Template-type: ReDIF-Paper 1.0
Author-Name: Robin Winkler
Author-Workplace-Name: Balliol College, University of Oxford
Author-Email:robin.winkler@balliol.ox.ac.uk
Title: Did Nazis save more? Household saving an ideology in pre-war National Socialist Germany
Abstract: It is commonly thought that the rapid increase in household saving during the early
years of National Socialism was partly driven by ideological factors. On this view, the
popularity of the regime allowed it to exert ‘moral suasion’ on households to save
more than they might have done in the absence of such indoctrination. This paper
employs the previously unpublished raw data from a household budget survey
conducted in 1937 to identify ideological heterogeneity at the household level.
Assuming that households’ responsiveness to the regime’s saving propaganda was a
function of their exogenous ideological commitment to National Socialism, the paper
tests the hypothesis that Nazi households saved more than others. The new evidence
presented here does not confirm this hypothesis.
Classification-JEL: N14, D12
Keywords: German economic history, National Socialism, household saving
Length: 41 pages
Creation-Date: 2013-09-13
Number: _119
File-URL: http://www.economics.ox.ac.uk/materials/papers/12887/Finkler%20119.pdf

File-Format: application/pdf
Handle: RePEc:nuf:esohwp:_119