TY - JOUR A1 - Kayser, Mark A. A1 - Leininger, Arndt T1 - Vintage errors: do real-time economic data improve election forecasts? JF - Research and Politics N2 - Economic performance is a key component of most election forecasts. When fitting models, however, most forecasters unwittingly assume that the actual state of the economy, a state best estimated by the multiple periodic revisions to official macroeconomic statistics, drives voter behavior. The difference in macroeconomic estimates between revised and original data vintages can be substantial, commonly over 100% (two-fold) for economic growth estimates, making the choice of which data release to use important for the predictive validity of a model. We systematically compare the predictions of four forecasting models for numerous US presidential elections using real-time and vintage data. We find that newer data are not better data for election forecasting: forecasting error increases with data revisions. This result suggests that voter perceptions of economic growth are influenced more by media reports about the economy, which are based on initial economic estimates, than by the actual state of the economy. KW - Forecasting KW - Elections KW - Economic vote KW - Real-time data KW - Media Y1 - 2015 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-16321 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1177/2053168015589624 SN - 2053-1680 VL - 2 IS - 3 SP - 1 EP - 11 PB - Sage CY - London [u.a.] ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Hofmann, Barbara A1 - Kreyenfeld, Michaela A1 - Uhlendorff, Arne T1 - Job Displacement and First Birth Over the Business Cycle JF - Demography N2 - In this article, we investigate the impact of job displacement on women’s first-birth rates as well as the variation in this effect over the business cycle. We use mass layoffs to estimate the causal effects of involuntary job loss on fertility in the short and medium term, up to five years after displacement. Our analysis is based on rich administrative data from Germany, with an observation period spanning more than 20 years. We apply inverse probability weighting (IPW) to flexibly control for the observed differences between women who were and were not displaced. To account for the differences in the composition of the women who were displaced in a downturn and the women who were displaced in an upswing, we use a double weighting estimator. Results show that the extent to which job displacement has adverse effects on fertility depends on the business cycle. The first-birth rates were much lower for women who were displaced in an economic downturn than for those who lost a job in an economic upturn. This result cannot be explained by changes in the observed characteristics of the displaced women over the business cycle. Y1 - 2017 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-23234 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1007/s13524-017-0580-4 SN - 1533-7790 SN - 0070-3370 VL - 54 IS - 3 SP - 933 EP - 959 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Reuben, Ernesto A1 - Traxler, Christian A1 - van Winden, Frans T1 - Advocacy and political convergence under preference uncertainty JF - European Economic Review N2 - We study the formation of advocacy groups and how they can impact policy outcomes by revealing information about voters׳ preferences to uninformed political candidates. We conduct a laboratory experiment based on a two-candidate spatial electoral competition setting where the policy preferences of voters are (initially) unknown and change over time. In the control treatment candidates learn about the preferred policy of the median voter through the voting outcome of elections. In the advocacy treatments, voters can organize themselves into advocacy groups in order to reveal their policy preferences. We find that voters often overcome the collective action problem of forming an advocacy group. In fact, we observe the formation of both informative advocacy groups, which convey new information, and uninformative advocacy groups, which do not. Overall, advocacy groups significantly speed up the convergence to the preferred policy of the median voter. However, advocacy does not lead to higher earnings as the gains from faster convergence are offset by the costs of group formation. KW - Advocacy groups KW - Information transmission KW - Political convergence KW - Voting KW - Median voter Y1 - 2015 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-19681 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euroecorev.2015.07.003 N1 - This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in European Economic Review. The final authenticated version is available online at: DOI 10.1016/j.euroecorev.2015.07.003 VL - 78 SP - 16 EP - 36 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Altmann, Steffen A1 - Traxler, Christian T1 - Nudges at the Dentist JF - European Economic Review N2 - We implement a randomized field experiment to study the impact of reminders on dental health prevention. Patients who are due for a check-up receive no reminder, a neutral reminder postcard, or reminders including additional information on the benefits of prevention. Our results document a strong impact of reminders. Within one month after receiving a reminder, the fraction of patients who make a check-up appointment more than doubles. The effect declines slightly over time, but remains economically and statistically significant. Including additional information in the reminders does not increase response rates. In fact, the neutral reminder has the strongest impact for the overall population as well as for important subgroups of patients. Finally, we document that being exposed to reminders repeatedly does neither strengthen nor weaken their effectiveness. KW - field experiments KW - reminders KW - nudges KW - memory limitations KW - prevention Y1 - 2014 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-19694 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euroecorev.2014.07.007 N1 - This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in European Economic Review. The final authenticated version is available online at: DOI 10.1016/j.euroecorev.2014.07.007 VL - 72 SP - 19 EP - 38 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Fellner, Gerlinde A1 - Sausgruber, Rupert A1 - Traxler, Christian T1 - Testing Enforcement Strategies in the Field: Threat, Moral Appeal and Social Information JF - Journal of the European Economic Association N2 - We run a large-scale natural field experiment to evaluate alternative strategies to enforce compliance with the law. The experiment varies the text of mailings sent to potential evaders of TV license fees. We find a strong effect of mailings, leading to a substantial increase in compliance. Among different mailings, a threat treatment which makes a high detection risk salient has a significant deterrent effect. Neither appealing to morals nor imparting information about others’ behavior enhances compliance on aggregate. However, the information condition has a weak positive effect in municipalities where evasion is believed to be common. KW - field experiments KW - enforcement strategies KW - compliance KW - perceptions Y1 - 2013 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-19704 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1111/jeea.12013| N1 - This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of an article published in Journal of the European Economic Association. The final authenticated version is available online at: DOI 10.1111/jeea.12013| VL - 11 IS - 3 SP - 634 EP - 660 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Scholz, Rembrandt A1 - Kreyenfeld, Michaela T1 - The register-based census in Germany : Historical context and relevance for population research JF - Comparative Population Studies N2 - In 2011, Germany carried out its first census after a 20-year break. In light of the United Nations’ recommendations that countries initiate a population census at least every 10 years, the census was long overdue. Moreover, demographers had for some time been demanding a new enumeration that would enable them to place the calculation of demographic indicators on a reliable basis. With the 2011 census, Germany not only met the demand for a current population census, but also broke new ground by using a register-based approach. Unlike the Scandinavian countries, which have a long tradition of performing register-based data analyses, the linking of administrative data in Germany is restricted by the country’s legal framework. Thus, the 2011 census was an ambitious project. After contextualising the 2011 census historically, we discuss in this contribution the census’ relevance for generating central demographic data. Specifically, we compare the updated population estimates of the 1987 census to the results of the 2011 census in order to identify possible systematic sources of error that distort demographic indicators and analyses. KW - Demographic indicators KW - Register data KW - Census Y1 - 2016 UR - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:kobv:b1570-opus4-21340 U6 - https://doi.org/10.12765/CPoS-2016-08en SN - 1869-8999 VL - 41 IS - 2 SP - 175 EP - 204 ER -