Highway to Hitler

In this paper Nico Voigtländer & Hans‐Joachim Both examine if building infrastructure projects decreases government opposition before elections and they use the case of the Hitler regime. They find that actually localities where a major highway was built (or close to it) show a reduction in opposition (higher support) to the Nazi Regime. 

. . . Our findings show that infrastructure spending can effectively enhance the political entrenchment of a dictatorship – and the Nazi Regime’s early rise in popularity matters because it effectively laid the foundations for the later war and genocide. 

When we examine changes in opposition in the sample as a whole, and in areas of motorway construction, we find a striking pattern: in areas that saw highway‐building in 1933/34, opposition to the Nazi Party was higher to start (Nov. 33); but by August 1934, opposition had fallen substantially. In the sample as a whole, average opposition declined by 1.6%; where the roads were built, it fell by 2.4%. 

They perform a variety of robustness cheeks, and I am only worried about the seemingly low power of the regressions in some cases.  

Whom to appoint as finance minister to balance the budget

Ministry of Finance, Germany. Wikimedia Commons.

So what appear to be the characteristics of the ’perfect finance minister’? In times of fiscal stress and global fiscal uncertainties the ’perfect’ finance minister should pay much attention to reaching a sound budget. It is more likely that she succeeds in doing so, if she has significant professional experience in the field of business finance and if she stays in office for a long time. Moreover, in a coalition government she should belong to the same party than the prime minister. It does not matter how old she is, or what (or if) she studied, or, for that matter whether the finance minister is male or female, with or without children (p. 25).

The article, by Beate Jochimsen & Sebastian Thomasius, is published here (June 2014). A draft is here (2012).

Culture and trade (Germany)

In this paper, we examine the effect of dialect similarity on intra-German trade patterns. Applying a standard gravity model of trade, we find that linguistic ties strongly promote trade. Since differences in local dialects do not hinder direct communication, and since all parts of Germany share a common institutional framework, we interpret our findings as evidence for the effect of culture on trade.

Source. 
HT: Roberto Zanola.

Cultural Influences and Fertility (Germany)

Based on a 1% sample of the German population, we study how fertility rates in the country of origin — a proxy for cultural imprint — influence the fertility outcomes of first- and second-generation female immigrants. We use both total fertility rates in the year of migration and a new measure of completed cohort fertility rates in the countries of origin as well as direct survey measures of fertility norms. Our large data set allows us to focus on a relatively narrow range for age at migration and to estimate models that rely on within-country variation only, leading to more credible identification. We find a statistically significant, sizeable and robust effect of country-of-origin fertility rates on fertility outcomes. The effect is strongest for the first generation and becomes weaker, though still statistically significant, for “generation 1.5” (migrants arriving as children) and the second generation. It is stronger for women with low education and for women who live with a partner from the same country of origin.

Source: Stichnoth & Yeter (2013). 

Radio and the Rise of Nazis in Pre-War Germany

How far can media undermine democratic institutions and how persuasive can it be in assuring public support for dictator policies? We study this question in the context of Germany between 1929 and 1939. Using quasi-random geographical variation in radio availability, we show that radio had a significant negative effect on the Nazi vote share between 1930 and 1933, when political news had an anti-Nazi slant. This negative effect was fully undone in just one month after Nazis got control over the radio in 1933 and initiated heavy radio propaganda. Radio also helped the Nazis to enroll new party members and encouraged denunciations of Jews and other open expressions of anti-Semitism after Nazis fully consolidated power. Nazi radio propaganda was most effective when combined with other propaganda tools, such as Hitler’s speeches, and when the message was more aligned with listeners’ prior as measured by historical anti-Semitism.

That is from a new and very cool paper by Adena et al (March 2013). Don't miss the graphs at the end.

State policies and behavior (Berlin)

On contextual grounds, we investigate the long-term impact of socialization in a totalitarian vs. a democratic state on values and attitudes toward doping. We deliberately chose this topic since, under State Plan 14.25, the communist regime of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) systematically administered performance-enhancement drugs to their top-level athletes, in most cases without the athletes’ knowledge or consent. These systematic doping activities were revealed and comprehensively discussed in the German media during the 1990s. Even more than 20 years after the peaceful reunification, we still find significant differences in attitudes toward doping behavior. This demonstrates that state socialization has a long-lasting impact. This long-lasting effect could either manifest itself through direct personal experience—e.g. among those who were active former athletes—or indirectly—through a form of emotional solidarity and justification with the state in which people were raised and socialized. P. 24.

The authors explain:

This paper makes three main contributions: First, it tests and improves upon the standard methodology in the literature that compares East with West German residents to assess the impact of communism. We exploit the city of Berlin as a microcosm of Germany’s division and reunification. Like Germany as a whole, Berlin was divided into four sectors and had a communist and capitalist part. We argue that East Berliners and West Berliners are more similar and comparable than East Germans and West Germans in general. Most importantly, during the 20 years following the peaceful reunification, Berliners were exposed to the same state government, institutions, and local labor market conditions. Likewise, East-West migration within Berlin was much less pronounced that the drastic East-West German migration flows pre and post the erection of the Wall. P. 3.

I find the term "state socialization" confusing, but it just probably means state involvement in social life.  

The paper, by Ziebarth & Wagner, is titled "Top-Down vs. Bottom-Up: The Long-Term Impact of Government Ideology and Personal Experience on Values" (March 2013).

The two Germanies

While we find that risk attitudes fully converged in the second decade of reunification, it will take at least one generation for social trust and possibly much longer for perceived cooperativeness to converge.

That is from a new published paper titled "A Different Look at Lenin’s Legacy: Social Capital and Risk Taking in the two Germanies" by Heineck & Süssmuth (Journal of Comparative Economics, March 2013). A draft is here.  

Shopping time!

Number of shopping trips per week for household maintenance

The graph is from the new paper "Who Does the Shopping? – German Timeuse Evidence, 1996–2009" by Procher & Vance (January 2013).
The abstract:

The labor force participation rate of women and men is converging in industrialized countries, but disparities nevertheless remain with respect to unpaid activities. Shopping for household maintenance, in particular, is a time-consuming, out-of-home activity that continues to be undertaken primarily by women, irrespective of their employment status. The present study employs panel methods to analyze, descriptively and econometrically, gender disparities in shopping behavior among couples using data from the German Mobility Panel (MOP) for 1996 to 2009. While women still shop more than men, we find evidence that the differential has narrowed in recent years, particularly among couples with children. Several individual and household characteristics are found to be significant determinants of shopping behavior, whereby employment status and children emerge as the most important single factors. In addition, the possession of a driver’s license coupled with unrestricted car availability increase each partner’s time in shopping. 

Television and Behavior: Effort vs. Luck

Does the information provided by mass media have the power to persistently affect individual beliefs about the drivers of success in life? To answer this question empirically, this contribution exploits a natural experiment on the reception of West German television in the former German Democratic Republic. After identifying the impact of Western television on individual beliefs and attitudes in the late 1980s, longitudinal data from the German Socio-Economic Panel is used to test the persistence of the television effect on individual beliefs during the 1990s. The empirical findings indicate that Western television exposure has made East Germans more inclined to believe that effort rather than luck determines success in life. Furthermore, this effect still persists several years after the German reunification.

From the new paper, "Exposure to Television and Individual Beliefs: Evidence from a Natural Experiment," by Tanja Hennighausen (October 2012).