Aufsätze (Articles)

Sibylle Lehmann-Hasemeyer/Andreas Neumayer
Does the preference for investment in local firms rise in turbulent times? Evidence from the portfolio of Joseph Frisch, private banker (1923–55) 1
Using a unique historical source, we show that the bias towards local investments can – to a large extent – be explained by overall economic circumstances, the general performance of the market and the level of activity of the investor. We examine portfolio choices Stuttgart private banker Joseph Frisch made throughout his life and find that the preference for local shares was highest in times of insecurity, low returns and reduced investment activity. With higher returns, a stable and growing economy and more experience, the preference for local shares decreased.

Louis Pahlow
«Vorzeigeunternehmen» in der Wirtschaftspolitik 19
The «Carl-Zeiss-Foundation» had a significant influence on the development of the law of business foundations in the Federal Republic of Germany after 1945. Founded by Ernst Abbe in 1889, the Foundation was created to manage two firms driven by a statute in a self-regulated governance exclusively. After World War II such kind of business foundations became part of the German corporated landscape, especially after the 1960s. Critizised by a leading group of ordoliberal lawyers and also in the focus of the legislator, the «Carl-Zeiss-Foundation» was seen as a successful «model-firm», which immunized the law of business foundations against further regulations. The article describes the significant influences of this «model-firm» in the making of policies and the non-making of legal rules.

Sebastian Knake
«Moderne Vertriebswege» 49
Research on performance-related compensations of financial advisors has recently become a promising field within economics and sociology, because it can help explain portfolio choices of retail customers. However, the expansion of this field to historical contexts has so far been prevented by the lack of knowledge about the historical development of these schemes. The following article aims to fill this void by exploring the spread of performance-related compensation schemes among banks and insurance companies in West Germany in the 1970s and 1980s. It is argued that this spread has been closely linked to a reform of the Federal Government system of savings subsidies in 1970. This reform led to a fierce competition between insurance companies and banks for wealth formation savings payments (vermögenswirksame Leistungen). In this article, it is argued that the characteristics of this particular state-subsidized market led to a significant advantage of financial institutions that used performance-related compensation schemes over those who did not. Thus, the latter institutions had to adopt these schemes to stay competitive. In the 1980s, banks as well as insurance companies expanded the application of compensation schemes that were originally designed for the market of wealth formation savings payments to other markets for financial products and services. Thus, the principles of competition on wealth formation savings payments were adopted to the general market for household savings.

Tobias A. Jopp
Kapazitätsauslastung, Skaleneffizienz oder technischer Fortschritt? 83
Capacity utilization, scale efficiency or technical change? Which factors determined total factor productivity of the large corporations in Ruhr coal mining in the interwar period (1919–1938)? Business and economic historians in Germany still face quite substantial informational gaps when it comes to assessing firms’ historical performance. While the use of indicators derived from external accounting or the capital market is common, indicators relating more closely to the sphere of production are often neglected, not the least because of data insufficiencies or the effort involved in collecting suitable data. For 15 mining corporations that can be associated with the 100 largest corporations in Germany as of 1938 according to Fiedler (1999), this article documents and interprets estimates of firm-specific total factor productivity and its components for the interwar period.

Rezensionen (Reviews)

Dorothea Schmidt
Johannes Bähr, Werner von Siemens 1816–1892. Eine Biografie
119

Sina Bohnen
Beatrice Morning/Richard Wall, Widows in European Economy and Society 1600–1920
121

Uwe Fliegauf
Wolfram Pyta/Nils Havemann/Jutta Braun, Porsche. Vom Konstruktionsbüro zur Weltmarke
123

André Steiner
Annika Biss, Die Internationalisierung der Bayerischen Motoren Werke AG: Vom reinen Exportgeschäft zur Gründung eigener Tochtergesellschaften im Ausland 1945–1981 (Perspektiven: Schriftenreihe des BMW Group Archivs, Band 6)
125

Mark Jakob
Ute Engelen/Michael Matheus (Hrsg.), Regionale Produzenten oder Global Player? Zur Internationalisierung der Wirtschaft im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert (Geschichtliche Landeskunde Bd. 74).
126

Dirk Wiegand
Günther Luxbacher, DIN von 1917 bis 2017. Normung zwischen Konsens und Konkurrenz im Interesse der technisch-wirtschaftlichen Entwicklung
128

Christian Kleinschmidt
Karl Lauschke, Widerstand lohnt sich! Die Geschichte der Bremer Hütte – oder: Wieso wird heute noch Stahl in Bremen produziert?
130

Eckhard Freyer
Verena Rothenbühler/Mario König/Adrian Knoepfli/Markus Brühlmeier/Rea Brändle, Wissen im Zentrum. 100 Jahre Zentralbibliothek Zürich
132

Arno Leonhardt
Malte Stöcken, Dokumentation der Chemie in Krieg und Frieden. Maximilian Pflücke, Erich Pietsch und die Deutsche Chemische Gesellschaft von den 1920er bis in die 1970er Jahre (Bochumer Studien zur Technik- und Umweltgeschichte)
134

Timo Leimbach
Jeffrey R. Yost, Making IT Work. A History of the Computer Services Industry
135

Jonathan Voges
Uwe Spiekermann, Künstliche Kost. Ernährung in Deutschland, 1840 bis heute (Umwelt und Gesellschaft 17)
138

Jan Logemann
Kevin Rick, Verbraucherpolitik in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland. Eine Geschichte des westdeutschen Konsumtionsregimes, 1945–1975 (Wirtschaftsund Sozialgeschichte des modernen Europa Bd. 5)
140

Boris Gehlen
Werner Abelshauser/Stefan Fisch/Dierk Hoffmann/Carl-Ludwig Holtfrerich/ Albrecht Ritschl (Hrsg.), Wirtschaftspolitik in Deutschland 1917–1990
142

Uwe Fliegauf
Matthias Georgi, Voith. 150 Jahre deutsche Wirtschaftsgeschichte
146

Alexander Donges
Christian Böse, Kartellpolitik im Kaiserreich. Das Kohlensyndikat und die Absatzorganisation im Ruhrbergbau 1893–1919 (Jahrbuch für Wirtschaftsgeschichte. Beihefte 21)
148

Christian Marx
Christian Kleinschmidt/Dieter Ziegler (Hrsg.), Dekolonisierungsgewinner, Deutsche Außenpolitik und Außenwirtschaftsbeziehungen im Zeitalter des Kalten Krieges
150

Werner Bührer
Nina Verheyen, Die Erfindung der Leistung
152

Mitteilungen (Announcements)
Preis für Unternehmensgeschichte
155