Volume 64, Issue 1

The Nobel laureate James M. Buchanan died on January 9, 2013. The article lists the main stations of his academic career and reviews the central thoughts of his scientific work, emphasizing its affinities to the Ordo-liberalism of the Freiburg School.

With his analysis of the Treaty of Versailles John Maynard Keynes became one of celebrated Economists of his time. As a member of the British delegation and therefore participant in the Paris Peace Conference he predicted that the principal product of the conference, the Treaty of Versailles, will fail to realize any of the major goals of its framers. Concerning this matter Keynes points to the cognitive errors and oversights of the negotiators as a primary cause. Against this background the logic of his reasoning is re-examined in light of recent research of behavioral economics. It reveals that Keynes′ approach is actually very consistent with and anticipating the results of recent economic works on cognitive heuristics, illusions and biases with respect to human information processing, judgment und choice in complex situations.

Considerations concerning the order of markets and competition in many cases refer to their “classical” origin. In this manner they are united by a couple of common questions. The integration of findings from psychological and sociological research, as well as from theory of knowledge is still an essential challenge of heterodox economics. This paper discusses how to describe competitive markets as emergent phenomena and how to interpret them as evolutionarily superior. The starting point of these considerations is F.A. Hayek′s posit of the “Primacy of the Abstract”. The problem of self-reference has to be expounded, as well as the interrelation between utility, scarcity and prices. The discussion focuses on the asymmetries between knowledge and motivation. The drawn conclusions are then referred to the problem of emergence.

Apparently, at the royal forest academy of Tharandt (Germany), two different theories on forest sustainability have been taught and investigated. These are the two directions which are related to Cotta and Pressler. At first, these two approaches do not seem to be compatible, they even appear mutually exclusive. In the article, the attempt is made to understand these two approaches as interrelated. This will be realized by using Hayek′s theory of the forms of human orders. As a result, it is proposed to separate between forest sustainability in an external and in an extended order. For forestry today, solely the influence of forest sustainability of the external order seems to be of particular importance as a kind of informal institution. To interpret the common forest regulation as a guideline for a sustainable forestry in the extended order of market exchange is a fatal misunderstanding. Instead, the theories of human order might be applied as commencements for systematic studies of how the order of rules improves sustainable forestry and which order of rules prevents sustainable forestry from evolving.

The idea of “social justice”, as it was publicized by Ordo-liberal economists based on Catholic social teaching, aims at providing all citizens with opportunities to live their life independently and on their own responsibility. Thus, this idea of justice bears significant analogies to the capabilities approach of A. K. Sen. Therefore, “social justice” should nowadays be interpreted as a norm to improve people′s capabilities to participate in social and economic life. In this context, the principle of subsidiarity plays a very important role as a link between Christian moral theology and liberal economic thinking. Besides this, the subsidiarity principle is closely connected with the norm of individual responsibility, which is a crucial point for combining liberty and responsibility.

Equability of taxation has an ethical as well as a theoretical dimension. With regard to this theoretical dimension the question occurs, how equability of taxation can be identified and which economic theories should be referred to. The result presented here is, that equability of taxation can be substantiated in a neoclassical as well as in an evolutionary way. Neoclassical equability of taxation is substantiated as neoclassical tax neutrality. Neoclassical equability of taxation has its foundation in the neoclassical theory of tax effects. Neoclassical tax neutrality is derived from neoclassical welfare economics. Evolutionary equability of taxation is substantiated as reduction of tax avoidance. It is based on the approach by Viktor Vanberg. The decision for neoclassical or evolutionary equability of taxation depends on ones dimensioning on either the degree of reality and consistency or methodical stringency. The view presented here is that a realistic, consistent, though less stringent evolutionary equability of taxation should be preferred to a neoclassical.

Our paper presents the results of a detailed study of the legislatory process within the German tax simplification act passed in 2011. We carve out influence factors on tax complexity within the legislatory process which are beneficial or detrimental to tax simplification. The comparison of the results with pivotal existing political-economic literature on the formation of tax law and tax complexity reveals how and when the arguments of the latter play a role in the processes observed. Further remarkable factors like the (biasing) influence of the press, incomplete information and ideological struggles are observed.

The paper at hand aims to verify, if and in how far the German corporate governance- system, in particular the financing patterns of firms, have converged towards international standards in the course of the ongoing institutional competition. For this purpose the German system is characterized in the context of alternative corporate governance-systems at first. After this the structure of financing patterns as well as corresponding institutional features of large German corporations are analyzed empirically. The results show that an efficient “mixed financing”-pattern, combining the traditional benefits of financing by a house-bank with the opportunities of financing on the capital market, clearly dominates in Germany. Against this background a re-orientation of the research on corporate governance as well as of the German legislation seems to be indicated.

German public broadcasting is in a deep crisis: bribe money, covered advertising, bad corporate governance, inefficient management and a debate about the new broadcasting fee brought the whole system of public broadcasting under pressure. This article discusses the main problem areas of public broadcasting and argues that the reasons for this mess are a lack of regulatory policy, wrong incentives and the absence of competition. Further on, several proposals of reform are being discussed.

The aims of the turnaround in energy policy (“Energiewende”) in Germany after 2011 have no solid foundation. Meanwhile, the share of German carbon emissions is only 2,5 % of world′s emissions. So the benefits of the extent and speed of German energy policy is doubtful. The political enforced division of a decreasing competitive market on the one side and a system of subsidies on the other side in the electricity market leads not only to a large volume of subsidies, but also to problems of the residual market with “classic” power generation. This part of the supply side is still necessary since a very large part of renewable generation is volatile. But the market incentives to build new capacities or to continue with old capacities are too weak. Therefore we have a discussion on capacity markets, which require additional subsidies. In fact, we would need a parallel building of renewable capacities, north-south expansion of the grid and simultaneously a construction of very large storage capacities. Germany does the first very strongly, lacks behind with the second, and the third requirement still is cloud-cuckoo-land. This will cause risks to the safety of the system. Concerning the other markets, we have a lot of interventions into the transport and heat sector, which in many areas are contradictory. Instead of trusting into market signals, the government intervenes at too many places.

In this paper, the climate policy of avoiding carbon dioxide is criticized and confronted with the strategy of an ex-post repair of damages - a strategy which provides various advantages. First of all, the climate models forecasting a largely mono-causal connection between an anthropogenic emission of carbon dioxide and climate change are encumbered with significant uncertainties. Furthermore, the policy of avoiding carbon dioxide generates considerable economic costs which are supposed to exceed by far the costs of a subsequent repair of damages caused by climate changes. Another advantage of the proposed strategy is that a purposive repair of the particular damages would be possible after the incident, when the specific kind, extent, and spatial distribution of the damages are known. Finally and consequently, correctable measures of a limited extent should be implemented. They would allow to dispense with large-scale projects entailing unforeseeable consequences.

Due to the introduction of mini- and midi-jobs in 2003, the final implementation of a subsidized low-wage sector in Germany was completed. After ten years, in 2013, the boundary arrangements of these types of employment were adjusted in order to compensate the interim development of wages. Our paper starts with an explanation on the theoretical effects of wage subsidies. Hereafter we evaluate the effects of mini- and midi-jobs on employment by using a meta-analysis of previous research results. For the two types of employment, however, we can′t find uniquely positive results. They don′t create a bridge between unemployment and employment nor do they serve as a stepping stone to a regular job. Based on the weaknesses of the mini- and midi-jobs, we propose two approaches to reform the low-wage sector in achieving positive effects on employment.

In times of transnationally integrated financial markets, the optimal design of financial supervision presents a particular challenge. Taking the Eurozone′s plan for a banking union as a starting point, this article analyses the intricate problems and offers solutions from a policy perspective. It discusses whether uniform law-making needs to be supplemented by uniform institutional arrangements for law enforcement; what is the appropriate scope of supranational financial supervision, e.g. whether it should only include Systematically Important Financial Institutions (SIFIs); which approach (sectoral or integrated) to supervision is more fitting; whether supranational financial supervision should be conferred to a college of national supervisors or to a self-standing body and whether this body should be a Central Bank or a separate institution. The contribution results in some practically oriented proposals that show the way beyond the current political discussion.

The separation of investment and commercial banking has had a long tradition primarily in the US. Since the global financial crisis similar rules are being discussed by rule-makers all over the world, now however with various modifications. The German legislator has just decided on their introduction. Traditionally, such rules have been justified by considerations with regard to single financial institutions, but since the financial crisis the question of system stability has come to the fore. By no means has it been proven, however, that the separation of investment and commercial banking is able to reduce systemic risks. In addition, such a regime restricts institutional diversity and thus threatens to have destabilizing effects itself. The modifications which are currently being discussed as alternatives to the classical separate banking system cannot dispel these doubts. A restriction of activities based on the US-american Volcker Rule causes substantial problems with respect to identifying prohibited transactions. Moreover, it raises concerns about an increase in unregulated shadow banks. The intra-group separation of business lines which is planned and/or adopted on the European level, in Great Britain and Germany does not offer any promising leverage against systemic risk spreading: According to applicable corporate law, individual corporate affiliates are by no means entirely unconnected, but remain effectively integrated in a corporate group. Moreover, investor confidence in the entire group will be shaken even in case of difficulties of single divisions only. To sum up, the reservations against structural rules introducing a separate banking system are predominant, as such rules massively intervene in grown bank structures, at the same time being very complex, and for this reason posing the risk of circumvention as well as the risk of unintended side-effects. An incentive-based, more focused regulation of securities trading seems to constitute a much better alternative.

Already prior to the global financial crisis since 2007, the transfer of assets and liabilities from insolvent banks to private sector purchasers or “bridge banks” (established and funded by public authorities) has been developed, and promoted, as a functional substitute for more traditional approaches to bank insolvency management by policymakers in a number of jurisdictions and international standard-setting bodies. In response to lessons learnt from the crisis, the concept has now become widely accepted as international best practice and, indeed, forms part of the innovative “toolbox” for bank resolution provided for by the proposed EU Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive. The present article critically evaluates the concept in view of the functional objec tives of insolvency law generally and its technical implications. Specifically, it analyses whether transfer mechanisms can facilitate the participation of bank owners and bank creditors in the losses arising from bank insolvency, and thus help to foster market discipline while minimising externalities for the taxpayer even in the case of large, complex, internationally connected banks and banking groups. It argues that, jointly with other measures, including a “bail-in” of uninsured creditors, the mechanism could indeed yield positive results with regard to the incentive structure of some of the relevant actors, but faces severe practical obstacles that could compromise the effective application of the concept in particular in very large and complex cases for the time being.

This paper analyzes whether price developments on commodity markets support the hypothesis that commodity prices are subject to speculative behavior in certain time periods. This is an important research question within the ongoing debate on the regulation of commodity trading. It can be shown that commodity prices occasionally exhibit explosive behavior. In particular, this is found for raw industrials, but also for foodstuff. An important implication is that the reasons and the effects on consumers and investors of bubbles on commodity markets have to be investigated in greater detail. Additionally, the distributional effects of these findings should be analyzed in future research.

The huge number of transactions of index funds on agricultural futures markets have been criticized by the media and many other stakeholders. The criticism is often based on wrong information. To correct this information it is partly needed to fill some gaps by future research in this field. However, the following research lays out the basis for an objective discussion based on the current knowledge which shows that index funds follow a passive trade strategy that likely stabilizes prices. Therefore, trade restrictions by position or price limits may significantly harm the functioning of futures markets and will likely not solve the problem of volatile futures and cash market prices.

A defect of democratic decision-making lies in the pressure of interest groups on politicians when competing for election votes. Politicians promise monetary benefits at public expense. Thinking in legislative periods favours acting within time frames which are too short. Different causes and forms of appearance of short-term thinking and acting are discussed in this article as well as possible countermeasures. A special focus is on institutions such as central banks which are not (yet) a subject to governmental orders. The lower the governmental interventions on markets are the smaller are the contact points for the influence of interest groups. Legislator′s responsibility to estimate long-term impacts for all actions and to expose predictions to public criticism can protect the next generation from serious burdens.

In the first part symptoms of policy failure within the framework of the European Currency Union will be presented. Thereafter those symptoms will be discussed by seven propositions. In part three the obtained results will be commented upon.

Many economists consider “Ordnungstheorie” to be a some what outmoded specific German approach in economics. In this paper it is shown that this is a totally misleading perspective, and that many innovative approaches in economics like Public Choice, Institutional Economics and Law and Economics are in fact belonging to the field of inquiry called “Ordnungstheorie” in German. Moreover, it is demonstrated that a number of damaging developments during the present crisis of financial markets and over indebtedness of states are caused by a neglect of corresponding analyses.

The call for “more Europe” has to do with fundamental currents in the process of european integration. At the same time it is said to give an answer to the present financial crisis. The fundamental currents can be systematized as the peace-argument, the internal market-argument, the imperial argument and the German-Argument. Some specific interests of the individual member states have to be added. Objectives and instruments, finally, are not in a proportionate relation. The present crisis is due to the political load of the project common currency. From a german perspective the aim was to make the process of the european integration “irreversible”. The peculiarities of the markets were heavily underestimated, the failing weight of the “no bail out-clause” in case of a banking crisis was not considered. Erronneously on trusting on the binding force of international treaties even then when core elements of policy were at stake. From a french perspective the target was to eliminate the “imperialism of the Deutsch-Mark”. The french diplomacy pursued its interests in a masterly manner. To overcome policy defects by an extension of policy seems rather grotesque. The concept of a federal European state lacks all necessary prerequisites. In addition one is handed over to the unknown results of majority decisions. The present policy of the European Central Bank is an example for that. The continuing responsibility of a member state has, under these conditions, the character of a safe harbour. As far as the currency union is concerned three options can be distinguished: The actual policy of saving banks and states is continued. The failure of this policy is not yet sure. When the attitude of buying time does not lead to lasting structural reforms we reach a transfer union. Imperative would be a revival of the no bail out-principle and determined resistance against all efforts to transform elements of a crisis-management into a rule of durability. Proposals from a green table to split up the currency union do not find a political majority and jeopardize in their antagonism the project of european integration itself.