Research

Working Papers


Fog or Smog? The Impact of Uncensored Reporting on Pollution on Individuals' Environmental Awareness

Abstract: This paper analyzes the effect of exposure to foreign mass media on environmental awareness and pro-environmental behavior. We exploit a natural experiment occurring in the German Democratic Republic, where geographic characteristics determined the reception of Western TV. Western media provided information on environmental pollution, a topic censored in East German state media. Using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP), we find a positive and persistent effect of Western TV exposure on environmental awareness and the likelihood of participating in environmental organizations. The analysis of survey data conducted before the fall of the Iron Curtain supports these findings. By examining county-level data, we show that Western TV induced individuals to submit complaint letters related to environmental protection to local authorities. Moreover, regions that could receive Western TV exhibited higher electoral outcomes for the Green Party in the first two federal elections of reunified Germany.

Presented at: International Conference on "The Political Economy of Democracy and Dictatorship"  (February 2023), CESifo Area Conference on Energy and Climate Economics (March 2023), EPCS (March 2023), RES & SES 2023 Annual Conference (April 2023), ESPE (June 2023), Asian Meeting of the ES (June 2023), EEA-ESEM Congress (August 2023), VfS (September 2023),  ASSA (January 2024),  International SOEP User Conference (July 2024)

Television and Labor Supply (with Adrian Chadi and Manuel Hoffmann)

Abstract: Television is a major spare-time activity with the potential to lower economic activity but also to manipulate behavior by changing preferences and social norms through role models. To provide a comprehensive investigation into the impacts of television on the labor market, we study two natural experiments providing variation in access to television broadcasts. First, we leverage a setting in West Germany, where individuals in some regions could watch commercial television via terrestrial frequencies while others could only watch public TV. By analyzing rich panel data, we provide evidence inconsistent with the notion of negative impacts on labor market outcomes. Instead, we find positive effects on the labor supply among females. This employment premium has limited monetary consequences for females, which could be due to gender-specific occupational choices. To better understand the mechanisms and to examine long-run effects, we exploit a setting in East Germany, where for decades, citizens in most areas had access to Western public TV with its emphasis on conservative and family-oriented values, except for those areas where only state-run socialist television with a focus on full employment was available. By analyzing several datasets, we provide evidence on the beliefs of East Germans about the role of women in the labor market, which could explain the persistent effects of TV on the female labor supply and gender equality in labor market participation. It appears that Eastern socialist TV shares a surprising similarity with today’s dominant form of Western free-market TV: they both encourage women to work.

Presented at: ESPE (June 2022), Asian Meeting of the ES (June 2022),  SOEP User Conference (July 2022), Asian Meeting of the ES in East and South-East Asia (August 2022), EALE (September 2022), VfS (September 2022), CESifo Area Conference on the Economics of Digitization (November 2022), ASSA (January 2023), SOLE (May 2023), EEA-ESEM Congress (August 2023)

A Neglected Determinant of Eating Behaviors: Relative Age (with Luca Fumarco and Francesco Principe), IZA DP No. 16920

Abstract: This study investigates a neglected determinant of adolescents’ dietary behaviors: the within-class age difference, in isolation from confounding factors (e.g., absolute age, season-of-birth, and countries’ specific characteristics, such as expected age at school start). We study a multi-country dataset, with more than 500k students from dozens of very diverse countries. We find that the youngest students in a class have worse dietary behaviors; they are more likely to be overweight, they eat fewer vegetables and fruits, they eat more sweets and drink more soft drinks, they tend to skip breakfast, go to bed hungry, and be on a diet. These findings are likely to reflect peer effects: two students with the same absolute age, who were born in the same season and started school at the same time, have different dietary behaviors because of how their age compares to that of their classmates. Finally, we show that this result holds across countries, which demonstrates the ubiquity of relative age effects on eating behaviors.

Work in Progress


Gender Inequality in Smoking: The Impact of West German Television on East Germany (with Andrea Bernini)

Perceived Climate Impacts and Environmental Action (with Julia Berazneva, Daniel Graeber, Peter Hans Matthews, and Michelle McCauley)

Works Councils and Income Perceptions (with Laszlo Goerke and Yue Huang)

More than Just Work Consequences: Uncovering the Relationship between Educational Mismatch and Health  (with Theresa Geißler)

School Starting Age and Educational Mismatch (with Theresa Geißler)