Wine prices in the Nordic countries: Are they lower than in the region of origin?

The aim of this paper is to analyse the retail prices on wine in different countries. In general, country-specific price differences on identical wines are expected to reflect differences in taxes, import prices, transportation and other costs. Also the competitive conditions on the retail markets in the relevant countries are important. Accordingly, lack of competition at the retail level, high import prices and high duties on wine all contribute to increase wine prices. Next, consumer prices on wine are expected to be relatively lowest in the producer country and even lower on the local markets in the producing region. The Nordic countries are located far away from overseas wine producing countries, i.e. Australia and California and they all tax wine higher than in the producing country. Finland, Norway and Sweden have state monopoly in the retail trade of wine and spirits whereas the sales system for wine in Denmark is liberal and in line with the Australian and Californian system. Based on price information at the retail level, the paper analyses the logic of the relative prices on identical Australian and Californian red wines bought in Australia and California compared to Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden.Wine prices, Californian wines, Australian wines, Wine taxes, The Nordic Market for wine

What does California have in common with Finland, Norway and Sweden?

The aim of this paper is to analyse the retail prices on wine in different countries. In general, country-specific price differences on identical wines are expected to reflect differences in taxes, import prices, transportation and other costs. Also the competitive conditions on the retail markets in the relevant countries are important. Accordingly, lack of competition at the retail level, high import prices and high duties on wine all contribute to increase wine prices. Next, consumer prices on wine are expected to be relatively lowest in the producer country and even lower on the local markets in the producing region. The Nordic countries are located far away from California and they all tax wine higher than the State of California. Some, e.g. Finland, Norway and Sweden, have state monopoly in the retail trade of wine and spirits whereas the sales system for wine in Denmark is more in line with the Californian system. Based on price information at the retail level, the paper analyses the logic of the relative prices on identical Californian wine bought in California compared to Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden.Wine prices; Californian wines; wine taxes

Short-run and long-run relationships in the consumption of alcohol in the Scandinavian countries

Traditionally, the Scandinavian countries have been characterized as spirits and beer consuming countries and a century ago the historical background was decades of relatively heavy drinking behaviour with spirit as the preferred beverage. Therefore, it might be expected that alcohol consumption – especially in the last part of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century – would behave in a counter-cyclical manner, i.e. heavy drinking during severe recessions characterized by harsh economic conditions. Using long-run time series data for alcohol consumption levels in the Scandinavian countries the question of a counter-cyclical or pro-cyclical behaviour is addressed – with the business cycle measured as the GDP – and the empirical findings are that generally, alcohol consumption behaves in a pro-cyclical manner in the short run, and with no long-run relationship concerning real income.Alcohol consumption; Business cycles; Scandinavia

Explaining champagne prices in Scandinavia - what is the best predictor?

This paper analyses the retail prices of champagnes sold in the Scandinavian countries. Price data for the champagnes contain nearly 380 observations including a range of quality attributes of each champagne. The empirical part of the analysis reveals that the retail prices of champagne can be fairly well explained by a hedonic price function with a degree of explanation corresponding to approximately 60 per cent. However the ratings by the wine experts, in this case Robert Parker, Wine Spectator and to a lesser extent the French ‘1855 Notation’, do just as well in terms of explaining the retail prices of champagnes. Especially the rating of champagnes by Robert Parker seems to be the most influential concerning the sales prices.Champagne; prices; hedonic price function; Scandinavia

An empirical analysis of the effect of labour market characteristics on marital dissolution rates

The development in the 1960s of the divorce rate is strikingly similar for the USA and Denmark where the rate in both cases increases very fast from 1967-68 until the mid 1970s. Using time series data for the USA and Denmark the relationship between the divorce rate and genderspecific labor market characteristics is analysed by using Granger causality tests and by estimating VAR-models including impulse response functions. Historically, the female labor force participation rate increases before the structural shift in the divorce rate and for both the analyzed countries the analysis suggests that the female labor force participation rate has some influence on the divorce rate.Divorce rates; Female labor force participation rates; VAR-model; Impulse response functions

Wine production in Denmark Do the characteristics of the vineyards affect the chances for awards?

By the end of the former century there were less than 10 commercial vintners producing wine in Denmark. There was widespread acceptance of the view that commercial production of wine in the most northern parts of Europe was impossible. However, the number of commercial wine growers in Denmark grew to more tha 60 at the end of 2009 and the Association of Danish Winegrowers now counts more than 1400 members. Denmark can no longer be seen as a non-wine producing country! Formally, the transformation of Denmark to a wine producing country took place in year 2000 when Denmark was accepted as a commercial wine producing nation within the European Union. Based on a remarkably detailed micro data set this paper first gives a description of wine production in Denmark and thereafter we address the question whether vineyard characteristics are important for the quality of the wine and/or whether individual characteristics of the wine grower are important. Using a hedonic model the focus is especially on the importance of general factors like the type of soil, slope, geography, grape variety etc. in relation to the awards obtained by the respective vineyards.No; keywords

Alcohol consumption and liver cirrhosis mortality: New evidence from a panel data analysis for sixteen European countries

Empirical evidence gives strong support to a close association between liver cirrhosis mortality and the intake of alcohol and most often a log-linear relationship is assumed in the econometric modeling. The present analysis investigates for unit roots in a panel data set for sixteen European countries – covering the period 1970-2006 - where both alcohol consumption and liver cirrhosis seem best described as trend-stationary variables. Therefore a fixed effects model including individual trends is applied in the analysis but also a more flexible non-linear functional form with fewer restrictions on the relationship between liver cirrhosis mortality and alcohol consumption is included. The conclusion is that the total level of alcohol consumption as well as the specific beverages – beer, wine and spirits – contributes to liver cirrhosis mortality, but the present study also reveals that directly addressing the question of panel unit roots and in this case subsequently applying a trend-stationary modeling methodology reduces the estimates of the impacts from alcohol consumption to liver cirrhosis. Finally, more restrictive alcohol policies seem to have positively influenced the country-specific development in cirrhosis mortality.Alcohol consumption; Liver cirrhosis mortality; Trend-stationary panel data; Non-linear modelling

What Drives the Demand for Temporary Agency Workers?

Temporary agency employment has grown steadily in most European countries over the past three decades as part of the general trend towards increased employment flexibility. Yet to this day, it remains an open question what drives the demand for temporary agency workers. The paper examines, first, whether the deregulation of temporary agency employment is responsible for the growth of the flexible staffing industry. Second, we investigate the cyclical behavior of temporary agency employment. Using monthly data for Germany covering the period 1973-2008, we show that the continuous liberalization of this sector is not responsible for the surge in temporary agency employment. Our analysis reveals, moreover, that temporary agency employment exhibits strong cyclical behavior and correlates with main economic indicators in real time. Since most European countries promoted the use of temporary agency employment in a similar way, we believe that our results may be interesting from an international perspective as well.business cycle, labor law, temporary agency employment, regulation

The Growth Opportunities for SMEs?

The extensive empirical literature on the validity of Gibrat’s law does not in general verify the law as it finds that firms’ growth rates are negatively correlated with both firm size and age. However, some studies find that Gibrat’s law holds for sub-samples of firms such as large firms or firms belonging to special industries. It has been pointed out that these results are due to the fact that the likelihood of firm survival for natural reasons is positively related to firm size and age. This study uses a relatively large and representative sample of Danish firms to evaluate the validity of Gibrat’s law for different kinds of firms over the period 1990 - 2003. In contrast to the majority of earlier studies our analysis corrects for the bias in the estimations by using variables related to the survival of small firms.Market Structure; Firm Strategy; Market Performance;

Prices of French Icon Wines and the Business Cycle: Empirical Evidence from Danish Wine Auctions

During the last decades auctions of selected wines have regularly taken place in Denmark. Therefore, by now, a considerable amount of data exists for auction wine prices, i.e. both the assessed wine prices of the auctioneer and the eventual price at which the wines are sold. From these data the prices of the most famous French icon wines (Premier Cru Classé) are extracted and a coherent time series data set is constructed. As the auctions have taken place several times each year, the data are analysed at a quarterly frequency. Having obtained the time series data for the price development of icon wines, these are expected to be influenced by a lot of factors, of course, but the income development as reflected in the business cycle fluctuations is considered to be of utmost importance. The wine auction prices are obviously exogenous to the business cycle, and thus eventual questions of causality are easier tested than usually done with many economic variables. Hence, the empirical part of the paper analyses the co-movements in the wine prices and the business cycle, the latter represented by several indicators in order to address the question of whether the wine auctions are affected by the general economic development or not. The major conclusions seem to be that the auctioneers valuation of icon wines may follow the international prices of these goods - and the prices of substitutes as represented by the stock market index - but in contrast to this, in recent years the actual hammer prices are stagnating and deviating from the path of the wine price valuations.Wine auction prices, French icon wines, Business cycles