Publications

Populists typically frame politics as a conflict between a corrupt elite and a virtuous people and are skeptical of institutional constraints, including those protecting freedom of expression, as they…

I estimate the cross-border effects of Swedish nuclear outages using hourly data on day-ahead prices, generation, and consumption across 15 bidding zones in Northern Europe from 2021 to 2024. I exploi…

We propose a novel dynamic panel estimator. Different from the commonly used difference and system GMM, our proposed estimator requires only one of the cross-sectional dimension (N) or the time dimens…

This essay examines the rise of “Green Deals” as large-scale state-sponsored active industrial policies to accelerate a transition toward climate neutrality. Building on the concept of mission-oriente…

Green Deals have been introduced across Western economies as large-scale, mission-oriented innovation policies (MOIPs) intended to combine economic growth with environmental sustainability. Rooted in…

How are preferences for innovation formed, and what determines the long-run direction of technological change? This paper shows that early-life exposure to environmental accidents can durably reorient…

This study examines how parenting styles predict children’s lifetime outcomes. Using a Swedish dataset which combines rich survey information on parenting styles with administrative records tracking c…

I study the digital market for attention in a freemium mobile game where users choose between paying with money or by watching 30-second video ads. Using unique event-level data, I estimate consumers’…

Welfare services such as healthcare, elderly care, and education are key to ensuring quality of life generally, and vital for rural communities across urbanizing countries. While these sectors are lar…

The European football (soccer) market increasingly funnels rents to superstar players and intermediaries while weakening competitive balance. We trace this dynamic to two forces: (a) technological inn…

What leads self-employed entrepreneurs to incorporate? I examine how tax incentives interact with the cost of incorporation to answer this question. I exploit the abolition of minimum capital requirem…

This study critically examines HYBRIT (Hydrogen Breakthrough Ironmaking Technology), a Swedish flagship project—led by the government-owned iron ore company LKAB—to produce fossil-free sponge iron usi…

We study how students adjust their early career choices in response to economic crises and how these decisions affect their long-run labor market outcomes. Focusing on Sweden’s deep recession in the e…

We present results from research on different dimensions of immigrant self-employment in Sweden. There are variations in self-employment rates between different groups of immigrants and the native pop…

Capital income is known to increase income inequality when measured on an annual basis, but the role of personal capital income in long-run inequality is rarely studied. Theoretically, capital income…

We examine EU and UK plans for achieving a fossil-free energy system by 2050, centered on massive electrification and large-scale deployment of wind and solar power. Using empirical trends, cost analy…

We study the wage effects of an expansion of for-profit preschools in Sweden, which followed after a reform in 2006 removed municipalities’ right to veto private entry. The expansion decreased prescho…

This paper examines income and employment outcomes for immigrants in Sweden’s most immigrant-dense neighbourhoods between 1998 and 2022. While relative employment among immigrants has improved, relati…

How do corporate tax systems shape the boundaries of the firm? This paper shows that nonlinear corporate income taxation can distort firms’ organizational structures by inducing tax-motivated firm spl…

Many countries have established new local colleges to increase access to education for disadvantaged populations. However, many of these expansions have not reduced educational inequality. Drawing on…

We examine how gender-based occupational sorting before the release of ChatGPT relates to predicted exposure to generative AI and its potential implications for the gender wage gap. Using Swedish admi…

We characterize Nash equilibria in multi-product markets in which producers commit to vectors of supply functions contingent on all prices. The framework accommodates (dis)economies of scope in produc…

We study the effect of prison sentences on recidivism using a unique feature of sentencing for drunk driving in the Swedish court system. Below the blood alcohol concentration (BAC) of 1.0‰, individua…

One of the most cited studies within the field of binary choice models is that of Klein and Spady (1993), in which the authors propose an estimator that is not only non-parametric with respect to the…

This paper examines how managerial background influences firms’ use of labor migration. Using Swedish data, we analyze whether firms led by foreign-born managers are more likely to apply for work perm…

I examine the pricing behavior of municipal and private firms in the unregulated Swedish district heating market, characterized by geographically bounded local monopoly networks. Conditional on exogen…

We use a natural experiment and administrative data to study the effect of corporate tax cuts on business activity. For identification, we exploit the abolition of municipal corporate income taxation…

We explore the challenges facing the current academic training of economists in small European countries like Sweden. The monolithic focus on publishing in the top-five journals, which prioritizes met…

Identifying high growth startups ex-ante and fostering their success is an important policy challenge. Using Swedish registry data, we show that previous labor market earnings of entrepreneurs is a si…

Recent developments in artificial intelligence raise fundamental questions about the future of academic accounting research. By integrating core microeconomic principles, a wide range of theoretical p…

This paper develops a simple nonparametric test for perfect competition in markets for homogeneous goods. The method only requires data on prices and some aggregate of output. We then generalize the m…

It has been suggested that an intensified trade war between China and the US could reduce CO2 emissions associated with exports. We develop an export-greenfield-endogenous merger model, showing t…

EU member state investment treaties have been criticized for potentially deterring EU countries from pursuing desirable policy measures. This paper explores whether these treaties can nonetheless serv…

This paper examines the impact of a Swedish policy allowing manufacturing firms to influence the curricula of local educational institutions. Our analysis shows that the program has contributed to a s…

This paper critically evaluates the European Union’s shift towards large-scale green industrial policies. It highlights the risks of government-directed resource allocation, such as inefficiencies, mi…

Using matched employer–employee data, we investigate the influence of human capital inputs on firm productivity. Several variables are used to measure firms’ access to skilled labor, such as their sha…

Uncertainty affects people in various ways. It is frequently found to hinder investment and production in the economic sphere. In this study, we examine the empirical relationship between uncertainty…

The rapid rise of e-scooters (electric scooters) in cities around the world, boosted by the introduction of shared e-scooter services has visibly reshaped the way people move around cities, sparking b…

We provide a critical analysis of the adoption of the US ‘top-five model’ by European economics academia. This model prioritizes publications in five elite journals, heavily influencing the career tra…

Understanding the consequences and recovery for countries hit by adverse national events such as political crises is central to understanding long-run development dynamics. Utilizing the Coleman boat…

The various form of pattern bargaining with manufacturing, as representative of the tradables sector, deciding the norm for wage increases in the Nordic countries are reviewed. This form of bargaining…

We document that large cities were instrumental in shaping women’s work and family outcomes in the early 20th century. We focus on migrants to Stockholm, Sweden’s largest city, using representative, l…

We exploit education reforms in Sweden and other European countries to estimate the causal effects of longer and modernized compulsory education on civic engagement. In most countries, compulsory educ…

The neo-Schumpeterian growth models, which appeared in the early 1990s, have ostensibly reintroduced the entrepreneur into mainstream growth theory. However, we show that by ignoring genuine uncertain…

This paper examines the long-term effects of early sports selection using a regression discontinuity design. I show that Swedish track and field athletes who qualified for a one-time appearance with t…

The power exchange and the real-time markets used by the system operator differ in how system constraints are managed. This can result in regulatory arbitrage, which can increase consumer costs, incre…

We document the socioeconomics of wind power expansion in Sweden using two metrics. First, we compute the difference in socioeconomic status (SES) between residents exposed to wind power (0-2 km from…

We analyze the effects of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the partial military mobilization, and the Wagner Group rebellion on a broad set of sentiments in the Russian population, using the exogenous ti…

We estimate the causal effects of parental incarceration on children’s short- and long-run outcomes using administrative data from Sweden. Our empirical strategy exploits exogenous variation in parent…

Electronic monitoring (EM) has emerged as a popular tool for curbing the growth of large prison populations. Evidence on the causal effects of EM on criminal recidivism is, however, limited, and it is…

The increasing electoral success of populist radical-right parties poses a significant challenge to established political parties in Western democracies. While mainstream parties often maintain a poli…

This paper presents evidence that anonymous grading benefits female university students based on a university-wide reform. Female grades improve by 0.04-0.06 standard deviations relative to males, wit…

Quasi-markets in the provision of public services are increasingly common but also highly contested. We formulate a conceptual framework based on economic theory to describe how quasi-markets differ f…

Borrowing ideas from the medical sciences, we propose tentative guidelines for reliable causal inferences that cover aspects related to both the study itself and its fit with background knowledge. We…

We study responsiveness of owner-managed companies to a corporate income tax kink using Dutch tax records linking firms to their owners. The corporate taxable income elasticity (CETI) is 0.08, but tax…

This paper examines long-term trends in aggregate wealth and inheritance and in their distributions, focusing on developed economies. A key stylized fact is that wealth is less equally distributed tha…

This chapter examines the implications of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and automation for the taxation of labor and capital in advanced economies. It synthesizes empirical evidence on worker displacem…

Startups face a trade-off between short-term profitability and long-term growth. Their cash flows are said to follow a so-called J-curve. The shape of the curve depends on investors' financing capacit…

The discussion of the growth consequences of socialism has fulminated for a century, sparked off by the Calculation Debate in the 1920s and 30s, and has concerned the performance of the Soviet Union i…

This paper investigates the role of individualism in explaining cross-country differences in working from home (WFH). Using data from the Current Population Survey (CPS) of the United States and the E…

We examine immigrant self-employment in Sweden during 2011–2021 – a turbulent decade with a large influx of refugees into the country and the outbreak of the global COVID-19 pandemic. Four outcome var…

Protecting biodiversity will require the phase-out of harmful production at a large scale. However, some of these stranded investments will be foreign-owned, and can therefore be protected by the more…

Aging populations strain pension systems, prompting policymakers to introduce partial retirement schemes to incentivize workers to retire later. I study the impact of introducing partial retirement wi…

This paper studies how a special wage increase for assistant nurses in Sweden affected income and employment. Workers in the public sector receive wages based on negotiations between unions and employ…

We study how financing constraints affect the cash holdings of small and medium-sized enterprises. There has been little empirical work on this topic, even though these firms often face financial cons…

This paper develops a comprehensive framework for analyzing the revenue, efficiency and social welfare implications of top income taxation. It generalizes the Saez (2001) formula for the optimal top t…

Populist parties have grown rapidly in popularity in most European countries, and are increasingly common in government coalitions. Analyzing 183 populist parties in 33 European countries from 1980 to…

This paper examines the electoral impact of increased foreign tourism, using data from Croatia. Exploiting exogenous variation in travel times to coastal municipalities from improved road infrastructu…

This article discusses welfare quasi-markets, a promising yet under-explored area of study in entrepreneurship research. Many countries have implemented quasi-markets to enhance entrepreneurship and i…

This study provides a comprehensive analysis of the generational wealth transfer within Sweden’s public pay-as-you-go pension system introduced in 1960. Using extensive administrative registers, the p…

Our use of longitudinal register data combined with a unique survey allows us to offer a more comprehensive picture of rural self-employment than in previous studies. We find that self-employed in rur…

Academic freedom is a cornerstone of modern academic life. It is not only implied by basic liberal principles but also contributes to scientific progress and economic growth. It is therefore important…

We evaluate a non-targeted summer youth employment program (SYEP) for high school students aged 16–19 in Stockholm, Sweden, where public sector job offers were as good as randomly assigned. In contras…

The notion that society should be organized around large so-called missions has gained momentum in public debate, and the reemergence of active industrial policy across the world has been inspired by…

The net-zero agreement on carbon emission from Paris 2015 gives a key role to fossil-free energy technologies with an expected multifold growth rate over the coming decades, when successively replacin…

Firms relying on working capital raise prices following monetary tightening, and this paper demonstrates that the working capital channel plays a key role in partial and general equilibrium inflation…

We study commercialization of personal data through personalized advertising by a content platform. Content consumption generates productive data about consumer preferences. The firm invests in artifi…

This study evaluated discrimination against children with Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus (T1DM) in Swedish sports clubs through a field experiment. Two fictitious fathers sent emails to 193 top-division clu…

A common claim holds that investment treaties reduce the willingness of host countries to regulate foreign-owned, environmentally-stranded, investments. A counter-argument is that the treaties can yie…

This paper integrates findings from several different case studies on Mission-Oriented Innovation Policies (MOIPs) and makes use of existing literature to briefly describe three other missions: The Wa…

Many insolvency systems focus on restructuring financial liabilities, and ignore operational liabilities such as leases and long-termsupplier contracts. We model the U.S. option to reject such contrac…

We investigate the impact of attending a free school in England – that is, a new start-up school that enjoys considerable autonomy while remaining in the state sector. We analyse the effects of two se…

Private equity buyouts have sparked debates among labor unions and worker representatives on how they affect workers. This chapter provides an overview of academic evidence on how private equity buyou…

Mission-oriented innovation policies are becoming increasingly popular among policymakers and scholars. We maintain that these policies are based on an overly mechanistic view of innovation and econom…

The association between freedom of expression – freedom of speech and the freedom of the media – and social conflict is theoretically ambiguous and politically highly contested. On one side of the deb…

This paper analyses the effects of independent-school competition on Sweden’s performance in TIMSS, an international low-stakes test in mathematics and science among students in year 8. Exploiting var…

There is widespread concern, especially in certain feminist circles, that a market-oriented economic system, or capitalism, disfavors women. This could take many forms, such as lower wages for the sam…

This study estimates the impact of carbon pricing on international trade in equipment used in the combustion of fossil fuels during the period 1995–2021. Using detailed data on bilateral trade combine…

This paper examines the European Union's changing perspective on globalization, reflecting a shift from its traditionally open, rules-based trade policy. The rise of internal protectionist measures, c…

Can competition and the existence of profit-seeking actors in the school market improve educational quality? To see cost-efficient, long-term improvements, we identify the school system’s capacity for…

Local resistance towards wind power is a central challenge for the energy transition, implying that legally imposed compensation schemes for nearby residents may become prevalent in the near future. I…

The European Union (EU) is becoming more inward looking and more hesitant towards globalization. This paper examines recent transformations in EU's economic policies, with a focus on international tra…

The paper acknowledges the changed geopolitical map and the new adjacent political mindset and examines the current state of the relationship between MNEs and governments/central banks. The focus is o…

Green parties are commonly seen as strong proponents of wind power. This paper presents an alternative view from Sweden’s highly decentralized institutional setup, where municipalities can veto wind p…

This paper investigates the impact of financial constraints on firms’ inventory holdings, an area of significant interest given that inventories are volatile over the business cycle. I use detailed da…

This paper examines the identity and origins of Swedish inventors prior to World War I drawing on the universe of patent records linked to census data. We document that the rise of innovation during S…

We study the heterogeneity of family firms using registry data on all private firms in Sweden. We restrict our sample to firms with at least one employee, and we define a family firm as a firm where t…

We study multi-unit auctions where bidders have single-unit demand and asymmetric information. For symmetric equilibria, we identify circumstances where uniform-pricing is better for the auctioneer th…

We investigate the returns to cognitive ability in the labor and capital markets. Using population-wide Swedish military enlistment data and administrative tax records, we find that cognitive ability…

In this study, we examine the relationship between within-firm pay inequality and employee productivity. We use hand-collected data on a sample of S&P 1500 companies from 2018-2022 and find a conc…