Stutzer Alois

The correct prediction of how alternative states of the world affect our lives is a cornerstoneof economics. We study how accurate people are in predicting their future well-being after facing major life events. Based on individual panel da...

Institutions systematically affect which individuals gain positions in the different branchesof democratic government. Given agents' discretion in decision-making, their characteristics matter for policy choices. This perspective of politic...

In this contribution, we first discuss how the analysis of self-reported measures ofsubjective well-being can contribute to a better understanding of the extent to which public choices serve individuals’ preferences. Our research insights...

Countries differ substantially in how they deal with politicians that come from the publicsector. Most constitutions include incompatibility and ineligibility rules due to concerns about conflicts of interest and the politicization of the p...

The consequences of tobacco control policies for individual welfare are difficult to assess,even more so when related consumption choices challenge people's willpower. We therefore evaluate the impact of smoking bans and cigarette prices on...

Is obesity the consequence of an optimally chosen lifestyle or do people consumetoo much relative to their long-term preferences? The latter perspective accepts that people might face self-control problems when exposed to the immediate grat...

In economics there is presently an almost revolutionary development. The direct measurement of subjective welfare challenges traditional economics, inspires it, and opens new avenues for scientific research. The approaches and possibilities...

This paper addresses the personal linkages between the public administration and the legislature that emerge because public servants pursue a political mandate. There are concerns that the strong representation of bureaucrats in many Wester...

Cross-disciplinary ?happiness research? has made big progress in the measurement of individual welfare. This development makes it tempting to pursue the old dream of maximizing aggregate happiness as a social welfare function. However, we p...

This chapter discusses the role of environmental morale and environmental motivation in individual behavior from the point of view of economics and psychology. It deals with the fundamental public good problem, and presents empirical (labor...

Der familienergänzenden Kinderbetreuung wird grosse wirtschaftspolitische Bedeutung zugemessen, und es fliessen immer mehr staatliche Mittel insbesondere in die Förderung von Kinderkrippen. Mit der Subventionierung geht eine zunehmende Re...

The paper studies a major human activity ? that of watching TV - where many individuals have incomplete control over, and foresight into, their own behavior. As a consequence, they watch more TV than they consider optimal for themselves and...

Individuals make systematic mistakes in their decisions, because they mispredict utility from choice options. When deciding, extrinsic attributes of choice options are more salient than intrinsic attributes. Adaptation is neglected, recolle...

World governance today is characterized by international organizations lacking democratic legitimacy and control by the citizens they claim to represent. They are also criticized for being inefficient. This leads to violent protests and to ...

In dieser Arbeit werden die Auswirkungen des Frauenstimmrechts auf die Staatsausgaben in den Kantonen der Schweiz untersucht. Anhand dieser institutionell bedingten Veränderung des Elektorats studieren wir den Zusammenhang zwischen repräs...

Alienation to politics weakens political competition and can undermine the acceptance and legitimacy of democracy as a political system. Governance and representation problems at the local level cause part of citizens? lack of power and pol...

The trends and consequences of terrorist activities are often captured by counting the number of incidents and casualties. More recently, the effects of terrorist acts on various aspects of the economy have been analyzed. These costs are su...

This paper intends to provide an evaluation of where the economic research on happiness stands and in which interesting directions it might develop. First, the current state of the research on happiness in economics is briefly discussed. We...

Volunteering constitutes one of the most important pro-social activities. Following Adam Smith, helping others is the way to higher individual well-being. This view contrasts with the selfish utility maximizer who avoids costs from helping ...

This paper discusses a novel approach to elicit people?s preferences for public goods, namely the life satisfaction approach. Reported subjective well-being data are used to directly evaluate utility consequences of public goods. The streng...

A crucial aspect of constitutional design is the provision of rules on how a constitution is to be amended. If procedures for constitutional amendment are very restrictive, changes will take place outside the constitution. These changes are...

Over the past few years, there has been a steadily increasing interest on the part of economists in happiness research. This paper argues that reported subjective well-being is a satisfactory empirical approximation to individual utility an...

People not only care about outcomes, they also value the procedures which lead to the outcomes. Procedural utility is a potentially important source of human well-being. This paper aims at introducing the concept of procedural utility into ...