Friedrich Heinemann

Does it Pay to Watch Central Bankers’ Lips? The Information Content of ECB Wording

SummaryIn this analysis, the informational content of central bank rhetoric is assessed based on the experience with the ECB since 1999. Among the ECB’s communication channels we focus on the monthly press conferences. Based on a counting of certain signal words we construct a wording indicator reflecting the “hawk-ishness” of monetary rhetorics. For the construction, we develop an objective algorithm. We then integrate this indicator into a standard Taylor type ordered probit model for the explanation of the interest rate. We show that the wording indicator can improve the model’s fit when added to the standard explanatory variables. However, a model based solely on this indicator performs worse than the baseline. The results are confirmed by an out of sample analysis where the determination of the wording indicators’ weights is based on the early ECB period which, subsequently, is excluded from the tests. Our conclusion is that linguistic analysis can improve but not substitute more rigorous forecasting techniques based on hard economic data.

Voter Involvement, Fiscal Autonomy and Public Sector Efficiency: Evidence from German Municipalities

Social and/or political involvement within the population is often argued to enhance public sector performance. The underlying idea is that engagement fosters political awareness and interest and increases the public’s monitoring ability. Still, weak fiscal autonomy can undermine voters’ interest in and demand for an efficient production of public services. In our contribution, we test whether and how voter involvement in the political sphere is related to government performance – in terms of its efficiency – using a broad panel of German municipalities. Our results suggest that voter involvement indeed has a positive impact on cost efficiency. Crucially, however, this efficiency-enhancing effect of voter involvement is significantly positively affected by local governments’ fiscal autonomy.

Is the Welfare State Self-Destructive? A Study of Government Benefit Morale

Assar Lindbeck has pointed to the problem that generous welfare state institutions may in the long-run undermine those social norms which limit the costs and incentives effects of the welfare state and thus guarantee its viability. This study is the first to assess the empirical validity of Lindbeck?s notion by assessing the long-run link between the welfare state and social norms with regard to the honest take-up of government benefits. Based on the results of four waves of the World Value Surveys the determinants of benefit morale – defined as the reluctance to claim government benefits without legal entitlement – are analysed. Besides a standard list of the respondents? individual characteristics, macroeconomic indicators describing a country?s long-run welfare state and labour market history are included. The results support the empirical validity of Lindbeck?s theory: An increase of government benefits and unemployment is in the long-run associated with deteriorating welfare state ethics.

Value for money? German local government efficiency in a comparative perspective

In this article, we investigate the cost efficiency of German local governments in the state of Baden-Württemberg in 2004 using a stochastic frontier approach. Besides being the first study on German data, we add two elements to the literature. First, we provide a comparative perspective, allowing us to embed our results in the broader literature. Second, unlike most previous studies, we explicitly account for exogenous or nondiscretionary influences when estimating municipal efficiency scores. The results suggest that disregarding such exogenous factors can lead to significant and systematic bias in the estimated inefficiency levels. Particularly, underestimation of efficiency occurs for municipalities with high tourist activity, while the reverse is true for municipalities with high unemployment.

The Impact of Trust on Reforms

In a constantly changing economic environment a countrys ability to undertake institutional reforms is crucial to maintain economic growth and to promote the welfare of its citizens. A wide range of determinants for institutional reforms have been identified. However, the impact of trust on reforms has so far never been addressed. We provide theoretical arguments why trust should influence institutional changes and test the relationship empirically. We find a significant positive relation between trust and reforms with regard to government size, the legal system, and deregulation of private businesses and the labor market. The results in other policy fields are ambiguous.

Integration Benefits on EU Retail Credit Markets - Evidence from Interest Rate Pass-through

Lending and borrowing interest rates are often slow to adjust to changing capital market conditions. This paper argues that national differences of the pass-through speed in the EU can be regarded as a retail-oriented indicator of financial integration. Based on an ECB database the speed of interest rate adjustments for different markets and countries is measured - showing a considerable fragmentation of markets. Simulations show how much consumers in some countries could gain from a convergence of adjustment speed on the fastest levels.

Sovereign risk premia: The link between fiscal rules and stability culture

There is a growing empirical literature studying whether permanent constraints on fiscal policy, such as fiscal rules, reduce sovereign risk premia. Nevertheless, it remains an open question whether these rules are effective genuinely or just because they mirror fiscal preferences of politicians and voters. In our analysis of European bond spreads before the financial crisis, we shed light on this issue by employing several types of stability preference related proxies. These proxies refer to a countrys past stability performance, government characteristics and survey results related to general trust. We find evidence that these preference indicators affect sovereign bond spreads and dampen the measurable impact of fiscal rules. Yet, the interaction of stability preferences and rules points to a particular potential of fiscal rules to restore market confidence in countries with a historical lack of stability culture.

How Integrated are the European Retail Financial Markets? A Cointegration Analysis

With the introduction of the Euro, a single European money market has emerged. Further wholesale financial markets are considered to be highly integrated within the European Union. However, integration in retail financial markets is less advanced. For measuring financial market integration this distinction between wholesale and retail markets becomes crucial. There is a wide literature relating to integration of wholesale financial markets but just a few studies that try to measure integration in European retail markets. This paper, in a first step, gives a systematisation of the literature on measuring financial market integration with a focus on the distinction between wholesale and retail financial markets. In a second step, bivariate and multivariate cointegration techniques are used to assess the degree of integration in four loans and two deposit markets in the European Union. Finally, based on this analysis obstacles to financial market integration are discussed.

Rate Cutting Tax Reforms and Corporate Tax Competition in Europe

While there is a large and growing number of studies on the determinants of corporate tax rates, the literature has so far ignored the fact that the behavior of governments in setting tax rates is often best described as a discrete choice decision problem. We set up an empirical model that relates a governments decision whether to cut its corporate tax rate to the countrys own inherited tax and taxes in neighboring countries. Using comprehensive data on corporate tax reforms in Europe since 1980, we find evidence suggesting that the position in terms of the tax burden imposed on corporate income relative to geographical neighbors strongly affects the probability of rate cutting tax reforms. Countries are particularly likely to cut their statutory tax rate if the inherited tax is high and if they are exposed to low-tax neighbors.

The political economy of EU enlargement and the Treaty of Nice

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