Mark Schelker

Professor of Economics, University of Fribourg, Switzerland

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

Most of the economic claims in these videos are either not supported by the federal government's own analyses (!) or grossly misinterpreted. I don't recall seeing this much spin and misrepresentation by our government. Why so much spin? Our analysis here: https://t.co/TvODhwwhN5

[Swiss Federal Government @SwissGov]

What would happen if Switzerland couldn’t participate in the EU single market?

The #SwissEUpackage guarantees this access, providing several benefits for both economies. 🇨🇭🤝🇪🇺

Learn more here: https://t.co/bMyi0VmDxa

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

We have an opening for a PhD position in economics at my Chair. Our research & teaching focus on public economics in its broadest sense. Good language skills in French are required for this position. Further information in the link below:
https://t.co/12G4lH4bRu

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

@bswud If it is of interest, here's the link to the research paper (accepted at Journal of Law and Economics): https://t.co/VLxkW43U9j

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

Heute hat die @NZZ unseren Gastbeitrag abgedruckt.
Das wissenschaftliche Papier dazu folgt bald im Journal of Law and Economics.
(3/3)
https://t.co/Q20G8fWB8P

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

Alle sind gegen Regulierung. Und dennoch beklagen viele die «Regulierungsflut». Natürlich reagiert die Politik auf die Nachfrage der Spezialinteressen. Darum nützt die Symptombekämpfung wenig.
(1/3)

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

Simon Lüchinger und ich haben uns den Effekt der Abschaffung des obligatorischen Gesetzesreferendums in den Kantonen angeschaut. Ohne das potenzielle Veto der Wählerschaft steigt die Regulierungsaktivität um fast 50 Prozent.
(2/3)

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

@DinaPomeranz @retolipp Genau! Und gleichzeitig ist das Phänomen nicht unabhängig von pol. Entscheidungen. Drum ja, nicht Teilzeit kritisieren. (!), sondern Ursachen besprechen.

[Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics (SSES) @swisseconomists]

📢 The full programme of the SSES Annual Congress 2026 #sses2026 at @HSGStGallen is now online: https://t.co/XU9P9L8bBX
1/

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

@SRamirez68083 field research for his new book „why nations jail“?

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

@DaraPelz @FelixSchneuwly Genau das ist die Berechnung der bundeseigenen Studie von Ecoplan auf deren Resultate ich mich eins-zu-eins beziehe.

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

Wir haben uns die Studien des Bundes zu den volkswirtschaftlichen Auswirkungen der Bilateralen angeschaut und kommen zu sehr unterschiedlichen Schlüssen. Wie der BR zu seiner Interpretation gelangt, ist uns ein Rätsel…
(mit Michael Funk & Swiss Economics)
https://t.co/dlX3cPZzaN

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

@retolipp Es ist wie wenn man sich jedes Mal wieder wundert, dass man bei Regen nass wird…
Die Wirkmechanismen sind längst geklärt, doch politisch wird munter weiterdiskutiert. Die exakt gleichen politischen Diskussionen immer wieder…

https://t.co/VEQjMLSOHs

[Jesús Fernández-Villaverde @JesusFerna7026]

As reflected in many of my posts over the past few months, I have been reading (and re-reading) a lot of social theory.

What strikes me is that most critics of “capitalism” (whatever “capitalism” might mean, and regardless of the value of those critiques) are really critics of modernity, understood as the organization of society around technology, formal institutions, and rational criteria.

I teach the economic history of the Soviet Union and socialist China, and all the pathologies (pollution, reliance on fossil fuels, inequality, depersonalization, consumerism, alienation, you name it) that you can find in a poor neighborhood of 2026 Philadelphia appeared in the same way, or even more, in a factory in Leningrad in 1970 or on a collective farm in Jiangsu in 1978.

Critics seem to lack a vocabulary (or, if you prefer, a cognitive framework) for distinguishing “capitalism” from modernity. For example, people everywhere tend to link personal relationships to displays of consumption. There are likely deep evolutionary reasons for this. De Beers did not invent spending a lot of money on a useless engagement ring: it rode a pre-existing disposition into a particular form of consumption. Couples in Leipzig in 1982 were as interested in conspicuous consumption as those in Chicago in 2026. Talking about “Love and the Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism” misses the point completely.

Of course, you can try, as some of the more perceptive Trotskyists did, to argue that the Soviet Union or China were not truly socialist countries, but this is just a lazy application of the “no true Scotsman” fallacy, and, consequently, their complaints failed to gain much traction outside some departments of cultural studies.

But this is not just a matter of poor analytic skills, as bad as those are. More importantly, it means that 99% of the policy proposals activists put on the table to correct the problems of “capitalism” are doomed to fail because they do not understand where the root cause of the phenomena they complain about lies.

I see this at the university. Do you think the corporation you deal with is self-serving and incompetent? Wait until you need to deal with the Graduate School at a private Ivy League university. The incentive problems (asymmetric information, career concerns, lack of timely feedback, pressure toward conformity) that cause dysfunction in the former are even more pronounced in the latter because of the absence of a profit motive, the sharpest disciplinary mechanism.

At a very fundamental level, Marx got modernity wrong; Weber got it right. Time to spend much less time with Marx and much, much more time with Weber.

[Luis Garicano 🇪🇺🇺🇦 @lugaricano]

The interview of @robin_j_brooks by @paulkrugman is outstanding. He puts to very good use all we (particularly he!) learned from Russian sanctions to try to understand the Hormuz shock. I post two key answers:
- Price may not have a lot more to increase: 3x quantity shock, 3x price shock. Fits also with elasticities. So we are (pricewise) done, in his view.
- US should announce a hard oil embargo on Iran. Only way to conclude this.
More in his note and in Paul Krugman's interview
https://t.co/KKEUnb731f
https://t.co/1biOduXvUi

[michael❌perricone @miperrico]

@PeterGehler @autonomiesuisse @feusl @nebelspalter @SchelkerMark Pardon. Dies Basis dieser Studie und Schelkers Zahlen sind nicht „Annahmen“, sondern die „offizielle“ Studie, welche der Bund in Auftrag gab und auf welche sich der Bund bei seiner Argumentation zu Bil III immer wieder bezieht. Schelker plädiert auch nicht für Abschottung.

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

@miperrico @PeterGehler @autonomiesuisse @feusl @nebelspalter Genau. Danke!

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

Interessantes und differenziertes Interview mit Tobias Straumann. Bitte nicht am Introsatz der NZZ hängenbleiben und schon denken, zu wissen, was kommt. https://t.co/Xk6whmaF6P

[Luis Garicano 🇪🇺🇺🇦 @lugaricano]

Truly an outstanding speech and a way forward for "middle powers" including European ones.

[Luis Garicano 🇪🇺🇺🇦 @lugaricano]

We cannot continue to play "cooperate " with a player that has chosen to defect. The strong must suffer, too. Our reaction to Greenland. https://t.co/5uHsFLOHWh

[Mark Schelker @SchelkerMark]

It’s not too late yet...! Don‘t forget to submit your paper to the 2026 Annual Congress of the Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics (SSES) by January 20! https://t.co/v893B6LULk

[Stefan Buehler @Ste_Buehler]

Don‘t forget to submit your paper to the 2026 Annual Congress of the Swiss Society of Economics and Statistics (SSES) by January 20!

https://t.co/6loLGX5oM7