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Germany, market penetration by alternative powertrains has been generally processing at a slow pace. Therefore, reaching the 2020 target of one million registered electric vehicles (EVs) is a major challenge. We analyze the German market by advancing and refining existing consumer-oriented total cost of ownership (TCO C ) models and demonstrate the validity of our model by comparing the cost-efficiency of EVs and internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs) including the battery resale value for second use and second life. The TCO C model was calculated for the ten most frequently registered battery electric vehicles (BEVs) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) and compared with ICEVs in the same vehicle segments. The results are further validated through applying three typical annual mileage driver profiles and by Monte Carlo simulations under various scenarios. Results reveal that only a few BEVs and HEVs are economical without subsidies when compared with ICEVs in all considered scenarios. The subsidies only barely change the results. The mini and the medium vehicle segment remain uneconomical in all tested scenarios. Overall, we conclude that subsidies support the competitiveness of BEVs, but fail to lead to favorable TCO C within several vehicle segments and several tested annual mileages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many competitive health insurance markets adjust payments to participating health plans according to their enrollees' risk - including based on diagnostic information. We investigate responses of German health plans to the introduction of morbidity-based risk adjustment in the Statutory Health Insurance in 2009, which triggers payments based on "validated" diagnoses by providers. Using the regulator's data from office-based physicians, we estimate a difference-in-difference analysis of the change in the share and number of validated diagnoses for ICD codes that are inside or outside the risk adjustment but are otherwise similar. We find a differential increase in the share of validated diagnoses of 2.6 and 3.6 percentage points (3-4%) between 2008 and 2013. This increase appears to originate from both a shift from not-validated toward validated diagnoses and an increase in the number of such diagnoses. Overall, our results indicate that plans were successful in influencing physicians' coding practices in a way that could lead to higher payments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates the degree of monopsony power of employers in different industries against the background of a statutory minimum wage introduction in Germany in January 2015. A semi-structural estimation approach is employed based on a dynamic model of monopsonistic competition. The empirical analysis relies on a linked employer–employee data set which allows to control for observed heterogeneity both on the worker and on the firm side. The results show important differences in monopsonistic competition among low-wage industries: While retailing, the hotel and restaurant industry as well as agriculture can be described as monopsonistic labour markets, this is not true for other services and manufacturing of food products. From a policy point of view, the introduction of a uniform minimum wage may therefore lead to different employment reactions in industries with a similar minimum wage bite. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]