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Against the background of multiple crises, welfare states face increasing challenges in maintaining living standards and combatting poverty. This contribution reviews the evidence with respect to poverty (risk) and homelessness in Austria, while assessing welfare state change in the past decade. It supplements traditional income-based measures with a discussion of material indicators of poverty, and discusses the important role of living costs and housing for the analysis of poverty in particular. Overall, the analysis highlights the need for policy-makers not only to rely on employment as a poverty reduction strategy, but also to ensure wage growth and the provision of basic goods and services to keep the cost of living moderate.

ZusammenfassungDieser Beitrag untersucht die Berichterstattung zur Vermögens- und Erbschaftsbesteuerung im frühen 21. Jahrhundert (2000 bis 2018) in sieben deutschen Tages- und Wochenzeitungen (Welt am Sonntag, Die Zeit, Der Spiegel, Die Welt, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Süddeutsche Zeitungundtaz).Der Artikel ist in der Tradition der Politischen Ökonomie der Medien verortet, die die mediale Verbreitung von Diskursen über gesellschaftliche Prozesse als konstitutiv auch für Präferenzen zu wirtschaftspolitischen Fragen ansieht. Medien geben nicht nur Informationen weiter, sondern tragen zur Konstruktion der sozialen Realität bei, indem die Diskurse in die Bevölkerung diffundieren. Internationale empirische Forschungen zur Medienberichterstattung über ökonomische Ungleichheit und die diesbezüglichen Umverteilungsmaßnahmen bilden die Grundlage der hier vorgestellten Studie.Die Analyse stützt sich auf Methoden der Korpuslinguistik und kommt zu vier zentralen Ergebnissen: erstens zeigt sich im Zeitverlauf, dass die Intensität der Berichterstattung von starken zeitlichen Schwankungen gekennzeichnet ist. Eine systematische Zunahme der Berichterstattung ist dabei aber nicht festzustellen, obwohl die Thematik im Kontext der stark ausgeprägten Vermögensungleichheit steht, deren verstärkte Debatte besteht. Der inhaltliche Fokus liegt zweitens auf der (partei)politischen Ebene, hat eine eindeutig monetäre Dimension, und lässt einen Zusammenhang mit gesellschaftspolitischen und wirtschaftlichen Diskursen, die im Kontext der Vermögens- und Erbschaftsbesteuerung stehen (z. B. ökonomische Ungleichheit, Umverteilungswirkungen usw.), auffällig wenig erkennen. Die Analyse einzelner, ausgewählter Zeiträume verstärkt drittens den Befund, dass die (partei)politische Ebene dabei im Vordergrund steht, da Kontroversen im politischen Raum und Reformdebatten die dominanten Anlässe der Berichterstattung darstellen. Viertens ergibt die Analyse der einzelnen Zeitungen, dass die Ausrichtung der Berichterstattung in allen Zeitungen durchaus ähnlich ausgerichtet ist; einige Differenzen ergeben sich hinsichtlich unternehmensbezogener Aspekte (Die Welt, Welt am SonntagundFAZ), Details zur Ausgestaltung der Steuern (Süddeutsche Zeitung) sowie dem Zusammenhang zwischen Erbschafts- und Vermögenssteuern mit Krisenentwicklungen und dem Klimawandel (taz).

Approaches to design comprehensive support systems for people in need of long-term care (LTC) have appeared on the policy agenda of European countries from the 1990ies. Austria was one of the first to implement such a system separate from health care. In this last significant expansion of its social protection system, the country established a universal and tax-funded LTC system, departing from Austria’s Bismarckian tradition while carrying along the familialist logic and federalist structure in this policy field. Thirty years later, Austria now joins other countries in creating solutions to important contemporary challenges by discussing another major revamp of its LTC system. This paper renders a country case study to explain the development of Austrian LTC policies in greater depth and from a dynamic perspective. The two-step approach, starts with presenting the logics and major building blocks of Austria’s LTC system, and provides an update on its benefits and services. The second part identifies and discusses a raft of current and planned measures for three areas that appear critical in terms of future proofing LTC: (i) responses to staffing challenges, (ii) policy pilots to support informal carers, and finally, (iii) the role of digital transformation for LTC in Austria. This showcase exercise fosters policy learning and thus supports innovation and refinement of LTC systems. It could also serve as a futile starting point for comparative LTC policy research that moves beyond the outer hull of care-regime typologies to explore more specific system features and policy interventions.

"An infinite number of fitness apps are available on various app stores. However, hardly any of them are fitted to the needs and requirements of care-dependent peo-ple. This paper investigates the effectiveness of a customised fitness-app prototype for increasing physical activity in home care service users. Home care service users from Austria and Italy were randomly assigned to two groups. In total, 216 partici-pants were involved in the field trial, 104 received a tablet with the fitness app and an activity tracker (treatment group), 112 did not (control group). Regularity of physical activity, frequency of fitness exercises and walking behaviour were self- reported by participants at baseline, after 4 months and after 8 months. In addition, the frequency of using the prototype was assessed based on the fitness app's logged usage data. We estimated multilevel mixed-effects ordered logistic models to examine the effects of the intervention. After 4 months, the intervention increased the home care users’ probability of agreeing strongly with being physically active on a regular basis by 28 percentage points (p< 0.001; 95% CI: 0.20, 0.36) and their probability of reporting to exercise more than once a week by 45 percentage points (p< 0.001; 95% CI: 0.32, 0.57). Walking behaviour was not affected on group- level but improved for frequent users of the activity tracker. Frequent and regular users of the fitness app benefited most and effects persisted until the end of the 8 months controlled trial. Tailoring a fitness-app prototype to the needs of care-dependent people has the potential to support people with functional limitations to engage in a more active lifestyle. Future research is encouraged to seek further insights into how new technologies can sup-port physical activities in people with long-term care needs."

PurposeUsing aggregated data at the municipality level allows the authors to assess the role of relative deprivation (RD) – a measure of income inequality – on top of absolute income in shaping internal migration in Austria.Design/methodology/approachIn this study, the authors analyse the effect of regional income inequality on emigration rates of Austrian municipalities using a unique spatial dataset that is constructed based on Austrian administrative register data. The register-based data contain information on the municipality of residence of all individuals aged 16 and over that have their main residency in Austria, as well as their income and socio-demographic characteristics.FindingsThe authors find that increases in relative deprivation in a municipality are related to higher emigration from the municipality. Allowing for heterogeneous effects across income, education and age groups reveals that the effect is stronger among those with comparably low levels of income and among low-skilled and young individuals.Originality/valueThe unique spatially disaggregated perspective is based on novel data from Austrian administrative registers, which comprehensively capture the economic situation and geographic movements of the whole Austrian population. Most importantly, this approach allows for measuring income inequality within local communities and for a direct identification of social groups that are more sensitive to inequality.

This article examines how the middle class has fared in twenty-six European countries between 2004 and 2014 based on European Survey on Income and Living Conditions (EU-SILC) data. We define individuals living in households with a median equivalized disposable household income between 75% and 125% to be middle class. We find that the middle class has decreased in eighteen out of twenty-six countries, which is accompanied by an increase of income polarization. Income redistribution is most influential for explaining differences in the size of the middle class across European countries.

Der vorliegende Text will herausarbeiten, wie sich ökonomische Modellformen zu bestimmten Formen von Computerspielen verhalten. Ausgehend von einer neuartigen interdisziplinären Kooperation zwischen Medienkulturwissenschaft und (heterodoxer) Ökonomik, die in Zukunft zu vertiefen ist, sollen neuartige Perspektiven auf die mögliche Rolle von Computerspielen und -simulationen in gesellschaftlichen Transformationsprozessen entwickelt werden. Basierend auf der systematischen Ausdifferenzierung von Computerspielwelten, vorgeschlagen von Claus Pias, wird erörtert, inwiefern sich Simulation zu einem experimentellen Medium der Kollektivierung gesellschaftlicher Utopien entwickelt, und somit zum Austragungsort politökonomischer Hegemoniekämpfe werden könnte., This essay explores how different forms of economic models relate to certain forms of computer games. Starting from a novel and interdisciplinary cooperation between cultural media studies and (heterodox) economics that is intended to be deepened in the future, it develops novel perspectives on the possible role of computer games and simulations in processes of social transformation. Analysing the systematic differentiation of computer game worlds as proposed by Claus Pias, it discusses the extent to which simulation might develop into an experimental medium for collectivizing societal utopias that would thus also become a venue for political-economic hegemonic conflicts.

This article presents the case for the significance of two neglected domains of sociological enquiry: housing tenure and subjective wellbeing. Our empirical focus is on the relationship between hou...

Purpose The Adult Social Care Outcomes Toolkit for informal carers (ASCOT-Carer) can be used to assess long-term care-related quality of life (LTC-QoL) of adult informal carers of persons using LTC services. The ASCOT-Carer instrument has been translated into several languages, but preference weights reflecting the relative importance of different outcome states are only available for England so far. In this paper, we estimated preference weights for the German version of the ASCOT-Carer for Austria and investigated the value people place on different QoL-outcome states. Methods We used data from a best–worst scaling (BWS) experiment and estimated a scale-adjusted multinomial logit (S-MNL) model to elicit preference weights for the ASCOT-Carer domain-levels. Data were collected using an online survey of the Austrian general population (n = 1001). Results Top levels in the domains of ‘Space and time to be yourself’, ‘Occupation’ and ‘Control over daily life’ were perceived as providing the highest utility, and states with high needs in the same domains seen as particularly undesirable. ‘Personal safety’ was the only domain where levels were roughly equidistant. In all other domains, the difference between the top two levels (‘ideal state’ and ‘no needs’) was very small. Conclusion The paper provides preference weights for the German version of ASCOT-Carer to be used in Austrian populations. Furthermore, the results give insight into which LTC-QoL-outcomes are seen as particularly (un)desirable, and may therefore help to better tailor services directed at informal carers and the persons they care for.

Reducing the energy demand has become a key mechanism for limiting climate change, but there are practical limitations associated with large energy savings in a growing global economy and, importantly, its lower-income parts. Using new data on energy and GDP, we show that adopting the same near-term low-energy growth trajectory in all regions in IPCC scenarios limiting global warming to 1.5 °C presents an unresolved policy challenge. We discuss this challenge of combining energy demand reductions with robust income growth for the 6.4 billion people in middle- and low-income countries in light of the reliance of economic development on industrialization. Our results highlight the importance of addressing limits to energy demand reduction in integrated assessment modelling when regional economic development is powered by industrialization and of instead exploring faster energy supply decarbonization. Insights from development economics and other disciplines could help generate plausible assumptions given the financial, investment and stability issues involved. Climate policy calls for energy demand reduction on top of decarbonizing energy generation. Analysis of historical energy–income data shows that achieving these climate targets alongside economic development poses unresolved policy and modelling challenges, especially for developing countries.

The Adult Social Care Outcomes Toolkit four response‐level interview schedule (ASCOT INT4) for service users was translated into Finnish. The aim of this paper was to investigate the construct validity and structural characteristics of the Finnish ASCOT. We used data from a face‐to‐face interview survey of older people receiving publicly funded home care services, which was conducted in 2016–2017 (n = 493), excluding missing values and proxy respondents (n = 334). Chi‐square tests, adjusted residuals and analyses of variance were used to examine hypothesised associations between each attribute and a number of relevant variables regarding health and well‐being, disabilities, living arrangements, social contact and support, experience of service use, and the nature of the locality and environment. Structural characteristics were explored using exploratory factor analysis and Cronbach's alpha test. The EQ‐5D‐3L and ASCOT were moderately correlated (r = 0.429; p < 0.001). The ASCOT attributes were statistically positively related to the overall quality of life. For other tested variables, we found a high number of significant associations with the control over daily life, occupation, social participation, and personal cleanliness attributes, but fewer significant associations with the other attributes. Cronbach's alpha was 0.697 and a single factor was extracted. This assessment provides evidence to support the construct validity of the Finnish ASCOT. The results support the introduction of the Finnish ASCOT into Finland for use in practical applications. Future research on its reliability would be useful.

A clear sign of the heightened interest in economic inequality was the surprising popularity of Thomas Piketty’s book, Capital in the Twenty-First Century, presenting a dense synopsis and major contribution to the economics of inequality. This article investigates discourses on inequality in news media, through the highly controversial debate raised by Piketty’s best-selling book, in selected print media in four European countries.We conceive of the media as having an impact on the perceptions and knowledge of economic processes, thus influencing preferences of the public for economic policy making. This is in line with Veblen, who terms the press an “educational system.” Regarding the topics of inequality, we will show that media coverage leads to a biased picture of both inequality and the role of redistribution policies to possibly curb such a development.

Lemoine and Rudik (2017) argue that it is efficient to delay reducing carbon emissions, due to supposed inertia in the climate system's response to emissions. This conclusion rests upon misunderstanding the relevant Earth system modelling: there is no substantial lag between CO2 emissions and warming. Applying a representation of the Earth system that captures the range of responses seen in complex Earth System Models invalidates the original article's implications for climate policy. The least-cost policy path that limits warming to 2°C implies that the carbon price starts high and increases at the interest rate. It cannot rely on climate inertia to delay reducing and allow greater cumulative emissions.

Background: The Adult Social Care Outcomes Toolkit (ASCOT) measures quality-of-life (QoL) outcomes of long-term care (LTC) service provision. Country-specificpreference weights are required to calculate ASCOT scores. ASCOT has been translated into German, but lacks preference weights for German-speaking countries. Objectives: This paper aims to establish Austrian preference weights for the German version of the ASCOT service user measure, using best-worst scaling (BWS). Methods: Data were collected using an online BWS-experiment from a general population sample (n=1,000) of Austrian adults. We use a scale-adjusted multinomiallogit model (S-MNL) accounting for positioning effects to estimate preference weights. Results: Austrians value the top attribute-levels in the ASCOT domains 'being meaningfully occupied during the day' and 'having control over daily life' most highly,whereas high needs were the least preferred in the domains 'dignity' and 'social participation'. From a methods perspective, we found significant positioning effectsonly for 'best' choices, with statements at the top of a list being picked more often than those further down in the list. Factors related to survey completion (self-assessed understanding of the tasks and survey completion time) were shown to have the greatest effect on individual choice consistency. Discussion:The paper provides Austrian preference weights for the German version of ASCOT for service users. The weights also provide insight into how Austriansvalue different LTC-QoL states. Future research may investigate how values for different LTC-QoL states differ between socioeconomic groups.

Assets in the fossil fuel industries are at risk of losing market value due to unanticipated breakthroughs in renewable technology and governments stepping up climate policies in light of the Paris commitments to limit global warming to 1.5 or 2°C. Stranded assets arise due to uncertainty about the future timing of these two types of events and substantial intertemporal and intersectoral investment adjustment costs. Stranding of assets mostly affects the 20 biggest oil, gas, and coal companies who have been responsible for at least one-third of global warming since 1965, but it also affects carbon-intensive industries such as steel, aluminum, cement, plastics, and greenhouse horticulture. A disorderly transition to the carbon-free economy will lead to stranded assets and legal claims. Institutional investors should be aware of these financial risks. A broader definition of stranded assets also includes countries reliant on fossil fuel exports and workers with technology-specific skills.

Massive increases in Internet data traffic over the last years have led to rapidly rising electricity demand and CO2 emissions, giving rise to environmental externalities and network congestion costs. One particular concern is the rise in data traffic generated by video-streaming services. We analyze the electricity-saving potential related to video streaming in Europe from 2020 to 2030. To this end, three trend scenarios (Business-as-usual, Gray, and Green) are considered and modeled bottom-up, taking specific electricity consumption (and trends) of data transmission networks, end-use devices, and data centers into account. Using these scenarios, we examine in more detail the approximate electricity-saving impact that regulatory interventions and technical standards can have on the electricity consumption of end-users, network operators, and data centers. The model results reveal that regulatory intervention can have a significant impact on electricity consumption and CO2 emissions of the residential houshold sector.

There is evidence that training for strength and balance prevents decline in physical function in old age when the training is personally instructed. It is an open question whether interventions that deliver training via up-to-date technologies can achieve long-term effects. This study examined the effects of an 8-month fitness training program delivered via information and communication technology (ICT) on lower-body strength and balance in female home care users (n = 72) aged 75 years on average. For statistical analysis, the test group was divided into two subgroups, one who used the program at least 8 times per month (n = 26) and another one who used the program less often (n = 17) compared with a control group that received no exercise program (n = 29). It was found that regular ICT-exercisers exhibited positive effects over time on lower-body strength and balance compared to a decrease in both indicators in irregular exercisers and the control group. The authors see potential in offering exercise programs to people of advanced age via ICT to counteract physical decline in old age.

This paper analyses the structure of the European income inequality by a decompo-sition in a within- and between-component. It illustrates a replication of the work of Beblo and Knaus (Rev Income Wealth 47(3):301-333, 2001) and decomposes the income inequality for the EU-28 in 2014 by using data from the European Survey on Income and Living Conditions. The Theil index is applied to additively decom-pose the sources of inequality into a within- and between-component by countries, country groups and demographic groups. This is done by using equivalised dispos-able household income and income before transfers and taxes. The results show that inequality, with regard to disposable income, is highest for households with house-hold heads older than 59 years and lowest for households with children. Moreover, high income countries have lower inequality, higher social expenditures and show a stronger relative reduction of income inequality after transfers and taxes than low income countries. On country group level, Social-Democratic countries have the lowest income inequality and redistribute most, while the opposite holds true for Baltic countries.

peer-reviewed The continued rise of socio-economic inequality over the past decades with its connected political outcomes such as the Brexit vote in the UK, and the election of Donald Trump are currently a matter of intense debate both in academia and in journalism. One significant sign of the heightened interest was the surprise popularity of Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the twenty-first Century. The book reached the top of the bestseller lists and was described as a ‘media sensation’, with Piketty himself as a ‘rock star economist’. This paper, drawing from a major international and cross-disciplinary study, investigates the print media treatment in four European countries of economic policy proposals presented in Capital. Applying social semiotic and critical discourse analysis, we specifically focus on articles which are in disagreement with these proposals and identify five categories of counterarguments used against Piketty: authorisation, moralisation, rationalisation, portrayal of victimhood and inevitability. Providing textual and linguistic examples we demonstrate how the use of linguistic resources normalises and conventionalises ideology-laden discourses of economic means (taxation) and effects, reinforcing particular views of social relations and class as common sense and therewith upholding and perpetuating power relations and inequalities.

Published: 02 April 2018 This article provides evidence on the decision of consumers to move from an "old" (copper-based) to a "new" (fiber-based) broadband technology, taking into account the impact of regulatory interventions imposed on the old technology. The analysis in this article has been applied to a sample of EU25 (25 European Union member states) countries using panel data from 2003 to 2015 on the adoption of fiber-based broadband technology by households and firms. Results show that an increase in the regulated price for accessing the old network favors consumer adoption of the new technology. In particular, we find that an increase in the unbundling price of 10% increases fiber-based adoption in the range of 0.7%-1%. Our results also provide insights on the take-up rate of the new technology, i.e. on the ratio between adopted and deployed fiber-based services and networks. By comparing the quantitative effects of regulation, we find that an increase in the access price decreases the take-up rate, meaning that the impact on fiber coverage is stronger than on fiber adoption.

Background: A growing number of older people, mainly women, live in single households. They represent avulnerable group as staying at home may turn out challenging when care needs increase, particularly at the end oflife. Non-kin-carers can play an essential role in supporting individuals’preferences to stay at home. In research littleattention has been paid to non-kin-carers, such as friends and neighbors, yet. Thus, the Older People Living Alone (OPLA) study will evaluate whether non-kin support is robust enough to enable care dependent people to stay athome even at the end of life. This paper aims to introduce the research protocol. Methods: We plan to apply a qualitative longitudinal study to better understand how older people living aloneand their non-kin-carers manage to face the challenges with increased care needs towards the end-of-life. We willconduct serial interviews with the older persons living alone and their non-kin-carers. A total of 20–25 completedata sets and up to 200 personal interviews were planned. These will be complemented by regular telephonecontacts. All interviews will be analysed following the grounded theory approach and strategies for reconstructingcase trajectories, supported by MAXQDA software. In the course of the study, inter- and transdisciplinary workshopsshall assure quality and support knowledge transfer. Discussion:This study protocol aims to guide research in a field that is difficult to approach, with regard to itstopic, methodology and the interdisciplinary approach. As this study introduces longitudinal qualitative researchmethodology in the field of home care in Austria, a deeper understanding of (end-of-life-) care trajectories will beenhanced, which is of major relevance for future care planning. With investment in additional reflexivity andcommunication procedures innovative results and robust knowledge are expected outcomes.

We evaluate the impact of a major European state aid programme for speed upgrades in broadband internet availability applied to rural areas in the German state of Bavaria throughout 2010 and 2011. We use a matched difference-in-differences estimation strategy that compares treated and untreated municipalities that are balanced with respect to funding criteria. We find that aided municipalities have a significantly higher broadband coverage at higher speed than non-aided municipalities. This increase in broadband coverage does not, on average, benefit the local population in terms of increase in local jobs per resident or wages. However, these effects are heterogeneous across skill groups. Furthermore, we find positive effects on the employment rate among residents. Taking these results together suggests that an increase in broadband coverage through state aid protects rural areas from depopulation (while residents work at other locations), but does not contribute to a further closing of the economic divide in the form of creating new jobs.

In a real effort lab and online team production experiment, we analyze exerted effort under different conditions of individual accountability. In a repeated setting, we vary the degree to which production can be directly traced back to a collaborator’s individual or randomly drawn effort level, respectively. We find that individuals produce much less and the decline of effort over time is significantly steeper under high as compared to low and endogenously chosen personal accountability. While endogenous accountability provides an option for monitoring others, it does not force subjects to learn about their under-performing peers, thus limiting the typical decline of contributions over time. We conclude that accountability one step removed may be an interesting institutional setting for repeated collaborations in contexts where low accountability for political, social or legal reasons is not a viable option. (author's abstract)

ArgumentThis paper argues that the economics discipline is highly concentrated, which may inhibit scientific innovation and change in the future. The argument is based on an empirical investigation of six dimensions of concentration in economics between 1956 and 2016 using a large-scale data set. The results show that North America accounts for nearly half of all articles and three quarters of all citations. Twenty institutions reap a share of 42 percent of citations, five journals a share of 28.5 percent, and 100 authors a share of 15.5 percent. A total of 2.8 percent of citations may be attributed to heterodox schools of thought. Also top articles are concentrated along these dimensions. Overall, concentration has strongly increased over the last six decades.

European countries have developed a range of long-term care (LTC) policy responses to support the increasing share of older people. However, little is known about the effectiveness of LTC services and benefits, particularly their impact on older peoples’ quality of life (QoL). This paper investigates the role of personal, care service and environmental characteristics on the effects of home care services on QoL across England, Finland and Austria. We used data from surveys conducted in England, Finland and Austria. In total, 811 older adults were included in the analysis. OLS regression including main effects and country-specific interactions was used to explore variation in gains in long-term care service-related quality-of-life (LTC-QoL). Explanatory variables were derived from the production of welfare framework and comprised home care service user socio-demographics, needs indicators, social support and environmental variables and characteristics of home care service provision. In all three countries, LTC-QoL gains increased with needs, indicating that home care services perform well, with additional gains declining the higher the needs. Also, better process quality contributed to LTC-QoL improvements in all three countries. In addition, the availability of informal care, social contact, financial household situation and living alone, were associated with changes in LTC-QoL only in one or two of the countries. Home care services increased service users’ QoL in all three European countries. The increase in QoL, however, varied across the countries. The results also provide insights into the benefits and limits of home care service provision and areas for future improvements. JEL: I31, I38, J14

Background: The emergency call feature of CARU, a voice-assistant and smart sensor, was developed by CARU AG (Switzerland, Europe). The feature is innovative as it allows older people to call for help using their voice only. Little, however, is systematically known aboutthe acceptance of CARU’s emergency feature in older adults living in assisted living facilities. Objective: The aim of this deliverable is to report on the results of the acceptance test (ACTEST) in Switzerland in older adults using the CARU emergency call in their apartments. Methods: The ACTEST lasted two months (September to November 2020). The ACTEST survey was administered in two waves. ACTEST I included test scenarios for test emergency calls from different rooms followed by survey questions. ACTEST II consisted of survey questions only. Using UTAUT2 as a conceptual model, data on acceptance indicators and predictors were collected from more than 20 customers (in 4 assisted living facilities) of the bonacasa AG, a provider of smart living services, via online-surveys. Quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive, bivariate and multivariate methods. In addition, a short questionnaire captured the view of bonacasa’s 24/7 emergency call centre staff. Results: The results show that trial participants could recall how to trigger the alarm but experienced difficulties with being detected by the CARU sensor, particularly at the first attempt. Most of the successful alarms were triggered from the room within which the CARU sensor was placed. If a connection could be established, both the guidance by CARU and the emergency service centre staff were understood clearly. Most participants rated the emergency call via CARU as easy to learn. However, acceptance, measured as intention to use, was rated very low. Ratings differed substantially across assisted living facilities.

In this chapter, I investigate the role of economists in public discourses. Conceptually, I draw on the recent ‘cultural turns’ in regulation theory and post-Marxist thinking, and in particular the work of Bob Jessop and Antonio Gramsci in their discussion of intellectuals and their role in society. Empirically, the role of economists is investigated drawing on the example of wealth and inheritance taxation in the German press in the beginning of the 21st century. The empirical analysis shows that well-known economists frequently occur in the newspaper coverage. Furthermore, a stark dominance of economists associated with mainstream economics and ordoliberalism over post-Keynesian and other heterodox economists is revealed. Given the role of economists as organic intellectuals in the political economy, this points to a continuing legitimation and normalisation of the structural power of the capital class to assert their interests regarding low wealth and inheritance taxation.

Residualization refers to the process whereby publicly subsidized rental housing moves towards a position in which it provides only a safety net for low-income households. In this paper we quantify residualization based on the income profile of households in the below market rates (BMR) rental sector. Various residualization indicators for 12 European countries from EU-SILC data are calculated. First, we explore the effect of the size of the BMR sector and the cost of alternative tenure types on residualization. Second, we investigate if there are similar trends of residualization from 2005 to 2016. We find that decreases in the share of the BMR sector are associated with significant increases in residualization. Increases in rent differences between the BMR and market rate rental sector are related to larger degrees of residualization. We further observe a rising level of residualization for most countries. However, countries with allocation systems that aim at broader income groups still display the lowest degree of residualization.

What is the impact of trade policy in developing countries? We address the question in the context of interwar India, whose trade policies have been accused of harming British export interests. We quantify the impact of trade policy on the value and composition of Indian imports, using novel disaggregated data on both trade policies and imports for 114 commodity categories coming from 42 countries. Indian trade elasticities were generally larger than those in the United Kingdom at the same time. We find that even though Indian protection lowered total imports, it sub- stantially boosted imports from the UK. Trade policy had a big impact on trade flows.

This working paper – like its companion, Caldwell and Klausinger 2021 – grew out of the authors’ joint work on Hayek: A Life, 1899–1950 (Caldwell and Klausinger 2022) and it contains material supplementing it. This paper draws to a large extent on Friedrich Hayek’s own investigations into the genealogical roots of his family. On the paternal side the family ancestry is traced back to the ennoblement of Friedrich’s great-great-grandfather Josef Hayek in 1789. On the maternal side we enquire into the family trees of Fritz’s grandfather Franz von Juraschek and his first and second wife, Johanna Stallner and Ida Pokorny. Finally, we look at the relationship between Fritz and two of his “distant cousins,” the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein and Fritz’s girlfriend in his youth and future second wife, Helene (“Lenerl”) Bitterlich.

The deployment of new broadband networks (NBNs) based on fiber-optic transmission technologies promises high gains in terms of productivity and economic growth, and has attracted subsidies worth billions from governments around the world in the form of various state aid programs. Yet, the effectiveness and the efficiency of such programs remains largely unstudied. We employ panel data from 32 OECD countries during 2002-2019 to provide robust empirical evidence of both. We find that state aid significantly increases NBNs by facilitating the deployment of new connections to 22% of households in the short term and 39.2% in the long term. By comparing the actual amounts of state aid support to the estimated impact on GDP growth, we also find it to be highly cost efficient, as the programs break even after three years on average.

The paper builds Distributional National Accounts (DINA) using household survey data. We present a transparent and reproducible methodology to construct DINA whenever administrative tax data are not available for research and apply it to various European countries. By doing so, we build synthetic microdata files which cover the entire distribution, include all income components individually aligned to national accounts, and preserve the detailed socioeconomic information available in the surveys. The methodology uses harmonized and publicly available data sources (SILC, HFCS) and provides highly comparable results. We discuss the methodological steps and their impact on the income distribution. In particular, we highlight the effects of imputations and the adjustment of the variables to national accounts totals. Furthermore, we compare different income concepts of both the DINA and EG-DNA approach of the OECD in a consistent way. Our results confirm that constructing DINA is crucial to get a better picture of the income distribution. Our methodology is well suited to build synthetic microdata files which can be used for policy evaluation like social impact analysis and microsimulation.