Departmental Responsibilities

Monash-Warwick Alliance, e.g. Monash-Warwick-Zurich-CEPR "Text as Data" Workshops, Monash-Warwick Applied Young Economist Webinar (AYEW), and Warwick-Monash Economics Student Papers (WM-ESP), joint degree programs.

Research Interests

• Economic History
• Political Economy
• Labour Economics

Recent Publications

Open access: Conquering Korea for Jesus: Protestant Missionaries, Local Churches, and Literacy in Colonial Korea,
(with Cheongyeon Won), 2024, Labour Economics 91, article 102618

Religion and Growth,
(with Jared Rubin and Ludger Woessmann), 2024, Journal of Economic Literature 62(3): 1094–1142.

Persecution and Escape: Professional Networks and High-Skilled Emigration from Nazi Germany,
(with Volker Lindenthal, Sharun Mukand and Fabian Waldinger), 2024 American Economic Journal: Applied Economics 16(3): 1-45. Lead article.

Open access: Persecution, Pogroms and Genocide: A Conceptual Framework and New Evidence, (with Sharun Mukand and Ivan Yotzov), 2022, Explorations in Economic History 86, article 101471. Lead article.

Open access: Entrepreneur Death and Startup Performance 2022,
(with Hans K. Hvide), Review of Finance 26(1): 163-185.

Open access: Forced displacement in history: Some recent research, 2022,
Australian Economic History Review 62(1): 2-25. Lead article.

Open access: More choice for men? Marriage patterns after World War II in Italy
(with Erich Battistin and Luca Nunziata), 2022, Journal of Demographic Economics 88(3): 447-472.

Open access: The Impact of Public Employment: Evidence from Bonn
(with Stephan Heblich and Daniel Sturm), 2021, Journal of Urban Economics 122, article 103291.

Jesus speaks Korean: Christianity and Literacy in Colonial Korea
(with Cheongyeon Won), Rivista di Storia Economica, 37(1), 7-32, special issue in memory of Carlo Cipolla's (1969) "Literacy and Development"

Open access: The Political Economy of the Prussian Three-class Franchise
(with Erik Hornung), Journal of Economic History, 80(4): 1143-1188.

Open access: Multiplex Network Ties and the Spatial Diffusion of Radical Innovations: Martin Luther's Leadership in the Early Reformation
(with Yuan Hsiao, Steven Pfaff, and Jared Rubin), American Sociological Review, 85(5): 857-894.

Open access: Prussia Disaggregated: The Demography of its Universe of Localities in 1871
(with Francesco Cinnirella) Journal of Demographic Economics, 86(3): 259-290.

Forced Migration and Human Capital: Evidence from Post-WWII Population Transfers
(with Irena Grosfeld, Pauline Grosjean, Nico Voigtlaender, and Ekaterina Zhuravskaya), American Economic Review, 110(5): 1430-1463.

Open access: The Separation and Reunification of Germany: Rethinking a Natural Experiment Interpretation of the Enduring Effects of Communism
(with Lukas Mergele and Ludger Woessmann), Journal of Economic Perspectives, 34(2): 143-171.

Open access: Consequences of forced migration: A survey of recent findings
(with Andreas Ferrara), Labour Economics, 59, 1-16.

Open access: Discrimination in Hiring Based on Potential and Realized Fertility: Evidence from a Large-Scale Field Experiment
(with Ana Fernandes and Doris Weichselbaumer), Labour Economics, 59, 139-152.

Religion, Division of Labor and Conflict: Anti-Semitism in Germany over 600 Years
(with Luigi Pascali), American Economic Review, 109(5): 1764-1804.

Open access: Who Voted for Brexit? Individual and Regional Data Combined
(with Eleonora Alabrese, Thiemo Fetzer and Dennis Novy), 2019, European Journal of Political Economy, 56: 132-150.

Open access: Social Cohesion, Religious Beliefs, and the Effect of Protestantism on Suicide
(with Ludger Woessmann), 2018, Review of Economics and Statistics 100(3): 377-391. Lead article.

Open access: Effects of EU Regional Policy: 1989-2013
(with Peter H. Egger and Maximilian von Ehrlich), 2018 Regional Science and Urban Economics, 69: 143-152.

Open access: Who Voted for Brexit? A Comprehensive District-Level Analysis
(with Thiemo Fetzer and Dennis Novy), 2017, Economic Policy 32(92): 601-650. Editor's Choice.

Open access: Education and Religious Participation: City-Level Evidence from Germany's Secularization Period 1890-1930
(with Markus Nagler and Ludger Woessmann), 2017, Journal of Economic Growth 22(3): 273-311.

Causes and Consequences of the Protestant Reformation
(with Jared C. Rubin and Steve Pfaff), 2016, Explorations in Economic History 62: 1-25.
Lead article

The Empire Is Dead, Long Live the Empire! Long-Run Persistence of Trust and Corruption in the Bureaucracy (with Katrin Boeckh, Christa Hainz and Ludger Woessmann), 2016, Economic Journal 126(590): 40-74. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/ecoj.12220

Trade and Tasks: An Exploration over Three Decades in Germany (with Marc-Andreas Muendler), 2015, Economic Policy 30(84): 589-641. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/epolic/eiv014

Absorptive Capacity and the Growth Effects of Regional Transfers: A Regression Discontinuity Design with Heterogeneous Treatment Effects (with Peter H. Egger and Maximilian von Ehrlich), 2013, American Economic Journal: Economic Policy 5(4): 29-77. http://dx.doi.org/10.1257/pol.5.4.29

Not the Opium of the People -- Income and Secularization in a Panel of Prussian Counties (with Ludger Woessmann), 2013, American Economic Review: Papers & Proceedings 103(3), 539-544. http://dx.doi.org/10.1257/aer.103.3.539

Offshoring and the Onshore Composition of Tasks and Skills (with Karolina Ekholm and Marc-Andreas Muendler), 2013, Journal of International Economics 90(1), 91-106. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jinteco.2012.10.005

A Gift is not Always a Gift: Gift Exchange in a Voucher Experiment (with Dolores Messer and Stefan C. Wolter), 2013, Economica 80(318), 345-371. dx.doi.org/10.1111/ecca.12004

Does Women's Education Affect Fertility? Evidence from Pre-Demographic Transition Prussia (with Francesco Cinnirella and Ludger Woessmann), 2013, European Review of Economic History 17(1), 24-44. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/ereh/hes017

Endogenous Product versus Process Innovation and a Firm's Propensity to Export (with Peter H. Egger), 2013, Empirical Economics 44(1), 329-354. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00181-009-0322-6

How low business tax rates attract MNE activity: Municipality-level evidence from Germany (with Peter H. Egger, and Valeria Merlo), 2012, Journal of Public Economics 96(9-10), 698-711. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jpubeco.2012.05.006

Too much of a good thing? On the growth effects of the EU's regional policy (with Peter H. Egger and Maximilian von Ehrlich), 2012, European Economic Review 56(4), 648-668. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.euroecorev.2012.03.001

The Effect of Investment in Children's Education on Fertility in 1816 Prussia (with Francesco Cinnirella and Ludger Woessmann), 2012, Cliometrica 6(1), 29-44.

Education and Catch-up in the Industrial Revolution (with Erik Hornung and Ludger Woessmann), 2011, American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics 3(3), 92-126.

Margins of Multinational Labor Substitution (with Marc-Andreas Muendler), 2010, American Economic Review 100(5), 1999-2030.

Going NUTS: The Effect of EU Structural Funds on Regional Performance (with Peter H. Egger, Max von Ehrlich), 2010, Journal of Public Economics 94(9-10), 578-590.

Education versus Fertility: Evidence from before the Demographic Transition (with Francesco Cinnirella and Ludger Woessmann), 2010, Journal of Economic Growth 15(3), 177-204. Lead article

Equity Fund Ownership and the Cross-Regional Diversification of Household Risk (with Mathias Hoffmann), 2010, Journal of Banking and Finance 34(1), 90-102.

The Effect of Protestantism on Education before the Industrialization: Evidence from 1816 Prussia (with Ludger Woessmann), 2010, Economics Letters 107(2), 224-228.

Youth Emancipation and Perceived Job Insecurity of Parents and Children (with Samuel Bentolila, Ana Fernandes and Andrea Ichino), 2010, Journal of Population Economics 23(3), 1047-1071 (corrected page number).

Was Weber Wrong? A Human Capital Theory of Protestant Economic History (with Ludger Woessmann), 2009, The Quarterly Journal of Economics 124(2), 531-596. Awarded the year 2010 'Prize for Academic Research' by the Friends of the Ifo Institute

Common political culture: Evidence on regional corruption contagion (with Peter H. Egger and Tobias Seidel), 2009, European Journal of Political Economy 24(3), 300-310.

Luther and the Girls: Religious Denomination and the Female Education Gap in 19th Century Prussia (with Ludger Woessmann), 2008, Scandinavian Journal of Economics 110(4), 777-805.

The Effect of FDI on Job Separation (with Marc-Andreas Muendler), 2008, The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis and Policy 8(1) (Advances), Article 8.

Income Insecurity and Youth Emancipation: A Theoretical Approach (with Samuel Bentolila, Ana Fernandes and Andrea Ichino), 2008, The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis and Policy 8(1) (Contributions), Article 19.