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Did the introduction of the euro lead to money illusion? Empirical evidence from Germany

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  • Bittschi, Benjamin
  • Duppel, Saskia

Abstract

Using the introduction of the euro as a natural experiment, we provide economy-wide evidence for money illusion based on declared donations from German administrative income tax data. Our results suggest a magnitude of the money illusion effect between 2.4% and 7.6%. Compared to previous studies on money illusion in the course of the euro currency changeover this effect size is significantly lower. We trace this back to the more comprehensive donation data in our study compared to hitherto studied face-to-face collections, which makes our results less prone to "power of the ask" and social pressure effects.

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  • Bittschi, Benjamin & Duppel, Saskia, 2015. "Did the introduction of the euro lead to money illusion? Empirical evidence from Germany," ZEW Discussion Papers 15-058, ZEW - Leibniz Centre for European Economic Research.
    • Handle: RePEc:zbw:zewdip:15058
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Grundmann, Susanna & Giamattei, Marcus & Lambsdorff, Johann Graf, 2019. "Intentions rather than money illusion – Why nominal changes induce real effects," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 119(C), pages 166-178.
    2. Benjamin Bittschi & Sarah Borgloh & Berthold U. Wigger, 2020. "Philanthropy in a Secular Society," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 176(4), pages 640-664.
    3. Antonio J. Morales & Enrique Fatas, 2021. "Price competition and nominal illusion: experimental evidence and a behavioural model," SERIEs: Journal of the Spanish Economic Association, Springer;Spanish Economic Association, vol. 12(4), pages 607-632, December.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    money illusion; euro introduction; charitable giving; natural experiment;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D12 - Microeconomics - - Household Behavior - - - Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
    • E03 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - General - - - Behavioral Macroeconomics
    • E40 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - General

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