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In the face of rising old-age dependency ratios in industrialized countries like Germany, politicians and their electorates discuss the loosening of immigration policies as one policy option to ensure the sustainability of public social security systems. The question arises whether this policy option is feasible in aging countries: older individuals are typically found to be more averse to immigration. However, crosssectional investigations may confound age with cohort effects. This investigation uses the 1999-2008 waves of the German Socio-Economic Panel to separate the effect of age on immigration attitudes from cohort and also from time effects. Over the life cycle stated immigration concerns are predicted to increase well into retirement and decrease afterward. Relative to other issues, immigration concerns are found to actually decrease over the life cycle.

In the face of rising old-age dependency ratios in industrialized countries like Germany, politicians and their electorates discuss the loosening of immigration policies as one policy option to ensure the sustainability of public social security systems. The question arises whether this policy option is feasible in aging countries: older individuals are typically found to be more averse to immigration. However, cross-sectional investigations may confound age with cohort effects. This investigation uses the 1999-2008 waves of the German Socio-Economic Panel to separate the effect of age on immigration attitudes from cohort and also from time effects. Over the life cycle stated immigration concerns are predicted to increase well into retirement and decrease afterward. Relative to other issues, immigration concerns are found to actually decrease over the life cycle.

In summary, the four essays in this thesis focus on the demand for immigration. Their aim is to discern the impact of individuals and populations growing older on immigration preferences and immigration policies. Economically, older individuals are found to benefit more strongly from immigration. However, non-economic factors are also key in explaining immigration preferences.

This paper analyzes how population aging affects immigration policy in rich industrialized countries. It sets up a two-period model of a representative democracy with two overlapping generations. The government's preferred immigration rate increases with the share of retirees in the population. The paper differentiates between an economy without a pension system and one with pay-as-you-go pensions. As immigrants have more children than natives, the chosen immigration rate is contingent on the design of the pension system. If pension contributions and benefits are set freely by the government, equilibrium immigration is lower than it is in the absence of a pension system. On the contrary, it is higher if the pension level is fixed ex ante to a relatively generous level, since native workers then benefit from sharing the burden of pension contributions with the immigrants.

This paper analyzes how population aging affects immigration policy in rich industrialized countries. It sets up a two-period model of a representative democracy with two overlapping generations. The governments preferred immigration rate increases with the share of retirees in the population. The paper differentiates between an economy without a pension system and one with pay-as-you-go pensions. As immigrants have more children than natives, the chosen immigration rate is contingent on the design of the pension system. If pension contributions and benefits are set freely by the government, equilibrium immigration is lower than it is in the absence of a pension system. On the contrary, it is higher if the pension level is fixed ex ante to a relatively generous level, since native worker s then benefit from sharing the burden of pension contributions with the immigrants.

AbstractIn most developed countries there exist ample possibilities for individuals to minimize their personal income tax burden by means of tax deductions. The associated revenue losses for the government have been estimated for a variety of tax deductions. However, relatively little is known about the share of eligible taxpayers who actually use these deductions, and, more specifically, about what determines utilization. The present paper tries to shed some light on this question in the context of the tax deductibility of expenses for child care in Germany. Using survey data on actual child care expenses and official tax-return data on deductions for child-care expenses, we derive utilization rates. We also analyze the determinants of utilization among those who filed a tax-return, using a subsample of the tax-return data. Our estimation results show that (potential) tax breaks from utilization are significantly positively correlated with the probability of utilization. Other kinds of deductions are also highly significant, suggesting that knowledge of tax statutes as well as opportunity costs matter. Moreover, we simulate the effects of a policy reform that enhances the generosity of deductions on the utilization rate. Such a reform would substantially increase utilization. Our results indicate that responses in utilization are more important than potential responses in labor supply. (JEL codes: D14, H24, H43).

The formation of party preferences is a complex and not yet fully understood process based on a number of factors. This process, which is of great interest for both social and political science, is usually studied using questionnaire data which has proven to be a very reliable yet often costly and limited approach. Advances in technology and the rise of the internet as a primary information source for many people have created a new approach to keep track of people's interests. The major gateways to the internet's information are the so-called search engines, and Google, arguably the most commonly used search engine, allows scientists to tap the vast source of information generated by its users' search queries. In this paper we describe how this data source can be used to estimate the effect of different issues on party preferences using German voters and the German party system as an example. We find that using data provided by Google Trends can lead to a variety of interesting and occasionally counter-intuitive insights into peoples' party preferences.

The formation of party preferences is a complex and not yet fully understood process based on a number of factors. This process, which is of great interest for both social and political science, is usually studied using questionnaire data which has proven to be a very reliable yet often costly and limited approach. Advances in technology and the rise of the internet as a primary information source for many people have created a new approach to keep track of peoples interests. The major gateways to the internets information are the so-called search engines, and Google, arguably the most commonly used search engine, allows scientists to tap the vast source of information generated by its users search queries. In this paper we describe how this data source can be used to estimate the effect of different issues on party preferences using German voters and the German party system as an example. We find that using data provided by Google Trends can lead to a variety of interesting and occasionally counterintuitive insights into peoples party preferences.

The formation of party preferences is a complex and not yet fully understood process based on a number of factors. This process, which is of great interest for both social and political science, is usually studied using questionnaire data which has proven to be a very reliable yet often costly and limited approach. Advances in technology and the rise of the internet as a primary information source for many people have created a new approach to keep track of people s interests. The major gateways to the internet s information are the so-called search engines, and Google, arguably the most commonly used search engine, allows scientists to tap the vast source of information generated by its users search queries. In this paper we describe how this data source can be used to estimate the effect of different issues on party preferences using German voters and the German party system as an example. We find that using data provided by Google Trends can lead to a variety of interesting and occasionally counterintuitive insights into peoples party preferences.

AbstractImmigration has various economic and non‐economic effects on the destination country's inhabitants. In this paper, we focus on the impact of immigration on factor returns and analyze how aging affects immigration policy, employing a dynamic political‐economy model of representative democracy. Aging, that is, a decline in the growth rate of the native population, has an expansionary effect on immigration in this framework. This immigration effect may even overcompensate the initial contraction of the labor force. We show that the immigration rate in the representative democracy equilibrium exceeds the immigration rate that would maximize welfare of current and future generations, and we also discuss the influence of social security on immigration policy.

Abstract
Factor price differences create economic incentives for migration to industrialized countries and for capital flows to developing countries. However, immigration restrictions and capital expropriation risks impede factor flows. Using a political-economy approach that takes into account different generations' conflicting attitudes toward immigration and expropriation, we explore how these restrictions interact. Then, we run two separate country fixed regressions to explore the interdependence of policies empirically. The results from our theoretical model are borne out by the data: We find a positive relationship between emigration and foreign investors' perceived security of property rights in developing countries and a negative relationship between the US foreign direct investment (FDI) outflows to developing countries and the share of US green cards granted to natives from the respective countries. Based on our analyses, we conclude that the key to lowering mobility barriers is not simply a quid pro quo.

We investigate the effect of population aging on international factor flows in a political-economy framework. Political barriers to immigration in developed countries and insecure property rights in developing countries impede factor flows. Taking into account different generations' conflicting attitudes towards immigration and expropriation, we explore how these policy barriers interact. We find that incentives to expropriate increase as more emigration from the developing country takes place. Meanwhile, the industrialized country admits less immigrants as less capital is allocated to the developing country. Furthermore, the effects of population aging on international factor flows are considerably underestimated if one does not take into consideration the interactions between immigration and expropriation policies. ; Der vorliegende Aufsatz untersucht den Einfluss des demografischen Wandels auf internationale Migrations- und Kapitalflüsse unter Verwendung eines polit-ökonomischen Ansatzes. So beschränken sowohl die politischen Migrationsbarrieren in den meisten Industrieländern als auch die Enteignungsrisiken in vielen Entwicklungs- und Schwellenländern die internationale Faktormobilität. Unter Berücksichtigung heterogener Einstellungen der unterschiedlichen Generationen zu Immigration und Enteignung ausländischer Investitionen, wird der Einfluss des demografischen Wandels auf das Ausmaß von Faktorbeschränkungen simuliert. Auf dieser Basis wird untersucht, wie sich Investitions- und Migrationsbarrieren verändern, wenn eine Interdependenz der verschiedenen Politikmaßnahmen unterstellt wird. Auf der einen Seite zeigen die Ergebnisse, dass Enteignungsanreize in Entwicklungs- und Schwellenländern im Zuge der Emigration von jungen Arbeitskräften in Industrieländer zunehmen. Auf der anderen Seite nehmen Immigrationsbeschränkungen in Industrieländern durch steigende Kapitalexporte in Entwicklungs- und Schwellenländer zu. Durch die Berücksichtigung der Verflechtung zwischen den Politikentscheidungen wird zudem der Einfluss des demografischen Wandels auf die internationale Faktormobilität deutlich verstärkt.