Université de Fribourg

Das House Kapital

Grossmann, Volker ; Larin, Benjamin ; Steger, Thomas

(Working Papers SES ; 523)

The housing wealth-to-income ratio has been increasing in most developed economies since the 1950s. We provide a novel theory to explain this long-term pattern. We show analytically that house prices grow in the steady state if i) the housing sector is more land-intensive than the non-housing sector, or ii) technological progress in the construction sector is weaker than in the non-housing...

Université de Fribourg

The patent buyout price for Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) vaccine and the ratio of R&D costs to the patent value

Songane, Mario ; Grossmann, Volker

(Working Papers SES ; 510)

Human papillomavirus (HPV) is responsible for almost all of the 530,000 new cases of cervical cancer and approximately 266,000 deaths per year. HPV vaccination is an integral component of the World Health Organization’s global strategy to fight the disease. However, high vaccine prices enforced through patent protection are limiting vaccine expansion, particularly in low- and middle-income...

Université de Fribourg

Reversal of migration flows : a fresh look at the German reunification

Schäfer, Andreas ; Steger, Thomas M. ; Fuchs, Benjamin ; Grossmann, Volker

(Working Papers SES ; 474)

We investigate the dynamic effects of interregional labor market integration on migration flows, capital formation, and the price for housing services. The co-evolution of these variables depends on initial conditions at the time of labor market integration. In an initially capital-poor economy, there may be a reversal of migration flows during the transition to the steady state, while housing...

Université de Fribourg

Optimal social insurance and health inequality

Grossmann, Volker ; Strulik, Holger

(Working Papers SES ; 464)

This paper integrates into public economics a biologically founded, stochastic process of individual ageing. The novel approach enables us to investigate the interaction between health and retirement policy in order to quantitatively characterize the optimal joint design of the social insurance system today and in response to future medical progress, and its implications for health inequality....

Université de Fribourg

Are sociocultural factors important for studying a science university major?

Grossmann, Volker ; Osikominu, Aderonke ; Osterfeld, Marius

(Working Papers SES ; 460)

This paper examines the role of the sociocultural background of students for choosing STEM fields in university. We combine rich survey data on university graduates in Switzerland with municipality level information from the census as well as nationwide elections and referenda to characterize a student›s home environment with respect to religious and political attitudes towards gender equality...

Université de Fribourg

Does Public Education Expansion Lead to Trickle-Down Growth?

Böhm, Sebastian ; Grossmann, Volker ; Steger, Thomas M.

(Working Papers SES ; 452)

The paper revisits the debate on trickle-down growth in view of the widely discussed evolution of the earnings and income distribution that followed a massive expansion of higher education. We propose a dynamic general equilibrium model to dynamically evaluate whether economic growth triggered by an increase in public education expenditure on behalf of those with high learning ability eventually...

Université de Fribourg

Does Bilateral Trust Affect International Movement of Goods and Labor?

Spring, Eva ; Grossmann, Volker

(Working Papers SES ; 442)

Trust in the citizens of a potential partner country may affect the decision to trade with or to migrate to a foreign country. This paper employs panel data to examine the causal impact of such bilateral trust on international trade and migration patterns. We apply instrumental variables (IV) approaches that capture the exogenous variance of bilateral trust separately with eight indicators of...

Université de Fribourg

Migration, Capital Formation, and House Prices

Grossmann, Volker ; Schäfer, Andreas ; Steger, Thomas M.

(Working Papers SES ; 441)

We investigate the effects of interregional labor market integration in a two-sector, overlapping-generations model with land-intensive production in the non-tradable goods sector (housing). To capture the response to migration on housing supply, capital formation is endogenous, assuming that firms face capital adjustment costs. Our analysis highlights heterogeneous welfare effects of labor...

Université de Fribourg

Migration, International Trade and Capital Formation: Cause or Effect ?

Felbermayr, Gabriel ; Grossmann, Volker ; Kohler, Wilhelm

(Working Papers SES ; 436)

In this paper, we provide an overview of the relationship between international migration and international trade as well as capital movements. After taking a brief historical perspective, we first investigate migration flows between two countries in a static, neoclassical context. We allow for a disaggregated view of migration that distinguishes between different types of labor and emphasizes...

Université de Fribourg

Does International Mobility of High-Skilled Workers Aggravate Between-Country Inequality ?

Grossmann, Volker ; Stadelmann, David

(Working Papers SES ; 416)

This paper analyzes the interaction of international migration of high-skilled labor and relative wage income between source and destination economies of expatriates. We develop an overlapping-generations model with increasing returns which suggests that international integration of the market for skilled labor aggravates between-country inequality by harming those which are source economies to...