Filter

Private school funding and energy price crisis

On behalf of the Association of German Private School Associations (VDP e.V.), DIW Econ has investigated whether and how stable the financing system of independent schools in Germany is with regard to extreme increases in energy costs.

The vending industry between regulation and economic trends since 1993

The vending industry is currently facing a variety of challenges. Rising operating costs, the decline in floor space in the hospitality industry, the COVID-19 pandemic, and increasing digital competition are putting providers of slot machines under increasing pressure. At the same time, there is only limited legal room for manoeuvre for the vending machine industry to counteract the changed economic conditions by adjusting prices, the quantity offered and via changes to product characteristics.

On behalf of the Verband der Deutschen Automatenindustrie e.V. (Association of the German Amusement Machine Industry), DIW Econ examines the key economic figures of the amusement machine industry against the background of the applicable regulations and the development of economic trends over the past 30 years.

Targeted, Ecological and Social? Evaluation of energy policy relief measures

Due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine, renewed curfews in China, and the consequences of these events on global supply chains, the inflation rate has reached historic levels in reunified Germany since the beginning of the year. The German government has already adopted two comprehensive measures to cushion the impact of rising prices for energy, food and mobility. However, given the increasing uncertainty in the energy supply and continuing high inflation rates, these do not seem to be enough.

Social welfare associations, in particular, have criticized that the relief measures have so far not considered lower income groups and pensioners sufficiently. At the same time, climate experts fear that individual interventions such as the fuel rebate will create false incentives in the fight against climate change.

Against this background, DIW Econ, together with Prof. Dr Claudia Kemfert, on behalf of the Climate Alliance Germany, has evaluated the existing relief measures and provides an outlook on how ecological and distributional effects can be considered together in a new relief package. This is done based on an analysis of five measures in the areas of energy & heat, transport & mobility and food, which are currently being discussed politically and in the media in anticipation of a further relief package.

Update Tourism Satellite Account (TSA) for Berlin 2020

Tourism plays an important economic role in Berlin. The new edition of the TSA study for the reference year 2020 not only once again quantifies economic indicators – gross value added and employment – related to tourists’ consumption*. For the first time, the impact of the Corona pandemic on Berlin tourism is also calculated by DIW Econ in cooperation with TouristiCon and dwif, on behalf of visit Berlin.

Education as an Enabler for Private Capital Accumulation

DIW Econ Economic Bulletin, No. 1/2022:

The pension system in Germany is based on the so-called three-pillar model, consisting of the statutory pension, work-based provision and private provision.

While the statutory pension is under intense pressure from demographic change, with the baby boomer generation reaching retirement age in the mid-2020s, only around 54% of employees subject to compulsory insurance in Germany benefit from the employment-based old-age provision. The private provision in the form of Riester contracts has also been taken out by only around a quarter of the working population.