Welding high-strength aluminum alloys

Handbook has been published which integrates results of 19 research programs involving welding of high-strength aluminum alloys. Book introduces metallurgy and properties of aluminum alloys by discussing commercial alloys and heat treatments. Several current welding processes are reviewed such as gas tungsten-arc welding and gas metal-arc welding

The geography of stock exchanges in Imperial Germany

23 Stock Exchanges were in operation in Germany in 1913. We provide new data about the number of listed firms, their market value, and the number of IPOs between 1897 and 1913 for all exchanges. We assess reasons why a firm opts to be listed at a certain exchange. Large firms tend to be listed and tend to go public at the Berlin Stock Exchange, while the regional stock exchanges were important hosts for small and medium-sized firms. Borders and distance affect listing decisions, suggesting that a patriotic home bias and asymmetric information between issuer and investors affected listing decisions

The persistence of ownership inequality investors on the Germanstock exchanges, 1869-1945

We study the ownership structure of joint-stock firms for the period of 1869 to 1945 based on a unique hand-collected data set. The data covers a selection of 785 general meetings of 276 firms, including details of more than 10,000 investors. We show that after the hyperinflation of 1923, when shares became cheaper, the ownership share among lower social classes rose significantly. Moreover, with the rise of women rights after 1919, the number of shares owned by women also increased significantly. However, despite these shifts, the majority of shares remained in the hands of institutional investors and investors from the upper class, who mainly constituted and controlled the general meetings. Thus, despite the increased participation of women and the lower social classes, a stark inequality of opportunities persisted

Does Social Security Crowd Out Private Savings?

Imperial chancellor Bismarck’s system of social insurance (with its three pillars health, accident and pension insurance) was an important role model for social security systems across Europe and in the US. How the introduction of the German system changed economic expectations and decisions of the German workforce has not been researched, though. This article tries to close this gap by analyzing the development of Prussian savings banks’ deposits in the late 19th century. The introduction of social security can affect private savings in at least two different ways: on the one hand, it might induce households to reduce their precautionary savings; one the other hand, it might give people a reason to reflect on their financial needs at old age or when sick, thereby increasing their motivation to accumulate private savings. To identify the causal effect of social insurance on private savings in Prussia, we employ a difference-in-difference-like approach. We show that, in our example, social security crowded out private savings considerably

The scientific revolution and its role in the transition to sustained economic growth

We propose a Unified Growth model that analyzes the role of the Scientific Revolution in the takeoff to sustained modern economic growth. Basic scientific knowledge is a necessary input in the production of applied knowledge, which, in turn, fuels productivity growth and leads to rising incomes. Eventually, rising incomes instigate a fertility transition and a takeoff of educational investments and human capital accumulation. In regions where scientific inquiry is severely constrained (for religious reasons or because of oppressive rulers), the takeoff to modern growth is delayed or might not occur at all. The novel mechanism that we propose for the latent transition towards the takeoff could contribute to our understanding of why sustained growth emerged first in Europe

Dynamic Modeling of Hybrid Renewable Energy Systems for Off-Grid Applications

The volatile prices of fossil fuels and their contribution to global warming have caused many people to turn to renewable energy systems. Many developing communities are forced to use these systems as they are too far from electrical distribution. As a result, numerous software models have been developed to simulate hybrid renewable energy systems. However almost, if not all, implementations are static in design. A static design limits the ability of the model to account for changes over time. Dynamic modeling can be used to fill the gaps where other modeling techniques fall short. This modeling practice allows the user to account for the effects of technological and economic factors over time. These factors can include changes in energy demand, energy production, and income level. Dynamic modeling can be particularly useful for developing communities who are off-grid and developing at rapid rates. In this study, a dynamic model was used to evaluate a real world system. A non-governmental organization interested in improving their current infrastructure was selected. Five different scenarios were analyzed and compared in order to discover which factors the model is most sensitive to. In four of the scenarios, a new energy system was purchased in order to account for the opening of a restaurant that would be used as a source of local income generation. These scenarios were then compared to a base case in which a new system was not purchased, and the restaurant was not opened. Finally, the results were used to determine which variables had the greatest impact on the various outputs of the simulation

Discrimination against foreigners: The Wuerttemberg Patent Law in administrative practice

In the second half of the nineteenth century, the patent office of the German state Wuerttemberg strategically discriminated against foreign inventors by charging comparatively high patent fees. We show that this administrative practice was driven by fiscal and protectionist motives

Savings banks and the industrial revolution in Prussia : supporting regional development with public financial institutions

We show that smaller, regional public financial intermediaries significantly contributed to industrial development, using a new data set of the foundation year and location of Prussian savings banks. This extends the banking-growth nexus beyond its traditional focus on the large universal banks, to savings banks. The saving banks had an impact through the financing of public infrastructure, such as railways, and new private factories. Saving banks were public financial intermediaries, so our results strongly suggest that state intervention can be very successful, particularly in regions in the early stages of industrial development when capital requirements are manageable, and access to international capital markets is limited

The value of political connections in the first German democracy : evidence from the Berlin stock exchange

In this paper, we provide the first overview over all political connections for all firms listed on the Berlin stock exchange in 1924 and for the same sample of firms four years later. In contrast to anecdotal evidence which suggest that these political connections had a positive effect on firms performance, an event study based on the election in December 1924 and May 1928 shows only little evidence that political connections had a positive impact on firm value. These results complement previous research emphasizing that political connections might have mattered less in democracies. Indeed, this seems true for Germanys first democracy - even though it was a very unstable one

MBI-KG: A knowledge graph of structured and linked economic research data extrated from the 1937 book "Die Maschinen-Industrie im Deutschen Reich"

The MaschinenBauIndustrie Knowledge Graph (MBI-KG) is a structured and semantically enriched dataset extracted from the 1937 publication “Die Maschinen-Industrie im Deutschen Reich” (The Machinery Industry in the German Reich), published by the “Wirtschaftsgruppe Maschinenbau” and edited by Herbert Patschan. This historical source offers data on German companies within the mechanical engineering industry during the pre-World War II era. The book was digitized, and Optical Character Recognition (OCR) was applied to extract text. The unstructured extracted data was then structured and semantically enriched to enable data integration and reuse. The semantically enriched data was uploaded into an open-source knowledge-graph software. The resulting knowledge graph includes detailed information about companies, individuals, and administrative entities relevant to the German mechanical engineering industry. The data is accessible through various means, including a SPARQL endpoint, an API, advanced search functionalities, a reconciliation API, and bulk files. Each entity in the knowledge graph can be exported in multiple formats, such as CSV, RDF (ttl), JSON, and NDJSON, ensuring compatibility with diverse research tools and platforms. This dataset can be reused in various research domains, including economic history, data science, and digital humanities. By providing machine-readable, structured data from a crucial historical period, the MBI-KG facilitates novel analyses and insights into the economic and industrial landscape of early 20th-century Germany. The dataset's interoperability with other data sources and its alignment with FAIR principles further enhance its value for interdisciplinary research and long-term preservatio