Essays on Systems Competition with Human Capital Mobility

Acknowledgements It is a pleasure to thank those people whose support has been of such great value for me during the past four years. First of all I would like to thank my scientific advisors, Professor Bernd Genser (University of Konstanz) and Professor Wolf-gang Eggert (University of Freiburg), for untiringly promoting my research and supporting me in so many ways. I always enjoyed the great working atmosphere at Professor Genser's Chair of Public Economics at the University of Konstanz. I am also indebted to many colleagues who enriched my work and who were always extremely helpful. My special thanks go to PD Dr. (University of Rostock) kindly accepted to serve as a reviewer of my thesis. Furthermore I would like to thank Hildegard Arnold and Meinhard Knoche who provided a lot of support at the Ifo Institute and Gundula Hadjiani (University of Konstanz) as well as Ulrike Budel (Ifo Institute) who helped me with many administrative affairs. Financial support for my research from the German Research Foundation DFG, Fritz Thyssen Foundation and The German Academic Exchange Service DAAD is gratefully acknowledged. Springer Science and Business Media kindly gave permission for the use of copyright material (Chapter 3). Last but not least, I owe deepest gratitude to my parents and Susan, who were backing me all the way.